Utils in Bat Country

Ah hell, Glee and HIMYM

Why are you both suddenly pretty terrible?

I held out longer than most, I kept hoping it was just a slump. But since I've started viewing both of you in the background while working on other things (like this blog post!), I have to admit it.  You've fallen. And you can't get up.

Please to watch Hart of Dixie and Vampire Diaries for lessons on how to do ridiculous properly.

Train Tales

More of a train musing, really.  I've noticed, what to me, is an odd occurrence. When people get to their stops, they go and line up at the doors a couple minutes prior to arriving and then as soon as the doors open, they leap off the train and sprint to their cars. At first I thought it was a random one off, but no, I see this every day, at all the different stops.

Why?

It's not like hordes of people get off at each stop either.  Dozens, ish.  Maybe 20 or 30 cars.  All cleared out within 8 minutes.  I know, because I wait when I get off the train before I leave.  I'm usually in the middle of a chapter anyway so I finish up, start the car and pull out with a minimum of fuss and muss and I imagine I arrive at my destination all of 4 minutes after the sprinters.

Am I missing something?  Are the 4 extra minutes really worth it? Is this some part of marathon training with which I'm just unfamiliar?

It's not snow. It's not snow.

It is, however, a giant swath of dark green spreading across my entire 10 hour drive.

At least, that's where weather.com tells me it'll be come my 6am wake up call.

But. It's not snow. It's not ice. It'll be fine. Nothing will stand in my way of Grandma's tortellini soup!

Safe travels to everyone out and about this week.

Happy Thanksgiving!!!

The Boots

The Boots were waiting for me when I got home from work Thursday and I am a bit disheartened. 

(Ignore the pj pants and terrible iphone pictures)

The good: the shearling is fabulous. They hit at a good part of my leg/ankle. Pretty comfortable to wear. Immediate issues: They're super high.  Getting into hooker high.  They do not look nearly this high on the website. And something about the platform and the toe box seems off.  The toe seems almost comically rounded?

The good: from this angle, that is a fine looking shoe.  The not as good: you can kind of see it towards the top of the heel but the leather has this odd pebbled/rough texture.  Doesn't look quite as sumptuous as I'd hoped.

In order to justify keeping them, I have to wear them with all types of pants so there'd be outfits where most of the shoe was covered and I think this just exacerbates the toe box issues.  Clown hooker is not a look I'm going for.

Overall, I like them.  But there's just enough quibbles where, even though I got them on sale, I still shelled out $380 and I don't know. I'm not head over heels in love with them so that means they should be returned? 

So close, dream shoe.  You were so close.

Back

And pitiful

Is not uncommon for me to come down with some sort of cold after having a panic attack and that plus the two days of damp, squishy hotel provided a perfect storm (ha! with the typhoon!) and am now a head fogged, sore throated, groaning shell of a person.

But!  Even though I had a full on breakdown in the middle of the reception - I started to cry, you guys, the weather moved far enough west where the flight yesterday was nearly pleasant.  There was hardly any actual turbulence but I had asked the flight attendants when I boarded how the air was and they said rough the whole way and then the pilot came on (several times) and said he wasn't letting the flight attendants up because the air was so rough so I was pretty tense the whole time waiting for the roller coaster to start.  Was only once we started our descent into MI that the Tylenol PM finally kicked in meaning I slept the last 8 minutes of the flight (and then for 3 hours yesterday afternoon).  Given the state of the weather Saturday though, I'll take it.  Could have been so so much worse.  Thank you God and Baby Jesus.

And! As a balm to my sniffling self, was 144.5 this morning.  Who says theme parks can't be healthy? 

Well, that and only being able to eat two bites of cake.  My anxiety's hallmark: tears and dry heaves.

Why teeth, whyyyy

Oh, for the love of GOD.

At my regularly scheduled cleaning, the hygienist was asking how the wisdom tooth procedure went (apparently I was 'looked forward to' when they presented at yesterday's staff meeting.  My teeth are soooo exciting) and they were all a bit surprised when they saw that #4 was still there.  [and there it will stay, forever, you hear me tooth?]  I told her about the random tingling feeling I get and she was all oh yes, that's completely normal, there's this big nerve and with such a procedure it's not uncommon to have a bit of nerve damage and it should go away in time but if it doesn't will just be annoying but no big deal.  Ok, good.  She does some bite wing x-rays (more things I bet effing insurance won't cover) and clucks her tongue at a few trouble spots.  What?  No. NO. I was in six months ago and everything looked good (beautiful as Dr. K said!) and the only thing left to get my mouth in shape was wisdom teeth.  I did that, suffered through the pain and the expense and now I am just hear for the polishing and the fancy floss.

Apparently, no. There are a few trouble spots that they are watching and THREE places they need to fill.  Dr. G came in and was explaining that cavities in adults aren't like when you're a kid, they can not show up for years but be slowly growing and then one cleaning you come in and oh, hello, we have eaten through your enamel and are going to make all your teeth fall out.  They prescribed $7 toothpaste that has fluoride to use at night that should help the spots being watched from getting worse and as long as they stay as they are, I never have to get them filled.  And the three I have to have filled should be 'straight forward'.  Then they were talking about how snacking on sugary things exacerbates any issues because it takes your mouth two hours to balance out after eating and if you keep snacking then your mouth never recovers.  Makes sense.  Farewell 3pm tootsie rolls!  I'll miss you!

But Fine. finefinefine.  I will go in on the 26th and remind them how last time the novacaine started to wear off so could they please load me up this time and at least appreciate that it won't be as bad as my wisdom teeth.

My gums are sparkling though, so there's that.

All before 8am

I woke up well before the alarm today (hate that) and woke to realize that the right side of my mouth was sore.  The side that has bothered me not at all, even a little during this whole wisdom tooth saga. Unclenched my jaw, rolled over and was half dozing when the TV came on.  Odd. I figured I rolled on the remote or something so I found the remote under a pillow and turned the TV off.  10 seconds later, the TV comes back on. And starts changing the channel (the TV and the DirecTV box work off of different remotes so the TV was changing its channels to static).  Actually sat up this time, turned the TV off and flopped back down.  And the TV came back on.  And ever time I hit power on the remote the TV would change a channel but not turn off.  Got out of bed, walked over and physically turned the TV off.  Watched it for a few seconds to see it wasn't coming back on, got back in bed and read one of the more atrocious book samples I've seen in awhile. Was still in that hazy not fully awake state when I heard Bella start to pee on the floor.  Shot out of bed and she took off like the terrible beast she is (and I have NO idea how to get her to stop, used to pee she'd pee on clothes if they were on the floor but now she's decided this particular spot on the floor against the wall is her prime location) and I grabbed a towel to deal with it, now fully awake.  As I was stomping to the bathroom - you'll never guess - the TV came on.  So I yanked the plug out of the wall and stormed downstairs with my soiled towel.  We shall see if the TV is on and waiting for me when I return.

Nothing like realizing you have a ghost and a bad cat (connected?) all before the alarm goes off.  Whatever, Monday.

Wisdom toothless (almost)

Warning! Contains a picture of teeth! Which according to fb are apparently very scary.  While I'm of the mind that teeth are scary if they are inside a great white's mouth that's zooming in to eat me, I seem to be an outlier so...

Thursday!

Took the mind altering drugs at 1:30, looked at a book and got that wave of exhaustion feeling about 10 minutes later where you know if you close your eyes you'll fall asleep sitting up.  I did not do that and just looked at the words till it was time to leave around 2.  Got in the car, was able to direct Mom to the office.  Only effects I noticed were seeing double of everything.  I knew what road we were on, what turn was coming up, completely aware, I just saw two of everything.  This is similar to being very drunk perhaps?  Went to the surgery room, turned Harry Potter Book 6 on the ipod and tried to sleep.  Except no. Was wide awake the whole time.  Wasn't concerned or anxious (yay drugs!), just awake.  Following the tools and motions with my eyes the whole time.  I must have been sort of out of it because it seems to have not taken very long and it had to have been at least an hour.  I do remember the doctor bending over me with a pair of pliers heading into my mouth but was more mildly fascinated than anything.  No pain (yay Novocaine!), but I could feel them pulling and pushing and doing that rocking thing back and forth with my bottom tooth to get it to wiggle out.  Wrench it all the way to the leftttt, back to the riiight.  Fun times in my mouth.  Finished up and Dr. B jetted right out and the assistant went to get Mom and go over aftercare with us.  She asked if I wanted to keep my teeth and I said no, I just needed to hold them to take a picture.  Occurred to me later that I should have kept them for the tooth fairy.  I figure wisdom teeth have got to be good for at least $20 a pop, no?  They were very happy they all came out in one piece, they say this will make recovery easier (ha!).  Fare thee well teeth! And #4 that would be the worst of all and I can't even imagine at this point. You better get nice and snuggly encased in my gums because that is where you are staying forever.

I was talking, not even all that numb (swallowed my first two pain pills with no problem), basically the whole you will not have control of your mental faculties for 8 hours effects had come and gone in 48 minutes.  Mom said hey, let's go to Target first and get a few things.  I weighed the benefits of going home and flopping on the couch with an ice pack to Mom paying for things and said off to Target!

Mom was very sweet and bought me two vacuums (I know) and frozen fruit for smoothies and soup and applesauce.  Midway through the Target adventure, the Novocain wore off and yeah...hello throbbing agony of having people dig around in your jaw.  Went back to apartment and hung out on the couch for the rest of the night.  Drank some water, changed the gauze every half hour, bout 9pm had a Slim Fast shake (c/o dentist's office...surprisingly not too bad) and went to bed around midnight.  Terrible night.  Couldn't fall asleep and then woke up multiple times because of the throbbing.  OMG the throbbing.  My problem was that the pain pills would wear off before I could take another so not only was I not staying ahead of the pain but I'd wake up and be so far on the other side of it that it'd take hours for the new one to catch up.  Friday was more of the same (with a generous sprinkling of whiny tweets for good measure), Mom telling me to eat something, drink something, me gazing at her blankly.  She did vacuum the apartment while I read most of The Half Blood Prince which made me a bit uneasy but she wouldn't let me hand her the attachments let alone help so ok.  I was still on the 48 hr strenuous movement ban anyways.  Had a remains to be seen if positive or negative outcome call from the dentist's office (will explain later).  But more of the same: watch food network and the clock until it's time for the next pill.  This was mostly fine except come Saturday when my appetite returned I was suddenly ravenous for pizza and short ribs and onion rings and bruschetta and all the foods that I can't have for two weeks.

24 hours after surgery I also got to experience the fun of my medicated mouthwash.  Have you ever tried to use mouthwash but not make the swishing movements?  I poured it in my mouth and then just moved my neck around to get to all the various teeth.  And then! The mouthwash causes you to drool a bit and know what else is super fun? Trying to spit when you can't make the spitting motions.  You have to sort of move the spit to the front of your mouth and push it out with your tongue.  Good times.

Sunday was finally able to feel like I could move around so went on a walk with Mom and a  little trip to the mall before her flight back to TX.  Was good that she came up even if I feel bad that 85% of the time I was staring at the TV or reading but she wasn't expecting anything more so all is well.

Or was until I was dropping her off at the airport and she went to cup my face to give me a kiss on the cheek and grabbed my jaw causing me to emit a involuntary eep of pain right outside Continental departures.

Giotto!

As I mentioned yesterday, aside from one event, Easter went off almost ridiculously smoothly.

Thus, the event.

I had the baguette all cut and olive oil drizzled on the baking sheet waiting to go in the oven and was chopping onions for the shrimp when I heard Giotto do his am about to throw up meow.  TS hears this and recognizes it as snack time (ugh, Till) so we both leave the kitchen to go find where the cat has horked.  As I'm trying to push her back out of the way, am peering around the cat on the stairs because I don't see anything... on the rug.  When I look closer, I see that along the side of my shoe and down the next step to INSIDE MY PURSE is a stream of half digested cat food. 

After recovering from the loss of peripheral vision, I realized this was actually sort of preferable as the leather is relatively easy to wipe off and the patent shoe rinsed off easily under the faucet.  Had to spend a couple minutes scrubbing the lining of my purse where things dripped (ew) but was doing fine managing the anxiety about the day.  Then I walk back into the kitchen and see my dog with bulging cheeks and several noticeable absences from the baguette filled cookie sheet.

And then, all was lost.  Rather than try and reclaim my bread, I just dragged her leash over to her crate and shut her in for awhile while I sorted out just how much she had gotten to.  Only took a couple rounds so still plenty left for the appetizers. 

But damn if I wasn't yearning for some Xanax while I was gripping the sides of the counter at 3:35 in flour covered yoga pants trying to stave off a panic attack before the guests arrived at 4 because it's all ruined(!!!)  Nothing can go right for the rest of the day! (woe)(wail)(rend garments spatula dramatically)

Siiiiick

Both your intrepid util borgs have been stricken with the sick.

Am waving the white flag and staying under the covers.

We shall return, fever and tissue free!