Category: Etc. Etc. Etc.

Nothing on a Stick for Me, Thanks

~ Judy ~ 2 Comments
IT'S JUST LIKE BEING THERE.

Five days left of The Great Minnesota Get-Together and I won’t make it again this year. I have nothing against the state fair; I just think you can go once every ten years and not miss much. As far as I know, eau de greasy food is still the prevailing scent, Princess Kay of the Milky Way still has her head sculpted in 85 pounds of butter, that guy at the Food Building is still hawking a veggie chopper, the smell from the poultry barn will still knock out a small child, and the line for mini donuts is halfway down the block.

I love mini donuts. What are they, four bucks a dozen now? I was pretty sure the deep-fried Snickers bar must be the highest-calorie item at the fair, but it turns out that twelve mini donuts (720 calories) beats out the Snickers (444). Taking the blue ribbon for calorie content: fried cheese curds (1,140 calories per 7-oz. container). Top it off with a trip to the beer garden and the only thing left is to waddle home and fall on the couch in a stupor.

I’m a sucker for all those Miracle products they pitch at the Grandstand too. The Miracle vibrating back pillow, the Miracle 2-stage cabinet cleaner, the Miracle mop – all items I have purchased, brought home and never looked at again. I will stand in awe for 20 minutes listening to someone talk about the life-changing properties of plum blossom honey. Obviously, life isn’t fit for living without several jars of honey in the cupboard.

But I have more than enough honey. I still have that miracle cabinet cleaner, for that matter. So no, I am not going to join the wandering masses sporting foam fish hats and “I’m With Stupid” t-shirts. Even though I would kill for some mini donuts.

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What’s With All the Penguins?

~ Judy ~ Leave a comment
MILLIONS OF PENGUINS DOING THEIR USUAL NOTHING

I would just like to know, when did penguins become so popular? And why? People just can’t seem to get enough penguin movies, to say nothing of T-shirts, refrigerator magnets and thong panties. Slap a penguin on it and get rich.

I’m guessing the tipping point was the film The March of the Penguins, which won an Oscar for best documentary in 2006, so I assumed it must be good. It’s penguins marching. The penguins march to the sea, the penguins march back. Then they march to the sea, then they march back. Then they march… I get it! Who cares?

Since then it’s been nothing but penguin films. Penguins relocating from one place to another, penguins lost and in trouble (no wonder), animated penguins dancing and telling jokes. Thirty years from now it will be a movie genre: Film Noir, Classic American Western, Penguin.

Which brings me to the reason why penguins have been on my mind. It seems a 10-month-old, 22-pound penguin from Antarctica got lost and ended up 2,000 miles away on a New Zealand beach last week. The story caught my eye because I happen to have a 10-month-old, 22-pound grandson, who just last weekend was lying in the doorway between my living and dining rooms, unsure if he should crawl into the living room, where the DVD player is within reach, or the dining room, where Mom was, so he just laid there paralyzed by indecision.

You’d think someone would rescue the lost penguin and send it home, but authorities say they don’t want to mess with nature, which if true would have to be a first for humankind. No, they are waiting for the befuddled adolescent to jump back into the ocean and reorient itself in the general direction of Antarctica. Excuse me? That’s a little like asking Baby Bret to navigate from my living room to his house 20 miles away. Good luck, little penguin.

Bloggery Potpourri

~ Judy ~ 3 Comments

We’re all lucky to be alive
Slowly but surely the winter from hell is passing. It was a long, treacherous haul, and I’m just glad no fool driving his truck too fast for the road conditions slid into my little car. Back in January, a Minnesota man ended up in the hospital when his car hit a cow and it went through the windshield. Thank the lord, the man wasn’t seriously injured, because how embarrassing would it be to die in a car-cow collision? His mother, who was in the car but unhurt, said she felt sorry for her son but she felt bad for the cow too. So that’s something else to be watchful for in winter. A cow wandering in the cold isn’t going to be as alert as usual, and a cow isn’t the smartest animal in the barn to begin with. Pigs. I heard pigs are pretty smart.

Happy Birthday to me
I had a birthday this week. I didn’t want to, but it was forced upon me by people who supposedly love me. They are not the kind of people who will leave something like that alone. This year I got handmade cards and money from three of the grandkids. Maria gave me a very crumpled dollar bill with the suggestion, “You can buy a dounut in the morning.” Christian glued a dime in his card and wrote, “Dear Grandma, I know it’s your birthday and I want to know when are we going to sleep over?” No money in Grace’s card, just the inscription: “Dear Grandma Judy, I love you very much. God loves you eternally.” So a whole different direction there.

So now I’m a Pisces?
You may have heard that some astrologers are now questioning the accuracy of the dates assigned to the zodiac. Big brouhaha. I won’t get into the whole gravity thing, but they’re saying because the earth wobbles on its axis, the stars’ alignment has gotten out of whack and we all have to back up a month. Well, I for one am a little peeved. Just how are we supposed to tell the sensitive, idealistic people from the friendly, adaptable people now? I have been an Aries all my life. We are fiery, take-charge kind of folks. I don’t want to be a Pisces. Fish are wishy-washy and they can’t make up their minds about anything. On the other hand, this may explain why things didn’t turn out the way I planned on May 11, 2008.

Proof again that crime doesn’t pay
From the local news: a St. Paul man was sentenced to 60 days in jail last month for stealing packages off front porches over the holidays. He was caught with twelve bathrobes, a box of ornaments and a box of steaks. Obviously, the steaks are long gone. So basically the guy is sitting in jail for a dozen bathrobes. What an idiot. Not as big an idiot as Charlie Sheen, but an idiot nonetheless.

My Left Foot

~ Judy ~ Leave a comment
THE VIRGIN FOOT (NOT VIRGIN'S FOOT), PLAIN AND WHITE, THE WAY GOD MADE IT

I finally got a tattoo this week. It didn’t take long, maybe a half-hour, but it hurt like hell, yes it did. Also, it’s a bigger tattoo than I expected to come out with, which is the kind of thing that happens to me. It isn’t that I’m unprepared. I’m a big planner. I plan and plan. Then I leave the plan at home and take off running as fast as I can, until I land in a spot that may or may not look familiar. It sort of works for me.

Uptown Tattoo looks exactly like you’d expect a tattoo place to look – kind of old, dark and funky, with every available surface covered in weird art. Not necessarily tattoo art, just weird art. And of course the artists have a lot of tattoos themselves, so you almost don’t know where to look. There is a stereotype of tattoo artists that didn’t seem to fit. For the most part they seemed smart, friendly and well-spoken. And covered in tattoos.

I like my tattoo a lot. I’d say that I should have done it sooner, but then it wouldn’t be this tattoo but some other tattoo that I probably wouldn’t like as much. It was designed by my friend Sunshine (a talented art director and undoubtedly old soul) and then fiddled with by me. So it is a one-of-a-kind tattoo. It includes five stars, one for each grandchild, with the option of adding more stars if people continue to be as fertile as they have been. I have no regrets.

FOOT WITH INK

Whatever You Do, Don’t Look Back

~ Judy ~ 2 Comments
RESOLVED: BUY MORE CUTE SHOES

Made my list of New Year’s resolutions yet again. I find that list-making gives me a sense of accomplishment, almost like actually doing the things on the list. Probably the only 2010 resolution I kept was quitting smoking, a big surprise to me and no doubt others, motivated primarily by fear. I may have kept other resolutions. I don’t remember them anymore.

Reflection is good though. I wanted to reflect on the many memorable events of last year, but for the most part I just came up with things that annoyed me, like:

1. The stitches behind and under my ear were supposedly removed two weeks after surgery, yet every other week another fragment of surgical thread works its way up and I have to yank it out myself. Is this my job? It’s gross.

2. Hi-lex has lost the bleach war. It’s a mystery to me, but there you are. I don’t like Clorox, i.e., chlorine bleach; I like Hi-lex, i.e., some other kind of bleach not chlorine that gets clothes really white. I knew of one major chain that still carried Hi-lex (a tiny island amid a sea of chlorine on the shelves), but in 2010 that store too bowed to the god Clorox. Civilization has taken a step backward, if you ask me.

3. Just when it looked like we may be nearing the end of the Paris/Britney/Lindsay madness, along came the Kim/Khloe/Kourtney insanity. “Keeping Up With the Kardashians” actually won a People’s Choice Award this week (Best Guilty Pleasure). If, like me, you were trying to retain a shred of faith in the American viewing public, just forget it.

4. How is it that younger women today do not understand the concept of The Slip? One of last year’s popular fashion trends was the little print dress in silk, rayon and other clingy fabrics. Fine, but please, look in the rear-view mirror. The only people behind you who enjoy seeing every bump, bulge and ripple of cellulite are people you probably wouldn’t want to be alone with. The Slip. Learn of it.

5. Billy Joel had double hip replacement. Billy Joel! How old does that make you feel? They said it was for a lifelong congenital ailment. Right.

Maybe remembering the things that annoyed you isn’t the most positive way to start a new year. I did get a beautiful, if fat, new grandson. And I also bought some very cute shoes.

“There will be a rain dance Friday night, weather permitting.” –George Carlin

~ Judy ~ Leave a comment

So the weather. There’s just no predicting it. It’s only December 7. and we’ve already had two snowstorms, both with horrible timing. Minnesota winters aren’t nearly as cold as some people think, but they make up for it in perversity.

I lost two trees in that first heavy snowstorm on November 12. I didn’t know it till the thirteenth, when I came home from the hospital, all medicated up and miserable, and found them blocking the driveway. It was a shock. My daughter Jessica, who was driving me home after spending the night in one of those plastic-covered bed-chairs the hospital provides as a deterrent, was driving a little fast, because the street hadn’t been plowed yet (big surprise) and when that happens you have to take a good run at the driveway lest you miss it and end up stuck down in the cul-de-sac. So when she came around the curve and saw the downed trees, she decided to take a quick left past the mailbox and into the front yard instead, where she did indeed get stuck. (To be fair, I may have been screaming instructions at her.)

So there we were. Jessica was wondering, “How am I going to get my bootless, drugged-up mother into the house?” and I was thinking, “For the love of God, will I always be at the mercy of the fates and Minnesota weather?” Then I just opened the car door and, weaving a little, stomped into the house.

Last Friday’s snowstorm wasn’t as wet or heavy, but it lasted all day, and by the time I set out for Maria and Grace’s dance recital that night, every car on the freeway had given up trying to find a lane and simply stopped, as cars on the freeway will do for no apparent reason. I mushed on for 45 minutes before I turned around and mushed back home.

We live in Minnesota. We endure. The trees were cleared out of the driveway, the car was dug out, and there was a matinee performance of the dance recital on Saturday. Big cold snap coming next week.

We Don’t Need No Stinking Soda Crackers

~ Judy ~ 1 Comment

That’s it. I’ve had it with surgery. If anything else goes whacko with this body, the doctors will have to make an extraordinary case for operating, and I’m not sure “or you will die” would do it. Had the tumor on my parotid gland removed last Friday and it was horrible. I wanted to die then for sure.

The thing is, I am not the best patient – ask my children, they’ll tell you. I complain, I argue, I don’t do as I’m told. I self-medicate – in the hospital, at home, I don’t care. It makes everyone crazy. And then in the hospital one is at the mercy of strangers, which keeps you from cursing as much as you might like. Some things I wanted to say in the 24 hours after surgery but didn’t:

1)  There is no anesthesia in the world that doesn’t make me nauseous, so there’s no point in telling me it shouldn’t. As my personal definition of hell is 23 hours a day of nausea and one hour of anticipation, it’s fortunate for you that there was nothing close enough to throw when I found out you were giving me only a half-dose of nausea medication. Finally, I do not want a soda cracker. If you keep pushing it, I will have to kill you.

2)  It seems no matter what time I ask, it isn’t time for more morphine. Really, is there a morphine shortage I haven’t heard about? Why are you hoarding it? Give me some!

3)  I have an IV taped to my left hand to put liquids in, another taped to my neck to take liquids out, and every other hour I have to wear inflatable leg wraps. If there is an optimal position for comfort in these circumstances, I have not discovered it. The bed is a rock, and none of its 56 amazing positions will change that. The pillow is a rock on top of a rock.

4)  Not only is my right ear and everything in the vicinity completely numb, it has the appearance of a breast implant gone terribly wrong. The scar below said ear looks like an amateur map of the Lewis & Clark Expedition. And I have bacitracin ointment in my hair. I do not feel pretty.

I can imagine the thousands of cell phone minutes burned when my daughters learned I was having surgery. “Who’s staying with Mom? What’s the plan? We need a plan!” They are patient and tolerant and sympathetic in the extreme, and after a day or so, I have to kick them out lest they lose their patience, tolerance and sympathy.

Those nodules on my thyroid gland? They will be the size of hard-boiled eggs before we part company.

Remedial Blogging

~ Judy ~ 2 Comments
REMORSE

I know. Long time no blog. I was sick. I was tired. I was sick and tired of being sick and tired. I got a prescription. I feel better.

Looking back:

10/27 – e-mail to lottery-playing coworkers

The Powerball pool has gotten completely off track. No point in denying it. I know it and you know it. We actually ran out of money last Wednesday, but that’s okay because I didn’t buy a ticket for Saturday anyway. I have a lot of excuses you don’t want to hear. “Where’s the money?” That’s all you people care about. So let us move along briskly.

To be in the next round, drop off your dollar by noon Friday. You’ll want to get it in quickly. By this time next week, I expect to be intolerable. I started taking Chantix on Monday (you take it for a week before you quit smoking). I expect no pats on the back, because I DON’T WANT TO QUIT. I won’t be wanting encouragement next week, I’ll be wanting a damn cigarette.

See, I’m getting grumpy already. Out of sheer rebellion, I’ve decided to get a tattoo.

10/29 – e-mail to lottery-playing coworkers

I don’t want to name names, but some of you still owe me money. Stop procrastinating.

I’m down to half a pack of cigarettes and no plan. You’re supposed to have a plan. I don’t have a plan, and that’s the story of my life. It’s crunch time, action is required, but the only plan I have is something vague in the back of my brain… quit smoking, don’t overeat, exercise more, meditate…make a plan!

By Sunday night, I’ll probably be scaring the trick-or-treaters.

10/30 – notes on babysitting for Cosette and Baby Bret while their parents go to a Halloween party

Obviously these two (Gina and Bret) need to get away. They were standing in the doorway ready to leave just about the time I picked up Baby Bret, who was screaming loud enough to curdle breast milk. They looked at me, smiled, said “Bye” and never looked back. This would have been unheard of when Cosette was three months old. The times they are a-changin’.

10/31 – notes on quitting smoking

Quit smoking. Big whoop. It’s going okay. I guess.

You always have to choose, don’t you.

Doctor Who?

~ Judy ~ 1 Comment

I am behind on my blogging but not without cause. Fall is always chaotic at work, where Christmas starts around September 1 and doesn’t end till Halloween, by which time I am usually grateful I didn’t shoot the last person who asked me to move a comma. Then I like to spend fall weekends moving a half-million leaves from one spot in the yard to another, which is what comes from living surrounded by your so-called majestic oaks.

So. Why not continue on the subject of health and put one thing to rest.

I have learned more about the world of glands in the last two weeks than in the last 20 years, most notably that the doctor you see about one kind (thyroid) is not the doctor you see about another kind (parotid), even though the two glands are about 5 inches apart. No, you have to make twice as many doctor visits to get the full picture on any glandular issues.

I also learned that two specialists who work in the same clinic, on the same floor and down the hall from each other, can be completely unaware of each other’s existence. In fact, one may be unable to pronounce the other’s name.

I saw the endocrinologist last week to get the results of Biopsy #2 (memorable for being stuck in the neck an added 16 to 17 times, because, gosh, we found some more of these things and, hey, why not check them out while you’re here!) and learned that my several thyroid nodules, while ugly, happily are not killing me. (I know they’re ugly because I searched online, where there are about eleventeen different kinds of nodules, all ugly as sin.)

I asked the endocrinologist for an opinion on Biopsy #1 while I was there, and that’s when I learned that he doesn’t do parotid. Said you might as well ask a dentist about your bunions. Said he didn’t know anything about it and wasn’t about to venture an opinion. Which is a big fat lie. He’s a doctor. Of course he has an opinion, one he isn’t about to share with me.

This week I go to the Ear Nose & Throat doctor, where I hope to get the final word on nodules and put this whole sordid experience behind me, except I probably won’t because I’m pretty sure one of them has to come out. Nevertheless, let’s just give it a rest for a while. I’m sick of nodules and I’m sure you are too.