Hick has been working in Massachusetts this week. His company bought out a factory there, so he is coordinating the move of a multitude of machines. Hick is good with that stuff. He knows how to take it apart and put it back together. With a minimum of leftover parts.
Tonight he called to report that he spent $20 on a coat. "I had to," Hick said. "It's snowing here. And I have to load the truck all day tomorrow." Lest you think I begrudge him $20 for a coat, a HEAVY coat, as he informed me, I do not. It's just that he has a penchant for using the debit card and neglecting to show me receipts. So each week when I call the bank's automated number to keep track of checking account expenditures, I am left with several mystery purchases. All of which mystify Hick. Making me think we're being scammed by some minimum-wage Lowe's clerk after Hick uses the card. Just last week there were three unknown charges. Upon a severe poking with a sharp stick--I mean, a round of questioning under a bare lightbulb, Hick remembered that he had used the debit card at the pharmacy for extra medication to take on his trip, at a sporting goods store to purchase ammunition, and for a fifty-dollar charge for something to do with the airport. My hair is thinning. Not from old age, but from tearing it out by the fistfuls.
I was shocked to hear that Hick was loading a truck. "You mean you and your helpers have to carry stuff out? You'll have a heart attack in that weather!"
"We don't CARRY it. I run the forklift. I've been doing it all week. Today, the guy here who does what I do back at the plant asked to see my license! He said, 'I just figured you had one, so I let you run the forklift. But now I need to see it.' I told him of course I HAVE a license to operate the forklift. I am the one who trains people at work, to certify them for the forklift. He said, 'Well, you DID drive it forwards down the aisle, when you should have been going backwards.' And I told him, yeah, but I turned it around as soon as you asked me to. He agreed that I did. But he STILL wanted to see my license. Can you believe that? I had to call work and have them fax a copy. So I can still drive the forklift."
Something tells me there's more to that story.
Wednesday, November 7, 2012
Tuesday, November 6, 2012
Val Goes to the Ends of the Earth to Cast Her Vote
I just drove back from voting a couple hours ago, and boy is my carpal tunnel tired. But seriously...
It is difficult for me to vote in the early morning hours before work, because my polling place is in the opposite direction from my job. Ninth-graders wait for no woman, so it wouldn't do for me to be late because I got tied up in the voting booth. Not literally tied up. I'm sure that would count as some untoward type of kinky voter intimidation. Please excuse me for taking liberties with the word "booth". It is more like a flip-down diaper-changing table at my polling place. No sides to speak of. You're airing out your stinky baby's butt of a ballot for all inappropriate gawkers to see.
I vote in a little country church. I don't know the denomination, or any of the parishioners. It's an old rock building. Voting is in the basement, where smells of phantom church socials linger. Oops! That's the aroma of today's cooking for the old ladies manning the voter rolls. The rustic chapel resides six miles outside town. I don't know how many people are expected to Garmin their way to the middle of nowhere to vote. But an old-fashioned revival could not have filled that church to the gills like this election. The Pony and I had to stable the Tahoe in overflow parking. That's a side lot, almost gravel, on the upper end of the churchyard.
Hopefully, all voters were able-bodied. Because upon entering, one must hike down four uneven carpeted steps. A long table of mature women sit behind the voter registration books. I'm not sure if it's required by law, but everybody always hands over a driver's license to the book biddies. They page through the tomes of A-F, and G-L, and so on, depending on your last name. I was pleased to see that Hick had a big yellow sticker covering his name, with the legend ABSENTEE BALLOT over his sign-in space. That's because Hick voted Saturday, and is now cooling his steel-toed heels in Leominster, Massachusetts, on a workation from his job. No voter fraud here in Backroads.
After signing in with a red pen, I was shuffled along the table to another eldster who handed me a ballot. That's it. No instructions. She might as well have shoved a baby bird from the nest to fly or die. In past years, we've had an electronic machine or two. Not this time. But we had a lot of round tables, suitable for a poker tournament. Or perhaps not, depending on the religious affiliation of the churchmembers.
I wove my way through the close-proximitied tables, to one with just a man and his grandson. The seven-or-so-year-old occasionally asked Grampy a question. "Do you have to pay to vote? Is it true that if So-And-So is elected, he will make school three hours a day? That's what I heard at school." Most people sat at the tables. Only a couple used one of the three baby-changers. It was hard work filling in the ovals with a BIC black pen.
The after-work rush started as I was finishing. A lady plopped at my table, blocking my way out of the voter's maze. I looked like Ms. PacMan trying to find an alternate route. I resisted making that dying sound when a strapping eighteen-year-old first-time voter refused to yield to me at the narrow escape slot. Kids these days. They don't realize that the elderly have the right-of-way.
The fellow elderly, though, know where it's at. A gentleman motioned for me to go ahead of him at the ballot-eater. The shredder-looking machine that you feed your own ballot into. I was skeptical. I couldn't take time to read the directions with people lining up behind me. Besides, they might have been looking at my ballot. I was not going to be the one charged with inciting a rumpus in a church basement. No sirree Bob! That machine sucked my ballot in like an early-elementary child slurps a spaghetti noodle.
Mission accomplished.
It is difficult for me to vote in the early morning hours before work, because my polling place is in the opposite direction from my job. Ninth-graders wait for no woman, so it wouldn't do for me to be late because I got tied up in the voting booth. Not literally tied up. I'm sure that would count as some untoward type of kinky voter intimidation. Please excuse me for taking liberties with the word "booth". It is more like a flip-down diaper-changing table at my polling place. No sides to speak of. You're airing out your stinky baby's butt of a ballot for all inappropriate gawkers to see.
I vote in a little country church. I don't know the denomination, or any of the parishioners. It's an old rock building. Voting is in the basement, where smells of phantom church socials linger. Oops! That's the aroma of today's cooking for the old ladies manning the voter rolls. The rustic chapel resides six miles outside town. I don't know how many people are expected to Garmin their way to the middle of nowhere to vote. But an old-fashioned revival could not have filled that church to the gills like this election. The Pony and I had to stable the Tahoe in overflow parking. That's a side lot, almost gravel, on the upper end of the churchyard.
Hopefully, all voters were able-bodied. Because upon entering, one must hike down four uneven carpeted steps. A long table of mature women sit behind the voter registration books. I'm not sure if it's required by law, but everybody always hands over a driver's license to the book biddies. They page through the tomes of A-F, and G-L, and so on, depending on your last name. I was pleased to see that Hick had a big yellow sticker covering his name, with the legend ABSENTEE BALLOT over his sign-in space. That's because Hick voted Saturday, and is now cooling his steel-toed heels in Leominster, Massachusetts, on a workation from his job. No voter fraud here in Backroads.
After signing in with a red pen, I was shuffled along the table to another eldster who handed me a ballot. That's it. No instructions. She might as well have shoved a baby bird from the nest to fly or die. In past years, we've had an electronic machine or two. Not this time. But we had a lot of round tables, suitable for a poker tournament. Or perhaps not, depending on the religious affiliation of the churchmembers.
I wove my way through the close-proximitied tables, to one with just a man and his grandson. The seven-or-so-year-old occasionally asked Grampy a question. "Do you have to pay to vote? Is it true that if So-And-So is elected, he will make school three hours a day? That's what I heard at school." Most people sat at the tables. Only a couple used one of the three baby-changers. It was hard work filling in the ovals with a BIC black pen.
The after-work rush started as I was finishing. A lady plopped at my table, blocking my way out of the voter's maze. I looked like Ms. PacMan trying to find an alternate route. I resisted making that dying sound when a strapping eighteen-year-old first-time voter refused to yield to me at the narrow escape slot. Kids these days. They don't realize that the elderly have the right-of-way.
The fellow elderly, though, know where it's at. A gentleman motioned for me to go ahead of him at the ballot-eater. The shredder-looking machine that you feed your own ballot into. I was skeptical. I couldn't take time to read the directions with people lining up behind me. Besides, they might have been looking at my ballot. I was not going to be the one charged with inciting a rumpus in a church basement. No sirree Bob! That machine sucked my ballot in like an early-elementary child slurps a spaghetti noodle.
Mission accomplished.
Monday, November 5, 2012
Out of the Mouths
What's in a name?
That which we call a breaded pork chopette? By any other name would taste as...adequate.
Would YOU eat a breaded pork chopette? That's the question the students asked themselves this morning. Except for the one who called it a breaded pork chop-it. "What's with these names?" he inquired. Foolishly wasting his breath, which he should have been saving to better ask, upon setting eyes on his tray, "Why are the baked fries looking exactly like tri-tators?"
I don't get it. The school lunch regulations. The same regulations which say students can only have mashed potatoes twice a month apparently say they can have a breaded pork chopette and three potato triangles thicker than a McDonald's hash brown, plus some kind of cookie in a sealed bag like potato chips. And a Pop Tart or six-pack of little chocolate donuts with juice and milk for breakfast.
Their's not to reason why. Their's but to eat and sigh.
I bring my lunch.
That which we call a breaded pork chopette? By any other name would taste as...adequate.
Would YOU eat a breaded pork chopette? That's the question the students asked themselves this morning. Except for the one who called it a breaded pork chop-it. "What's with these names?" he inquired. Foolishly wasting his breath, which he should have been saving to better ask, upon setting eyes on his tray, "Why are the baked fries looking exactly like tri-tators?"
I don't get it. The school lunch regulations. The same regulations which say students can only have mashed potatoes twice a month apparently say they can have a breaded pork chopette and three potato triangles thicker than a McDonald's hash brown, plus some kind of cookie in a sealed bag like potato chips. And a Pop Tart or six-pack of little chocolate donuts with juice and milk for breakfast.
Their's not to reason why. Their's but to eat and sigh.
I bring my lunch.
Sunday, November 4, 2012
The $48,000 Envelope
Last Wednesday, I rushed to the dead-mouse-smelling post office after school to mail The $48,000 Envelope.
No. It wasn't an entry for the Publisher's Clearing House Sweepstakes. It was an application for a Chancellor's Scholarship to Missouri S&T. The student has to meet specific academic criteria to qualify. Fifteen of these scholarships are awarded to incoming freshmen. That's twelve thousand dollars a year, renewable, as long as a 3.25 grade point average is maintained.
The deadline was a postmark of November 1. Genius had been toying with the idea of applying for quite a while. Upon receiving his last ACT score of 35 (out of a possible 36), he checked into it again, and saw the rapidly-approaching cut-off date. He rounded up his references, wrote a required editorial response on the subject of gas price control, and requested an official transcript to be mailed by the counselor. The office brought me the packet in a manilla envelope, ready for posting.
Perhaps you remember some of my previous dealings with the dead-mouse-smelling post office. How I did not feel that they handled some of my writing contest submissions with the proper amount of reverence. Things have not changed.
I pushed The $48,000 Envelope across the counter to the postal clerk. He tossed it onto a scale. Without even wiping it down with alcohol! There could have been cocaine crumbs on there. Or fecal matter.
"Will that have today's postmark? October 31st?"
"That's what this sticker will say. October 31st."
"It's my son's scholarship application."
Postal Quirk did not even dignify that with a response. Like mothers brought him scholarship applications that could decide the future of their first-born sons all day, every day. He printed the sticker and stuck it on. Without even measuring the distance from the top and side of the envelope! Just slapped it on there, all willy-nilly, not caring whether or not it was geometrically correct! We're talkin' about a scholarship application to Missouri S&T here. Not a portfolio to the Picasso Institute of Matchbook Cover Art! An engineering school. Where precision is a virtue.
Furthermore, Postal Quirk tossed that envelope sideways into a gray plastic tub. Rather than carrying it on a red velvet pillow to the back of the mail truck and securing it with a special Velcro seatbelt made just for scholarship applications to Missouri S&T.
Genius did not grasp the gravity of this situation. He thinks of S&T as his fall-back choice. His safety school. I look at it as MY number one choice. Genius has already officially applied, and has an offer of a scholarship packet that amounts to almost 71 percent of this very special scholarship. But still...
Momma needs to have adequate 44 oz. Diet Coke money in her golden years.
No. It wasn't an entry for the Publisher's Clearing House Sweepstakes. It was an application for a Chancellor's Scholarship to Missouri S&T. The student has to meet specific academic criteria to qualify. Fifteen of these scholarships are awarded to incoming freshmen. That's twelve thousand dollars a year, renewable, as long as a 3.25 grade point average is maintained.
The deadline was a postmark of November 1. Genius had been toying with the idea of applying for quite a while. Upon receiving his last ACT score of 35 (out of a possible 36), he checked into it again, and saw the rapidly-approaching cut-off date. He rounded up his references, wrote a required editorial response on the subject of gas price control, and requested an official transcript to be mailed by the counselor. The office brought me the packet in a manilla envelope, ready for posting.
Perhaps you remember some of my previous dealings with the dead-mouse-smelling post office. How I did not feel that they handled some of my writing contest submissions with the proper amount of reverence. Things have not changed.
I pushed The $48,000 Envelope across the counter to the postal clerk. He tossed it onto a scale. Without even wiping it down with alcohol! There could have been cocaine crumbs on there. Or fecal matter.
"Will that have today's postmark? October 31st?"
"That's what this sticker will say. October 31st."
"It's my son's scholarship application."
Postal Quirk did not even dignify that with a response. Like mothers brought him scholarship applications that could decide the future of their first-born sons all day, every day. He printed the sticker and stuck it on. Without even measuring the distance from the top and side of the envelope! Just slapped it on there, all willy-nilly, not caring whether or not it was geometrically correct! We're talkin' about a scholarship application to Missouri S&T here. Not a portfolio to the Picasso Institute of Matchbook Cover Art! An engineering school. Where precision is a virtue.
Furthermore, Postal Quirk tossed that envelope sideways into a gray plastic tub. Rather than carrying it on a red velvet pillow to the back of the mail truck and securing it with a special Velcro seatbelt made just for scholarship applications to Missouri S&T.
Genius did not grasp the gravity of this situation. He thinks of S&T as his fall-back choice. His safety school. I look at it as MY number one choice. Genius has already officially applied, and has an offer of a scholarship packet that amounts to almost 71 percent of this very special scholarship. But still...
Momma needs to have adequate 44 oz. Diet Coke money in her golden years.
Saturday, November 3, 2012
The Lost Art of Cooling One's Jets
People need to be less impulsive.
Seriously. We are human beings. Not animals. Apparently, a large portion of the populace of Backroads has never seen The Elephant Man.
I stopped by my soda-supplier on the way home yesterday. Grabbed my fill-up cup from the passenger seat of my Tahoe, and practically danced a "Wouldn't you like to be a Pepper, too?" jig into that convenience store. Not that I was after a Dr. Pepper, mind you. We all know that Diet Coke is my dark master. But I was elated with anticipation. I only partake of the magical elixir on weekends during the school year.
As luck would have it, another customer had arrived in Cokeland afore me. So I did what any sensible adult would do, and stood back a few feet from the soda bar. Stood right there by the pyramid of the beer of the week, patiently waiting my turn. Three-Soda Annie was jawing with the dude who gives me free refills. I could tell by his voice, even though he was hidden behind the scenes like Oz the Great and Terrible. Three-Soda Annie had already drawn her sodas. She was rummaging through the lids. But her bounty was scattered about the counter without their tops.
"You hit me in the head! Watch what you're doing with that ice, buddy!"
Though I was a bit hurt that Soda Dude has another close personal customer, I did not begrudge them their banter. I could picture him deadpanning his response, while standing on a soda crate and pouring cubed ice from a white ten-gallon drywall bucket into the dispenser. Three pieces of said ice observing me insouciantly from where they rested on the terra cotta tile. "There's no way I could hit you on the head with a piece of ice!" declared Soda Dude. As a square popped over the gap at the top of the soda dispenser, which has not fit properly in that custom-made space since they replaced it two months ago.
"Don't worry. I'll just kick it out of the way so nobody slips on it and sues you." Three-Soda Annie side-kicked the cubes under the edge of the cabinet. She went back to wrestling with the lids and straws.
This all happened in the span of a gnat's wing-flutter. A long-haired methy woman walked in with a younger guy as I stood waiting. She barged ahead. Looked at me with a wary eye. Like my dogs look at each other just before breaking for whatever leftover treat I have tossed onto the porch. Just before they snarl and gnash their teeth until one winner emerges and the other two cower in submission. I did not meet her eye. I've heard that's a sign of aggression.
Methy Woman grabbed a 32 oz. foam cup out of the wall hole. Lightweight. She gave Younger Guy a look of annoyance. Pertaining to me. I could tell. Then she sneered in my direction. Rolled her eyes. I edged closer to the soda bar. The ice dispensers at BOTH ends work now. Careful not to tip over one-third of Three-Soda Annie's beverage haul, I rattled a tiny bit of ice into my refill cup. Three-Soda Annie gathered her be-topped bevy of potables and scooted off to the register. I moved over to the Diet Coke spout.
Methy Woman sprang into action. She pressed that ice lever like a famished lab rat hitting his self-feeder in an obesity experiment. She shot Mountain Dew into her wide-mouthed cup while her own wide mouth practically salivated. As soon as it topped off, she bent her head over and SLURPED like a cowboy at a babbling brook. A drag rider, the cowboy at the back of the herd, after traveling twelve hours across the Dust Bowl. She darted around me and snatched a plastic lid, taking another loud SLURP before covering her caffeine and poking a straw into it.
Something tells me that Methy Woman has not even a passing acquaintance with Emily Post.
Seriously. We are human beings. Not animals. Apparently, a large portion of the populace of Backroads has never seen The Elephant Man.
I stopped by my soda-supplier on the way home yesterday. Grabbed my fill-up cup from the passenger seat of my Tahoe, and practically danced a "Wouldn't you like to be a Pepper, too?" jig into that convenience store. Not that I was after a Dr. Pepper, mind you. We all know that Diet Coke is my dark master. But I was elated with anticipation. I only partake of the magical elixir on weekends during the school year.
As luck would have it, another customer had arrived in Cokeland afore me. So I did what any sensible adult would do, and stood back a few feet from the soda bar. Stood right there by the pyramid of the beer of the week, patiently waiting my turn. Three-Soda Annie was jawing with the dude who gives me free refills. I could tell by his voice, even though he was hidden behind the scenes like Oz the Great and Terrible. Three-Soda Annie had already drawn her sodas. She was rummaging through the lids. But her bounty was scattered about the counter without their tops.
"You hit me in the head! Watch what you're doing with that ice, buddy!"
Though I was a bit hurt that Soda Dude has another close personal customer, I did not begrudge them their banter. I could picture him deadpanning his response, while standing on a soda crate and pouring cubed ice from a white ten-gallon drywall bucket into the dispenser. Three pieces of said ice observing me insouciantly from where they rested on the terra cotta tile. "There's no way I could hit you on the head with a piece of ice!" declared Soda Dude. As a square popped over the gap at the top of the soda dispenser, which has not fit properly in that custom-made space since they replaced it two months ago.
"Don't worry. I'll just kick it out of the way so nobody slips on it and sues you." Three-Soda Annie side-kicked the cubes under the edge of the cabinet. She went back to wrestling with the lids and straws.
This all happened in the span of a gnat's wing-flutter. A long-haired methy woman walked in with a younger guy as I stood waiting. She barged ahead. Looked at me with a wary eye. Like my dogs look at each other just before breaking for whatever leftover treat I have tossed onto the porch. Just before they snarl and gnash their teeth until one winner emerges and the other two cower in submission. I did not meet her eye. I've heard that's a sign of aggression.
Methy Woman grabbed a 32 oz. foam cup out of the wall hole. Lightweight. She gave Younger Guy a look of annoyance. Pertaining to me. I could tell. Then she sneered in my direction. Rolled her eyes. I edged closer to the soda bar. The ice dispensers at BOTH ends work now. Careful not to tip over one-third of Three-Soda Annie's beverage haul, I rattled a tiny bit of ice into my refill cup. Three-Soda Annie gathered her be-topped bevy of potables and scooted off to the register. I moved over to the Diet Coke spout.
Methy Woman sprang into action. She pressed that ice lever like a famished lab rat hitting his self-feeder in an obesity experiment. She shot Mountain Dew into her wide-mouthed cup while her own wide mouth practically salivated. As soon as it topped off, she bent her head over and SLURPED like a cowboy at a babbling brook. A drag rider, the cowboy at the back of the herd, after traveling twelve hours across the Dust Bowl. She darted around me and snatched a plastic lid, taking another loud SLURP before covering her caffeine and poking a straw into it.
Something tells me that Methy Woman has not even a passing acquaintance with Emily Post.
Friday, November 2, 2012
A Study of Two Misdiagnoses
I must thank you all for expressing your concern about my recent liver ailment. Even thought it turned out to be merely a case of overwork and old age and a sore diaphragm, not a liver ailment. You have warmed the cockles of my hepatic vein. And I must especially thank my newest commenter, whose comment you will not read in the comments section, but here, on the blog proper:
My name is WITHHELD, I am from Ukraine, I am 32 years old man. I don't smoke cigarettes and don't drink alcohol. My blood is O+ and I have a good health. If you need liver transplant I am ready to give part of my liver, but I want to receive a big compensation for that. WITHHELD@yahoo.com WITHHELD@yandex.ua P.S. This is not a joke and I am not a scammer or cheater.
What a selfless act of generosity! WITHHELD is willing to part with a part of his liver. Just for ME! Of course he would like a big compensation. Selfless generosity has its price, it seems.
Thank you for the offer, WITHHELD. But I think I'll keep my own liver. Old as it is. It hasn't failed me yet. And you, WITHHELD, I am awarding a berth of honor in my 5PAM folder. For old time's sake.
Genius was not amused by my malingering liver. He sat with his head propped up in the corner of the exam room at the convenient care clinic last evening, rocking a 100-degree fever that he had battled since Sunday. To pass the time while waiting on the nurse practitioner, I regaled him with tales of my aches and pains.
"I can't take it anymore," Genius announced to the walls that had ears. To the entire waiting room full of virus- and bacteria-shedding ambulatory Petri dishes on the other side of that thin sheet of drywall. "I can only take so much stupidity in one day. I have reached my limit. Make it stop!"
I might add that this came after a Scooby Doo gummy treat plopped onto the floor in front of The Pony, who was swinging his legs from atop the exam table, running interference for a time with those eavesdropping diseases-in-waiting by crinkling the paper atop the table to beat the band.
"What is wrong with him? How can you have a gummy fall out of you like that?"
The Pony looked at the ceiling. "I don't know. I don't remember eating a Scooby Doo gummy today. It must have been in my pocket for a loooong time."
Let the record show that I wash and dry The Pony's clothes every week. No gummy would survive intact like the green Mystery Machine that sprang full-blown from some portion of The Pony's person. The Pony hopped down. Picked it up. Inspected it. Threw it away. As we left the office and crossed the parking lot, I spied a spilled-open packet of gummies in a vacant parking space.
"Huh. I'm guessing you took that path when you walked into the office to meet me."
"I think I DID walk that way."
Diaphragms impersonate livers, and a Scooby Doo gummy hitches a ride on the bottom of a shoe. It's a crazy, mixed-up world out there.
My name is WITHHELD, I am from Ukraine, I am 32 years old man. I don't smoke cigarettes and don't drink alcohol. My blood is O+ and I have a good health. If you need liver transplant I am ready to give part of my liver, but I want to receive a big compensation for that. WITHHELD@yahoo.com WITHHELD@yandex.ua P.S. This is not a joke and I am not a scammer or cheater.
What a selfless act of generosity! WITHHELD is willing to part with a part of his liver. Just for ME! Of course he would like a big compensation. Selfless generosity has its price, it seems.
Thank you for the offer, WITHHELD. But I think I'll keep my own liver. Old as it is. It hasn't failed me yet. And you, WITHHELD, I am awarding a berth of honor in my 5PAM folder. For old time's sake.
Genius was not amused by my malingering liver. He sat with his head propped up in the corner of the exam room at the convenient care clinic last evening, rocking a 100-degree fever that he had battled since Sunday. To pass the time while waiting on the nurse practitioner, I regaled him with tales of my aches and pains.
"I can't take it anymore," Genius announced to the walls that had ears. To the entire waiting room full of virus- and bacteria-shedding ambulatory Petri dishes on the other side of that thin sheet of drywall. "I can only take so much stupidity in one day. I have reached my limit. Make it stop!"
I might add that this came after a Scooby Doo gummy treat plopped onto the floor in front of The Pony, who was swinging his legs from atop the exam table, running interference for a time with those eavesdropping diseases-in-waiting by crinkling the paper atop the table to beat the band.
"What is wrong with him? How can you have a gummy fall out of you like that?"
The Pony looked at the ceiling. "I don't know. I don't remember eating a Scooby Doo gummy today. It must have been in my pocket for a loooong time."
Let the record show that I wash and dry The Pony's clothes every week. No gummy would survive intact like the green Mystery Machine that sprang full-blown from some portion of The Pony's person. The Pony hopped down. Picked it up. Inspected it. Threw it away. As we left the office and crossed the parking lot, I spied a spilled-open packet of gummies in a vacant parking space.
"Huh. I'm guessing you took that path when you walked into the office to meet me."
"I think I DID walk that way."
Diaphragms impersonate livers, and a Scooby Doo gummy hitches a ride on the bottom of a shoe. It's a crazy, mixed-up world out there.
Thursday, November 1, 2012
Please Help Me Mend My Broken Liver...and Let Me Liver Again
Yesterday morning, I feared that my liver was failing.
You know how it is. You cough, and a spasm surges through your liver. A crampy spasm. Don't tell me people in this day and age don't know where their liver is located. Surely you have all received adequate anatomy instruction in the public schools of our great nation. The liver is on your right side. Tucked up in under your ribs, with part of it hanging out. Not hanging out of your body. That wouldn't be right, unless you'd accidentally cut yourself rather badly, and sliced through the abdominals and fascia. Your liver has four lobes. Did you know that you can donate a part of your liver for transplant into somebody else, and two people can live quite nicely on one liver? But enough about generic liver facts. Let's get back to MY liver.
I started to get a bit worried. I treat my liver well. No alcohol to metabolize for MY liver. He's a teetotaller. Don't want him coming down with cirrhosis, by cracky! And no intravenous drug use or promiscuous sex to expose him to hepatitis. Yellow is not a good color on Val. She would not wear jaundice well. I don't make it a habit to go about my day kissing multitudes of people. So mononucleosis should steer clear of my liver. And I most certainly do not overdose on acetaminophen. I know that's a liver no-no. What could give me such spasms with a simple cough? Sure, I've been sick over the last ten days. But a round of azithromycin nipped that blight in the bud. So my liver should be in the pink of health, filtering blood cells willy-nilly, not even noticing that void in the middle where my gallbladder used to reside.
Then the truth hit me like a cartoon frying pan over my cartoon head, with stars and birdies circling my noggin. I am getting old!
There was no injury to my liver. My diaphragm was sore. Don't tell me people in this day and age don't know where their diaphragm is located. Surely you have all received adequate anatomy instruction in the public schools of our great nation. Or at least in your choir class in eighth grade. Your diaphragm separates your thoracic cavity from your abdominal cavity. It keeps your lungs from touching your liver. It also enables you to breathe. It's a big ol' muscle. As long as we're discussing structure, we might as well discuss function. Or not. Because all I really wanted to say was that my diaphragm was aching from overuse.
Apparently, when old people practice CPR on a dummy for two hours, the diaphragm is sorely taxed. The liver, on the other hand, never breaks a sweat.
You know how it is. You cough, and a spasm surges through your liver. A crampy spasm. Don't tell me people in this day and age don't know where their liver is located. Surely you have all received adequate anatomy instruction in the public schools of our great nation. The liver is on your right side. Tucked up in under your ribs, with part of it hanging out. Not hanging out of your body. That wouldn't be right, unless you'd accidentally cut yourself rather badly, and sliced through the abdominals and fascia. Your liver has four lobes. Did you know that you can donate a part of your liver for transplant into somebody else, and two people can live quite nicely on one liver? But enough about generic liver facts. Let's get back to MY liver.
I started to get a bit worried. I treat my liver well. No alcohol to metabolize for MY liver. He's a teetotaller. Don't want him coming down with cirrhosis, by cracky! And no intravenous drug use or promiscuous sex to expose him to hepatitis. Yellow is not a good color on Val. She would not wear jaundice well. I don't make it a habit to go about my day kissing multitudes of people. So mononucleosis should steer clear of my liver. And I most certainly do not overdose on acetaminophen. I know that's a liver no-no. What could give me such spasms with a simple cough? Sure, I've been sick over the last ten days. But a round of azithromycin nipped that blight in the bud. So my liver should be in the pink of health, filtering blood cells willy-nilly, not even noticing that void in the middle where my gallbladder used to reside.
Then the truth hit me like a cartoon frying pan over my cartoon head, with stars and birdies circling my noggin. I am getting old!
There was no injury to my liver. My diaphragm was sore. Don't tell me people in this day and age don't know where their diaphragm is located. Surely you have all received adequate anatomy instruction in the public schools of our great nation. Or at least in your choir class in eighth grade. Your diaphragm separates your thoracic cavity from your abdominal cavity. It keeps your lungs from touching your liver. It also enables you to breathe. It's a big ol' muscle. As long as we're discussing structure, we might as well discuss function. Or not. Because all I really wanted to say was that my diaphragm was aching from overuse.
Apparently, when old people practice CPR on a dummy for two hours, the diaphragm is sorely taxed. The liver, on the other hand, never breaks a sweat.
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