Hypocritical Cat

I got some food from the Mexican grocery store that Kailyn recommended tonight. Can I just say, I can't believe they actually sell those Mexican spicy carrots in cans? And now I am a huge fan. Though I don't think they are as good as the fresh kind, but still they are pretty tasty. I am tempted to add a little bit of lemon juice or something to them or maybe mix in a can of jalapenos, but that would require effort. Anyway, I was eating my carnitas and whatnot, and I took too big a bite and got a little ill, and realized I'd have to cough out what I was eating, so I ended up throwing it up into my hand. Kiki sees me and gives me the dirtiest look. It's like, kitty, you are the champion vomiter, no way you can be grossed out by my little bit. I mean, this is the cat who will throw up right in her food bowl (then again, that is easier to clean, I assure you).

It's just been one of those odd weeks. My boss is out all week, which means the level of micromanagement is low, but then there are also those things that my boss takes care of, like keeping others in line that annoy me. And let's face it, it would be pretty hard for me to get to a day without being annoyed by someone.

I'm reading this book series called The Age of Unreason by Charles Handy, and these alternate history books are pretty entertaining. Those who know me know I'm not a big lover of historical books (though I do like non-European historical novels a lot, go figure) but I am enjoying these. And since the next box of books from my dad is stuck at the post office (thanks to my postal carrier who didn't manage to like, leave the package on the one day I was home).

Eh, I do sound a little cranky. Think I'll go play Doodle God on my iPhone for a while. They just added some new elements to play with. This is what passes for excitement these days, ha ha.

Weak-end

I took Friday off work. I got completely ready for work, showered, hair done, even put makeup on, and as I was starting to put on clothing, I realized that I just didn't feel up for working. So I called in sick, actually talking to my boss, then I washed off the makeup at went back to sleep. And I slept until about noon then got up and did some stuff. The physical pain was going away, but was replaced by mental anguish, feelings of listlessness and depression. I realize that there are times that I like my job and times I hate it, but it really is so much of a habit and being out of that habit is very hard for me. I definitely was better not going to work, but sitting at home wasn't really a good thing either. I started having bad thoughts, starting wondering if I was sinking into a real depression, or if this was related to physical illness, and if giving up psych meds was really the right idea. I didn't feel physically good enough to leave the house until later.

I was glad that my friend Kim was coming into town, and I had dinner at her parents' house. It's funny how I've been going there for years and years, and they remember the guy I dated over 10 years ago more than any of the others and are always happy to see me. It's funny how they are amused by my dumb job stories, though they also drink a lot of wine so I think that helps their sense of humor. I realize that with work, I have so much social interaction but very little of it is fun, so it was good to hang out with them and be appreciated, and catch up with Kim a little bit.

Then Saturday was Kailyn's birthday party, so I headed out there. I think I've actually been to three of her birthday parties, or maybe four? I think one time we all went out for Indian food instead of her having a party at her house. I also think that she doesn't seem to be aging year to year and will have to find out how she manages that. Kailyn throws down a mean spread of food, and since I showed up early (aka fifteen minutes after the time on the evite), I got to see the entirety of the preparation. It always just kind of amazes me watching people who cook in real life. On TV, they always do things in thirty minutes or an hour, but she spent at least three hours throwing stuff together. The party was fun too, because I got to catch up with Zombie Mom and see how ginormous her kids have become. They were very civilized, particularly her older daughter, the Commander, who had decided that she was tired and wanted to leave before she behaved badly. Such sense in that child, when most of us adults haven't learned that lesson yet.

Kind of a different weekend because I didn't go to see C, which I'm now a bit regretting because his house is ten times cooler than mine. It's currently melting here in San Jose, and even with my a/c on, I think my feet are sweating, and I need to go grab my laundry out of the drier before I lose any and all motivation. Oh and feed the cats. Teddy just reminded me that he needs to be fed. I should say that he's been reminding me for the last two hours, but now he's actually timely about it.

Low-grade

I remember my mom telling me that back in the old days, whenever it was that doctors were all men, when they would see their women patients, they would hold out a doll or picture and ask the woman to point to where it hurt her on the doll or picture instead of actually (god forbid!) touching the woman. I don't know if this is an apocryphal story or what, but I think sometimes such things would be preferable to current treatments.

I have had weird stomach pain for the last four or five days. Now, when I say stomach, I suppose I mean abdominal. I finally phoned into the advice line today and went into see a doctor, because I was sick of it hurting, and feeling pain every time I was sitting at work. The thing was, it wasn't a shooting or stabbing pain, and because I'm female and in my child-bearing years, and despite them asking me several times if it was possible that I could be pregnant, they made an appointment with my gynecologist, who also tested me to see if I could be pregnant. Um no, that's why I'm on the pill. And why I got my period ten days ago.

After that test, when they finally remove pregnancy from the table, the doc examines me basically by putting his fingers up in my vagina to just push and feel around to see if he can connect the pain to something internal. And yeah, what he is doing really hurts, but it isn't connected to anything else that is hurting. Then he presses on the outside of my body, which fucking hurts like hell, and pretty much says that I've just been wearing too tight clothes or my belly fat has been pushing against my body or something that honestly makes me feel like shit, makes me feel ashamed. Then he tells me to take ibuprofen about five times, like I'm an idiot who doesn't understand what pain killers are. However, I do make them take my temperature (and I find it weird that at the vets' office, that is the first thing they do with the cats because it's a pretty good indicator of things, but here at my doctor's office, I had to ask for it) and it's at 99.9 which is a low-grade fever. So the doctor also orders a blood test to see if anything is elevated, and it isn't. So my cure? Wear loose pants (or possibly muumuus) and take some Advil.

So, why do I feel angry and ashamed? I'm not really sure. I feel like going to the doctor is generally fairly useless and it's better to just sit in pain than deal with this weird humiliation. Maybe that's not a really mature way to look at it, but I honestly am in good health most of the time and I kind of feel like I wasted $20 on my co-pay and I could have just called in sick to work and spent some time with Dr Kiki who was making sure I took naps to make myself feel better. I don't really think the doc was trying to make me feel like an idiot who was just wasting his time but that was sort of the end result.

Things I Wish I Learned Earlier In Life

Thanks to everyone for the comments. I was definitely hitting a low spot last week. Though I feel like my hormonal periodal issues have passed, and I'm still a bit cranky and wondering what my excuse is this week!

We have a student intern at our office for a few weeks this summer, and she has this horrid valley-girl type voice and I was really thinking about how I used to talk about that when I was in my early twenties and how some older well-meaning woman told me that I should stop talking like that because it undercuts people taking you seriously in the work place. I am guessing at the time I was somewhat insulted but I have since learned that she was in fact correct, and using the word "like" continuously when you aren't trying to create similes isn't really a good way to express yourself if you want to be taken seriously. I started thinking about other stuff that I wish someone had told me years ago and thought I'd compile a little list here. Feel free to add your own suggestions in comments.

• Pick a specific time period to mourn over a failed relationship and leave it at that; don't drag it out indefinitely over years and years. And keep repeating the phrase, "it's not about me, it's about the other person," until you believe it, because I tell you that is the truth.
  
• Someone who is continuously critical of you is not your friend, especially if it is the same criticisms leveled again and again, particularly if they are about your body. Everyone has their own issues, but having someone dump their issues on you again and again is not something you have to put up with.
• Joking that you don't have enough work to do at your job is a good way to get yourself laid off. Better to act like you have too much to do and are very busy even if that isn't true.
• It's worth it to find people in your life who respect you and understand you, and also not worth it to spend time with people who don't.
• Setting boundaries with your boss at work is really important, and in the long run, it's a lot easier not to be bff with someone you work for.
• Don't dumb down your vocabulary because you worry about alienating people because it's hard to get that vocabulary back once it is gone.

Any other suggestions to this list?

Passing of Time

I was kind of thinking of posting about how I read In Cold Blood by Truman Capote last week and found it kind of boring, and really nothing to compare to a lot of modern novels and non-fictional accounts of murderers, but I guess I can pretty much sum that up in one sentence here. I remember reading in the last six months about how someone claimed that Capote also wrote To Kill A Mockingbird because he was good friends with Harper Lee and she never wrote anything else, or something. It was a more complicated explanation. Oh and I saw the movie Capote with my ex whenever it came out and now I wish I could watch that again after having read In Cold Blood, but not enough to actually go out and rent it or something.

I have just been feeling foul the last few days. I know a large part of that is hormones, and another part is quitting my psych meds, but I am still trying to convince myself that this is temporary and it is going to be okay and I really really don't need to start smacking someone in the head about it. I think it doesn't help being at work all day every day and feeling a sort of volcanic build-up of pressure at the annoyingness of it all, dealing with mean callers, shitty micromanager, and generally feeling stuck and under appreciated. I know this will pass.

I haven't had any comments or more than one comment (not in English anyway) for the last few posts. I wonder if it's the case of people not reading my blog anymore, or people just not commenting. I don't really write for attention or comments, but I feel a weird echo-y sensation if I think that no one is reading. Then again, I started going through the list of the links on the right and how many of those have folded up. And most of the things that I read in my reader now are all lolcat variants, feminist sites, or news-related.

I do know that so many negative thoughts are just a matter of perspective, and lately mine has been in the negative, focusing more on the problems in my life and not the good things. I think I need to flip a switch and start thinking about good things. And maybe plan more vacations.

All Plans, Great And Small

We went to see the A-team movie this past weekend. C had mentioned wanting to go see it a few weeks ago, and so did his roommate (who really deserves a nickname of his own but I do try to keep this blog PG13). I realize that I would much rather sit through a goofy action movie than see something like Sex & The City 2 or some romantic comedy crapola with Jennifer Aniston. I actually don't ever remember loving romantic movies or thinking they were my favorite category ever, but I think as I get older and have more real life experience with real life romance, I grow more and more tired of them. I'm sure that happens every so often that people will be friends for ever and suddenly decide they are in love, but that seems like bullcrap to me. Anyway, I digress. I was pretty interested in seeing the movie anyway, and then I read Pajiba's review of it which made it sound like it would be more than just a bit entertaining.

I was a fan of the original show. Fan really? I don't know. I remember being induced into watching it by my dad and brother because there was a "really good looking guy on there." I suppose that is how some women coerce a man into seeing a chick flick or something. Having someone good-looking on a show made it more interesting, but the show was also entertaining. It's funny thinking about it, because even though A-team was on prime time, it was very much a show for kids. Everything was very clear cut as to whom the good and bad guys were, and the good guys always won. And despite a large number of explosions and gunshots, everyone good and bad seemed to walk away unscathed. Yeah right. It's like the Smurfs, surely all those times that Gargamel caught them, Azrael the cat would have taken a little bite out of one of them.

Whereas this movie was brought into the modern age, sort of. There certainly were a lot of people dying in those explosions, dying with the gunshots actually hitting them in the face. And that dude was certainly no real Faceman, I mean the whole thing is that Faceman is supposed to be really good looking. And there's something a bit odd about seeing Liam Neeson in a role like that, dunno I usually think of him as more actor than action star. And the Murdock guy was good, but not really convincing as someone totally crazy (though maybe it would be less appropriate to have someone play the character the same way as back in the 80s). Also I thought the beating to death the standard tropes ("I love it when a plan comes together" said over and over and BA being afraid to get in a plane, well it was only funny the first time) was overdone, but still it wasn't so horribly heavy-handed.

My verdict, entertaining and won't make you hate the jerks who continuously strip-mine everything that was good from when we were kids and reduce it to pablum. I would recommend it as a fun popcorn flick that isn't going to change your view of the world or anything. But as I told DMA today, I hope they just go with this and don't try to make a fucking sequel.

How Soon Is Now, Anyway?

"Cold turkey isn't as delicious as it sounds." -- Homer Simpson

So I'm now officially off Wellbutrin, or more accurately, I haven't taken it for a few days. And I feel partly like crap, super irritated at everyone and everything (like the idiot who parked too close to where I wanted to park in the parking spot this morning) all day. I had some moments where I just felt like I was a record going at the too low speed. (And since it's been a long ass time since I played a record, well you know what I mean right? Unless you're like young and don't really know what records are. But they had this thing where you could play them at the wrong speed and they'd sound really odd and funky. But I digress.) Also my body just feels kind of weird and shaky, like my mind and my body aren't really in the same room. It's like, not getting enough caffeine without the headache. My psychiatrist said that it is out of your system in twenty-four hours, so I should have been fine after the first day, right? I guess the good thing is that I'm not depressed. Because I'm too out of it to care. I hope by tomorrow I'm feeling more normal, or at least, not feeling like my body is made out of jelly and my feet feel strange when I'm walking without shoes, like on a bumpy surface. That was pretty unpleasant and the hand-shaking even more so (particularly since I need to do a manicure tonight). This is temporary, is what I tell myself, knowing it is, and hoping it is, at the same time.

Listening In The Car

I usually spend about forty-five minutes each way to see C on the weekends, and often I call my mom or other friends while I'm in the car. Where he lives, my local public radio station dies out about halfway there, so listening to the radio isn't really much of an option. So if I'm not talking to people on the phone, I end up listening to stuff from my iPhone. Rarely, I do listen to music, but I mostly listen to Podcasts. There are a few I listen to regularly, Wait Wait Don't Tell Me and This American Life and while Lost was on, I was listening to those podcasts. Also I recently started listening to a new podcast, Fatcast which is freaking awesome.

This weekend, I was listening to this episode of This American Life about Urban Legends, and I heard a story about Steve Poizner, this guy who is running for governor of California. That part wasn't really really interested me about the story, but that it is about his experience teaching at an "inner city" school, Mt Pleasant, in East San Jose. You can see this link for a summary or even listen to the whole thing or get a transcript if you want. And if you aren't from around here, this is just going to seem different to you than it did to me. Because when I first moved to San Jose area, I lived not very far from where this supposedly gang-ridden high school exists. And I'm pretty sure that it wasn't as bad as Mr. Poizner found it. Then they mention where SP himself lives, which is Los Gatos, a pretty wealthy enclave full of ginormous houses in the hills. I suppose if you have that kind of background and world view, some less than wealthy communities are going to look "slumlike" or something, but yeesh. I think they said the average price for homes around Mt Pleasant is about $350-425k, which anywhere but California probably means you are living in a mansion anyway.

I'm not really sure why this story got into my brain anyway. I know I grew up with a lot of privilege, white, middle-class, college educated parents, etc, but I went to a high school that was very racially and economically mixed (and some days it seemed like the far ends of the bell curve were the ones that we saw the most of, with the sixteen year old kids driving BMWs into the lot and then the others who had to take the buses). I know that Mr Poizner wasn't talking about my high school, but when the discussion turns to kids not being motivated, I was thinking about my own high school days and how not motivated I was. If I didn't have parents pushing me to go to college (and willing to pay for it), I doubt I would have gone. Then I think about kids who don't have those kind of advantages and have to really start thinking about how they will support themselves once they graduate from high school (or even sooner), and I think, well what the hell would motivate them? It's pretty easy to sit from a high point and think that it's all these teenagers faults because they aren't listening to your lectures or whatever, and it's a lot harder to motivate kids to learn something that has no real application in their daily lives.

Ira Glass ends up talking to Poizner and asks him, well maybe you didn't see things clearly because you come from a different background, maybe you didn't quite get the right impression because of your own cultural baggage, and Poizner denies this. I know politicians often don't like admitting they are wrong, but I would love for this guy to stand up and say, "yeah I'm a little bit scared of people who are lower middle-class, not white, and don't have as many advantages as I do." But is that going to happen? In any case, I don't see myself voting for this guy.

Remission

Somehow in the last few months, I had the brilliant idea to stop taking anti-depressants. I had been taking two different meds, Celexa and Welbutrin, and I just stopped the last Celexa a few weeks ago when my prescription ran out. Then I went to see my psychiatrist on Tuesday and talked about quitting the drugs altogether. It was one of those very overpriced kind of meetings that cost my whole copay and I end up talking to her for about five minutes. And the whole five minutes was spent with me saying that I was thinking of going off my meds, and her telling me how to do so. Then she wrote me up, as being in remission. With a plan to start tapering off Welbutrin, mostly by just taking one pill instead of two for a week, and then nothing.

The funny thing about this is that I've been feeling kind of crappy since this meeting. And not because I felt like I was depressed, but because I have had to work since then. I think it took me only a few hours to remember why work sucks. People calling and bitching at me are the least of it, then it's the dealing with the micro-managerial business. It's been a bit much. And even though it's been super hot here, it's nice at night, and the week is about half over. Very good news that is.