I read an interesting article in the Washington Post the other day. It was about how to raise kids--specifically, should you or should you not tell your kids about your past indiscretions? There’s no scientific evidence saying that it helps or hurts your chances of having an idiot teenager. Sometimes it works to use your past as a cautionary tale, but then there are apparently instances of teenagers yelling retorts of “Oh you’re one to talk smokedog!” This reminded me of that HILARIOUS (unintentionally, of course) public service announcement from the 80s where the kid yells, “I learned it from yooouuuu!” Found it!
Wow. I totally forgot they say “Parents who use drugs have children who use drugs.” Well that’s ominous.
Anyhoo, this got me thinking. If I knew more about my parents, would it have made me behave better as a teenager? Then I remembered that this is a pointless question, because my mother was a perfect angel growing up. She didn’t drink till she was 21, she “puffed on a cigarette once but didn’t inhale,” and she also...wait for it....never smoked a “marijuana cigarette.” She actually called it that.
Of course then there’s my dad, but good luck getting any info from him. Although my siblings and I joke that he was born wearing a suit and tie, I still suspect he did some crazy stuff as a kid. I had to get it from somewhere, right? So if he had opened up, would it have stopped me from getting drunk at 13? I sort of doubt it.
Then again, if my sister had told me not to drink, I probably would have listened. She is responsible for my clean lungs after all. After she started smoking in high school and quickly became addicted (she's since quit! Holla!), she begged me not to try it until I was older. Apparently if you smoke for the first time after age 18, you're less likely to become addicted. So I listened. I didn’t smoke my first cigarette until I was living in Spain at age 20, and thank goodness I listened to my sister because MAN did I like it. Of course when you wake up the next day with no voice and a pounding headache, you can thank your pack of ciggies. Someone should have told my sister the old Spiderman line though--with great power comes great responsibility--because she also wielded her power over me for entertainment purposes. She was, after all, responsible for that drink at 13. Little did she know that I'd been sampling from the liquor cabinet since 12.
Luckily for my kids, I have a real cautionary tale, and it has nothing to do with how early I started hitting the bottle. It’s a little lesson called Why Drinking Games Are Bad. It is similar to another lesson, How Binge Drinking Can Kick Your Ass. Starting at age 21, when I was a senior in college, I started getting these wicked hangovers. They are the stuff of legends really. I can never tell when it will happen, because I can drink a lot and feel fine, or I can have a few drinks and end up hating life. I can drink only wine and feel horrible, or I can savor the holy trinity (which, children, means wine, beer AND liquor) and get up at 6 the next morning to go for a jog.
This past weekend I think (hope and pray) I may have experienced my last illustrious hangover. It all started with a game of beer pong with Scooby and some friends. I played a couple of games and actually did quite well, but stumbling home, I worried I might have overdone it. I even got the hiccups, which is a sure sign of trouble.
The next morning I woke up at 7 a.m. And that’s when the puking started, which didn’t end until 6 p.m. I literally couldn’t hold down a sip of water or a single chewable Pepto Bismol tablet. I couldn’t roll over in bed, I couldn’t turn my head, I couldn’t stand up or sit down without needing to run to the bathroom to throw up. As if that wasn’t torture enough, there also wasn’t much on television, so I was subjected to a day of She’s All That, Because I Said So and Ocean’s Eleven, which I have seen 500 times.
I was luckily able to eat dinner (and breakfast and lunch) finally at 11 p.m. but I was thrown off for two days, feeling sort of lethargic, ill and depressed. I have decided to take an extended hiatus from alcohol. Clearly my body doesn't like it, so I feel like I should listed for once. The plus side is that I now have my cautionary tale. But is it wise to admit to your children that you played drinking games? What if they wonder what beer pong is, and you suddenly find yourself teaching them the rules along with all the important strategies to ensure victory?
It's a scary thought. I could end up on my very own PSA, walking in on a game of quarters to: “I learned it from YOUUUUUUU!”
Wednesday, May 7, 2008
Sunday, April 27, 2008
Fear of Flying
For reasons I may never understand, I am completely terrified of flying. I do it a lot, out of necessity, but every time I reach my cramped little seat and click shut my seat belt, the hyper-ventilating begins. I'm usually fine after the takeoff, but the moments between entering the plane and having the seat belt sign switch off are excruciating.
This last time I flew home, it was especially difficult. It all started at the gate. As soon as the gate agent said that we would be boarding in about 10 minutes, I had a strange sensation--it was as if a herd of buffalo had just sprinted past me. I put down my New Yorker and glanced around me to find that all of the people who had been sitting and waiting had suddenly opted to stand in a clump encircling the path to the gate.
"Sucks to be a Type A," I thought to myself and got back to my magazine. I was in boarding group 2, yet when I got on the plane I noticed that there was hardly any overhead bin space left. I managed to finagle a little area where I could stow my suitcase (which is long, so I had to put it sideways--oops!) and then sat down.
Now I know a lot of people like to stare at the oncoming passengers to do a bit of racial profiling and play Spot the Terrorist, but I'm less interested in race than other potentially dangerous traits. I prefer, instead, to do personality profiling. If the people who board the plane seem nice, friendly and orderly, I feel safer somehow. "God's not going to strike us down with all these pleasant people," I think to myself. Extra points if I end up on a flight with a nun or two.
But if the passengers seem easily riled and irritable, then my palms start to sweat. "We're goners," I'll say between desperate prayers. In this case, the lack of overhead bin space didn't bode well for my personality profiling.
One man took it upon himself to unload the entire bin above my head so that he could rearrange the items and potentially create more space. Unfortunately he was being a little rough with the bags. He started throwing them down violently on the seat beside me. Then the man sitting in front of me came running.
"Hey! Hey! Give me that! What are you doing?" the man in front of me yelled. "That has my computer in it."
"I'm sorry," the well-intentioned do-gooder replied (somewhat sarcastically). "If you don't mind, I was just trying to..."
"I do mind!" The man replied turning redder and redder. And then he needlessly repeated himself. "I DO mind!"
"Okay, well I was thinking if you could fit it under the seat in front..."
"Well I can't, and you can't just throw bags around like that."
This went on for quite some time, and even though it was somewhat train-wreckish, I couldn't watch. It was too embarrassing. I turned red in honor of all those involved.
The irked passenger sat back down, while the man next to me continued to (more delicately) rearrange bags. A couple minutes later, as the man was still at it, the angry passenger stood back up, went up to the man and said, "well maybe I can fit the bag under the seat in front of me." It was his way of saying I'm sorry without having to apologize. Or maybe it was his way of telling all the people around him who had seen the chaos: "I'm not usually an asshole but flying brings out the worst in me!"
Maybe this simple non-apology afforded us safe passage, because we didn't crash.
On the way back to California, I had another interesting experience. When I got to my window seat, there were two men who were flying together sitting in the middle and aisle seats. As soon as I sat down and clicked the seatbelt shut, ready to do a little personality profiling, the man in the aisle (who didn't speak much English) gestured to a man sitting in front of us. He indicated that the man was his friend, and would I mind switching with him? The problem, of course, was that the man was in the middle seat.
Would I be willing to switch my window for a middle? You know, a couple of years ago I probably would have said yes. But I'm less of a pushover these days.
"Sorry," I said shaking my head. "I got a window seat so I could sleep," I said gesturing with my hands next to my head to indicate nap time. The man in the middle and the man in front of us clearly didn't catch what I had said so the man in the aisle loudly translated in Mandarin how the bitch in the window seat wasn't willing to swap seats because she's a lazy nap-taker.
I imagined that the man in the middle responded: "Oh great. We're sharing a row with an evil, slovenly lint-licker. Now we're going to crash for sure!"
This last time I flew home, it was especially difficult. It all started at the gate. As soon as the gate agent said that we would be boarding in about 10 minutes, I had a strange sensation--it was as if a herd of buffalo had just sprinted past me. I put down my New Yorker and glanced around me to find that all of the people who had been sitting and waiting had suddenly opted to stand in a clump encircling the path to the gate.
"Sucks to be a Type A," I thought to myself and got back to my magazine. I was in boarding group 2, yet when I got on the plane I noticed that there was hardly any overhead bin space left. I managed to finagle a little area where I could stow my suitcase (which is long, so I had to put it sideways--oops!) and then sat down.
Now I know a lot of people like to stare at the oncoming passengers to do a bit of racial profiling and play Spot the Terrorist, but I'm less interested in race than other potentially dangerous traits. I prefer, instead, to do personality profiling. If the people who board the plane seem nice, friendly and orderly, I feel safer somehow. "God's not going to strike us down with all these pleasant people," I think to myself. Extra points if I end up on a flight with a nun or two.
But if the passengers seem easily riled and irritable, then my palms start to sweat. "We're goners," I'll say between desperate prayers. In this case, the lack of overhead bin space didn't bode well for my personality profiling.
One man took it upon himself to unload the entire bin above my head so that he could rearrange the items and potentially create more space. Unfortunately he was being a little rough with the bags. He started throwing them down violently on the seat beside me. Then the man sitting in front of me came running.
"Hey! Hey! Give me that! What are you doing?" the man in front of me yelled. "That has my computer in it."
"I'm sorry," the well-intentioned do-gooder replied (somewhat sarcastically). "If you don't mind, I was just trying to..."
"I do mind!" The man replied turning redder and redder. And then he needlessly repeated himself. "I DO mind!"
"Okay, well I was thinking if you could fit it under the seat in front..."
"Well I can't, and you can't just throw bags around like that."
This went on for quite some time, and even though it was somewhat train-wreckish, I couldn't watch. It was too embarrassing. I turned red in honor of all those involved.
The irked passenger sat back down, while the man next to me continued to (more delicately) rearrange bags. A couple minutes later, as the man was still at it, the angry passenger stood back up, went up to the man and said, "well maybe I can fit the bag under the seat in front of me." It was his way of saying I'm sorry without having to apologize. Or maybe it was his way of telling all the people around him who had seen the chaos: "I'm not usually an asshole but flying brings out the worst in me!"
Maybe this simple non-apology afforded us safe passage, because we didn't crash.
On the way back to California, I had another interesting experience. When I got to my window seat, there were two men who were flying together sitting in the middle and aisle seats. As soon as I sat down and clicked the seatbelt shut, ready to do a little personality profiling, the man in the aisle (who didn't speak much English) gestured to a man sitting in front of us. He indicated that the man was his friend, and would I mind switching with him? The problem, of course, was that the man was in the middle seat.
Would I be willing to switch my window for a middle? You know, a couple of years ago I probably would have said yes. But I'm less of a pushover these days.
"Sorry," I said shaking my head. "I got a window seat so I could sleep," I said gesturing with my hands next to my head to indicate nap time. The man in the middle and the man in front of us clearly didn't catch what I had said so the man in the aisle loudly translated in Mandarin how the bitch in the window seat wasn't willing to swap seats because she's a lazy nap-taker.
I imagined that the man in the middle responded: "Oh great. We're sharing a row with an evil, slovenly lint-licker. Now we're going to crash for sure!"
#1 reason to not start a blog
The guilt factor of not updating your blog is only compounded by the reminder from friends and family that you're a lazy sack of schmoopaloop (which is a bad thing). There is really only one person who notices when I fall behind on blog postings, and that's my brother. His name is Ruben--you know, like the sandwich. Actually it's not, but that's what I call him when he annoys me.
This is an IM message Ruben left me:
throw me a bone, I mean even a 1 paragraph blog to tide me over would be better than seeing the best infomercial ever blog!!! Help a brother out
The brother double-meaning almost made it endearing. Almost.
This is an IM message Ruben left me:
throw me a bone, I mean even a 1 paragraph blog to tide me over would be better than seeing the best infomercial ever blog!!! Help a brother out
The brother double-meaning almost made it endearing. Almost.
Tuesday, April 22, 2008
Jump on it
So back when I worked for the Corporation That Shall Not Be Named, I had to find entertainment in the most mundane events in order to keep my sanity. That included, but was not limited to, my Mormon cube neighbor singing "talk to me boy" from Justin Timberlake's Rock Your Body in a perfect falsetto, free fruit snacks at 3 p.m. every day and flirtatious emails with a strangely attractive yet still undeniably ugly coworker. Without these little funsies, I would have time to realize that I worked 12 hour days for $27,000 a year, and then I would sink into a deep depression.
During this dark period, I received a forward from my hilarious Icelandic coworker Eva. I'm sure the email said something like, "if this doesn't get you through the day, I don't know what will." And when I clicked on the attachment, a video popped up showing what you would see on the jumbotron during the halftime show of a basketball game. There's music playing (Jump On It) and random people shaking their groove thangs. Little kids bashing together thunder sticks. And then the camera pans to a gray-haired guy who looks perfectly normal....but wait....what's he doing? He's dancing LIKE A MANIAC.
I can't put it into words. You really just have to watch it. And the other day, I really HAD to watch it because I was feeling a little down and a little under the weather. Yet after searching high and low I couldn't find the email that contained the URL. So I emailed Johanna, because I knew she had it saved somewhere in case of emergency. I think my desperation is palpable in the email I sent her:
Do you still have the URL for that video of the guy dancing to "jump on it" during the halftime show...?
I took dayquil and I feel really funny right now. That has nothing to do with wanting to see the video though.
And her response:
if you go to youtube, type in gay halftime basketball (i kid you not) and you can find it.
Of course when I went to YouTube and typed in those words, I was confronted with a bunch of videos, but none of them were The video. The search continued. But after a well-spent 30 minutes of googling, I found him.
And here he is! Love of my life! A couple things to note: is he wearing a t-shirt with the silhouette of a naked women? Like you might see on the mud flap of an 18-wheeler? Also look out for the funky moves in which he uses the bottom of his shirt as a prop.
During this dark period, I received a forward from my hilarious Icelandic coworker Eva. I'm sure the email said something like, "if this doesn't get you through the day, I don't know what will." And when I clicked on the attachment, a video popped up showing what you would see on the jumbotron during the halftime show of a basketball game. There's music playing (Jump On It) and random people shaking their groove thangs. Little kids bashing together thunder sticks. And then the camera pans to a gray-haired guy who looks perfectly normal....but wait....what's he doing? He's dancing LIKE A MANIAC.
I can't put it into words. You really just have to watch it. And the other day, I really HAD to watch it because I was feeling a little down and a little under the weather. Yet after searching high and low I couldn't find the email that contained the URL. So I emailed Johanna, because I knew she had it saved somewhere in case of emergency. I think my desperation is palpable in the email I sent her:
Do you still have the URL for that video of the guy dancing to "jump on it" during the halftime show...?
I took dayquil and I feel really funny right now. That has nothing to do with wanting to see the video though.
And her response:
if you go to youtube, type in gay halftime basketball (i kid you not) and you can find it.
Of course when I went to YouTube and typed in those words, I was confronted with a bunch of videos, but none of them were The video. The search continued. But after a well-spent 30 minutes of googling, I found him.
And here he is! Love of my life! A couple things to note: is he wearing a t-shirt with the silhouette of a naked women? Like you might see on the mud flap of an 18-wheeler? Also look out for the funky moves in which he uses the bottom of his shirt as a prop.
Monday, March 31, 2008
Best. Infomercial. Ever.
Now I'm not proud to admit the fact that I was watching the Oxygen network over the weekend, but I have an explanation! I needed a break from cleaning and Pride and Prejudice was on, which totally sucked me in, because, well who can say no to Mr. Darcy? Am I right?
Anyway, it turned out to be far more entertaining than I could have imagined, due to the fact that the commercials on Oxygen are a hilarious mess of low-budget film making. Among the (expected) slew of Massengil, FDS and tampon advertisements, there was an endless string of ridiculous infomercials. One had a particularly special effect on me, so much so, that I had to rewind my DVR and actually watch the ad for a second time. For your viewing pleasure:
First of all, I think one reason I fell in love with the Listen Up commercial was that my dad listens to the television so loudly, that the entire house shakes whenever the Law & Order dum-dum sounds, so it kind of gave me the warm and fuzzies.
But I also love the fact that the wife in the commercial is such a nagging bitch. She seems so disgusted with her husband's hearing problem; and the hokey look he shoots her as he shakes his head and turns down the volume on his stereo merits extra points for its high Unintentional Funny Factor.
The best part of the ad however comes in when the sinister applications of the product come to light. BUT WAIT! THERE'S MORE! You can spy on your neighbors, and they will assume you're merely listening to your iPod. But I fear the Listen Up's cleverness is also its undoing. After all, how many elderly people do you know walking around listening to mp3 players?
And more importantly, doesn't the Listen Up actually represent a technological retrogression? Why would you get a little box (the size of a credit card!) in order to hear, when you could just put in a far more inconspicuous hearing aid? But perhaps there's something extra special about the Listen Up that has the capability to save the marriage of an exasperated old lady and her increasingly deaf husband. We can only hope...
Anyway, it turned out to be far more entertaining than I could have imagined, due to the fact that the commercials on Oxygen are a hilarious mess of low-budget film making. Among the (expected) slew of Massengil, FDS and tampon advertisements, there was an endless string of ridiculous infomercials. One had a particularly special effect on me, so much so, that I had to rewind my DVR and actually watch the ad for a second time. For your viewing pleasure:
First of all, I think one reason I fell in love with the Listen Up commercial was that my dad listens to the television so loudly, that the entire house shakes whenever the Law & Order dum-dum sounds, so it kind of gave me the warm and fuzzies.
But I also love the fact that the wife in the commercial is such a nagging bitch. She seems so disgusted with her husband's hearing problem; and the hokey look he shoots her as he shakes his head and turns down the volume on his stereo merits extra points for its high Unintentional Funny Factor.
The best part of the ad however comes in when the sinister applications of the product come to light. BUT WAIT! THERE'S MORE! You can spy on your neighbors, and they will assume you're merely listening to your iPod. But I fear the Listen Up's cleverness is also its undoing. After all, how many elderly people do you know walking around listening to mp3 players?
And more importantly, doesn't the Listen Up actually represent a technological retrogression? Why would you get a little box (the size of a credit card!) in order to hear, when you could just put in a far more inconspicuous hearing aid? But perhaps there's something extra special about the Listen Up that has the capability to save the marriage of an exasperated old lady and her increasingly deaf husband. We can only hope...
Strabismus and Me
So I had a follow-up appointment to look into my eye issues. I decided to stay far, far away from the University Eye Center after my dreadful experience there and instead went to Kaiser, which seemed like a bit of a risk as well actually...
But in the end, I sort of lucked out. I had an appointment with a general ophthalmologist and about 2 minutes into our appointment, this little man in a white lab coat came in and said, "ummm....can you help me? I can't log into my computer."
"You need a passcode?" my doctor asked him and he responded with a sheepish nod. "I'm so sorry," she said to me, "you'll have to excuse me for a moment."
I tried to play nice. "Oh sure! Take your time," I assured her, when I was really thinking "OK lady, but make it quick. I already sat for 30 minutes in the waiting room."
When she came back though, I was glad I had been so gracious. "Great news," she told me. "That is our strabismus specialist (which is what you have). He doesn't usually come to the Richmond branch on Tuesdays, but he just happens to be here and said he could squeeze you in." Apparently, if I had left and called to schedule an appointment with him, his next opening would have been at the end of May.
Of course my initial glee to meet with the wee man was soon overshadowed with the diagnosis: if I wanted my eye to stop marching to the beat of its own damn drummer, then I was going to have to tighten up a nerve ending to fix a muscle. And that, my friend, requires surgery.
"EYE surgery?" I croaked, picturing my eyeball out of its socket, resting in the palm of a be-gloved hand.
As it turns out, they don't have to actually remove my eyeball (thank the lord). I know this, because I googled strabismus surgery and found a Wikipedia entry about it.
Did you look at the link? I'm so sorry to do that, but I just HAD to. It is so sickening, that I couldn't possibly look at that image and not share it with someone. I still feel queasy about the whole thing, because I have a bit of a gag reflex when it comes to eyes and sharp instruments (and nail-biters, but that's a whole different blog entry). Whenever I think about it, a strange sensation comes over me that reminds me of my parents' neighbors--when the man of the house had back surgery, his squeamish wife couldn't bare to change the bandages, so she asked her son to do it. But as soon as he saw the incision, he began running around the room in circles screaming, "I've got butterflies in my butt! I've got butterflies in my butt!"
If you are afflicted with a weak stomach, then you know exactly what he means. Of course, it's somewhat related to, but not quite as fun as having "tickles in my belly," which I get when I see pictures of my niece wearing her new Adidas. As you can see, she takes after her aunt's sense of colorful style. Let's just hope she doesn't also inherit my penchant for random maladies:
But in the end, I sort of lucked out. I had an appointment with a general ophthalmologist and about 2 minutes into our appointment, this little man in a white lab coat came in and said, "ummm....can you help me? I can't log into my computer."
"You need a passcode?" my doctor asked him and he responded with a sheepish nod. "I'm so sorry," she said to me, "you'll have to excuse me for a moment."
I tried to play nice. "Oh sure! Take your time," I assured her, when I was really thinking "OK lady, but make it quick. I already sat for 30 minutes in the waiting room."
When she came back though, I was glad I had been so gracious. "Great news," she told me. "That is our strabismus specialist (which is what you have). He doesn't usually come to the Richmond branch on Tuesdays, but he just happens to be here and said he could squeeze you in." Apparently, if I had left and called to schedule an appointment with him, his next opening would have been at the end of May.
Of course my initial glee to meet with the wee man was soon overshadowed with the diagnosis: if I wanted my eye to stop marching to the beat of its own damn drummer, then I was going to have to tighten up a nerve ending to fix a muscle. And that, my friend, requires surgery.
"EYE surgery?" I croaked, picturing my eyeball out of its socket, resting in the palm of a be-gloved hand.
As it turns out, they don't have to actually remove my eyeball (thank the lord). I know this, because I googled strabismus surgery and found a Wikipedia entry about it.
Did you look at the link? I'm so sorry to do that, but I just HAD to. It is so sickening, that I couldn't possibly look at that image and not share it with someone. I still feel queasy about the whole thing, because I have a bit of a gag reflex when it comes to eyes and sharp instruments (and nail-biters, but that's a whole different blog entry). Whenever I think about it, a strange sensation comes over me that reminds me of my parents' neighbors--when the man of the house had back surgery, his squeamish wife couldn't bare to change the bandages, so she asked her son to do it. But as soon as he saw the incision, he began running around the room in circles screaming, "I've got butterflies in my butt! I've got butterflies in my butt!"
If you are afflicted with a weak stomach, then you know exactly what he means. Of course, it's somewhat related to, but not quite as fun as having "tickles in my belly," which I get when I see pictures of my niece wearing her new Adidas. As you can see, she takes after her aunt's sense of colorful style. Let's just hope she doesn't also inherit my penchant for random maladies:
Cesar Chavez, Patron Saint of Vacation Days
When Scooby decided that he wanted to go on a little ski vacation to Colorado, I was definitely excited by the idea, but given that I need to conserve vacation for the endless string of weddings, reunions and bachelorette parties this summer, I wasn't sure I could swing it. But then I remembered Cesar Chavez. Chavez was a migrant worker turned labor leader who improved conditions for farm workers. More importantly, his very existence warrants a vacation day in California. I had never heard of the man before moving here, but he is all over the place. It seems like every third street is named after him, and last Friday was Cesar Chavez Day.
So, since I had never taken Cesar Chavez Day off before, I figured I wouldn't miss it if I decided to work that day and instead take the previous Friday off for Colorado ski fun.
The trip promised to be stellar on multiple levels: we would stay with Scooby's parents, so there would be no lodging expenses; the snow in Colorado is amazing this year; one of my best friends from college was going to be there at the same time. There was just one thing I forgot to account for: I am, apparently, a delicate flower. It's funny, because I don't usually think of myself as a weakling. In fact, I often make fun of other delicate flowers, namely my sister's dog Dexter, because he is so sensitive and easily injured. I mean look at him:
But I'm slowly starting to realize that I may not be able to live up to my sturdy Germanic heritage. Even high altitude makes me sick.
Of course I've been skiing in Colorado before, and I've been to a number high-altitude locales, but for some reason this time around my body refused to tolerate it. As soon as we were driving from Denver up into the mountains, I could feel my head start to pound. I decided to start guzzling water, since I knew that being at 9,000 feet can cause dehydration and then headaches, but the pain persisted. I was so exhausted by the time we arrived, I decided to go straight to bed, but I slept restlessly and was awake for two hours in the middle of the night. By the time the alarm rang in the morning, my head hurt so badly, I could barely open my eyes. I reached for more water thinking it would alleviate some of the pressure in my head, but it only seemed to exacerbate some rumblings in my stomach.
And that's when the puking started.
After an hour and a half of running between the bed and the bathroom, I finally decided to follow my mother's advice and head to the hospital. So I hopped in the car with Scooby, his friend (both dressed and ready for the slopes), his mother and stepdad. And wouldn't you know it? I had to request that Scooby's stepdad pull over the car so I could hop out and vomit on the side of the road. In a word: humiliating.
Scooby's mom stayed with me at the hospital, where I sat in the waiting room with a tiny blue cone that was supposed to be my vomit receptacle, should I get sick again. I couldn't help but think of Garth in Wayne's World saying, "if you're gonna spew, spew into this," and holding up a little Dixie cup. Luckily, I didn't need to use the cone, but I did have to run to the hospital bathroom--again--to dry heave.
Once the doctors saw me, they immediately put me on oxygen and pumped me full of drugs and fluids. The medicine made me feel strange and jerky though, and I was preoccupied with the fact that I was acting strange and erratic in front of my boyfriend's mother. I felt miraculously better in the next couple of hours, but they made me take the oxygen tank with me, which made me look uncannily like my grandmother at 70. On my way out, as I was waiting to pay for my medications, I sneaked a glimpse at a little boy who was in a wheelchair with a broken leg, broken arm, fat lip and a black eye. His mother walked over to him and said, "you okay?" and he just looked up at her without saying a word, his chin starting to quiver. It broke my heart and simultaneously made me miss my mother.
The little boy looked over and caught me staring, so I looked away, but when I looked back he was staring at me, which reminded me that he wasn't the only spectacle in the hospital. I did, after all, have a oxygen tank slung over my shoulder and plastic tubes descending from my nose. How quickly we forget...
In the end, lots o' drugs and pure oxygen perked me right up and I was able to go skiing the following two days and even eat chili on the slopes, but being in the hospital is not exactly the ideal way to spend Cesar Chavez Day (observed).
Plus, I had to come to an empty (except for one person) office building on the real Cesar Chavez Day. I decided to use the luxury of an empty office to call my brother. "It's a holiday, but I'm working," I told him. "Cesar Chavez Day."
"You gotta be kidding me," he practically yelled into the phone. "You get a day off to celebrate that guy?" I wondered for a second (a) how Rob knew who Cesar Chavez was and (b) why he would dislike the migrant worker turned hero.
And then it dawned on me.
"Not Hugo Chavez! CESAR Chavez." I mean Berkeley may have protesters living in trees and people picketing the Marine's office, but we do have some standards.
So, since I had never taken Cesar Chavez Day off before, I figured I wouldn't miss it if I decided to work that day and instead take the previous Friday off for Colorado ski fun.
The trip promised to be stellar on multiple levels: we would stay with Scooby's parents, so there would be no lodging expenses; the snow in Colorado is amazing this year; one of my best friends from college was going to be there at the same time. There was just one thing I forgot to account for: I am, apparently, a delicate flower. It's funny, because I don't usually think of myself as a weakling. In fact, I often make fun of other delicate flowers, namely my sister's dog Dexter, because he is so sensitive and easily injured. I mean look at him:
But I'm slowly starting to realize that I may not be able to live up to my sturdy Germanic heritage. Even high altitude makes me sick.
Of course I've been skiing in Colorado before, and I've been to a number high-altitude locales, but for some reason this time around my body refused to tolerate it. As soon as we were driving from Denver up into the mountains, I could feel my head start to pound. I decided to start guzzling water, since I knew that being at 9,000 feet can cause dehydration and then headaches, but the pain persisted. I was so exhausted by the time we arrived, I decided to go straight to bed, but I slept restlessly and was awake for two hours in the middle of the night. By the time the alarm rang in the morning, my head hurt so badly, I could barely open my eyes. I reached for more water thinking it would alleviate some of the pressure in my head, but it only seemed to exacerbate some rumblings in my stomach.
And that's when the puking started.
After an hour and a half of running between the bed and the bathroom, I finally decided to follow my mother's advice and head to the hospital. So I hopped in the car with Scooby, his friend (both dressed and ready for the slopes), his mother and stepdad. And wouldn't you know it? I had to request that Scooby's stepdad pull over the car so I could hop out and vomit on the side of the road. In a word: humiliating.
Scooby's mom stayed with me at the hospital, where I sat in the waiting room with a tiny blue cone that was supposed to be my vomit receptacle, should I get sick again. I couldn't help but think of Garth in Wayne's World saying, "if you're gonna spew, spew into this," and holding up a little Dixie cup. Luckily, I didn't need to use the cone, but I did have to run to the hospital bathroom--again--to dry heave.
Once the doctors saw me, they immediately put me on oxygen and pumped me full of drugs and fluids. The medicine made me feel strange and jerky though, and I was preoccupied with the fact that I was acting strange and erratic in front of my boyfriend's mother. I felt miraculously better in the next couple of hours, but they made me take the oxygen tank with me, which made me look uncannily like my grandmother at 70. On my way out, as I was waiting to pay for my medications, I sneaked a glimpse at a little boy who was in a wheelchair with a broken leg, broken arm, fat lip and a black eye. His mother walked over to him and said, "you okay?" and he just looked up at her without saying a word, his chin starting to quiver. It broke my heart and simultaneously made me miss my mother.
The little boy looked over and caught me staring, so I looked away, but when I looked back he was staring at me, which reminded me that he wasn't the only spectacle in the hospital. I did, after all, have a oxygen tank slung over my shoulder and plastic tubes descending from my nose. How quickly we forget...
In the end, lots o' drugs and pure oxygen perked me right up and I was able to go skiing the following two days and even eat chili on the slopes, but being in the hospital is not exactly the ideal way to spend Cesar Chavez Day (observed).
Plus, I had to come to an empty (except for one person) office building on the real Cesar Chavez Day. I decided to use the luxury of an empty office to call my brother. "It's a holiday, but I'm working," I told him. "Cesar Chavez Day."
"You gotta be kidding me," he practically yelled into the phone. "You get a day off to celebrate that guy?" I wondered for a second (a) how Rob knew who Cesar Chavez was and (b) why he would dislike the migrant worker turned hero.
And then it dawned on me.
"Not Hugo Chavez! CESAR Chavez." I mean Berkeley may have protesters living in trees and people picketing the Marine's office, but we do have some standards.
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