So: I'm taking a break from surfing, from perusing this fine website. Not to be dramatic, of course; I have no beef nor "beef" with SG, nor erotica, nor internet pornography. This is not a typical "I'm leaving the internet" rant. Rather, following the events of the summer, I am refocusing my effort. Where last I wrote regularly -- in an almost proto-blogger fashion (though in reality it was just "words of wisdom" sent weekly (on Fridays) to my two Peace Corps-Romania mates, Thor & [a man who shares his name, first & last, with a renowned internet publisher of musico-critico pith]) -- seven years ago, I am getting back to it. I am going to write a novel, one that has been slow-roasting in my imagination since Feb '03, spending evenings outlining it at Marco Polo Restaurant in Deva, Romania. I am going to start going to bar-trivia on a weekly basis, again. I am going to take a Tango class.
&, no, the novelling affectation is not due the impending Twenty-ten installment of the National Novel-writing Month. It is not a regrettable coincidence, either.
The impulse to attack my tome, then, struck toward the end of September, my first weeks back to work (part-time), & even more, doing three-days-weekly cardiac rehab. Endeavouring to physical improvement -- my body is doing remarkably, for the surgery it required; I chalk it to youth (most thirty year olds don't have aneurysm repairs) & general (if not specific) good fortune in health, rarely taking ill -- I saw a need to increase my occupational, intellectual, & hobbyist condition. That the introspection came in autumn, when mine usually does, with or without life-saving surgery, is unsurprising. That others feel the same, thus NANO.... NANO... NANOTGONNAWORKHERENOMORE, does not surprise either. & simply, I will ride this wave with them.
&, hopefully, by 1st December, with only about 152 hopefuls sets in the hole, I shall return.
See you further on up the trail... & no, I havn't seen nor heard from the New Year's Eve '09 babe, nor did I expect it, & certainly don't expect to now. It was good to try, though.
I need to try more.
I should join a gym. I might even get a ten-games "season" tickets package for the local nine (Go, Brewers, Go).
But, for now, I bid you well. I shall return.
xoxo, undershaker
&, no, the novelling affectation is not due the impending Twenty-ten installment of the National Novel-writing Month. It is not a regrettable coincidence, either.
The impulse to attack my tome, then, struck toward the end of September, my first weeks back to work (part-time), & even more, doing three-days-weekly cardiac rehab. Endeavouring to physical improvement -- my body is doing remarkably, for the surgery it required; I chalk it to youth (most thirty year olds don't have aneurysm repairs) & general (if not specific) good fortune in health, rarely taking ill -- I saw a need to increase my occupational, intellectual, & hobbyist condition. That the introspection came in autumn, when mine usually does, with or without life-saving surgery, is unsurprising. That others feel the same, thus NANO.... NANO... NANOTGONNAWORKHERENOMORE, does not surprise either. & simply, I will ride this wave with them.
&, hopefully, by 1st December, with only about 152 hopefuls sets in the hole, I shall return.
See you further on up the trail... & no, I havn't seen nor heard from the New Year's Eve '09 babe, nor did I expect it, & certainly don't expect to now. It was good to try, though.
I need to try more.
I should join a gym. I might even get a ten-games "season" tickets package for the local nine (Go, Brewers, Go).
But, for now, I bid you well. I shall return.
xoxo, undershaker
* *** ****** *** *
So, this predates my involvement with Suicidegirls, as a paid subscriber by two years, as one aware of the phenomenon by a little over a year. It's an ancient story, then, especially in the internet age of accelerated time, but it explains a lot why I fell on the crutch of erotica & strip-clubs for my feminine affection (in the former case, merely fantasy; in the latter, almost just that, but at least they were bodily adjacent). But, as an explanation, anecdotal as it is, it should be shared.
" I grew at least an inch in about an hour (so Bryce can bite down on that noise (for sure as I am commenting on Deadspin he's everything I hate)).
"It was 3rd December 2001, close of the Packers-Jaguars Monday Nite tilt. Leaving the dorm second floor restroom, following my evening's last voiding, I came to the aid of a dame upon whom I had been crushing since the previous March -- for two months, I ran into her in the library, usually weekends, & tried to flirt, but usually flailed -- & had re-encountered, with her ex from first year (she was flinging, on the side, with him, while having a steady in Madison), the following November. She had fallen out of a Coachman's chair in her ex's room, where she, the ex, & his roommate were enjoying Domino's (note: hardly food*) & watching the game.
"Having picked her up, literally, we chatted for a few about music, her lamenting she didn't know I had two ducats for the Weezer/Smoking Popes**/Tenacious D show at the Alliant Coliseum (but no ride; alas, she had a car, & could've have driven me in exchange for the 2nd entry) that nite, then going next door to my room to listen to Cake's Fashion Nugget. We didn't stay too long there, returning to her ex's room, then her departing for her own, one building over in the Quad.
"She returned after fifteen, though, & after suffering her ex's tickling for a coupla, she swung to my side, leaned into my right, & hand-fed me lukewarm Domino's, all the while smiling, eyes twinkling just as much. & once the slice was finished, she slid to my left, catching a rest, curled into my lap, her soft, platinum locks nestled along my burgeoning erection, the largest erection I had ever achieved. (& I was a frequent self-polluter, with knowledge I was not more than four & an half inches, give or take an half.) But, with my nine months crush in my lap, I was at least five & an half.
"Unfortunately, then, my thought to whisper sweetly to her ear, "Shall we make haste to my room?", was preempted by a desire neither to be slapped about by a jealous ex-with-benefits nor cuckold a current beau at the state's flagship campus. So, I went home that nite with my hard-on, larger than ever, but thoroughly unsatisfied".
#drunkenhookupfailure (though I had not had a sip of drink, only my potential paramour had)
*Credit to Dashiell Bennett for that description of Domino's.
**A late sub for Jimmy Eat World. At the time, in fact, I don't believe the Smoking Popes were an otherwise active/touring band.
* ** *** ** *
Flash to eight years later. Namely, as described in this blog-dropping. Cockblocking oneself at New Year's Karaoke.
For the three months after I failed to close any manner of deal with the lady, let's call her Polonia, I hemmed & hawed whether to drop her a note via USPS apologizing for my social retardation & inquiring if she might remain interested in at least an acquaintance/friendship. I never did. It seemed too weird. Yes, I did find out in an above-board way where she worked, so I could have mailed the correspondence there & not felt guilty, or aggrieved that I might end up with a restraining order, but how many men outside of romantic comedies actually do that. I know the sort who do: looney-tunes. I would like to think, while I might be a pathetic, self-flagellating sort, I am not a loon, though. So, no dice.
Until this week.
I am going to mail a letter to Polonia. It's a total shot in the dark, one I expect to find no target... But even for that, at least I won't regret my failure, anymore. (It might still get me wistful, but I'll know that I've tried.)
With no further preamble, then, the letter:
"7th September 2010
Wauwatosa, WI
"[Polonia],
"To open, I should express my regret for not having captured your last name. This effort, however shallow &/or bizarre it may be, on which I am embarking would be much more easily endeavoured, for nought or (some measure of) success were I to know that. Alas, when first & last we met, nine months ago, I had but two, perhaps three, hours to share with you in conversation, & such in-depth personal questions as family name could not & did not arise.
"As is, even for the above, the mention of the time-frame at which we met -- nine months, or, I should specify, the New Year’s Eve -- you doubtless have not a clue who I am. & perhaps, too, I am better for that. This improbable attempt at connection, quite likely doomed, would drift more easily from my biography, hardly haunting me, if our ships passing in the nite were to remain on first name basis & hardly recollected.
"Still, I press on. I met you, once, as I have said, & as the eve closed I should have approached, at least asked for a means to contact you (so as to make plans for a later reconnoitering), or possibly offered to join you, taking you home (with nought but the expectation of a mutual launch to 2010 & a cheek peck), but I did as I always do in such situations & second-guessed my interpretation of the “join us, as we leave, my sister, friends, & I” gesture.
"Of course, as well, I was kicking myself within fifteen minutes of your departure, as I walked to my own vehicle for the brief, but saddening, maddening, drive home, another flailing attempt at sustaining a social interaction. & for the next three months, in fits & starts, I tried to figure how possibly to redeem myself, pursue you in a manner hopefully befitting a mid-period John Cusack romantic comedy (& pointedly, not a hair-shirts & fava beans style), but each time, I balked. It seemed too weird.
"As the three months since have tripled, though, I have turned thirty -- an event occuring at approximately the end of the third month -- & experienced certain complications which have led me to re-consider my reticence in pursuit & over-arching, too large, fear of rejection.
"With this note, then, I am asking if there could be a chance we might meet again, then, a planned encounter, maybe just tipping back a Strongbow apiece, & sharing a few words. It could be a date, or just a friendly meeting -- Lord knows, I could use more acquaintances as much as I could resume dating -- & if this note has not made you ill (for my seeming desperation, or its probable strangeness), I hope we should.
"Please feel free to respond via phone, then. I can be reached at 414.732.3766. & if you do not call, I will accept that my chance came & went on the same nite, & will cease effort to contact you. I feel, though, I must try, once. Even if I should have made that once the New Year, or January 15th (at the latest).
"I hope you find yourself well, & best of luck in your graduate studies;
"cordially,
"[undershaker]
"P.S. Regardless whether you respond or not, I will never hear “Goodbye Earl” as I did before December 31st, 2009. As well, I owe an affection for Lady Gaga to you & yours. As little as we knew & know each other, then, you affected me, & for that, I thank you".
* ** *** ** *
No regrets.
If only what I am doing, now, could be so easy as this. Sadly, I will never look as good, nor come off as smoothly, as Bono doing an Elvis Costello imitation.
" I grew at least an inch in about an hour (so Bryce can bite down on that noise (for sure as I am commenting on Deadspin he's everything I hate)).
"It was 3rd December 2001, close of the Packers-Jaguars Monday Nite tilt. Leaving the dorm second floor restroom, following my evening's last voiding, I came to the aid of a dame upon whom I had been crushing since the previous March -- for two months, I ran into her in the library, usually weekends, & tried to flirt, but usually flailed -- & had re-encountered, with her ex from first year (she was flinging, on the side, with him, while having a steady in Madison), the following November. She had fallen out of a Coachman's chair in her ex's room, where she, the ex, & his roommate were enjoying Domino's (note: hardly food*) & watching the game.
"Having picked her up, literally, we chatted for a few about music, her lamenting she didn't know I had two ducats for the Weezer/Smoking Popes**/Tenacious D show at the Alliant Coliseum (but no ride; alas, she had a car, & could've have driven me in exchange for the 2nd entry) that nite, then going next door to my room to listen to Cake's Fashion Nugget. We didn't stay too long there, returning to her ex's room, then her departing for her own, one building over in the Quad.
"She returned after fifteen, though, & after suffering her ex's tickling for a coupla, she swung to my side, leaned into my right, & hand-fed me lukewarm Domino's, all the while smiling, eyes twinkling just as much. & once the slice was finished, she slid to my left, catching a rest, curled into my lap, her soft, platinum locks nestled along my burgeoning erection, the largest erection I had ever achieved. (& I was a frequent self-polluter, with knowledge I was not more than four & an half inches, give or take an half.) But, with my nine months crush in my lap, I was at least five & an half.
"Unfortunately, then, my thought to whisper sweetly to her ear, "Shall we make haste to my room?", was preempted by a desire neither to be slapped about by a jealous ex-with-benefits nor cuckold a current beau at the state's flagship campus. So, I went home that nite with my hard-on, larger than ever, but thoroughly unsatisfied".
#drunkenhookupfailure (though I had not had a sip of drink, only my potential paramour had)
*Credit to Dashiell Bennett for that description of Domino's.
**A late sub for Jimmy Eat World. At the time, in fact, I don't believe the Smoking Popes were an otherwise active/touring band.
* ** *** ** *
Flash to eight years later. Namely, as described in this blog-dropping. Cockblocking oneself at New Year's Karaoke.
For the three months after I failed to close any manner of deal with the lady, let's call her Polonia, I hemmed & hawed whether to drop her a note via USPS apologizing for my social retardation & inquiring if she might remain interested in at least an acquaintance/friendship. I never did. It seemed too weird. Yes, I did find out in an above-board way where she worked, so I could have mailed the correspondence there & not felt guilty, or aggrieved that I might end up with a restraining order, but how many men outside of romantic comedies actually do that. I know the sort who do: looney-tunes. I would like to think, while I might be a pathetic, self-flagellating sort, I am not a loon, though. So, no dice.
Until this week.
I am going to mail a letter to Polonia. It's a total shot in the dark, one I expect to find no target... But even for that, at least I won't regret my failure, anymore. (It might still get me wistful, but I'll know that I've tried.)
With no further preamble, then, the letter:
"7th September 2010
Wauwatosa, WI
"[Polonia],
"To open, I should express my regret for not having captured your last name. This effort, however shallow &/or bizarre it may be, on which I am embarking would be much more easily endeavoured, for nought or (some measure of) success were I to know that. Alas, when first & last we met, nine months ago, I had but two, perhaps three, hours to share with you in conversation, & such in-depth personal questions as family name could not & did not arise.
"As is, even for the above, the mention of the time-frame at which we met -- nine months, or, I should specify, the New Year’s Eve -- you doubtless have not a clue who I am. & perhaps, too, I am better for that. This improbable attempt at connection, quite likely doomed, would drift more easily from my biography, hardly haunting me, if our ships passing in the nite were to remain on first name basis & hardly recollected.
"Still, I press on. I met you, once, as I have said, & as the eve closed I should have approached, at least asked for a means to contact you (so as to make plans for a later reconnoitering), or possibly offered to join you, taking you home (with nought but the expectation of a mutual launch to 2010 & a cheek peck), but I did as I always do in such situations & second-guessed my interpretation of the “join us, as we leave, my sister, friends, & I” gesture.
"Of course, as well, I was kicking myself within fifteen minutes of your departure, as I walked to my own vehicle for the brief, but saddening, maddening, drive home, another flailing attempt at sustaining a social interaction. & for the next three months, in fits & starts, I tried to figure how possibly to redeem myself, pursue you in a manner hopefully befitting a mid-period John Cusack romantic comedy (& pointedly, not a hair-shirts & fava beans style), but each time, I balked. It seemed too weird.
"As the three months since have tripled, though, I have turned thirty -- an event occuring at approximately the end of the third month -- & experienced certain complications which have led me to re-consider my reticence in pursuit & over-arching, too large, fear of rejection.
"With this note, then, I am asking if there could be a chance we might meet again, then, a planned encounter, maybe just tipping back a Strongbow apiece, & sharing a few words. It could be a date, or just a friendly meeting -- Lord knows, I could use more acquaintances as much as I could resume dating -- & if this note has not made you ill (for my seeming desperation, or its probable strangeness), I hope we should.
"Please feel free to respond via phone, then. I can be reached at 414.732.3766. & if you do not call, I will accept that my chance came & went on the same nite, & will cease effort to contact you. I feel, though, I must try, once. Even if I should have made that once the New Year, or January 15th (at the latest).
"I hope you find yourself well, & best of luck in your graduate studies;
"cordially,
"[undershaker]
"P.S. Regardless whether you respond or not, I will never hear “Goodbye Earl” as I did before December 31st, 2009. As well, I owe an affection for Lady Gaga to you & yours. As little as we knew & know each other, then, you affected me, & for that, I thank you".
* ** *** ** *
No regrets.
If only what I am doing, now, could be so easy as this. Sadly, I will never look as good, nor come off as smoothly, as Bono doing an Elvis Costello imitation.
It started March 2008. I cannot recall the day, middle of the month, though -- not quite my birthday -- & I were at work. Doing the data-entry, appointment-check-in grind, staring at a computer -- when my eyes filmed over. Particularly, the right eye; just a grey, quiksilver, almost, blotchiness across my field of vision. Largely to the right, I figured it right eye -- might have been left?
I don't know.
Went to the doctor, to have the event considered. Chalked it up to an ocular migraine, & indeed, seemed simple enough: had lain down on a leather sofa a coupla stories up, had a styrofoam cup of water, trouble seemed to dissipate.
Of course, at the doctor, on this occasion, my blood pressure started to run high. Systolic reading in the high 140s, into the 150s. (At my initial consult with the MD, March '04, I distinctly recall 120/80, or maybe 124/76. High-normal, but not problematic.) & over the next year, I tried to regulate my pressure. Cut out Taco Bell -- all the sour cream! -- & still havn't had it more than two years on. My frequent usage of the Dollar Menu, which started off around the time of the Tigers '06 World Series appearance, & after I had gotten squared away in my own third floor flat (after eighteen months or so in a town-house with two roommates) only a block & an half from a Mickey D's, dropped off.
I still have yet to fully kick the Golden Arches.
Did these, kept up my active lifestyle, two jobs, lots of time out of the house, but blood pressure didn't decrease. It spiralled upward to the heavens, & an episode of light-headedness around end of February 2009, right before a fairly major trip to Alaska & then the West Coast, culminated in a reading of 173/121. Just exorbitant.
I went on blood pressure medication (Benazopril, 10 mg, once a day).
I coincided this diagnosis with guilt. I was not thirty, hadn't even gotten within a year's breath of it, & I was on blood pressure meds. I felt bad for my mother: after she had raised me right, fed me with homemade dinners & balanced lunches (at least thru the start of middle-school, when I first went to public school & had the option of hot-lunch; the parochial school before that did not offer it), had encouraged me not to catch TEH FAAAAAAT, I had done just that. But, I started a new course, only skim or soy milk in my chai or latte, no more late nute runs to Johnny Five's (or Johnny V's, as it actually goes), smaller portions generally. Lost 25 pounds, from 260 to 235 between the first script for Benazopril & my next MD's visit (annual check-up... I had been in the office a time or three between Feb '09 & the following April).
Blood pressure, starting from April '09, ran normal, or closer to, at least; usually in the 116/78 range.
Still, I was having the occasional visual quiksilver, all the same. Had another instance like the first, in Feb '10, then the worst, possibly skirting death, in June, on the ninth. I had just run across a cousin of mine, amid my agency's work, & (in hindsight, unrelatedly) had the most horrific bout of upper-chest tightness & sweating, plus more blurry vision, of my life.
I gave myself twenty minutes to regain composure, walked about the office, & phoned my doctor's office. Needed to get in as soon as possible. I made an appointment for that Friday; convenient, since I planned on taking the day off anyway, personal day, to watch the World Cup opener, Mexico-South Africa at a bar in my town's Latin neighbourhood.
Went to the appointment before the game, did the standard things to open, weighing, blood pressure. Down to 227 pounds. (Huzzah! My goal had been 225 by end of summer '09, but in the event, was prolly unrealistic to expect thirty pounds off in six months.) Met with the MD, described my symptoms. He ordered an ecocardiogram.
Scheduled it for 2nd July.
Went in that day, had a rather smart young ultrasound tech -- Kelly... quite a babe -- do the scan. Only went about fifteen minutes, & started timely, so I had only ten or so -- after straightening a billing issue, from a previous visit -- to watch the disputatious Uruguay-Ghana match. (I was rooting for Uruguay, as Ghana had just knocked out the U.S., but for the Lions to lose on that hand-ball... Let's just say I am glad Netherlands brought the pain the next round.) The eco seemed fine.
I would be proved wrong.
That nite, though, I met my mother at Red Robin for burgers & owned up, odd as the venue would seem for such an admission, that I am hypertensive, & had been on blood-pressure med since the previous March. But it was all in all a festive moment.
Two weeks later, I got a call. Also from mom. It was about a message from my MD's assistant, needing to talk to me about my eco results. In the hub-bub of the summer, another fat -- fatter than I, even -- gal met, I had changed my number. Not, mind you, to keep ahead of the pizza & pie slanging dame from Port Washington, but instead due a total collapse of my mobile's screen. Pulled it out of my pocket on a Saturday at the Solstice, on a date with the hefty dame, no less, & went to check the time. Screen just cold shorted out on me.
Thankfully, I have a second line -- for God knows what reason, other than convincing phone-sales reps for Sprint -- & went to using that one. My doctor, alas, did not have that line, nor had I updated them.
Oddly enough, of course, I had been thinking, all the same, of the eco, in the week or so preceding the call on the 16th July. Thinking, I should call, just to see what they found.
What the cardiologist who read the film found was a 5 cm aneurysm on my ascending aorta. & as the medical assistant & MD pointed out, I would need an angiogram, for confirmation & determination of need for surgery... & I scheduled that, to be read by same cardiologist as the eco, for the coming Thursday. The MD also reminded: any chest pains, get to an ER.
I ended up in the ER that nite.
After a trek thru surgical hell -- the ER doc, the radiologist on site (who read an angiogram administered in my time in Columbia St. Mary's ER) believed the aneurysm needs immediate surgery; the surgeon covering for the one mentioned in my charts by my family practice MD advised, "You look good, you don't need to be in surgery" (mostly, he didn't want to work on the weekend... such a loverboy) -- I ended up at a teaching hospital -- & discharged the next day.
My care remained fast-tracked, though, thru the efforts of my mother (an RN of thirty-plus years).
Had surgery on the 22nd, the day when I would have had the angiogram, then was in ICU for two days, & recovery for three, three-&-an-half more. Had most of my family in the area, an aunt & uncle, an aunt & her Twilite-loving daughter (for whom I had procured four tickets for opening nite of Eclipse (IMAX release), mother & stepfather, father (who bailed on a chance to go to Italy for the nuptials of his girlfriend's daughter... of course, my father really didn't want to go in the first place, too cheap to buy a plane fare, too incurious to want to visit Italy).
I am doing well.
Of course, the dame I had just started seeing -- distinct from the aforementioned dame, & no, I am not two-timing either -- & actually had taken a liking to, didn't show. But that tale of woebegone romance for another time.
I am just happy to be alive.
I don't know.
Went to the doctor, to have the event considered. Chalked it up to an ocular migraine, & indeed, seemed simple enough: had lain down on a leather sofa a coupla stories up, had a styrofoam cup of water, trouble seemed to dissipate.
Of course, at the doctor, on this occasion, my blood pressure started to run high. Systolic reading in the high 140s, into the 150s. (At my initial consult with the MD, March '04, I distinctly recall 120/80, or maybe 124/76. High-normal, but not problematic.) & over the next year, I tried to regulate my pressure. Cut out Taco Bell -- all the sour cream! -- & still havn't had it more than two years on. My frequent usage of the Dollar Menu, which started off around the time of the Tigers '06 World Series appearance, & after I had gotten squared away in my own third floor flat (after eighteen months or so in a town-house with two roommates) only a block & an half from a Mickey D's, dropped off.
I still have yet to fully kick the Golden Arches.
Did these, kept up my active lifestyle, two jobs, lots of time out of the house, but blood pressure didn't decrease. It spiralled upward to the heavens, & an episode of light-headedness around end of February 2009, right before a fairly major trip to Alaska & then the West Coast, culminated in a reading of 173/121. Just exorbitant.
I went on blood pressure medication (Benazopril, 10 mg, once a day).
I coincided this diagnosis with guilt. I was not thirty, hadn't even gotten within a year's breath of it, & I was on blood pressure meds. I felt bad for my mother: after she had raised me right, fed me with homemade dinners & balanced lunches (at least thru the start of middle-school, when I first went to public school & had the option of hot-lunch; the parochial school before that did not offer it), had encouraged me not to catch TEH FAAAAAAT, I had done just that. But, I started a new course, only skim or soy milk in my chai or latte, no more late nute runs to Johnny Five's (or Johnny V's, as it actually goes), smaller portions generally. Lost 25 pounds, from 260 to 235 between the first script for Benazopril & my next MD's visit (annual check-up... I had been in the office a time or three between Feb '09 & the following April).
Blood pressure, starting from April '09, ran normal, or closer to, at least; usually in the 116/78 range.
Still, I was having the occasional visual quiksilver, all the same. Had another instance like the first, in Feb '10, then the worst, possibly skirting death, in June, on the ninth. I had just run across a cousin of mine, amid my agency's work, & (in hindsight, unrelatedly) had the most horrific bout of upper-chest tightness & sweating, plus more blurry vision, of my life.
I gave myself twenty minutes to regain composure, walked about the office, & phoned my doctor's office. Needed to get in as soon as possible. I made an appointment for that Friday; convenient, since I planned on taking the day off anyway, personal day, to watch the World Cup opener, Mexico-South Africa at a bar in my town's Latin neighbourhood.
Went to the appointment before the game, did the standard things to open, weighing, blood pressure. Down to 227 pounds. (Huzzah! My goal had been 225 by end of summer '09, but in the event, was prolly unrealistic to expect thirty pounds off in six months.) Met with the MD, described my symptoms. He ordered an ecocardiogram.
Scheduled it for 2nd July.
Went in that day, had a rather smart young ultrasound tech -- Kelly... quite a babe -- do the scan. Only went about fifteen minutes, & started timely, so I had only ten or so -- after straightening a billing issue, from a previous visit -- to watch the disputatious Uruguay-Ghana match. (I was rooting for Uruguay, as Ghana had just knocked out the U.S., but for the Lions to lose on that hand-ball... Let's just say I am glad Netherlands brought the pain the next round.) The eco seemed fine.
I would be proved wrong.
That nite, though, I met my mother at Red Robin for burgers & owned up, odd as the venue would seem for such an admission, that I am hypertensive, & had been on blood-pressure med since the previous March. But it was all in all a festive moment.
Two weeks later, I got a call. Also from mom. It was about a message from my MD's assistant, needing to talk to me about my eco results. In the hub-bub of the summer, another fat -- fatter than I, even -- gal met, I had changed my number. Not, mind you, to keep ahead of the pizza & pie slanging dame from Port Washington, but instead due a total collapse of my mobile's screen. Pulled it out of my pocket on a Saturday at the Solstice, on a date with the hefty dame, no less, & went to check the time. Screen just cold shorted out on me.
Thankfully, I have a second line -- for God knows what reason, other than convincing phone-sales reps for Sprint -- & went to using that one. My doctor, alas, did not have that line, nor had I updated them.
Oddly enough, of course, I had been thinking, all the same, of the eco, in the week or so preceding the call on the 16th July. Thinking, I should call, just to see what they found.
What the cardiologist who read the film found was a 5 cm aneurysm on my ascending aorta. & as the medical assistant & MD pointed out, I would need an angiogram, for confirmation & determination of need for surgery... & I scheduled that, to be read by same cardiologist as the eco, for the coming Thursday. The MD also reminded: any chest pains, get to an ER.
I ended up in the ER that nite.
After a trek thru surgical hell -- the ER doc, the radiologist on site (who read an angiogram administered in my time in Columbia St. Mary's ER) believed the aneurysm needs immediate surgery; the surgeon covering for the one mentioned in my charts by my family practice MD advised, "You look good, you don't need to be in surgery" (mostly, he didn't want to work on the weekend... such a loverboy) -- I ended up at a teaching hospital -- & discharged the next day.
My care remained fast-tracked, though, thru the efforts of my mother (an RN of thirty-plus years).
Had surgery on the 22nd, the day when I would have had the angiogram, then was in ICU for two days, & recovery for three, three-&-an-half more. Had most of my family in the area, an aunt & uncle, an aunt & her Twilite-loving daughter (for whom I had procured four tickets for opening nite of Eclipse (IMAX release), mother & stepfather, father (who bailed on a chance to go to Italy for the nuptials of his girlfriend's daughter... of course, my father really didn't want to go in the first place, too cheap to buy a plane fare, too incurious to want to visit Italy).
I am doing well.
Of course, the dame I had just started seeing -- distinct from the aforementioned dame, & no, I am not two-timing either -- & actually had taken a liking to, didn't show. But that tale of woebegone romance for another time.
I am just happy to be alive.
[This is from an e:mail to a correspondent of mine on OkCupi. We befriended each other internetically in April '05, & though we've never actually met, we maintain sporadic, amiabile discourse. She is also recently married, so quite willing to give dating advice. -- ajs]
So, the evening's story: NYE, I opened at the cineplex -- this year, for the first in my seven years at my nine-to-five, I was off the Eve as well the Day -- & stayed 'til 5.00 pm, 5.30. Afterward, drove over to my mother & stepfather's, ate some cheese & crackers, drank a Coca-Cola Zero, & talked about the news & the year that were. Got out of there about 6.30, 6.45, & went back to my flat. Stripped out of my work-clothes, read a magazine, napped, & up at nine. Showered, put on a nice pair of denim long-pants & button shirt, & drove to the near-by, newly-christened Cafe Hollander location in the Tosa Village (diablosrojos.us). Read there would be karaoke there, & having caught the bug to embarass myself at such while in Toronto -- two nites, at one Irish bar, did Andrew W.K.'s "Party Hard", then Tenacious D's "Fuck Her Gently" -- I figured, why not take my shamelessness local? I don't have any friends to lose, anyway...
So, I did. But when I got there, the singing hadn't begun, so I took a table on the opposite side of the bar from where the 'oke dj would set up & had a cup of chili, some fries, & two hot-toddies & part of one Strongbow Cider. Also tried to pip up to the off-duty bar-staff & their friends/sig-others playing Scrabble just behind & talking amongst themselves. Alack, I was not cool enough for their sceneasta circle-jerk.
Damn me.
But my nite was not lost. 10.30 pm, I hear the music playing (Fernando). The tones were dulcet (Fernando). So, I picked up my Strongbow & took a seat in the back. Ended up getting chatted up by a couple there with about eight, nine other people, & they tried to talk me into singing Tom Petty. (No dice. But more on that, later.) Did commit to sing, though. Didn't go up 'til after the cajolers had departed, shortly before midnite's strike.
Too, in the space between venturing over, & singing, I struck up what I hoped would be more than a conversation (Fernando... I mean, Mr Jones) with whom I have to presume the only unattached member of the party of 11 or so. Doll named Corinne, 26, teacher at a parochial campus (& Polish Catholic (a favourite of mine, more the Polish than the Catholic, though Cath is cool too)), with either a master's or almost to that point. She was a little thick, but in that, quite chesty, with a low-cut top... & even better, no obvious underwear. Her unbelted jeans were sagging down the bum, revealing a rather tantalizing length of crack... & I was hoping I could well be in.
Not in the butt, mind you -- I've actually never done anal, though I have done analingus & fingering of same locale -- but in, in general. Get some New Year's strange &/or dates in the New Year.
We did seem to hit it off, though maybe we only shared a love of Strongbow -- she was drinking it well before I met her, & I, well before meeting her -- but whatever. We talked, shared biographic data, & when it came time for me to sing (ABBA (!) -- "Dancing Queen") she joined me, even though her voice had been taxed by at least four previous performances, including "Goodbye, Earl" (a filthy, filthy, awesome song), something from Lady Gaga, & Tom Petty's "American Girl".
I was having about as much success chatting up a broad as I had had back in April '05, chatting up two sisters from Eau Claire, Emily, 23, & Kelly, 20, undergrads at the time at UW-Milwaukee, taking a break from studying for finals at Comet Cafe toward close. & after my & Cori's sort-of duet, sitting down, I proffered (creepily, I'm sure, even I didn't want to be), "How 'bout a nite-cap?"
Shortly thereafter, she went to the bathroom with her mates, including her older sister, but reminded me not to leave, they'd be coming back. & they did. But I did nothing. Even when she demuringly but obviously turned back to me, smiled, & gave a little wave as she left with the other seven or eight in her pary.
Didn't even ask for her number. Didn't even think she'd give me a wrong/fake number, let alone a real one.
Did I blow it? Did I demonstrate a certain self-loathing &/or misogyny, with my perception of myself & how the opposite sex views its potential for amour?
Help me, Ea. I'm an aging nobody, & I can't get laid.
I have already posted The Ukelele Orchestra of Great Britain -- "Theme from Shaft" to my blog. Today, I think I have found something even greater. Behold:
A new blog-dropping, already? Yes. It goes with my immersion in SG this evening, after an absence of 11 days, give or take. (This was as well my second such remove from SG in about a month. (Damn the internet & my neighbours's patchy wi-fi connections.) At least this time my withdrawl -- which may be a problem, that I experience SG withdrawl? -- was not so pronounced in my psyche that I dreamt on it, quite luridly (for me, anyway; I don't have erotic dreams, or at least don't remember them, & when I do it's usually missionary or finding an impediment to same (e.g. my dream in late '00, I was at the Mormon Tabernacle in Salt Lake, & ran into my friend Meghan (from my semester abroad, the previous spring); I wanted to engage in intercourse with her, but Saints & non-Saints don't mix like that, so in the dream I was confined to a wheelchair (waking, I am ambulatory)).)
& so it goes.
Anyhow, I have a pithy essayette that I put together in response to that ridiculousness that is Twilight. Specifically, I refer to the "baseball scene". Why is it included?
My thoughts: "As it is, I have three or five reasons for the scene rattling in my head, but the one that stands out to me is this: vampires are traditionalists. Specifically, as it relates to scene, they are sporting traditionalists. You will have noted how the male lead (sorry, I cannot remember names) rather dismally responded to Bella's proffer of joining her at the shore for the multi-racial clique's surf outing. Of course, we assume the dismissal were due the fact that vamps do not respond well or amicably to sunlight. But this is Washington & or Oregon! How much sun is there? Further along, the actual surfing took place on a dreary day, not raining, but misting -- & no sun about. So, clearly, the vampire would have survived.
He chose not to go though. Why? Simply, surfing is too "extreme", too 'Dew Generation', for the ageless blood-sucking monsters who were there for polo's invention (as buzkashi (spelling?)). The vampire just will not abide the churlishness of surfing. Baseball, meanwhile, is a pastoral, timeless game -- one they can & do enjoy. Just to get away from the lust for human flesh (in the bad way), to be amongst themselves; not expending energy, but having fun at least. But fun within the bounds of taste.
Vampires do, then, but they do not do the Dew".
So, what say you?
& so it goes.
Anyhow, I have a pithy essayette that I put together in response to that ridiculousness that is Twilight. Specifically, I refer to the "baseball scene". Why is it included?
My thoughts: "As it is, I have three or five reasons for the scene rattling in my head, but the one that stands out to me is this: vampires are traditionalists. Specifically, as it relates to scene, they are sporting traditionalists. You will have noted how the male lead (sorry, I cannot remember names) rather dismally responded to Bella's proffer of joining her at the shore for the multi-racial clique's surf outing. Of course, we assume the dismissal were due the fact that vamps do not respond well or amicably to sunlight. But this is Washington & or Oregon! How much sun is there? Further along, the actual surfing took place on a dreary day, not raining, but misting -- & no sun about. So, clearly, the vampire would have survived.
He chose not to go though. Why? Simply, surfing is too "extreme", too 'Dew Generation', for the ageless blood-sucking monsters who were there for polo's invention (as buzkashi (spelling?)). The vampire just will not abide the churlishness of surfing. Baseball, meanwhile, is a pastoral, timeless game -- one they can & do enjoy. Just to get away from the lust for human flesh (in the bad way), to be amongst themselves; not expending energy, but having fun at least. But fun within the bounds of taste.
Vampires do, then, but they do not do the Dew".
So, what say you?
