It’s Thursday once again, and so I find my weekend drawing to a close.
In contrast to what felt like a short weekend last week, upon my return from Michigan, this weekend has seemed to stretch out interminably.
That wouldn’t necessarily have been a bad thing if it had been an eventful and entertaining weekend, but it really wasn’t either of those things.
Beyond going to the Oral Surgeon on Monday, and going for a few walks, I didn’t go anywhere all week. Not needing much in the way of food, I didn’t have to go grocery shopping, and being in something of a “funk” thanks to the bloody mess that my mouth has been and to the unbearable mugginess of the weather, I really didn’t feel motivated to go anywhere.
That’s hardly anything new, I know, but it was a little more extreme this week.
When I was taking that class last week, by way of illustrating a point the instructor asked if anyone in the class had a job that required no human interaction whatsoever, as if from starting time to quitting time there would be no interaction either in person, by phone, by e-mail, or IM, with another member of the human race.
Of course no one there had such a job, and the instructor stated that he would feel sorry for anyone who did.
Meanwhile, I was envying this hypothetical hermit.
Honestly, though, I think that high a level of isolation would be a bit much even for me, but what I’m getting at is that this week I found myself feeling a little more anti-social than usual.
Of course, I’m already pretty anti-social, so it’s not like anyone besides myself would notice.
Today, though, I did need to head out to pick up some suitable food and snacks for this weekend, so I picked up a variety of soups, yogurts, and puddings.
I didn’t feel like straying too far from home, though, so I just walked over to Safeway.
When I go for my walks, as part of the routine I stop at a Sunoco gas station, which used to be the only Circle K I’d ever seen in Virginia (Circle Ks are all over the place in Tucson) before it switched over to Sunoco, to pick up a bottle of water or a SoBe or something.
The other day I realized that I was running out of cash, so I walked over to the ATM across the street to replenish my water/SoBe funds. While doing so, I spotted a guy on a bicycle.
This wouldn’t have been noteworthy, except that the bicycle in question was one of those original bicycle designs from the turn of the last century; one of those numbers with the gigantic front wheel.
It made me wonder how you go about getting on one of those things, then it made me wonder why you would bother at all. After all, there have been all kinds of advancements in the science of bicycle-making since the days of handlebar mustaches and Coke with real coke in it, most of which have greatly enhanced their ease of use, though none of which, I suppose, are likely to inspire people to scratch their heads in bafflement and write entries in their blogs about you as you unsteadily bicycle your way past them.
So if you’re into that sort of thing (getting people to notice you), I suppose that riding an old-fashioned bicycle is more likely to get you noticed than some state-of-the-art mountain bike, though I think if you’re going to try to get people to notice you, the unicycle is really the way to go…
As I walk in the mornings I’m beginning to recognize some of the people I (very briefly) encounter along the way.
Mostly they tend to be middle-aged (and older) housewives, and men, but there have been a few younger, more attractive women…though they are all married and have kids.
Today I saw two and a half attractive women out on the trails.
I say “two and a half” because one of them I’m only assuming was attractive based on what I saw of her from behind as she jogged past me. She looked to be in pretty good shape, so at least the back side of her looked good, though I did note that she had a ring on her finger.
Further down the trail, and a bit ahead of schedule, I saw the Running Lady, as I refer to her, who jogs along pushing a stroller with her two kids in it.
At one of the playgrounds I saw a very attractive woman, apparently named Sasha, based on the fact that one of the kids called her that. She was watching three kids, and given that one of them called her by name, not all of them were hers, but at least one of them called her “mom.”
I’m guessing that “Sasha” is a stay-at-home mom who babysits other kids as a means of income to allow herself to be a stay-at-home mom, which is, I think, a fairly common practice in this area.
I’m not sure what the money is like, but with a husband working a decent-paying job here in the tech sector, I’m sure that it works pretty well as a supplemental income.
After all, daycare costs around here are insane, so a mom working out of the home could charge a fair amount and still manage to undercut the prices of even the employer-subsidized daycare centers that working parents in NoVA have to choose from.
Scott could provide more input on this subject, though, as his wife watches some kids during the week.
In any case, while I didn’t get up close enough to see her left hand, it’s probably safe to assume that “Sasha” is married.
Still, while none of my fellow travelers on the trails, not even the younger, attractive ones, are bringing me any closer to actually meeting “someone,” since they’re all spoken for, it occurs to me that when you tally up all of the “good mornings” and “hellos” I exchanged with them this week, I actually had more in the way of interaction with people than I typically would despite the fact that all week long I was feeling especially anti-social.
I suppose there’s some irony in that.
Mostly, though, I think it’s just representative of the fact that I can never get what I want. After all, I wanted to keep my contact with people as minimal as possible, but it ended up being maximized.
Ah well.
It’s been around 6 years since Fiona Apple last released an album, though in that intervening time she has actually recorded one.
There seems to be some confusion surrounding the reason that the album hasn’t been released. The most common view is that Sony, the record company, feels that it isn’t “commercially viable,” which prompted fans to start an online petition that goes about literally sending “An Apple a Day” to Sony Music execs until the album is released, though there are some claims that Apple herself is unhappy with the album.
Still, no matter what the cause, the effect is that there is no new album, even though one could be available. If you like Fiona Apple, this is distressing. If you don’t like Fiona Apple, then why are you bothering to read this part?
Most of the people I know who don’t like Fiona Apple dislike her because of her perceived political views, whatever they may be, though I think most of them based this opinion on some random comments she made like seven or eight years ago at some award show or other.
For my part, I like her. I love her voice, and I think she’s a very talented songwriter, and for me, that’s really all that matters.
I pretty much always manage to separate performers from their personal lives. So in much the same way that the fact that they are lousy singers whose songs are treacly, sentimental pabulum doesn’t change the fact that Britney Spears and Jessica Simpson are freakin’ hot, the fact that Fiona Apple may or may not be some kind of tree-hugging, preachy hippy isn’t reflected in her music, and since the odds are that I’m never going to meet her, what she’s like in her personal life is absolutely meaningless to me.
Of course, this separation of the art from the artist (or separating her hotness from her lack of real talent) isn’t absolute. I mean, if someone proved that Fiona Apple, like, ate babies or something, that would probably color my perceptions of her and lessen my enjoyment of her music considerably.
That doesn’t seem too likely to happen though, as I believe she’s a vegetarian.
In any case, getting back to the unreleased album, last year someone leaked a track from it out to the Internet, which helped further fan the flames of fans who were already clamoring for its release.
(As an aside, if for the alliteration if nothing else, you have to dig that line: further fan the flames of fans)
Recently, though, someone leaked the entire album out to the Internet community, and I have to say that of late, “Extraordinary Machine,” as the album is titled, has been the number one thing I’ve been listening to.
What I find most interesting about it is the rather “cartoony” nature of the music. Often, it seems as though she’s singing along with, or just as frequently, in counterpoint to, the soundtrack of a Looney Toons cartoon, though when you actually listen to it it’s not as silly as sounds here, and it really works well.
So for that aspect alone I enjoy the album, though how could I not enjoy an album by someone who actually manages to use the word “falderal” in a song?
So for those of you who like Fiona, or at the very least are Fiona-neutral, I’d recommend checking it out, particularly if you ever enjoyed the musical stylings of an old Warner Bros. cartoon…
Of course, when I say that I “recommend” checking it out, obviously I don’t advocate the illegal downloading of music. So for the record RIAA, I wanted it stated that my belief is that clearly, illegally downloading music is a crime against God and man, and shouldn’t be practiced by anyone on penalty of torture, and, eventually, after lots and lots of torture, death.
(Seriously, I’m totally okay with illegally downloading music)
Then again, I wonder about the illegality of downloading music that has not been released commercially. If Sony has no intention of releasing the album anyway, then they can’t really claim that they’re losing revenue through the free distribution of the album on the Internet, though I suppose that, strictly speaking, their intentions for the album notwithstanding, it is stolen property.
(Screw it; ust download it anyway)
Lately I’ve been reading a book called “Pattern Recognition” by William Gibson, who, years ago, created the “cyber-punk” genre with his novel “Neuromancer.”
I’ve meant to read some Gibson for a while now, but hadn’t gotten around to it until I picked this book up (based largely on the fact that it had blurb by Neil Gaiman on it).
So far it’s…interesting, if a bit dense and rather “high-concept.”
One element of the story focuses on people who collect rather esoteric pieces of computing history, and there is a character who, with no trace of irony, comments on how he’s preparing to purchase Stephen King’s Wang.
Now he’s actually talking about a word processor, but I was greatly amused by how Gibson managed to slip in a dick joke that pretty much only nerds would get…
As an aside totally unrelated to anything, for anyone out there wondering, my dad continues to recover quite nicely. Yesterday he told my mother that for the first time since before the surgery he actually felt like himself when he woke up.
Yesterday I mentioned not having anything in the way of reference photos to work from for drawing the male D&D characters for the picture I’m working on.
…
The problem with searching the Web for pictures of anything is that having a lot of porn mixed in with your results is inevitable, but when you’re searching for pictures of men it becomes a little more problematic.
Now, anyone who knows me can attest that, any gay jokes I make (particularly within the next couple of parapgraphs) notwithstanding, I’m not even slightly homophobic.
That I have a positive attitude towards and about homosexuality (especially the female kind…at least the female kind you see late at night on Cinemax, but not so much the kind you’re likely to see at, say, an “Indigo Girls” concert…) does not mean, however, that I had any interest in seeing some of the things that popped up (literally) in my Google Image search…
I have to say, though, that, religion aside, I don’t really understand the basis for homophobia. I mean, what’s to be afraid of? They’re gay. It’s not like we’re talking about members of a biker gang, or escaped prisoners, or snakes, or something. The worst they’re likely to do is make a scathing sarcastic comment about what you’re wearing, and that’s not really that scary, is it?
Then again, given the way a lot of homophobes dress, particularly in the South, I guess that could be pretty scary after all…
Seriously, though, I’m no homophobe. Hell, if it weren’t for gay men I’d never get hit on.
In any case, that’s pretty much going to do it for this entry, and this week. I hope you have a good weekend, and I’ll see you all back here on Monday.
Thursday, June 09, 2005
Wednesday, June 08, 2005
Nothing Day
Once again today I’m “off schedule,” though the day did start out with what is becoming the typical four-mile walk.
When I got home I started working on a picture that I’ve been commissioned (which is to say “asked,” as there is no money involved) to draw.
It’s actually a picture of a group of people; specifically, characters from a D&D game that Scott and several other people play.
I did a group picture for them before, but since that time most of the characters have changed, so it’s time for an update.
As it stands, I’ve completed three of the six characters to my satisfaction. I’ve completed a fourth, but I’m not really satisfied with that one.
The biggest problem is that some of the characters are male.
I can draw males, it’s just that I generally prefer not to, so they’re going to take a little more work than the female characters, which I’ve already finished drawing.
The biggest problem is that I have plenty of female reference pictures to work from, but I don’t have any male reference pictures, nor am I especially inclined to seek them out. Given how the fourth picture (of a male) turned out when drawn without reference, though, I think I’m going to have to do so.
Beyond walking and drawing, I didn’t do much today.
I did take a stab at eating solid food, in the form of an omelet.
Said omelet had nearly turned out picture-perfect, but ended up ripping in half when I was folding it. Ah well.
It was still a bit difficult to navigate the actual eating of food, as my gums are still raw, so I’d prefer not to get food stuck in them. Looks like I’m going to be sticking with soup for a while yet.
It’s hot and muggy again today, so I find myself feeling sticky and gross just sitting here. Normally I don’t bother with the A/C, as it doesn’t work that well, but today I was inclined to do so. The only problem, though, is that instead of not working well, it’s not working at all. Apparently whatever caused the fan to stop working last summer has happened again, so at some point I’m going to have to get maintenance in here. If nothing else, I will need the fan to work in the winter for heat, if we assume that I don’t move when my lease is up.
I don’t want to move, but given that they (apparently on accident) didn’t raise my rent at all last time I renewed my lease, it seems likely that they might bump it up quite a bit this time around. We’ll see, I guess. I still have six months to go, but as I get older, and particularly with my work schedule, months fly by rather quickly, even though I’m seldom having fun.
In any case, there’s not much else for me to write about, as today has been kind of a nothing day.
When I got home I started working on a picture that I’ve been commissioned (which is to say “asked,” as there is no money involved) to draw.
It’s actually a picture of a group of people; specifically, characters from a D&D game that Scott and several other people play.
I did a group picture for them before, but since that time most of the characters have changed, so it’s time for an update.
As it stands, I’ve completed three of the six characters to my satisfaction. I’ve completed a fourth, but I’m not really satisfied with that one.
The biggest problem is that some of the characters are male.
I can draw males, it’s just that I generally prefer not to, so they’re going to take a little more work than the female characters, which I’ve already finished drawing.
The biggest problem is that I have plenty of female reference pictures to work from, but I don’t have any male reference pictures, nor am I especially inclined to seek them out. Given how the fourth picture (of a male) turned out when drawn without reference, though, I think I’m going to have to do so.
Beyond walking and drawing, I didn’t do much today.
I did take a stab at eating solid food, in the form of an omelet.
Said omelet had nearly turned out picture-perfect, but ended up ripping in half when I was folding it. Ah well.
It was still a bit difficult to navigate the actual eating of food, as my gums are still raw, so I’d prefer not to get food stuck in them. Looks like I’m going to be sticking with soup for a while yet.
It’s hot and muggy again today, so I find myself feeling sticky and gross just sitting here. Normally I don’t bother with the A/C, as it doesn’t work that well, but today I was inclined to do so. The only problem, though, is that instead of not working well, it’s not working at all. Apparently whatever caused the fan to stop working last summer has happened again, so at some point I’m going to have to get maintenance in here. If nothing else, I will need the fan to work in the winter for heat, if we assume that I don’t move when my lease is up.
I don’t want to move, but given that they (apparently on accident) didn’t raise my rent at all last time I renewed my lease, it seems likely that they might bump it up quite a bit this time around. We’ll see, I guess. I still have six months to go, but as I get older, and particularly with my work schedule, months fly by rather quickly, even though I’m seldom having fun.
In any case, there’s not much else for me to write about, as today has been kind of a nothing day.
Tuesday, June 07, 2005
Not Managing Time, Pigeonholes, Some Pig, I'm A Dave Gibbons, And Hot Mamas And Creepy Grandpas
I had intended to get back into the whole “time management” thing today and had written out a schedule.
Getting up before nine and going out for a four-mile walk was a strong start, but once I got home and was in the unstructured “free time” I’d written in for myself I found it impossible to motivate myself to move on to the structured time.
In particular, I found myself still feeling a little woozy from a combination of the heat and humidity and yesterday morning’s activities, and so I ended up taking a two-hour nap.
My general malaise could have been the lingering effects from the Vicodin I took before going to bed last night.
My mouth isn’t especially sore today, so I’ve opted to forego the Vicodin, as I’m not sure I like the effect it has on me. It does serve to dull the pain, but it also makes me feel odd, sort of the way I would feel on those rare occasions when I would drink just to the point of starting to get drunk and then cut myself off, which is to say slightly light-headed and vaguely nauseous.
Of course, in fairness to the Vicodin, this feeling could just as easily have been attributed to the lack of sleep I’d had, the blood loss, and the overall trauma of having six teeth yanked out, but even so, given that I had no real need for an especially potent painkiller today it seemed prudent to simply not take it.
As mentioned, my mouth isn’t hurting too much, though it is still kind of tender, so I can’t do things like rest my chin on my hands, and as for chewing…well, not so much.
Mostly it’s just gross, what with bits of food falling into the empty spaces where the teeth used to be, so I’m sticking with a mostly liquid diet, surviving on protein shakes, soup, and applesauce.
I suppose I could supplement that with things like yogurt or pudding, but I don’t have those things, and don’t really feel like going anywhere to get them.
It’s my hope that, as I continue to walk (and sweat like crazy when I do so, thanks to the 90%+ humidity) and have a lower caloric intake, thanks to what, and how little, I’m “eating,” I’ll actually manage to ditch some of my body fat, allowing me to work more effectively towards building and toning my muscle mass.
I’m sure that won’t happen, though, and that somehow I’ll manage to gain ten pounds, but at least I’m hoping to lose weight.
Last week I took a class for work that, essentially, involved learning how to communicate with people.
The idea presented in the class is that there are four basic communication styles that people use. The class examined the attributes of each style, helped us (via a survey we sent out to people we know before the class) identify our own style, how to learn to identify the communication style other people use, and, finally, how to adapt our individual styles to most effectively communicate with them.
…
Apart from the specific terminology, there wasn’t much in the way of new concepts to me, and the communication styles roughly correlate to the kinds of personality types identified by other systems, such as Myers-Briggs.
So basically there were no real surprises for me.
Beyond that, though, while much of it seemed like common sense (basically you have to tailor your communications to your audience), there was, I thought, perhaps too much emphasis on accommodating other communication styles.
After all, not everyone is going to make the effort to communicate, and there are times that you need to be obstinate in response. For example, “Implementers” like to maintain control. So what? Does that mean you always have to give them control, or even the illusion of control in your communications with them? Hell no. Sometimes baby just doesn’t get his bottle, and if he doesn’t like it, tough.
Another issue I had was that, while the instructor did give lip-service to the notion, not enough emphasis was placed on the fact that a communication style is only one element of an individual’s personality.
I tried to point this out, but I don’t think anyone took it to heart.
Further, I saw some of the participants in the class finding themselves pigeonholed into a specific pattern of behavior based on the results of their communication profiles, and simply accepting it, while others found themselves lamenting the fact that they didn’t fit into communication styles that they saw as “better.”
One woman was very upset by the fact that she wasn’t an “Innovator,” as she took it to mean that not being one makes her completely incapable of creative thought.
One of the “Investigators,” which, by the way, is my preferred style of communication, when I pointed out that another “Investigator” might want some recognition during a role-play exercise, held up a laminated “cheat sheet” and said, “Well, according to this, we aren’t interested in recognition.”
WTF? You’re going to base your life on a little card that some guy you barely know gave you? Okay, so it’s laminated, but that doesn’t make it the equivalent of a stone tablet brought down from the mountain by Moses.
Of course we’re interested in getting recognition; we’re human beings, jackass.
Still, these complaints are largely directed at the participants in the class, not the presenter, who at least wasn’t an irritating jerk like the instructor of that one class Kathleen and I took a while back, or the material.
As something of an “ice-breaking” exercise, the details of which I won’t get into, at the beginning of the class we were all asked to draw a picture of a pig. The consensus seemed to be that mine was the best.
Of course, I had a lot of reference material to work with, as, with the exception of one cute Asian girl, this was not a pretty group.
Okay, that was kind of mean…but damn, this was an ugly group. It really made me long for my negotiation class, which had quite a few lookers in it.
Speaking of looks, some time ago, in a Threshold entry I don’t feel like tracking down, I made a reference to how in life I frequently see real people who look as though they could have been drawn by different comic book artists. For example, Jessica Simpson is a total Adam Hughes.
Pamela Anderson, meanwhile, who, thanks to the wonders of modern cosmetic surgery, is about as close as is possible to having an Image Comics female character come to life, looks like she could have been drawn by any number of Jim Lee imitators…
In any case, the other day when I was performing that most horrific of tasks (looking in the mirror) I realized that I’m something of a Dave Gibbons.
Is that a bad thing? Not necessarily…except that, specifically, I think that I look like some corpses that he drew in Watchmen…
Also on the topic of looks, there’s a woman who lives in my apartment complex whom I refer to as “Hot Mama.” Hot, because she’s always appeared to be attractive from what I’ve seen of her and Mama because she has a young son.
Sunday night when I came home from work I got a very good look at her, as she was wearing a bikini top and some sort of matching sarong.
She looked extremely hot.
The one problem, though, was where I saw her, which was on the balcony of the guy who lives downstairs and to the right of me.
This was bothersome to me because he’s a total creep.
He’s this old (he appears to be retired) bald guy who either sits out on his balcony smoking and staring at people, or else wanders around the parking lot in his tank top, too-short shorts, and flip flops.
It was, therefore, bothersome to me to see this old creep making time with Hot Mama, who, as mentioned, was looking especially hot, in particular because this wasn’t the first time I’ve seen the old creep making time with a hot chick.
Ah well.
In any case, that will do it for this entry. I may or may not be back later.
Getting up before nine and going out for a four-mile walk was a strong start, but once I got home and was in the unstructured “free time” I’d written in for myself I found it impossible to motivate myself to move on to the structured time.
In particular, I found myself still feeling a little woozy from a combination of the heat and humidity and yesterday morning’s activities, and so I ended up taking a two-hour nap.
My general malaise could have been the lingering effects from the Vicodin I took before going to bed last night.
My mouth isn’t especially sore today, so I’ve opted to forego the Vicodin, as I’m not sure I like the effect it has on me. It does serve to dull the pain, but it also makes me feel odd, sort of the way I would feel on those rare occasions when I would drink just to the point of starting to get drunk and then cut myself off, which is to say slightly light-headed and vaguely nauseous.
Of course, in fairness to the Vicodin, this feeling could just as easily have been attributed to the lack of sleep I’d had, the blood loss, and the overall trauma of having six teeth yanked out, but even so, given that I had no real need for an especially potent painkiller today it seemed prudent to simply not take it.
As mentioned, my mouth isn’t hurting too much, though it is still kind of tender, so I can’t do things like rest my chin on my hands, and as for chewing…well, not so much.
Mostly it’s just gross, what with bits of food falling into the empty spaces where the teeth used to be, so I’m sticking with a mostly liquid diet, surviving on protein shakes, soup, and applesauce.
I suppose I could supplement that with things like yogurt or pudding, but I don’t have those things, and don’t really feel like going anywhere to get them.
It’s my hope that, as I continue to walk (and sweat like crazy when I do so, thanks to the 90%+ humidity) and have a lower caloric intake, thanks to what, and how little, I’m “eating,” I’ll actually manage to ditch some of my body fat, allowing me to work more effectively towards building and toning my muscle mass.
I’m sure that won’t happen, though, and that somehow I’ll manage to gain ten pounds, but at least I’m hoping to lose weight.
Last week I took a class for work that, essentially, involved learning how to communicate with people.
The idea presented in the class is that there are four basic communication styles that people use. The class examined the attributes of each style, helped us (via a survey we sent out to people we know before the class) identify our own style, how to learn to identify the communication style other people use, and, finally, how to adapt our individual styles to most effectively communicate with them.
…
Apart from the specific terminology, there wasn’t much in the way of new concepts to me, and the communication styles roughly correlate to the kinds of personality types identified by other systems, such as Myers-Briggs.
So basically there were no real surprises for me.
Beyond that, though, while much of it seemed like common sense (basically you have to tailor your communications to your audience), there was, I thought, perhaps too much emphasis on accommodating other communication styles.
After all, not everyone is going to make the effort to communicate, and there are times that you need to be obstinate in response. For example, “Implementers” like to maintain control. So what? Does that mean you always have to give them control, or even the illusion of control in your communications with them? Hell no. Sometimes baby just doesn’t get his bottle, and if he doesn’t like it, tough.
Another issue I had was that, while the instructor did give lip-service to the notion, not enough emphasis was placed on the fact that a communication style is only one element of an individual’s personality.
I tried to point this out, but I don’t think anyone took it to heart.
Further, I saw some of the participants in the class finding themselves pigeonholed into a specific pattern of behavior based on the results of their communication profiles, and simply accepting it, while others found themselves lamenting the fact that they didn’t fit into communication styles that they saw as “better.”
One woman was very upset by the fact that she wasn’t an “Innovator,” as she took it to mean that not being one makes her completely incapable of creative thought.
One of the “Investigators,” which, by the way, is my preferred style of communication, when I pointed out that another “Investigator” might want some recognition during a role-play exercise, held up a laminated “cheat sheet” and said, “Well, according to this, we aren’t interested in recognition.”
WTF? You’re going to base your life on a little card that some guy you barely know gave you? Okay, so it’s laminated, but that doesn’t make it the equivalent of a stone tablet brought down from the mountain by Moses.
Of course we’re interested in getting recognition; we’re human beings, jackass.
Still, these complaints are largely directed at the participants in the class, not the presenter, who at least wasn’t an irritating jerk like the instructor of that one class Kathleen and I took a while back, or the material.
As something of an “ice-breaking” exercise, the details of which I won’t get into, at the beginning of the class we were all asked to draw a picture of a pig. The consensus seemed to be that mine was the best.
Of course, I had a lot of reference material to work with, as, with the exception of one cute Asian girl, this was not a pretty group.
Okay, that was kind of mean…but damn, this was an ugly group. It really made me long for my negotiation class, which had quite a few lookers in it.
Speaking of looks, some time ago, in a Threshold entry I don’t feel like tracking down, I made a reference to how in life I frequently see real people who look as though they could have been drawn by different comic book artists. For example, Jessica Simpson is a total Adam Hughes.
Pamela Anderson, meanwhile, who, thanks to the wonders of modern cosmetic surgery, is about as close as is possible to having an Image Comics female character come to life, looks like she could have been drawn by any number of Jim Lee imitators…
In any case, the other day when I was performing that most horrific of tasks (looking in the mirror) I realized that I’m something of a Dave Gibbons.
Is that a bad thing? Not necessarily…except that, specifically, I think that I look like some corpses that he drew in Watchmen…
Also on the topic of looks, there’s a woman who lives in my apartment complex whom I refer to as “Hot Mama.” Hot, because she’s always appeared to be attractive from what I’ve seen of her and Mama because she has a young son.
Sunday night when I came home from work I got a very good look at her, as she was wearing a bikini top and some sort of matching sarong.
She looked extremely hot.
The one problem, though, was where I saw her, which was on the balcony of the guy who lives downstairs and to the right of me.
This was bothersome to me because he’s a total creep.
He’s this old (he appears to be retired) bald guy who either sits out on his balcony smoking and staring at people, or else wanders around the parking lot in his tank top, too-short shorts, and flip flops.
It was, therefore, bothersome to me to see this old creep making time with Hot Mama, who, as mentioned, was looking especially hot, in particular because this wasn’t the first time I’ve seen the old creep making time with a hot chick.
Ah well.
In any case, that will do it for this entry. I may or may not be back later.
Demotivational Posters
Some of these "motivational" posters are pretty funny. Check them out here.
Thanks to Kathleen for pointing them out.
Thanks to Kathleen for pointing them out.
Monday, June 06, 2005
Toothless Wonder
This morning found me waking early to pay a visit to my friendly neighborhood Oral Surgeon who proceeded to yank six teeth out of my mouth.
In so doing he completed the final phase in my secret origin as a super hero: The Toothless Wonder!
Yes, it’s the Toothless Wonder, strange visitor from a town without a central fluoridated water supply, who, in his identity as Jon Maki, lazy kid with parents who didn’t have dental insurance, never bothered taking care of his teeth until it was far too late, and who fights a never-ending battle to pay ever-increasing dentist bills, and whose frequent visits to dentists over the past fifteen years have led to the development of Toothless Wonder’s one and only super-power: a slight immunity to Novocain…
The end result of this “power” of mine was that, despite several shots and the fact that my lower lip felt as if it had swollen to three times its normal size, I wasn’t completely numb when several of the teeth were pulled. This didn’t result in any sort of extreme “Marathon Man” levels of pain, but even so, it was quite painful.
Past experience had taught me, though, that there was nothing that could be done to completely eliminate the pain, so I had to simply not grin and bear it.
Prior to the actual extractions, as we waited for the numbness (incomplete though it may have been) to spread, the doctor’s cute-ish, though slightly too chubby assistant engaged me in conversation about the weather, which eventually meandered into different areas of discussion.
Of course, very early on she made reference to having a fiancé, though even if she had been single any chances I might have had with her would have been destroyed the instant she looked in my mouth, which, even before the extractions had rendered it a bloody mess, looked like a scene taken straight from a horror movie.
After all of the yanking was over the doctor stitched me up with self-dissolving stitches (I could feel the stitching taking place as well. Also not pleasant.), informed me that I had been a “marvelous” patient, and I was on my way.
I suppose I should be glad that they’d made me pay my contribution ($150+) up front before the procedure, which allowed me to just get the hell out of there without any fuss, but it still struck me as a bit mercenary.
From there I was on my way to the pharmacy at my local Giant to pick up my prescription for an anti-biotic and Vicodin, which the doctor had called in.
Or so he claimed, at any rate.
The pharmacy had received no call on my behalf.
I had to go out to my car and grab the bag of gauze and instructions the doctor had given me so that I could get the number and call in to verify that the prescription had been called in. The girl who answered assured me that he had called and that he’d left a message. The pharmacist checked her messages again and confirmed that he had not called, or rather, had not called there, as the number that I’d been told he’d called was not the number of the pharmacy.
I called back and gave them the correct number, to which the girl responded, “That’s not the number you gave us.”
Beginning to feel more than a little annoyed, I bit my tongue with my remaining teeth and kept myself from going off on her as I calmly explained that I’d never given them a number at all, as, prior to just getting the number from the pharmacist a minute earlier, I had no idea what the pharmacy’s number was.
Eventually the doctor’s office called the pharmacy and I was given a number and was forced to hang around at this shopping center killing time until my prescriptions were ready.
Sitting out on a bench in the humid 80+ degree weather, made all the more muggy by someone hosing down the sidewalk in front of the store, I felt like a character in a Chuck Palahniuk novel, given my misanthropic nature, my swollen lips, several missing teeth, and mouth full of blood.
I became increasingly irritated as the “Rx Ready” sign seemed perpetually stuck on “11” (my number was 14) and I ran out of things I could do to occupy my time at a strip mall that consists primarily of a grocery store, a Starbucks, various kinds of doctors’ offices, and a video store.
Eventually I decided to take a walk all the way around the shopping center, figuring that it would get me a little bit of exercise and kill a little more time.
One of the offices located in that center is my optometrist’s, which is where the woman I’ve referred to in the past as “Stone Face,” whom I had, mostly unsuccessfully, attempted to date quite a while back, had once worked.
It may be that she now works exclusively at one of the other offices, or that, as she mentioned she might, she’s moved back to Florida, but in any case it’s been quite some time since I last saw her.
However, as I walked around to the back of the shopping center, where most employees park, I spotted what I thought was her car, and it occurred to me that, after all this time, it would be just my luck to bump into her under my present circumstances.
It turned out not to be her car, or at least the car she had when I knew her, and at no point in my time-killing did I bump into her.
By the time my prescription was ready I was beginning to feel a bit woozy from the heat and because I hadn’t eaten any breakfast before going in for the extractions. So I was going on four hours with my only sustenance being whatever amounts of my own blood I had swallowed since my teeth had been pulled.
And while swallowing blood was in line with the doctor’s recommendation of limiting myself to a liquid diet for the next couple of days, it wasn’t exactly an ideal breakfast.
So once I had my drugs I came home and made myself a protein shake, popped my pills, and tried to take a nap.
My attempt at napping was a less-than-complete success, and so I find myself here, writing this.
I’ve never taken Vicodin before, and I have to say that so far, as what numbness there was wears off, I’m seeing its reputation for efficaciousness as largely undeserved.
Still, I think I may take another crack at the whole napping thing, which may aid the Vicodin in defending its reputation.
In so doing he completed the final phase in my secret origin as a super hero: The Toothless Wonder!
Yes, it’s the Toothless Wonder, strange visitor from a town without a central fluoridated water supply, who, in his identity as Jon Maki, lazy kid with parents who didn’t have dental insurance, never bothered taking care of his teeth until it was far too late, and who fights a never-ending battle to pay ever-increasing dentist bills, and whose frequent visits to dentists over the past fifteen years have led to the development of Toothless Wonder’s one and only super-power: a slight immunity to Novocain…
The end result of this “power” of mine was that, despite several shots and the fact that my lower lip felt as if it had swollen to three times its normal size, I wasn’t completely numb when several of the teeth were pulled. This didn’t result in any sort of extreme “Marathon Man” levels of pain, but even so, it was quite painful.
Past experience had taught me, though, that there was nothing that could be done to completely eliminate the pain, so I had to simply not grin and bear it.
Prior to the actual extractions, as we waited for the numbness (incomplete though it may have been) to spread, the doctor’s cute-ish, though slightly too chubby assistant engaged me in conversation about the weather, which eventually meandered into different areas of discussion.
Of course, very early on she made reference to having a fiancé, though even if she had been single any chances I might have had with her would have been destroyed the instant she looked in my mouth, which, even before the extractions had rendered it a bloody mess, looked like a scene taken straight from a horror movie.
After all of the yanking was over the doctor stitched me up with self-dissolving stitches (I could feel the stitching taking place as well. Also not pleasant.), informed me that I had been a “marvelous” patient, and I was on my way.
I suppose I should be glad that they’d made me pay my contribution ($150+) up front before the procedure, which allowed me to just get the hell out of there without any fuss, but it still struck me as a bit mercenary.
From there I was on my way to the pharmacy at my local Giant to pick up my prescription for an anti-biotic and Vicodin, which the doctor had called in.
Or so he claimed, at any rate.
The pharmacy had received no call on my behalf.
I had to go out to my car and grab the bag of gauze and instructions the doctor had given me so that I could get the number and call in to verify that the prescription had been called in. The girl who answered assured me that he had called and that he’d left a message. The pharmacist checked her messages again and confirmed that he had not called, or rather, had not called there, as the number that I’d been told he’d called was not the number of the pharmacy.
I called back and gave them the correct number, to which the girl responded, “That’s not the number you gave us.”
Beginning to feel more than a little annoyed, I bit my tongue with my remaining teeth and kept myself from going off on her as I calmly explained that I’d never given them a number at all, as, prior to just getting the number from the pharmacist a minute earlier, I had no idea what the pharmacy’s number was.
Eventually the doctor’s office called the pharmacy and I was given a number and was forced to hang around at this shopping center killing time until my prescriptions were ready.
Sitting out on a bench in the humid 80+ degree weather, made all the more muggy by someone hosing down the sidewalk in front of the store, I felt like a character in a Chuck Palahniuk novel, given my misanthropic nature, my swollen lips, several missing teeth, and mouth full of blood.
I became increasingly irritated as the “Rx Ready” sign seemed perpetually stuck on “11” (my number was 14) and I ran out of things I could do to occupy my time at a strip mall that consists primarily of a grocery store, a Starbucks, various kinds of doctors’ offices, and a video store.
Eventually I decided to take a walk all the way around the shopping center, figuring that it would get me a little bit of exercise and kill a little more time.
One of the offices located in that center is my optometrist’s, which is where the woman I’ve referred to in the past as “Stone Face,” whom I had, mostly unsuccessfully, attempted to date quite a while back, had once worked.
It may be that she now works exclusively at one of the other offices, or that, as she mentioned she might, she’s moved back to Florida, but in any case it’s been quite some time since I last saw her.
However, as I walked around to the back of the shopping center, where most employees park, I spotted what I thought was her car, and it occurred to me that, after all this time, it would be just my luck to bump into her under my present circumstances.
It turned out not to be her car, or at least the car she had when I knew her, and at no point in my time-killing did I bump into her.
By the time my prescription was ready I was beginning to feel a bit woozy from the heat and because I hadn’t eaten any breakfast before going in for the extractions. So I was going on four hours with my only sustenance being whatever amounts of my own blood I had swallowed since my teeth had been pulled.
And while swallowing blood was in line with the doctor’s recommendation of limiting myself to a liquid diet for the next couple of days, it wasn’t exactly an ideal breakfast.
So once I had my drugs I came home and made myself a protein shake, popped my pills, and tried to take a nap.
My attempt at napping was a less-than-complete success, and so I find myself here, writing this.
I’ve never taken Vicodin before, and I have to say that so far, as what numbness there was wears off, I’m seeing its reputation for efficaciousness as largely undeserved.
Still, I think I may take another crack at the whole napping thing, which may aid the Vicodin in defending its reputation.
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