Archive for November, 2010

In Jean Shepherd’s A Christmas Story, Mr. Parker (the “old man”) is purported to have a wild love for turkey that is unsurpassed by any other person’s avian affections.

I beg to differ, for I love turkey more than life itself. My mouth begins salivating for that damnable bird weeks before Thanksgiving. I imagine it perfectly browned, stuffed to bursting, as moist as can be, and slathered in gravy.

As soon as we purchase a 20-pounder and it’s ensconced safely within the confines of the fridge, I frequently look in on it, sometimes stopping to caress its bumpy, half-thawed skin. Oh God, the turkey.

I do not mind sticking my hands deep within a cold turkey’s butt because it is a labor of love. I do not mind rubbing its cold skin with butter and salt and pepper, because I long for it. All I can think about is the final product, the delicious, juicy fruit of my labor.

The waiting is the worst. This year we had a twenty-two pound turkey that necessitated four hours of cooking, and it was pure hell for me. The house filled with the delicious aroma of turkey, and yet I could not sample the bird for fear of contracting salmonella. Oh, turkey, how you tease.

Finally, it was done, and I removed it from the oven and set it on the kitchen counter. Dear God, it was magnificent. It was huge and steamy and resplendent. Surely our oven had never birthed a more attractive bird.

I began to carve the turkey (we carve ahead of time, thank God, for if I had to wait I would surely collapse from strain), and after removing much of the lesser but still unbelievable dark meat, I removed one of the breasts.

I cannot even begin to express how much I love turkey breast. I could eat it every day for the rest of my life.

I sliced the breast – which was like butter – into neat slices and then slowly, carefully took one for myself. This was the moment of truth.

I brought the turkey to my lips and took a bite.

Truly this was the most savory and wonderful turkey that ever scratched its way through a yard. Obviously this was a turkey of remarkable intelligence and fine breeding. I was almost on the verge of feeling sorry for it when I remembered that I still had half a slice in front of me.

I heard a voice. “STOP EATING ALL THE TURKEY.”

Nothing could stop my love, though. Nothing. I surreptitiously flipped the voice the finger and continued to enjoy my savory bounty.

I finished carving and completed preparing the Thanksgiving meal, and we ate it, and it was remarkably good, and since we always buy too big a turkey, there was a lot of turkey left over.

Oh, how I look forward to this.

I ate turkey the next day for lunch, with cranberries on the side. Then I ate turkey for dinner, drowned in gravy. I ate turkey for lunch on Friday, and then turkey for dinner.

On Saturday I had a turkey sandwich with some candied sweet potatoes. Turkey for dinner. Was I sick of turkey? Not on your life. Yesterday I had a generous plateful of turkey for lunch, with a little stuffing on the side.

I am not even going to mention the brownies and cookies the J-Man and I baked that I have been eating for breakfast every morning. Nope.

It has been a glorious fucking weekend. I have been as happy as a clam, all stoned on tryptophans and comfort food, full-bellied and sleepy and not even needing all the wine I bought.

Then, this morning I weighed myself.

I gained four pounds. Four pounds in four days.

Oh, turkey, you are a cruel mistress indeed. You are a sinuous, delicious siren, and your charms have once again led me down the path of Fat.

Sigh.

So today it’s back to protein shakes and cereal for this girl, and I must ignore the remaining turkey leftovers, as hard as that will be.

I shall miss you, turkey. It’s been amazing.

Happy Monday.

This is another boring entry about my boring medical issues.

I just finished furiously wrestling with two pairs of pliers for forty minutes in an attempt to remove my nose ring without also removing my nose. I have a particularly thick ring and a particularly small nose, so this is more difficult than one would think.

The reason for the removal is that I have two MRIs and an X-ray today, and apparently if one leaves metal in one’s face during an MRI, bad things happen. Like hey, it’s the Human Picasso.

I’d rather not risk it.

I am having said MRIs to ascertain just how fucked up my back and neck are this year, and since I haven’t had the tests done in a several years and since the last time I had them done I heard this proclamation of doom:

“Before you’re forty, you’re going to have to have back and neck surgery.” (surgery surgery surgery) *gong*

Yeah, since THAT, I’m not expecting good things.

I flat-out refuse to have back surgery. Nearly everyone I’ve come across who has had it has told me awful things: The recovery period is ridiculously long, they’re worse off or no better than they were before, they now require ridiculous amounts of narcotics, or they use a cane or walker.

Fuck that in the ear.

I do have pain, but I think it’s not unreasonable. This is why God made pills. I don’t take an excessive amount, and I also have a pain patch that keeps me medicated through the week. I can’t sit for an excessive amount of time, but I can stand or lie down. Problem solved. As far as the discs being slipped, they’re just going to have to keep right on slipping and a-sliding; because someone is not cutting into my spine, near my spinal cord, you know, the thing that attaches to your BRAIN.

Fuck that in the ear TWICE.

I also am having X-ray of my hips because I have arthritis, because I am 36 years old and everyone knows that 36 is doddering old lady age, the age when one starts to fall completely apart and contract maladies like arthritis and gout and fucking weak bladders. Next thing you know I’ll be wearing adult diapers and talking about my rheumatiz.

I hate this body sometimes.

One of these days I am going to find my biological parents and thank them profusely for the stellar genes they have passed along to me. Then I’m going to hit them both with a shovel.

God, that would be satisfying.

So tomorrow is Turkey Day and I’ve already baked biscuits and started on cookies and brownies (because we must have at least eighteen varieties of sweets). Tomorrow I’ll have my hands rammed up a turkey’s ass (highlight of my day), drink too much wine, and be up to other fun things. My best friend and my sister and her kids are coming for dinner, so we should have quite a crew.

I have some sort of sick urge to shop on Black Friday, and I can’t quite figure out why. I hate crowds. I hate blatant commercialism. I hate sales in which hyperactive women are grabby and pushy. I love deals, but not enough to deal with the shitty parking and the mob scene and the spazzed out customers.

Still, there’s some small voice in my head that whispers, “Go. Shop. Get your shopping done and perhaps score an iPod touch. (selfish voice) Dooooo eeeeet.”

I must be losing it.

Anyway, here’s hoping you and yours have a great one. Happy Long Weekend.

My mother, all seventy-five pounds of her, is an insidious, evil little being.

Perhaps confusing food with love, or more likely wanting desperately to be the only thin person in the house, or even more likely desperately wanting to shovel the food she refuses to eat into anyone else’s gaping maw; she buys sugary, fattening crap and plies it upon us like a crack dealer.

Not being mobile and therefore having no control over the grocery shopping, I am at a loss. I simply unpack bags of frozen pizzas and disgusting chicken nuggets and french fries and tater tots and coffee cakes and other things my fat ass cries out for but will NOT be fed and sigh the sigh of the downtrodden daughter.

The J-Man is out of shape, as he should be, given the fact that he only exercises his thumbs whilst texting and playing the XBox. I am out of shape due to years of eschewing exercise and allowing my yoga and Pilates and aerobics DVDs to become covered in a thick layer of dust.* (*Note to self: Dust.)

My stepdad, who walks four miles a day, rain or shine, can consume huge platefuls of all of this crap because he’s as healthy as a horse. His weight never fluctuates. My mom can remain a sickly seventy-five pounds because she lives on the occasional Altoid and a small plate of pretzels.

She’s getting downright ridiculous, too. The other morning I sat down at my laptop to find a package of fun-sized candy bars wantonly staring up at me.

I called her at work.

“What the hell are these candy bars for?”
“I bought them at Walgreens.”
“I can’t eat this crap!!”
“I thought you and the J-Man would like them.”
“MOM.”
“Well, then don’t eat them! Don’t get mad at me!”

I can’t help it. She knows I’ve lost a considerable amount of weight. She knows I still have a considerable way to go. I can’t help but feel that she is trying to sabotage me.

I can almost imagine her sitting alone in her room at night, dressed in her kitten sweatshirt (baby angel kittens – I’m not joking, and I don’t fucking care whether it was a gift or not), plotting how to inject trans fats and sugar into my protein shakes. Shit, she probably coats the blender in corn syrup before I use it.

All of this is making me paranoid. Is she spiking my Diet Coke with sugar?? My cereal?? The milk?? Is she pouring sugar into my mouth as I sleep??

The possibilities terrify me, for I don’t know how far she’ll go to re-fatify me.

I was tossing out some old fat clothes, putting together a box for Amvets, and she looked at me and shook her head. “You’d better hang onto that stuff. You don’t know whether you’re going to need it again.”

Ouch.

I’ll admit that this made me want to either A) pump her full of sugar and steroids, B) kick her bony ass, or C) smile sweetly and then poke her with sewing needles as she slept later that evening.

Why do my parents sabotage me? Is this part of steeping me in low self-esteem so that I never grow up, get married, and leave? Jesus.

I suppose it’s worked thus far, hasn’t it.

Anyway, I’m determined to get this family fit. I’m looking into joining a local gym through Medicare, which might actually pay for it due to my back problems, and then I could pay to have the J-Man join, too.

The J-Man will be just about as enthused about this as he would be for a week over at Abu Ghraib, but what the hell. He needs to get fit, too, and they have some great classes for kids.

This is the same gym I previously attended for physical therapy sessions – the same gym I was kicked out of for having seizures during said physical therapy sessions – so hopefully I will be OK and not have any seizures during workouts. Apparently they have a no tolerance policy regarding seizures, because those fucking epileptics, they ruin everything.

I made the J-Man a cup of coffee this morning – he’s allowed a cup maybe once a week, a third coffee, two thirds milk – and he said, “I get why you guys need this in the morning. It’s so refreshing. I wish I could do this every morning.”

And lo, an addict is born.

Parenting? I am great at it.

Happy Weekend.

If you didn’t read yesterday’s entry, this is about that.

I spent the day worried sick that the dude had offed himself, actually puking at one point because this distressed me so, and finally I went to bed early, realizing that I had to let it go and that there was nothing I could do.

Then I got another text. This one said, “I’m fine, sorry.”

I was fucking livid. Relieved, but livid.

I said yesterday that cell phones should come with breathalyzers, and now I know that I was right. The guy probably tied one on, had a pity party, and decided to flip out everybody in his contacts list.

Again, I was fucking livid. I didn’t answer the text, but there were a few choice words I could have thrown his way.

Having lost two friends to suicide, I don’t take talk of suicide lightly. Perhaps this is because I have always wished that I would have picked up on cues that I didn’t pick up on, or maybe that I’d have been a better and more perceptive friend. Whatever the case, it’s a sore subject, and I think rightfully so.

I don’t think anyone should go around threatening suicide unless they’re rock-solid serious, and I don’t think it’s the kind of thing that should be played around with via fucking drunk text.

This really fucked with my head. I’m angry, and I think I have every right to be. I’ve been drunk, depressed, AND suicidal at different times in my life, and NEVER would I have done such a thoughtless thing to someone else. Ridiculous.

Anyway, that’s how the story ends, and believe me when I tell you I will not be answering any texts from THAT number anytime soon.

In other news, the J-Man is taking a cooking class this grading period and loves it. So far they’ve made easy things such as quickbreads, but they’re eventually going to move on to pies and cakes. Does this mean I have found a replacement baker for the holiday season? I hope so, because man, baking does nothing for me but make me sample my own wares.

I’ve lost fifty pounds since last December and am shooting for another forty or so, so as to get back down to my fighting weight. Christmas cookies just throw a wrench into the mix. While I’m at it, so do turkey and gravy and sweet potatoes and mashed potatoes and stuffing.

I could eat my weight in all of the above. I’m a Thanksgiving food whore. Basically I’ve been living on soy cereal and soy
protein shakes, and it would be folly to fuck it up now.

It would sure be delicious, though. I wonder if a sweet potato-turkey shake could work.

Maybe not.

Happy Wednesday.

Today shall be known as Random Day, and I shall remain utterly confused and flabbergasted by its fucked-up events.

I have a fever and chills, ostensibly due to the flu shot I had about a week and a half ago, even though I was told that this would not happen due to the fact that the virus was not live.

That dead virus is currently kicking my ass, dear pharmacist. Sorry to burst your bubble. Either that, or your damned shot didn’t work worth a shit.

There is that. There is also this:

I didn’t turn my phone on until about eleven today, because I felt like ass last night and turned the sucker off so as to have a good night’s sleep free of booty calls messages from T-Mobile.

I turned it on this morning to find a fucking suicide text from an ex.

I don’t know whether the shit was serious, or whether this text was sent during some sort of a drunken stupor. I don’t remember his street address, so I can’t very well send anyone over to check it out. I’m just left to sit here tweaking out about it.

Not good.

If you’re going to kill yourself, may I recommend that you don’t decide to make amends via text first. Just go on and fucking do it. And if you’re drunk, STAY OFF OF THE PHONE. I swear to God, cell phones should come with breathalyzers. This would prevent a lot of heartache, embarrassment, and meaningless sex.

Actually, I take the mention of suicide very fucking seriously, which is why I am tweaking.

Anyway, that was my morning. To say that it has been less than pleasant would be a gross understatement.

This afternoon I must type up recipes for the Weetacon cookbook so as to have them in at the last minute, because procrastination is my middle name. Unfortunately my recipes are long and convoluted due to anecdotes that I throw in as well as stupid jokes and roundabout instructions that would make Julia Child weep. This is going to be time-consuming.

I’m really trying not to think about this text thing. I really am. But God knows that everything that happens to everyone is my fault and under my control, so I have to stress out about it.

Right.

Have a happy Tuesday. Send soothing waves of relaxation my way.

I had a plastic plug inserted into my left eye yesterday, and you may now all refer to me as Jen “Left Eye” Trance.

Now, I was really a big baby about this. I don’t like anyone touching my eyes. I don’t like it when the doctor prods around in there or even puts in drops – I want to do it MYSELF. I don’t even like the glaucoma test, in which they shoot a little puff of air into your eyes. I am an optical wuss.

You’d think I’d be more than used to all of this shit, having undergone every eye test there is more than a hundred times a year since the age of two, but no. I just get more and more squicked out with every passing poke.

Anyway, I was nervous. I asked the ophthalmologist for a Valium, which they shockingly do not keep in stock. I cursed myself for not bringing any muscle relaxers, which tend to calm me. The eye doctor looked at me and shook his head. “This is really no big deal. You’re going to be fine. We’re only doing one today, and we’ll do one next month.”

Have you ever looked at the holes in the corners of your eyes? They are not all that fucking big. Imagine putting something in there.

Ouch.

He showed me the plugs, which were about as big as the head of a pin, and I relaxed. No problem. Then he came toward my eye, and I started to flinch.

Problem.

Thankfully I was able to hold it together and relax while he took out his little tools and started to try to hammer the little plug into place.

“Um… we have a problem.”

“What?”

“Your hole is really small.”

“That’s what HE said.”

(No, I didn’t really say that, but GOD I wanted to.)

I really said, “What do you mean my hole is really small?” (snort)

“I can’t get it in.” (more and more this was sounding like prom night)

“Keep trying, I guess.” (persistence pays off)

“Does it hurt?” (considerate lover)

“A little.” (should have thought of lube!)

“I’ll try one more time – there it is!” (penetration)

“Really?” (shock)

“How does that feel?” (never HAD such a considerate lover, now that I think about it)

“It feels fine, I can’t really feel it.” (I guess you can’t have it all)

“I’m going to leave it in indefinitely, and you’re going to notice a lot more moisture.” (A-ha!)

OK, OK, enough.

Anyway, after we finished having hot filthy eye sex, I read a Highlights magazine (rock on, Goofus and Gallant) for twenty minutes in the waiting room to make sure the thing was comfortable, and I was able to leave.

Now I’m all paranoid that I’m going to knock it out, but I have a great excuse to make the J-Man listen to me.

“Don’t make me yell, you’re going to make me mad and my eye plug is going to come out!!”

“Don’t get shitty grades and make me upset, or I will cry and my eye plug will come out!!”

I’m sure this will work quite well.

I have been referred to a rheumatologist because my eye doctor thinks my dry eye is tied in with both my arthritis and this weird blistery patch I have on my hand that I thought was eczema and have been trying to treat at home because I am cheap. Apparently rheumatoid arthritis can cause all of these things, and the blistery shit can be psoriasis, which for some reason grosses me out more than eczema. I don’t relish the thought of adding another doctor to the regime OR taking arthritis medication when I’m already on enough drugs to kill a horse OR having more MRIs and being told how badly I’m falling apart at the tender age of 36, but whatever. Maybe arthritis drugs would work better than painkillers. Maybe then my neurologist would stop telling me I have fibromyalgia, which I disagree with. Maybe then the sun will shine out of my butt, because we all know that doctors have the answers to fucking everything.

Righty-O.

Happy Tuesday. Go out and have some rousing eye sex.

So, about a month ago I started this project in hopes that it would keep me both busy and warm all winter. I started knitting an afghan.

Now, let it be known that I am one shitty knitter. I have been knitting for years and still can only knit square things, save the cat bed I made that one time that was too small for any of our fat beasts and bore a striking resemblance to something Raisa Gorbachev would have worn on her head back in the day.

Anyway, I basically suck, but if you give me a few days, I can turn out a scarf.

Man, do we have a lot of scarves in this house.

So, the afghan. The instructions swore up and down that this was easy easy easy and that even a three-year-old who’d been dropped repeatedly on the head could master it, so I bought an insane amount of exorbitantly expensive yarn and decided to go for it.

The pattern basically calls for making forty-nine 7 x 9 rectangles. I have made about ten. I haven’t fucked any up so far, but I am going ridiculously slow due to this damned recurring eye thing*, which makes it almost impossible to do any close work.

I estimate that I will be finished roughly around the time of year that I will have absolutely no use for an afghan.

*This eye thing is getting ridiculous. I haven’t been allowed to wear my contact lens in months. Basically the shit comes down to really really bad dry eye, for which I was taking Restasis, but then that didn’t work and the dry eye wore holes in my corneas. This was… painful. Four eye medications later and it has started to improve a little, but if you will step into the time machine and turn the clock back, you will remember that this happens every fucking year when it starts to get cold.

My eye doctor thinks he’s found a solution, and that is to put plastic plugs in my tear ducts.

*collective EEEEEEEEW*

Apparently this prevents the tears from draining and keeps the eyes all moist and happy, which will save my corneas a lot of wear and tear. I may even be able to wear a contact lens again.

The thought of someone sticking plastic ANYTHING in my eye squicks me out hardcore and I fear I will have to be sedated/restrained/sat upon, but hopefully it will go well. The procedure is on Monday.

After that, I will be knitting like a stone cold fool until this damned afghan is finished. Then it shall be my woobie, and I shall take it everywhere, even to the bar.

Happy Thursday.