Tag Archives: home doctorin’

Vomitola down!

Get Out the Vomitola

Your breathless correspondent has thrown out her back. Do not ask how. The answer is undignified for both of us.

I believe this officially entitles me to some ObamaCare! Which means, what, exactly? I’ve heard the term, and I haven’t bothered to figure out what the dilly is. One hears things, and one nods along, and then one is like…what…? Just today, a child asked me to explain what a Three-6 is. A member of Three 6 Mafia? Something to do with pimps? Don’t ask me, I just have a car radio, which is never getting turned on again. I thought I was doing so well with covering 808 and several urbane and even witty possibilities for the identity of a G-6, and then she tries to stump me with Three-6.

So, in short, ObamaCare means we can’t have nice things, but we’re damn well going to try, and I am going to take a leftover prescription pill that is only close to expiring but not actually expired. Or some truly expired yet still piquant sizzurp. Cripes. This really hurts! Typing makes it worse. Each right-handed letter an agony. You love it.

Wooooooo

I got a scale that measures my body fat percentage, and you are about to be painfully informed of how happy this makes me. Some people are afraid of the numbers on the scale, but I take it in stride as Science. I have 25% body fat, by the way! Wooooo! I am excited not because this is a good number to have (it’s smack in the middle of the optimal range for my height, which means that Anna Wintour would actually throw up at the sight of me), but hey, if I can have a device in my home that shoots electricity through my feet, it’s only a matter of time before I can buy a home MRI machine.

OK, if you need me, I’ll be wearing a jacuzzi suit. In the future. ThatswhatImtalkinabout.

Where does one begin?

One could begin last week, when one spent a fair amount of time sitting on the toilet while barfing in a Halloween pumpkin bucket (don’t you keep one handy to play with in your bath tub?), or one could begin two years ago tonight, when one was flippantly out for a pasta dinner while in labor, unaware of dire twists and impending abdominal surgery, but at any rate, one could say it has been a most intriguing run-up to this year’s ybab birthday celebration.

Martha Stewart be damned! Martha Stewart would have known to pencil in “salmonella,” and she would have hired someone to get sick for her and her entire household. That person would have barfed in a hand-turned ceramic bucket with a pleasing shade not unlike the egg of a young Buff Orpington. Then Martha would have been free to make a monkey cake with a face fully articulated by sixteen colors of buttercream icing. A ybab has an incredibly long memory when promised a monkey cake, so a monkey cake was obtained through back channels. I am ashamed to say what actually took place. It may have contained real monkey.

At least I had the foresight to have cart loads of toys arrive UPS in the days leading up to ybab’s birthday, so once she was feeling better just as I was becoming completely incapacitated, she was able to enjoy learning to use a box cutter and diving into piles of bubble wrap. It was like her birthday all week! And so efficient. I will never wrap again.

My parents are also in town, which is a story in itself for another time. They arrived one morning wearing matching lime green shirts, but not exactly matching: one was more of a kiwi than a lime. “Did you feel I was not already sufficiently nauseated?” I asked. “Oh, we didn’t plan it.” “But surely you looked at each other before you left the hotel room?” This line of questioning was fruitless because my sister had told me about the matching lime green shirts making an appearance weeks ago. They know exactly what they are doing!

And they would be the only ones to know what they are doing, but somehow Mr. H and I rallied and pulled off a birthday party. Mr. Whole Foods may have helped. For my re-entry to solid food, I went with sangria. Vitamin C is good for what ails you. A good time was had by 100% of the ybabs who live in my house, and a cat has barfed a festive coil of pink ribbon, so we will count this as successful, even though the poor monkey is never getting back from space.

The Halls of medicine

Bless, but there is a giant disgusting hole cut in my back! An actual doctor did it, so at least this time there is an explanation.

He was going to remove another thing while he was at it, but I asked him if he was going to cut it the same way as the other one, and he said “Oh, no, that’s just a skin tag. I’ll just snip it off with scissors.” Well, to hell with that. I can boil water, and I have a pair of scissors. That is not going to count against my deductible, no thank you! “You’re not going to try this yourself,” he asked when I declined assistance. “Uh, no, I’m going to pray about it.” Ybab is boiling water right now.

Mr. H has gingivitis. He claims the dentist told him he needed prescription mouthwash. I asked if the dentist also suggested that he start flossing. “Oh, uh yeah, I guess.” I JUST LIVE HERE. In a land where nobody puts anything back where it belongs, and everyone manages to climb on me and jab me in the band-aid covering the gaping crater that a professional burned to crispy blackness as an afterthought of sadism. I sure would like one of those hyfrecators for my home kitchen. I’d make the tiniest Baked Alaskas.

A ybab screams bloody murder and refuses to brush her teeth, and we have to wrap her in a towel like we’re giving a pill to a cat. I say “You don’t want gingivitis like your father, now, do you?” And she glares at me and plans to kick me in the kidney after I fall asleep. These people have no respect for the gums and other soft tissues.

Is this stuff a business expense too?

The murderer across the hall further surprised us by heavily dragging in an inflatable rubber boat. When we next went into the hallway, we found a crumpled piece of gauze on the floor outside his door. I wanted to poke it with a stick, but Mr. H reminded me that this could accidentally link me to scores of heinous crimes. Wouldn’t that be a pisser? At any rate, I hope he got the full value of his FSA for murderers contributions for 2007. It’s so important to keep good records. Did you know rubber gloves and electrical tape are allowed, but not kitty litter? Use it or lose it. I’d refer him to my accountant, but he’s already dead, unfortunately.

I recently celebrated a triumph by liberating an old retirement account that had been misappropriated by former employers, halfassedly refunded under supervision of the Department of Labor, and then frozen in time and avoidance for the next five years. I had to track down people who don’t enjoy remembering I exist any more than I enjoy the reverse, and it took several months of calls and emails and pleading and wheedling and third party involvement to finally resolve. I got my check in my pasty little paw right before Christmas, and I sent it in to my new evil empire, feeling a sense of great accomplishment and relief. At last, this unpleasant chapter and even more unpleasant paperwork was but a distant memory.

Then I got another check for $1.12. MAYHEM FROM BEYOND THE GRAVE. I should put this in my IRA for zombies.

May cause inability to LOL

We are sailing the high seas of December here at the Vomitorium. Two-thirds of us were violently ill for a protracted period last week, prostate and one-third of us is on drugs. One-third of us is planning to snitch the drugs from the other third as soon as humanly possible because one-third of us never met pills we did not like! Shiny, ask shiny, ooh! Like a magpie, one-third of us is.

One-third of us may already have diabeetus!

One cat makes annoying noises under the bed.

One UPS driver once again claims we are not home when we are! We are very much at home. So at home that we wear slippers. We are super relaxed and ready to receive a UPS delivery.

Handwashing is key

October starts as a tickle in the back of your throat, a nagging little sensation that something bigger looms. I can get over this, you say. Let me take some zinc. The next thing you know, October has put a copy of “Star Wars: Episode I” in the dishwasher, unbeknownst to you. Why is there even a copy of that in this house? One can only blame A. Husband. Why did one marry someone with such poor taste? October is bungled logistics and petty grievances and the horror of taking a shower every day. October secretly arranged to go out to lunch with your Saturn Return and talk about you, and then they strike up a friendship born of shared distaste for you and stay up late on the phone, planning new pranks. I know, says October, I am going to call and ask if she has Prince Albert in a can! This wakes up a ybab, by the way.

If caught in time, October can be cured by a brisk walk and smoking an entire pack of cigarettes while listening to Ziggy Stardust on repeat five times. There is currently no vaccination for October, and even if there were, it would probably give you cankles and ennui. October is highly contagious. You may have contracted October just from reading this.

The only thing worse than October is November!

Oh, screw you, October, don’t make me take an adult ed pottery class. Don’t do me like that.

O, I has a blog

Just the other night, I was thinking I might write a blog post, and maybe even see if I could goad anyone into a content challenge, but then I encountered a group medical situation in my home. This situation has been reviewed by bystanders with phrases including “God hates you” and “OMG plague of Jaffa.” Sneak preview: herpangina!!!1111!!!!

So, I kind of forgot what I was going to write about. I think it had something to do with Dr. Who and might have been timely last week. Timely. Oh, I kill. I didn’t even mean to do that nerd pun. It just springs from my virus-ladden digits. It’s my 25th birthday again today. Each one keeps getting worse. Last year, the highlight of the day was not throwing the baby in the river and eating a burrito. This year, I can’t swallow food, so the burrito is out. Next year, I expect to accidentally teleport somewhere with a lot of lava. And Sarah Silverman. Man, I am just skipping next year.

925: Product Review: The Blendtec Total Blender/That Baby From the Grocery Store

Recently, my attention was directed to a blender by an alert husband. Because he’s pretty much the only person I’ve talked to this week, except for yelling at the receptionist at my doctor’s office.

Her: “Do you have insurance?”
Me: “DYING! DYING! DYING!” (slumps against wall to make this clear)
Her: “Well, it’s just that what we have on file has expired. Do you want to self-pay?”
Me: (inner monologue) I actually have very fancy insurance. However, husband or husband’s work colluded in such a way that the cards for new job’s insurance have not yet arrived prior to my throat rotting from within. Insurance rep was most unhelpful on the phone, as nature intended. Can I wheedle this frowsy wench into calling them to verify it for me, since I can barely talk?)
Me: “DYING!” (throws checkbook at her head).

This blender, the Blendtec Total Blender, can blend an iPhone. I give them credit for ripping off “Will it float?” from Letterman as “Will it blend?” I also give them credit for blending up a variety of dangerous objects into pure shrapnel pâté. I would buy this product if I ever did anything in the kitchen save rearrange the take out menus. I may buy this product anyway just to blend things. I have a shoe rack I don’t need anymore, but I don’t want to throw it out or summon the mouthbreathers from FreeCycle to my house.

Speaking of mouthbreathers, at the grocery store, I sometimes see really ugly babies. My ybab tends to get many approving looks and comments, for her beauty as well as her poise and charm. “Reeesh?” she might exclaim, magnanimously including the deli counter in a sweeping hand gesture. The market employees know her and come out to see her, summoning others from the back. “SHE’S here!”

Another baby might be waiting in line too, but that other baby is so ugly that he is not even offered free stuff. I look at the other mother, and I think “Wow, that’s what you go home to, lady?” I would pity her, except that emotion demeans us all. Clearly, that other baby is an inferior specimen in many ways even apart from its decided unattractiveness: lolling, drooling, not even making an attempt to communicate or observe its environment. I think of the clever lies we must all tell ourselves, convincing ourselves to get out of bed each morning, no matter how lackluster our lives may be. “But tonight, I will watch that show I like! I may even fast forward the commercials. Except I like that one with the guy who does that thing.” Or perhaps we look forward to using a certain glitter bodywash. I can’t really say. I don’t have these problems. Aside from a little hoof and mouth disease, my life is a dream, something so marvelous it used to be reserved only for people like Pat Sajak.