I've been meaning to do some kind of 2008 wrap-up, but every start I make feels like it doesn't even do justice to the year that was. At the risk of sounding all sentimental and stuff, I'm going to remember this year for quite some time. It was full of really high highs and really low lows, and maybe some points in between, but extremes were the name of the game. I don't know how ot sum up everything; I could write paragraph after paragraph in sickening detail about every little thing, but why? So I can go back and think really hard about some of the crap I put up with? Nah. So for your reading ease and my emotional ease, here is 2008: Abridged.
January: School. Took 18 hours. Thought it would manageable AS A SECOND-SEMESTER SENIOR. It was, for about three days. Started getting ASB stuff going and realized it would be a slight headache. Lived in the newsroom. Started The Great Resume Mail-Out to every newspaper for which I could find the name and address of a managing editor.
February: Still tried to fool myself into thinking 18 hours was manageable. Slipped a little but what else is new? Witnessed the Versus Valentine Debacle. Laughed hysterically whenever I thought of it. Moped that I had no Valentine. Rejection letters resulting from said mail-out began arriving. Forgot what self-esteem was. Lived in the newsroom. Worked like a maniac on ASB stuff and realized it would be worth it.
March: Totally slacking on classes. Go figure. Keeping up, but barely. Really only cared about Guralnick's class. Lived in the newsroom. Loved ASB. Jarred got fired. I took over The Hustler. My life promptly fell apart. Cried at least twice a day. In one week only managed to sleep 5 hours. Would occasionally forget to eat. Yelled at a lot of people, including some who didn't deserve it. Stopped going to class because I was afraid to be out of the newsroom. Updated the resume and continued to canvass the U.S. with that and my clips. More rejection.
April: Wait, I had class? Never missed Guralnick's though. Realized I AM a good writer. Not good enough to write a paper without reading the book and think the professor wouldn't figure me out. Cried a lot more. Had my first panic attack. Would I graduate? Thought I was going to fail two classes. Took SND Quick Course and gave my resume to everyone there. Got a call from the T-U. Got an interview from the T-U. Got a job from the T-U (on the last day of class). Saw Steve Earle. Cried during my favorite song. Still had to finish paper to get grade for a class. Didn't sleep for three days straight in order to finish paper. Did not finish paper. Lived in the newsroom. More Hustler drama.
May: Flew to Jacksonville to look for place to live. Found it. Foolishly thought I could afford it. Wrote paper that was due last month on plane home. Finished paper at the very last second possible. Got a sympathy grade that let me pass. Washed my hands of the newspaper. Drank heavily and threw up a lot. Symbolic. GRADUATED. Moved to Jacksonville. Started job. Thought I would do horribly. I didn't? Fancied myself well-adjusted.
June: Beaches. Sunburns. Made a handful of friends in the newsroom. Nothing else remarkable. Still fancied myself well-adjusted. Got kittens. Mom visited. Bought furniture. Bad choice. Started Scrabbling heavily with Pat.
July: Friends invited me with them for the Fourth. Realized, "Hey, these people actually care about me!" Got friendly with more people in the newsroom. Melted in Florida heat. Living alone is expensive. Found good places to drive around when I need to drive around.
August: Started working on the daily. Started missing home. Started wanting to broaden social circle. Got scared of my first "hurricane." Acted like a Tennessean with the snow and stocked up on bread, water and toilet paper. Lost power for three days. Met The Boy. Realized I very much liked The Boy. More work nonsense.
September: Whispers of layoffs in the newsroom. Rumors are just that. The Boy and I continue to hang out. Make wonderful friends on the news desk.
October: Birthday month! Work continues. Layoff whispers get a little louder. Start working more on the daily than on communities. Things with The Boy keep going well. Things with new friends going well. BIRTHDAY! More than I could ask for. Cat breaks her toe.
November: Layoffs become reality. One of my fantastic friends gets the boot. Another friend quits. Morale drops to frightening lows. Spend Thanksgiving with The Boy's family. Awesome. Homesick.
December: Go home for a few days. The Boy meets the family. Glad to be home but glad when I get back to Jacksonville. Work work work. Christmas is OK. Work work work. New Year's Eve is fun. Fireworks. New year.
And there you have it, my year in brief. Despite all the lows, I think the highs were enough to get me through it all. I graduated. I got a pretty decent job. I got a great boyfriend.
As soon as I was finished with The Hustler, I could breathe. In just a couple days, my whole self did a 180 and I was finally OK again. I didn't have anything to worry about, I didn't have to stay up until 5 a.m., I had nothing to keep me up until 5 a.m. It's funny; things seemed to just get mediocre and routine after all that, but they weren't. They were finally just normal.
So my year was sucky, and so was everyone else's. I guess 2008 was just Year of the Suck, and now it's time to move on and find something good to look forward to this year. I know what I'm looking forward to, and it's finally something that I want because I want it not because it's going to rescue from a crap situation (much the way I looked at graduation; no more drama). And for once, I'm excited about a new year and seeing what new things happen and how much is going to change in these next 12 months. It's a pretty long time.
Showing posts with label health. Show all posts
Showing posts with label health. Show all posts
1/5/09
7/29/08
Tweet tweet
A number of my work friends Twitter, so like the sheep that I am, I jumped on the bandwagon. I joined more to follow my friends than to update people on the things I do because frankly I don't do anything. I may Twitter my Scrabble victories, but other than that I've got nothing spectacular going on.
That's a lie. I do. Or my cat does. Anyway.
So a couple weeks after I moved to J'ville, I adopted two precious little kitties — Bess and George — from the Jacksonville Humane Society, and we've gotten along fabulously. They can be little shits sometimes (like kids!) but they're also darn cute and really sweet (unlike kids).
They both have their own little quirks and weird things, but they're mostly endearing. Except this new behavior from George where she sleeps in her litter box. In. The. Litter. Box. On her and Bess' poop. It's slightly cute but mostly gross.
I did some Googling yesterday, and all the discussion boards suggest three things:
1. She feels most secure in her litter box because she's been spooked by something or feels threatened by another cat. I don't think this is the case because it's brand new behavior and she and Bess are sisters and have always seemed to get along well.
2. A lot of shelter cats slept in their litter boxes because it's the softest place in their cage. I just switched litter, so the new stuff might be similar to what they used at the Humane Society and she just feels like it's more homey. A very likely explanation.
3. She's sick. Some cats will indicate that they don't feel well by just hanging out at the litter box all the time, whether they're actually using it or not. She seems to be using it normally and isn't feverish or anything, so this is possible but not likely. I should take her to the vet but can't afford it. Donations?
So yeah, anyone know any cat-behavior experts? I could use some help, here.
8/14/07
Losing you's a sure way to set off my allergies
Yeah, so is having allergens shot right into my arm.
Today, I went to the ASAP clinic to get re-tested for allergies and other things in hopes of determining why I have so many sinus problems. I was last tested during my freshman or sophomore year of high school, and none of my allergies were severe or even moderate. The tests for dust, mold, mildew and grass were positive, but those are super-common and easily treated. I was put on a mild antihistamine and sent on my way.
Well, instead of becoming a NORMAL HUMAN BEING and growing out of my allergies, I've grown into them, and they're become pretty severe in the last year or so. During the fall and early spring — my worst allergy seasons — I get several sinus infections and can barely do anything between the massive itching that's going on and the fact that I'm getting too little oxygen.
During one of my many trips to Student Health this past April, I actually got to see a real doctor instead of a nurse practitioner, and she said I may have more serious problems than just allergies and recommended I go to ASAP for tests. It was the end of the school year: I had finals and other things to worry about, like what I was going to do with my life, so I just put it off. Of course I got sick again this summer and made yet another visit to Student Health, where I was quickly referred to ASAP for testing.
That testing finally happened today, after five loooooong days of not taking my beloved Zyrtec. I made it through the first two okay, with a little congestion and itchy eyes. By Saturday, however, I had urticaria, commonly known as hives (NOTE: That is not a picture of mine. They weren't quite that severe, and they were on my back and arms, but that gives you a good idea of how much I resembled a leper.) If you've never had hives, I hope you never do. Unless I don't like you.
Anyhow, they were not as I'd imagined they would be; they were just big clusters of mosquito bite-looking bumps that ITCHED. And scratching only makes them worse, FYI. Occasionally, I gave in and scratched and damn it felt good, but that just made them stick around longer. Luckily, I don't have severe ones, and they come and go rather quickly (the longest any stayed at one time was about an hour). Pretty much the only thing that made them not itch was, well, okay nothing. Bathing helped some, so did copious amounts of hydrocortisone, but last night I got in bed and cried for an hour because I itched beyond belief and there was nothing I could do about it.
So, after that misery, I "agreed," as my doctor kept saying, to let a nurse inject 15 different allergens under my skin to see what my reaction would be. These were just common allergens, such as grass, mold and various trees. Right away, the spot for dust got really red and swollen and ITCHY, and so did the ones for mold and some tree mix. There was another dot that was nearly as bad as the one for dust, but I didn't see the reference sheet in time to know what it would be.
Fifteen long minutes later, the nurse washes off my arm and makes some notes, and then announces to what I am allergic: mild reactions to grass and mold, moderate reaction to mildew and the tree mix, severe reactions to dust and (get this) COCKROACH.
BARF BARF BARF. I am allergic to cockroaches. That was the mystery allergen I didn't see in time on the sheet. I looked at the nurse incredulously and asked how I can be allergic to cockroaches; they don't bite or anything, so it's not the same as being allergic to bees or other insects. What contact do I have with cockroaches?
Well my friends, we as humans INHALE COCKROACH DROPPINGS, and some people (e.g., me) have an adverse reaction to it. I seriously almost puked all over the poor woman's desk. I was extremely grossed out by this revelation — I, who will clean the stuff out of a kitchen drain with my bare hand, which I have come to believe is the standard by which a person's gross-out threshold can be measured. Grooooooooossssssssssss.
The nurse told me it's pretty uncommon to be allergic to cockroaches. Well, yippee, look at me being a minority! They should put my name on a plaque somewhere for having to acknowledge that there is cockroach poop somewhere inside my body and it's making me sick. I have weird allergies: cockroach, bananas, nasal spray for allergies (Hey, Alanis, want irony? Are you allergic to allergy medicine?).
My parents produced a freak of nature. George doesn't have bad/freakish allergies; how did I get so screwed? I've decided that I'm allergic to everything that can be inhaled except for oxygen (and even that is probably questionable). Randy Travis is the singer of the song that is my title; maybe this will give him some new inspiration.
And for your viewing pleasure:
Those are my 15 dots of hell. They look worse now than they did when I was actually at ASAP, so that probably means I'm deathly allergic to something there that they weren't able to catch. At the same time, this picture doesn't do the cockroach spot a bit of justice.
Today, I went to the ASAP clinic to get re-tested for allergies and other things in hopes of determining why I have so many sinus problems. I was last tested during my freshman or sophomore year of high school, and none of my allergies were severe or even moderate. The tests for dust, mold, mildew and grass were positive, but those are super-common and easily treated. I was put on a mild antihistamine and sent on my way.
Well, instead of becoming a NORMAL HUMAN BEING and growing out of my allergies, I've grown into them, and they're become pretty severe in the last year or so. During the fall and early spring — my worst allergy seasons — I get several sinus infections and can barely do anything between the massive itching that's going on and the fact that I'm getting too little oxygen.
During one of my many trips to Student Health this past April, I actually got to see a real doctor instead of a nurse practitioner, and she said I may have more serious problems than just allergies and recommended I go to ASAP for tests. It was the end of the school year: I had finals and other things to worry about, like what I was going to do with my life, so I just put it off. Of course I got sick again this summer and made yet another visit to Student Health, where I was quickly referred to ASAP for testing.
That testing finally happened today, after five loooooong days of not taking my beloved Zyrtec. I made it through the first two okay, with a little congestion and itchy eyes. By Saturday, however, I had urticaria, commonly known as hives (NOTE: That is not a picture of mine. They weren't quite that severe, and they were on my back and arms, but that gives you a good idea of how much I resembled a leper.) If you've never had hives, I hope you never do. Unless I don't like you.
Anyhow, they were not as I'd imagined they would be; they were just big clusters of mosquito bite-looking bumps that ITCHED. And scratching only makes them worse, FYI. Occasionally, I gave in and scratched and damn it felt good, but that just made them stick around longer. Luckily, I don't have severe ones, and they come and go rather quickly (the longest any stayed at one time was about an hour). Pretty much the only thing that made them not itch was, well, okay nothing. Bathing helped some, so did copious amounts of hydrocortisone, but last night I got in bed and cried for an hour because I itched beyond belief and there was nothing I could do about it.
So, after that misery, I "agreed," as my doctor kept saying, to let a nurse inject 15 different allergens under my skin to see what my reaction would be. These were just common allergens, such as grass, mold and various trees. Right away, the spot for dust got really red and swollen and ITCHY, and so did the ones for mold and some tree mix. There was another dot that was nearly as bad as the one for dust, but I didn't see the reference sheet in time to know what it would be.
Fifteen long minutes later, the nurse washes off my arm and makes some notes, and then announces to what I am allergic: mild reactions to grass and mold, moderate reaction to mildew and the tree mix, severe reactions to dust and (get this) COCKROACH.
BARF BARF BARF. I am allergic to cockroaches. That was the mystery allergen I didn't see in time on the sheet. I looked at the nurse incredulously and asked how I can be allergic to cockroaches; they don't bite or anything, so it's not the same as being allergic to bees or other insects. What contact do I have with cockroaches?
Well my friends, we as humans INHALE COCKROACH DROPPINGS, and some people (e.g., me) have an adverse reaction to it. I seriously almost puked all over the poor woman's desk. I was extremely grossed out by this revelation — I, who will clean the stuff out of a kitchen drain with my bare hand, which I have come to believe is the standard by which a person's gross-out threshold can be measured. Grooooooooossssssssssss.
The nurse told me it's pretty uncommon to be allergic to cockroaches. Well, yippee, look at me being a minority! They should put my name on a plaque somewhere for having to acknowledge that there is cockroach poop somewhere inside my body and it's making me sick. I have weird allergies: cockroach, bananas, nasal spray for allergies (Hey, Alanis, want irony? Are you allergic to allergy medicine?).
My parents produced a freak of nature. George doesn't have bad/freakish allergies; how did I get so screwed? I've decided that I'm allergic to everything that can be inhaled except for oxygen (and even that is probably questionable). Randy Travis is the singer of the song that is my title; maybe this will give him some new inspiration.
And for your viewing pleasure:
Those are my 15 dots of hell. They look worse now than they did when I was actually at ASAP, so that probably means I'm deathly allergic to something there that they weren't able to catch. At the same time, this picture doesn't do the cockroach spot a bit of justice.
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