Be careful what you wish for

So I know someone who finally got a job she doesn't want to get Dooced from, and it is just....wow.
She is learning a lot. Most days it's stuff that renders her speechless or sputtering. That used to be almost impossible. You wouldn't believe it if she could tell you, but let me just say it's not that unusual for grownups to want to have a job where they do little besides keep up with their social media and get money. We are talking about jobs that specifically prohibit the use of social media. So being the fearless leader of a troop that apparently contains Galapagos tortoises addicted to iPads definitely has its challenges.
On the bright side, there is no way anyone can sit in her office any more and fart without her getting to throw them out. So yay. Also having to suffer through a roommate burping, yelling at people on the phone, heating up unbearably stinky frozen dinners in the microwave by her head and taking up 75% of a closet-sized space are things of the past.
I honestly think that after some growing pains she will like it a lot. It's based on what she always enjoyed the most at bedside. Meanwhile, growing pains are why they invented Aleve. This Thanksgiving season she is very thankful for her great new boss who she feels will support her through it all.

Why Women Doctors are Better

I asked around at Big Teaching Hospital and got a lead on a newly minted neurologist who is the wife of the nicest new heme-onc. So I got an appointment with her and took her my EMG results, the one which elicited disbelief in Mr. Chief of Department Neurologist. She read them twice with a frown; turns out it's not one kind of damage but many. Her first idea was the Hashimoto's antibodies had damaged various nerves and muscles and symptomatic treatment was most likely the only offer. I insisted that the research is for Hashimoto's neuropathy to resolve when the thyroid is replaced, and mine has been level for eighteen months at least. She considered my suggestion of CIDP because this crap tends to come and go and CIDP is underdiagnosed, linked to both colitis and Hashimoto's by different researchers, and treatable. So she is requesting all my old tests and said she would read them and call me with ideas for further workup. I am going to see Mr. Major Pain in the Ass Rhematologist soon for a followup on the Polyclonal gammopathy and hope to have a request list for him, as I can't afford the deductibles at her sleazy Catholic umbrella organization. A lumbar puncture, which was suggested by Ms. Gorgeous Endocrinologist years ago, may soon be in my future; joy.
Bottom line here; if I had been able to find women specialists from the beginning of this mess, I'd have had a full workup before I got foot drop. Now that I do, maybe some of these women will be on my side for a scientific examination of this bizarre and cruel syndrome. Its latest mean trick? When I stand for a few seconds, get a chill, or feel a little warm, I get a sensation on my hands, feet, arms to the elbow and lower legs to the knee like tiny ants running on me and biting me. Itch and pinch, I guess you would call it. I have to look at the limbs while rubbing them to get it to stop, it's so realistic. So now do I not just stagger like a drunk, I rub like a crackhead. So lovely.

Finally

I have been kinda crushed lately; the neuropathy pain is really getting me down. My sis took me to Dallas to see my child during an extended travel layover and while the trip was amazing, I was a pure dee mess. Just riding in the car made my walking reflex disappear, making each step a huge challenge. It's hard to explain how tiring it is to think about each footstep so you won't fall. I saw the neurologist who is supposed to be the pro from Dover after I got back and walked out of there super mad. There may have been some problems with my tone of voice after he told me he didn't believe the results of the (super painful) EMG and nerve conduction tests, and maybe I had fibromyalgia, not an autoimmune neuropathy. I said a few choice things about MDs who tell women who have lost their careers to painful illness they have fibromyalgia and test men with the same problems until they find what is wrong and treat it. He took it pretty well considering he is the chair of the department at a big old teaching hospital, and grudgingly ordered another test.
The results finally posted today, and I could not believe it. There is a 17% percent chance of someone with my symptoms having an abnormal test, and I did. Polyclonal hypergammaglobulimia, I think I love you. Now maybe someone will treat this motherfucking pain and muscle spasms.

Jon Armstrong is a bad influence

I went back to reading Blurbomat when Jon published his announcement. Honestly, I had stopped because he was just putting up moody pictures and occasional geek stuff that is tl:dr for me because I don't understand it. I really enjoy his meditations on single dad life when he edits himself less, but those are few and far between. I had found him through Dooce, of course, and really liked him better but she was funnier until last year. A few weeks ago he linked to some guy he'd palled around with at an Austin conference who is a blog traffic guru. This guy has all these ideas to drive views to your site. I, being the dedicated social scientist I am, decided the guy was full of crap and made a deliberately meaningless post with a headline that matched his suggestions.
Whoops. He was right. I usually have twenty people or less read this site (Hi, Sis!) but that post got over a thousand views. For nothing.
So for what it's worth, I got in trouble a year or so ago on Dooce.com for mentioning that Heather wasn't funny anymore, getting a slapdown from Jon for my two cent's worth. It was like the Emperor's New Clothes as it turned out and I was just one of the earliest to mention it. I don't click through anymore for the same reason I deliberately do not stare at crime scenes or traffic accidents, so I don't know if she is funny again. I do know that if I do the headline bomb thingie like Jon's buddy suggested, a lot more random people will click through, and to them I say, "Howdy!"
I guess my conclusion is that a bunch of the Internet is either random or thrill-seeking and I am random but no longer thrill-seeking. My world has gotten pretty small, what with the massive chronic mystery pain syndrome and the soul-killing job trapped in a room with Ms. Pee Pad. So they will click through to see if there is anything to gawk at, and finding nothing, will go back to HuffPo. Nice seeing ya'll. If anyone has any suggestions about treatments for a mysterious neuromuscular pain and spasm syndrome that seems to be autoimmune, drop them in the comments, please.

Boob sweat, or there goes the neighborhood

How awesome is that. I bet the property values fell audibly on my street this morning. I went out to pull weeds in the front beds before they dried out too much from the frogstrangling rains we got this week. The bad thing is that this side, with the dirt and the scratches on my arm that make me look like a wrinkly fat old cutter plus beaucoup boob sweat, is actually the good one. Feel sorry for the neighbors who were looking at my back; the shirt climbed up with the same alacrity as my pink granny panties so they got a real treat. I saved the hoarded Lortab for tomorrow; I intend to get high and make Easter dinner.

Dooce Community was no help with preventing me from going postal

 Last Friday I had some minor oral surgery that went completely sideways and made me swell up like a mumps patient and lie around moaning in pain. I did that for about four days. So,then I stopped the thing I was doing at the first of the week, which was preventing my couch and my Lortab from being stolen. By sitting on the couch to keep thievy thieves from stealing it, and eating all the Lortab to keep stealy stealers from thieving it. Worked good, too, but I was about to high-security myself into needing a doctor's note to go back. So back I went on Wednesday.
I was sorry I had acted so rashly by nine am. By ten-thirty I was burning up my text message contact boxes, whining to every friend and relative I had that MY FACE HURT  and MY CO WORKER WILL NOT STFU.
I put my earphones in my ears reluctantly, as, ummm, MY FACE HURT and just acted like I turned the music on because I've gotten her to leave me alone before. When I got home that night I posted on dooce community that they needed to think of things I could do to keep from going postal on this harpy. They were all, "Tell her to be quiet."
We are dealing with crazy and annoying of an advanced and higher order here and "shhhh" is not going to cut it. This female has: made repeated racial slurs and ignorant attacks on the President directly to me, AFTER I told her I'd stood in line for hours for the privilege of voting for him, would do it again, and felt it best if we not discuss politics. She fights on the phone with someone EVERY DAY. She will yell at the cable people for cutting off her service for nonpayment for hours and hours and then tell me the story like I am supposed to side with her. Pay your bill, bitch. She seriously just talks to hear herself talk, and will talk to me with my back turned to her even if I am speaking on the phone before she begins a thought. She takes the required beeper off her ample person and leaves it on her desk and goes away for an hour. For some reason, she is the only person who does not get in trouble for not wearing her beeper. She has told me that she peed on her pee pad and just went to the bathroom to change it.
"Be quiet and let me work please" is not going to change her.
I suppose loosening the wheels on her chair would be wrong. Maybe I will just start farting with my earphones in like I don't know I'm doing it.

Jon and Heather Armstrong's Divorce

Some of the folks on the Dooce community website have wanted to discuss it, but older/wiser/better compensated for their time heads have prevailed. Of course, Internet strangers should be allowed to have private lives, even after they pull back the curtain a little before dropping it.
I don't think most people wanted to gossip or declare Team Jon or Team Heather. I know I have an odd feeling of knowing people I can't possibly know, just because they are talented writers and convey a sense of their lives through their writing and photos. Harder to figure out is why the news bothered me so much; I really identify with Jon's grief for his years of effort and the effect the divorce will have on the kids.  It's probably easier to take the news of divorces in our real-life circles because you can see a lot of those coming; body language tells people all over church when you least realize it.
Plus, we were all rooting for them, all the time, glad for the good stuff and howling at their tormentors when Maytag or the crazy homeowner or Mormons deserved it. It was part of the Dooce experience; so much that we got used to being chastised for mentioning that Heather stopped being funny about a year ago. That was the "f" word that could not be named.  So now we know why she stopped being funny, and there's a weird sense of guilt about acknowledging that, too; like she wasn't dancing fast enough for us while her life was crumbling somewhere else.
I wonder what Leta thinks of what the internet says about her family. She is certainly a good enough reader to know. I couldn't stand the thought of being a preacher's wife with the public life that entails, so I can't imagine a fully public life on the internet.

Not truly and completely dead

Whoa, who knew somebody would keep looking here?
That is nice.
I stopped blogging for a while because work was itself and specifying what is so frustrating about that particular hamster wheel would most certainly get me dooced.
Anyway, the refi came through with just a few slam down the phone and scream moments, the roof got replaced in the same fashion, and the fella deflected my plan to hire a window professional but now he has all my new ones in.
I had oral surgery that went poorly Friday and am sitting on my couch, windows open to the early Spring, robins chirping, new Boston terrier buddy snoring next to me. Lortab and doggies ftw.
Oh, the dog story!
Christmas was nice; the girl and her dear boyfriend were scheduled to fly in for a bit. I was shopping a few days prior and on my way to the gym when a van crossed in front of me at a red light. It turned on to a busy four-lane street and was followed in hot pursuit by a Boston Terrier, running desperately behind it. I enraged three other citizens turning around to follow the dog, in an attempt to prevent its death in the street. I found it panting and exhausted at a store parking lot. He came to me when called and jumped in the car. He was so adorable and well mannered I hated to put up posters, but I did. While my fella walked him around the neighborhood in search of his owner, I put up posters on all the cross-streets that were the direction from which he had come. I told my child about him and she was all full of longing: oh, a dog for Christmas. My fella, a cat person to the core, fell for him during their walk and hoped out loud the owners would not call. I was astounded.
The owners called four hours later. There were some iffy things that happened before they showed up, twenty minutes late from a purported address three blocks away. They drove up in a car that was past beater status three years ago. They got out, smiling, and the dog rushed to them happily. As they thanked us, my heart sank more; both of them were skinny as rails, pale, with telltale meth spots on their teeth, and the guy had some picked spots on his face and neck while the girl had half of one eyebrow missing. My lovely, dear little dog was going home with his meth-head mom and dad. Nothing to be done, he obviously loved them.
My fella did not notice the meth signs. He was super quiet for a few days, though. Christmas came, and my daughter enjoyed her visit although she mourned the lack of a dog in the house. I told her about keeping the secret from my fella about the meth use; we sighed over the little dog and gave him up to the universe.  It was a year since Lily died and we both start crying when we think of her. I hauled the kids back to Dallas for their return flight and came home to a quiet house with two cats. Back on the hamster wheel I went.
About two days back into the New Year at work, my cell buzzed with a number that seemed familiar but I couldn't place it. It was meth-head girl; they could not keep the dog and needed fifty bucks. Sold.

My fence is currently torn down for renovation, so the fella keeps the dog for now. He is a huge hit; the adult neighbors offer to babysit so he won't be lonely while we are at work, the neighbor kids beg to play with him, and the golfers put the clubs up to watch him play soccer with us in the back yard. He is good around the cats, all six of them, and he loves to ride in the car with us and snuggle in the recliner with the fella at TV time. I do not love him like I loved Lily; missing the puppy stage leaves a little hole. But he is a joyful addition to our lives.