Archive for January, 2009
20090113
I’m gonna jump the shark tonight and confess that I’m pretty friggin down about this surgery I’ll be having in a couple of hours. It’s not that I’m scared. I’m not scared one bit, to the extreme of just about not caring if something does go horribly wrong.
Ultimately, it is not that I am sick, that I’ll have had four surgeries in a year, that defines me. Well, that’s good, right? Unfortunately, for me, what defines my life is that I know when I float away under anesthesia, there’s no one waiting for me to wake up. I do have friends who will drive me to the hospital and wait around for hours…well, actually, I don’t really know how many friends I have who’ll do that. I have at least one, but each time I have to ask this friend, it’s a greater and greater imposition, to the point that I have not insisted on it for today. I have a family member who could’ve come here today, but I knew the imposition outweighed the necessity.
I have a neighbor dropping me off, and then I’m on my own.
I have struggled with the question of whether it really makes sense to make this such a big deal…so no one’s with you when you have surgery, so what?
Well, even if I discount the need for emotional support–they’re low-risk procedures, after all–there’s still the question of needing someone to tell me what the heck is going on and where the heck my stuff is. I know better than to expect the hospital staff to cater to my whims. They’re not going to fetch me my glasses or my phone from my bag. You’re helpless when you’re on one of those gurneys. With any luck, I will be too drugged up to care, but what if I’m not? I am going to feel absolutely alone.
And that gets me to why I’m not going to be anxious to wake up from my surgery or any drug-induced hazes I may find myself in today.
I should have more connections in my life, strong connections, people I don’t need to hesitate to ask for help. I don’t
Sorry. I’m the eternal-downer, I guess. And while I’m on this path, I’ll confess I do not look forward to 2009. I try to fool myself into thinking this can be some transcendent year. There’s a fat chance of that. My body is breaking down. There’s no joy to look forward to. I am engaged in lots of battles in my life, and I am losing them all. People have no idea how much I fight them or how much it takes out of me to fight them.
I know giving up is not a viable option. Truly, I do. So I suppose I’ll be fighting whether I like it or not.
But I am spent.
I realize this attitude boxes me into a corner. This is what I’m feeling right now. Even if I have second thoughts about this later on today or tomorrow, I won’t be in much of a position to censor it.
Win a 2009 calendar!
I’d been meaning to order some pet calendars for the past month-and-a-half. I finally got it done just now. Want one? Be the [n]th unique individual to leave a comment on this entry, and you’ll get this 2009 calendar of Aremid, Zellouisa, and Herman absolutely free! (n is a number I just picked, and it resides in my head; it is quite possible there won’t be n unique commenters).
Harris Teeter and Pumpkin Pie Yankee Candles
One exciting element of my day was going to the new Harris Teeter at Guess Rd and Horton Rd (the “Willow Haven” store as opposed to the now-closed Willowdaile store). I spun a wheel to win a coupon for free Harris Teeter ice cream, a $5.29 value! (And now I will get who-knows how many e-VIC emails). I also was happy to see their promotion for their pharmacy–save $20 on future purchases for EVERY prescription filled at the HT pharmacy. This will add up quickly for me, and also solves my problem of needing to replace Rite Aid, which has pissed me off for the last time (and deserves but will not get a “Rite Aid Sucks” post, although Google will probably now consider this a Rite Aid Sucks post, which is fine).
Excitement continued with the discovery of half-price holiday-themed Yankee Candles at Bed Bath and Beyond. This basically means there are ridiculous quantities of Pumpkin Pie and Pumpkin Spice candles. I grabbed a couple, because I have come to find that a burning Yankee Candle effectively counters my disillusionment with my impossibly messy and damaged house.
Two days until basilic vein transposition
One of those fun health updates…I called it a “basal” vein transposition in the video, which is wrong, as anyone who knows anything about biology obviously knows (which I don’t and don’t want to know, because it all makes me quite queasy when I read up on the specific details).
Uncrappy Prius
I have meant to add a quick note mentioning that my Prius turns out not to have been crappy after all. It did not need a new hybrid battery or anything else exceptionally pricey, just a new 12-V battery. It was still a painful episode, but the mechanic said my car was in decent shape overall, and so I am in-like with it again. But I think I might be in love with the 2009 Honda Fit. The wise decision is probably to keep the Prius for awhile longer. But I’m only gonna live once, and I’d like to drive more cars in my lifetime as opposed to less; I’m itching for a change. Alas, I had a much more insightful meditation on automobiles in my head over the past week, but this is all I’m putting up here for now.
The Mediocrity of Kate Hudson
This scathing post by Chez on the awful-sounding new film Bride Wars (11% fresh on Rotten Tomatoes) led me to the following geeky exercise:
That graph is really too kind to Kate Hudson. If you couldn’t guess, the mere notion of Kate Hudson is a pet peeve of mine.
Hmm…actually, Rotten Tomatoes makes their own graphs, and this Kate Hudson Tomatometer graph shows a bit more dramatically how crappy Kate Hudson movies have been since 2001.
Howard’s End
I never fully got on the Obama train, as much as I believe he was still an infinitely better choice than McCain. It didn’t help that Obama/Biden never sent me one of those round magnets that I should’ve gotten following my post-Biden-pick donation.
I don’t think I’ll be writing much about politics anytime soon. But I just want to get this off my chest. I’m pretty disappointed by President-elect Obama right now. I am getting the feeling I will always be.
A few highlights:
1. Having Rick Warren give the invocation at his inauguration
2. Loading up his stimulus package with a bunch of tax cuts for people who don’t need them in, what I think is, a misguided attempt to win over Republicans that is more like giving the finger to the left-wing of the Democratic party.
3. Giving the finger to Howard Dean. Actually, it’s this last one that motivates me to post this. I don’t really know the back-story as to why the Obama camp hates Dean so much. Was he too deferential to Hillary during the campaign? I don’t know, but Obama is treating Dean like shit, and I can’t see see how Dean deserves anything but gratitude for steering the Democrats towards a 50-state campaign that allowed Obama to build a national movement.
U.S. Economy circa January 2009
The storm metaphor is just too easy, but this is what I saw when I left work today, from the parking deck of American Tobacco, overlooking University Ford. Apparently, Durham has the lowest unemployment in the state of North Carolina, at just 5.8% compared to 7.9% for the state and 6.7% nationwide. Ford isn’t doing too well, however. Their December sales are down 32% from a year ago. (They actually fared better than G.M., Chrysler, BMW Toyota, and Honda).
2008: One Last Trip to Wasilla City Hall
I like year-end lists but haven’t made time for my own. I’d like to do some sort of retrospective, but looking back generally isn’t something that’s terribly helpful for me.
Nonetheless, I want to note that one of my enjoyable reading experiences of 2008 was the blog Deux Ex Malcontent. You should add it to your daily reading. and I’d like to link to Chez’s Ten Most Ridiculous, Shameful or Generally Unfortunate People and Events of 2008. If you don’t have the time to read through it all, at least scroll down to #1.
