That woman I used to work for, the one I hated with a deep-seated and long-abiding passion, has cropped up again.

I saw her on the street this morning on my way to work. But, with sunglasses on and earbuds firmly in place, I was able to walk past her as though I was in a hurry and not concentrating on my surroundings. Then I log in to facebook and see that she has requested that we be friends.

BAHAHAHAHAHAAAAA... man, that's still funny 12 hours later.

No, you unimaginably stupid twit, we are not going to be friends. We are never going to be friends. Ever. I don't want to hear about your absurd potty training stories, or how cute you think your average kid is (mine's cuter, nyah!). I hear plenty of ridiculous things about your behavior and still eagerly await the day that your marginal behind gets fired.

As many of you know, I lost my favorite aunt to breast cancer last fall. Her absence is still deeply felt by my family, and I'm not sure when that particular pain is going to ease.

My friend Tanya is participating in the Susan G. Komen 3-day walk in Austin, TX later this year. It's too late for me to participate in this year's (but watch out next year!) but I would really appreciate it if you could help her raise funds for her walk. You can link to her contribution page here. Any amount helps, and remember: if you are in the US, your contribution is tax-deductible! You can make  your contribution anonymously, and I thank you all in advance if you do choose to help.

HELP SAVE THE TATAS!!

I mentioned last week that I accepted a new position at a non-profit organization. I am really happy to be leaving, not because I no longer believe in the good work that my present company does, but because they've fallen into the habit of hiring questionable people. Those people usually get weeded out within one cycle, but my own boss -- thankfully for just a few more days! -- has remained despite some truly ridiculous behavior. The problem is this: it took a lot of time and money to find her in the first place, even though she was not the ideal candidate. The powers that be are kind of aware of how ridiculous she is both personally and professionally, but because of the tough economic times, cannot spare the additional expense to hire another person in that position. So, she stays. Since she has been here, about 17 months including her 3 months off of maternity leave, two of the most senior people in the department have left because of her and I am about to peace out as well.

I really wanted to post a follow-up to this post of November 24. I was pretty pissed off at the HR manager because of her actions, and the chief of staff as well. I was mildly annoyed at my boss's continued self-centered behavior, but let it slide. Turns out she is the reason why this whole fucked up incident occurred in the first place.

The HR manager went to her first and asked whether I should be docked bereavement or sick leave because she was uncertain of the relationship between me and my aunt. Keep in mind that I had already explained the relationship to my boss at the time that I asked for time off in September. Her response: oh, it's just her aunt. Dock her sick leave. So, I was docked sick leave, and I got pissed off. The HR manager subsequently finds out that I did actually have a close relationship with my aunt and was really upset because she knew I was mad at her and didn't know how to approach me to resolve the situation.

I hope that there is an especially deep pit reserved in hell for you, Sandra. Seriously. You are the worst boss I've ever had, and I've had some doozies.

But wait, there's more. Because that impossible twit has made no attempt to get to know me over the last 17 months, she came to me today to ask me to send her highlights of my career here so she can send out the email announcing my departure. Even my fucking intern could do that and she's only known me since last September. Then she drops this one: because of the budget crunch that we're in, we can't do an extravagant happy hour or anything, so we're going to lunch at California Pizza Kitchen. Fucking ridiculous. I have never been so happy to get the fuck away from someone.

It is with enormous excitement that I announce....

No, I'm not knocked up.

But after many months of griping and grousing about my job, I was able to secure a new one! I'm going to be the Donor Programs Manager for a non-profit called Defenders of Wildlife (yes, the same people with the commercial featuring Ashley Judd), and I will be coordinating some of their mail and phone fundraising efforts. Because I am going to be going on vacation on Friday next week anyway, I was only able to give my present company four days' notice. Well, let's say that I'm not crying about that one.

Anyway, I am SO EXCITED I AM SHAKING!!!

In the continuing saga that is my shit situation at work, at least I can say that it's entertaining. Sometimes.

I had a meeting with the boss a couple of months ago, and I pointed out a particular reality of my work situation. I accrue 15 vacation days per year, and during election years, we are allowed to roll over an unlimited number of them. In non-election years -- this year -- we can only roll over 5 of them. Because last year I : 

1. Had rolled over 5 from the previous year;
2. Was on maternity leave for 14 weeks and felt obligated not to take as many vacations to let the people who were covering for me while I was out to get some of their recovery time in;
3. Was prohibited from taking any time off between Labor Day and Election Day ...

I ended up rolling over 12 vacation days into 2009. Add two personal days, which are use or lose, plus the 15 days that I will accrue this year (assuming that I stick around this madhouse), means that I will have 29 days to be used this year. Since I only need use 24 of them, I proposed to her in November that I would take one three-week trip home in February. 

Now, I usually do take this particular vacation every year at the same time. It's not happened since she's been here because she's only been here 18 months or so. So, pretty much everyone knows that Joanne is gone for a couple of weeks in the middle of winter, and she goes down to Trinidad to visit the family. I emailed her again on December 23rd to make sure that the dates were okay, and she doesn't respond, so I submit my leave slip today.

She tells her assistant to tell me (not willing to risk a confrontation,  I imagine?) that she is going to hold on to the slip to "check to make sure those dates are okay." This is code for: I need to double-check with the chief of staff that Joanne can take that time off at all. She is probably also going to check that I have that much time available to take off. Too bad I've already booked my tickets, and I am also meticulous in the math of my vacation time, so I not only have the time off, but will have an additional two days to take off when I get back.

I can envision one of a few outcomes: 

1. She says nothing and approves the time off; all is well.
2. She denies the time off, at which point I tell her that the tickets are already booked. She pitches a fit, but lets me go anyway.
3. She denies the time off, I tell her that the tickets are booked, and she pitches a fit and tries to prevent me from going. I submit my resignation with a smile on my face.

I am being inordinately bitchy and bratty on this, but after the last six months, I feel like I've earned it, so the behavior stands. But I do have the upper hand in this situation simply because of the way this place is structured. Sure, someone else can figure out my job if I walk out, but it's not going to be an easy task since I work pretty much independently and a lot of stuff lives in my head that lives nowhere else.

We're also going to be celebrating Stinky's first birthday, and that is not negotiable.

I really, really, really cannot tolerate it when people waste my time. If you say you're going to show up somewhere, do show up and don't leave me hanging. We've made plans? A heads up if they're canceled is always appreciated.

The boss is so disrespectful of others' time, it's not even vaguely amusing. She will break her ass to make it to a meeting with the higher-ups, but does not care if she leaves someone else waiting because that meeting runs over. Whatever happened to politely saying that you have another meeting, do you mind if I excuse myself?

My new(ish) resolution to dealing with her is to not put up with it, and throw in a little passive-aggressive behavior for good measure.

We had a meeting scheduled this morning with her, four of us. We walk over there a couple minutes late -- this is a standing meeting and usually starts a little late anyway -- and she's not in her office. My coworker and I turn in unison and walk away. In the past, we would have sat in her office and waited for her to show up, but no more. I comment that this is my resolution (even though I started doing this a month ago) and that I won't have her wasting my time.

I'm assuming that she showed up not too long after we left, but does she convene the meeting? No. Does she send out an email apologizing? Nuh-uh. Does she re-schedule? Nope. I heard the silly twit on the phone not too long after on what was obviously a personal phone call. I rolled my eyes.

There's one more thing I won't be putting up with: the personal phone calls that interrupt the meetings. That is what voice mail is for, so you can call these people back. Your husband does not need to know rightthisminute what temperature to set the oven on to cook dinner. I've started walking out when she does too: it's beyond rude and unprofessional.

I won't claim to be a nice person. Well, sometimes I am, but other times I let my Inner Brat assert herself and am not nice. It's not usually the obvious kind of nice so much as the subversive, undermining, turning-off-the-filter-on-my-mouth kind of brattiness.

I think that doing stuff like holding a door open for someone who has a mountain of crap in their arms, saying good morning to your barista, smiling at the security guard who dutifully stands there calling elevators for bustling building denizens -- all easy ways to be nice to people. Then there are other people who, even though it's a new year and I want to start out with a new attitude, will be on my permanent shit list.

I'm looking at you, Bankers. You fuckers who refuse to use the stairs to go from floor one to floor two, even though you have keys to move from floor to floor. You asses who make lame excuses as you hop on 4 to go to 5 just to use the microwave and make some lame joke about not taking the stairs. You ever notice how other people in the building on the upper floors never laugh back? It's because it's not funny or fun to stop on each floor when all you want to do is get to work.

One day you'll have to take the stairs, and we will laugh at you. Heartily.

If you have the flu, stay the fuck home.

I do not love it when my fucking boss, who has been sick SINCE MONDAY, has been coming into the office daily even though she looks -- and feels! -- like death. And coughing. And sneezing. And refusing to take anything to alleviate her symptoms. And spreading her fucking germs everywhere. And being forced to leave early because she doesn't feel well. And then admitting that she thinks she has the flu.

I felt no qualms about saying to her directly that I hope to not see her tomorrow.

Stupid, selfish, inconsiderate twit.

Hubby asked for the complete seven-season series of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine as his Christmas gift. I looked around and it was a little too pricey, so I told him that I wouldn't be able to do that, but would get one of the other items on his list. Then I got a coupon for 40% of DVD box sets at Border's and I thought, "Cool, that'll be a nice surprise."

Turns out, the coupon is only good in stores. Also turns out, the DVD set is not sold in stores, only online.

Bitches. I hate you all.

This is one of my favorite recipes! Enjoy and if you do try it, let me know how they turn out.


Ingredients:

1 cup water
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 cup sugar
1 teaspoon salt
1 cup brown sugar
4 large eggs
1 cup nuts
2 cups dried fruit
1 (750 ml) bottle tequila (Jose Cuervo or your other favorite brand)

Directions:

1. Sample the tequila to check quality.

2. Take a large bowl; check the tequila again to be sure it is of the
highest quality.

3. Pour one level cup tequila and drink.

4. Turn on the electric mixer.

5. Beat one cup of butter in a large fluffy bowl.

6. Add one peastoon of sugar.

7. Beat again.

8. At this point it's best to make sure the tequila is still ok, so try
another cup just in case.

9. Turn off the mixerer thingy.

10. Break 2 leggs and add to the bowl and chuck in the cup of dried
fruit.

11. Pick the frigging fruit off the floor.

12. Mix on the turner .

13. If the fried druit gets stuck in the beaters just pry it loose with
a drewscriver.

14. Sample the tequila to check for tonsisticity.

15. Next, sift two cups of salt, or something.

16. Who geeves a sheet.

17. Check the tequila.

18. Add one table.

19. Add a spoon of sugar, or somefink.

20. Whatever you can find.

21. Greash the oven.

22. Turn the cake tin 360 degrees and try not to fall over.

23. Don't forget to beat off the turner.

24. Finally, throw the bowl through the window, finish the quetila and
make sure to put the stove in the wishdasher.

25. Cherry Mistmas!

My mother-in-law watches Stinky on a daily basis, and we pay her a small amount weekly to do so. It works out well, because Stinky is with her grandmother daily, and we don't have to worry about late fees if we are a few minutes late picking her up in the afternoon. It's usually an all-around good situation, but we did have to lay down some ground rules. Several months ago, I discovered that she was literally spending the money that we were giving her on the Munchkin. The problem was that she wasn't exercising Grandma's Privilege and buying her toys or a cute pink dress (she loves pink; I do not.). No, she was buying formula, and diapers, and cereal.

I told her nicely that she should probably not waste her money on those things since we will provide them. She ignored me. The result was that she bought a CASE of diapers as did I. Then Pumpkin hit a growth spurt and grew out of the diapers. Instead of being left over with a dozen or so extra diapers, I was left with A HUNDRED. One. Zero. Zero. One long, drawn out fight with the hubby later, I made him sit down with her and lay down the law: do not buy diapers and do not buy baby food of any kind. 

A few weeks ago, Stinky started getting her teeth in so we moved on to Stage 3 baby food, which has chunks. She wasn't too fond of it, but she has to learn how to chew, so Mommy wins. I found out last week that my mother-in-law has been putting that food in the blender. Apparently, in Grandma's house, if Baby doesn't like something, then Baby doesn't have to eat it. I got really, really mad because I see it as her interfering in the gradual development of this kid, which includes at some point her eating food that can't be taken in through a straw!

Mommie Dearest, my own mother, overheard me giving the hubby a hard time about this and decided to intervene. I am pretty annoyed about the situation, but considering that she won't listen to anything I say, I have my husband deal with his mother on occasions like this. My own mother always manages to take my husband's side in any disagreement. This was today's conversation: 

MD: You know, you really need to stop giving your husband such a hard time about his mother.
ME: What are you talking about?
MD: I hear you giving him a hard time all the time about his mother.
ME: You need to give me a specific example...
MD: Well, the whole thing about her blending up the baby's food.
ME: You understand that the baby needs to learn how to CHEW her food, right? There is a reason why I gave him a hard time about that.
MD: But you need to be careful about how you talk to him about his mother. (SIDE NOTE: she conveniently forgets that we have been married for almost ELEVEN YEARS and that this is old news). If you have a problem with her, you need to talk to her directly.
ME: Listen, that is between me and him. I have tried approaching her directly, and that does not work because she ignores me. Furthermore, that is between me and my husband.
MD: Are you trying to tell me to stay out of it?
ME: Yep. Enjoy the rest of your day

As for the situation with my mother-in-law? I decide to train the baby on the chunky food myself. Usually I'm not at home to feed her meals, but this was a nice long weekend. 6 of her meals were chunky food. Mommy: 6. Baby: 0. She ate every last bite that I fed her with minimal protest. Le sigh.

Craig's List has your back!

I've been trying to think of ways to spice up my life. I'm 32 years old, and I have a good job in telecommunications. But somethings missing. I feel like I'm old before my time. I need to inject some excitement into my daily routine through my arm before its too late. I need a challenge, something to get the adrenaline pumping again. An addiction would be nice, but, in short, I need a nemesis. I'm willing to pay $350 up front for you services as an arch enemy over the next six months. Nothing crazy. Steal my parking space, knock my coffee over, trip me when Im walking to my car and occasionaly whisper in my ear, "Ahha, we meet again". That kind of thing. Just keep me on my toes. Complacency will be the death of me. You need to have an evil streak and be blessed with innate guile and cunning. You should also be adept at inconsicuous pursuit. Evil laugh preferred. Send me a photo and a brief explanation why you would be a good nemesis.

Every time I think this place couldn't possibly get worse, I am unpleasantly surprised. I will preface this by saying that I am actively job hunting at the moment, and aim to be out of here by the end of the year.

My aunt died the Saturday after election day, and we went down for the funeral. Her decline was very sudden and very dramatic, and I will post more about her at a later date. The work piece is what was entertaining.

I left on Veteran's Day (Tuesday) and returned to work the following Monday. I opened my pay stub to discover that I had been docked three sick days for the privilege. No preamble, no email that this was coming. So, I email the HR "person" and said: 

Did I really get docked three sick days instead of being allowed bereavement leave?

To be fair, I had already looked up the bereavement policy in the employee handbook. It stated three days for immediate family, that grouping being spouse, sibling, parent, child. I was expecting her to reiterate that, but not this heinously cold response: 

The bereavement policy covers immediate family members only.  Per our handbook, immediate family members include spouse/life partner, parents, siblings, or children.

I apologize in advance for any discomfort this may bring.

That's right. No, "I'm sorry for your loss, but bereavement policy only covers..." blah blah blah. That I would have accepted. She used the word "discomfort," and nowhere said, "I'm sorry." I of course fly off the handle, but sit on it for a day to think about whether I was truly justified in being mad. The next day, I was even angrier, the more I thought about the extraordinarily emotionally absent response.

I respond: 

Thanks for your response. I guess I'm in shock that I didn't even get so much as a condolence note from this organization, but lost sick leave over this. Nice to know I'm a valued employee.

Clearly at this point, I don't give a fuck-all about the hierarchy and the fact that I could, in theory, get in trouble for that (and this post, for that matter). Two days later, I get a note in the mail from the boss. What a coincidence! Then today, the Chief of Staff pays me a visit. As soon as she walked in, I knew what it was about, but I guess she was expecting me to have some kind of breakdown over it? Sorry, you picked the wrong person on that score. Her justification of the exchange went something like this: 

I would like to discuss the email exchange that you had with ______. <insert mental eyerolling here>. I want to reassure you that you are a valued member of the "team" and you were probably very upset at the time that you sent the email. But the thing is that if you were working at another organization, you would have been docked vacation time. Here, you were allowed to take off right before the election, which we don't usually do, and there wasn't even any question about you taking time off for the funeral. We have no idea of what someone's relationship is with a family member -- some people are very close to their third cousin! So, I wanted to know it's not that we didn't sympathize, but it's not our policy, and I understand you were upset.

I responded that I wasn't upset about the bereavement policy because it's just that: policy. I am upset at the tone of her email, and that she couldn't even offer proper condolences. She used the word "discomfort" in an email to an employee about a relative who died. It was cold-hearted and, I believe I used the term "weird."

So she got it that the HR manager is a cold-hearted bitch, incapable of executing her job with the slightest modicum of sympathy or empathy. Check. Then I found something else out that made this whole situation even WORSE, if possible.

As it happens, the HR manager *did* know the closeness of my family relationship and that my aunt was more like my mother, yet because she didn't hear it from me, she wasn't going to acknowledge it. I wonder if I can get her on Keith Olbermann's "Worst Person in the World" list? She has another long list of sins that can get her fired, and I hope karma comes back to bite her in the ass. I really do.

I really wish I could make this shit up, I really do.

How was your day?

Well, for future note: traveling internationally by yourself with a young baby is only a good idea if things run smoothly.

I carefully planned the flights we would be taking to and from Trinidad. On the way there: a 6 AM departure to Miami, 90 minute layover, 2 PM arrival in Trinidad. On the way back: 2:50 PM departure to Miami, 90 minute layover (cutting it kind of close, but still doable), 11 PM arrival in D.C. On the way down, we experience some kind of mechanical difficulty on the way to Miami so we had to divert to Orlando. I immediately knew we would miss our connecting flight, but there was one more flight on this airline to Trinidad later in the day. At worst, we could hop on another airline and get there. Our 1-hour delay in Orlando turned into four. Thank goodness I have a baby who has a very sweet disposition (I wonder where she got that from?) and who not only made friends on the flight, but was really good with the pressure changes by choosing to nap during takeoffs and landings. I took the precaution of calling the airline while I was in Orlando to make sure our butts were on that flight to Trinidad out of Miami. Good thing too, because that sucker was full.

We get to Miami and there is the world's greatest asshole of a gate agent. I approach and say, excuse me sir, but I will be needing a seat assignment and a boarding pass for this flight. He barks something at me about needing priority documents. I say I have no documents, and he continues to be an asshole. All this time, he does not even bother to look us up in the computer because he is an incompetent dumbass. I start to have my meltdown, having been up since 3 AM and operating on 2 hours' sleep. It's now 5 PM and I have had enough. So I let the tears flow and embarrass the shit out of him because he is yelling at a crying woman with a baby. He straightens up and I leave him so I can deal with the other gate agent who knows what she is doing and lets us board early. The flight attendant on the plane was a dream: she took Pumpkin from me for a short while so I wouldn't completely lose my mind. We got to Trinidar at 9:30 PM, 16 hours of travel. YAY!

The way back was no picnic either. More mechanical trouble, this time in Trinidad. Our flight left 4 hours late again, but this time we were going to miss all remaining connecting flights out of Miami to DC for the evening. Pumpkin, once again, was really good and slept for a couple of hours on the plane while I watched the very fast, very bright, and very loud Speed Racer. We get to Miami and get hotel vouchers, and the staff was so great. The gate agent went through the trouble of switching my hotel to the one in the airport so we didn't have to wrangle with a shuttle nor get up super-early to get back to the airport -- just wake up, dress and walk downstairs. We finally made it back, 24 hours after starting out, and we're still exhausted.

An instant karma story: people can be amazing and helpful but also extremely rude. Homeland Security at the airport would open up additional lanes to process people faster as they got agents to help out. One line opened up and this guy rudely pushes in front of me and Pumpkin. I loudly remarked to the woman behind me of the rudeness of some people toward people traveling with infants. He says that unlike most of us, he had a prayer of making his connecting flight. I retorted that was no excuse for his rudeness. Two minutes later, the border officer singled me and another woman with children out to form a new line and we get out a good 10 minutes ahead of Mr. Asshole. I hope he missed his flight.

I sent out an invitation to family to join us to "celebrate" as we scare the devil out of the former parasite. I was nagged about christening her, so before I have to take someone out, it's going to be done in a couple of weeks.

I gave people an email address to send their RSVPs. The point behind that was if anyone wanted to actually come to the church, I could give them additional details. Instead, I am getting voice mails and text messages, all of which are asking about Church details. For fuck's sake, if you followed instructions in the first place, you wouldn't be annoying the living shit out of me now.

I am dealing with this in my own sarcastic way of course: you don't follow the prescribed method of responding, and you get no additional details. That is all.

My favorite aunt is dying.

She has had cancer for a number of years, but it has spread all over her body and she is slowly dying. She is still as upbeat as ever, and still behaves as though she is going to recover. I'll be taking a few days off of work to take Stinky down to go visit her. She keeps looking at all of the myriad Facebook albums and saying that she has to come visit the baby, but a plane trip would kill her, so we are going to go down for a few days. We had originally intended to wait until after the election to do this, but Mommie Dearest called me a couple of weeks ago and suggested that we do it sooner.

Getting the time off was a gigantic pain in the ass from the standpoint of a boss who is seemingly devoid of empathy, nevermind the fact that when her father was ailing and dying last winter, it was not a problem for her to drop everything and go to him. I had to jump through hoops, and this morning's were the worst of all.

September 3: I sit in her office and tell her that I have a family emergency and have to go down to Trinidad for a few days. Her immediate response? You know, Joanne, I'm under strict orders not to let anyone have time off after Labor Day. I counter with a statement that I was going to be going to visit my aunt and would like to know when the best time for this would be? Lady, let's get something straight here. I'm not asking you for the time off, but am letting you know that I will be out of the office for three days. Your alternative is to have me call in sick three days running, so pick your poison. We hammer out an agreement, based partly in fact that she herself was going to be attending a wedding (!) and was going to be out of the office for two days.  I emphasize the fact that my aunt is dying and I would like to have my daughter meet her before she leaves us for good. My coworkers disbelieve the extent of this craziness, but wait, there's more.

September 6: She comes into my office and tells me that my trip has been approved (insert eye-rolling here) but I have to know that this is an exception. It's very rare, she states, that anyone is allowed to do this, but she really wants Gabby to meet the family. I thank her nicely and mentally call her some very foul names. She is behaving as though I am asking to go on a fucking vacation. But wait, there is still more.

Between then and today, I run around, make travel arrangements, get a quickie passport for the baby, arrange for diapers, a playpen, and a carseat at the other end, all whole planning the baby's baptism...

Today: We have a weekly managers' meeting in the department, and I open by stating that I would be gone for three days next week. She says, oh, you're going to have such a great time. I am flummoxed by this because I was under the impression that the circumstances were less than ideal, so it takes me a minute for my brain to process this. Tell everyone where you're going, she says excitedly. To Trinidad for a few days, I respond, still puzzled. She says again, you're going to have a great time, and the baby gets to meet your whole family, you deserve it. My brain starts to wake up. I wish it were under different circumstances, I stutter. At this point, our analyst steps in and says, wait, aren't you visiting an ailing family member? Oh, I had forgotten about that, the clueless nitwit, says.

I need a drink, but she is not worth the hangover. I'll channel my energies into cleaning the house instead.

After several years, I've come to the inescapable conclusion that I hate my doctor and can no longer continue to give them my business. It was fine when it was just a co-pay and an annual physical, but I think I'm going to have to be seeing a lot more of a physician. I usually just need to go once a year for a physical, but I've had to go multiple times this year, and I realized the same thing that I've noticed for several years: I do not like her because I don't think she pays attention and does not listen.

It would seem that my family predisposition to high blood pressure has asserted itself post-partum. I only found this out because I tried to get my prescription renewed for my migraines, and they took my blood pressure, which was sky high. I'm talking if this kind of pressure continues, it's medication for my sorry ass.

I usually have pretty low blood pressure. As worked up as I can appear to be about a lot of stuff, it very rarely affects my blood pressure because I'm usually pretty laid back about most things.

I suffered from migraines and went back the other day to get a prescription for medication, just in case I get one. I came pretty close the other day and I'm usually pretty miserable. I get there and the nurse asks about medication, etc, and I tell her that I am on something new for my tendinitis. She writes it down and takes my BP, which is 131/100. I'm usually a 98/60 kinda girl, so even my eyes bugged out when she said the number.

Doc comes in and says that she won't be giving me the prescription. Did you get diagnosed with migraines by a neurologist, she asks? No, I respond, it was actually your office. I've been receiving the prescriptions since 2001. You know, since the time you refused to see me without an appointment even though I'd been in pain for 6 days and you made me go to the ER? Yep, since then.

Now she wants me to go see a neurologist. I'm fine with that, but please acquaint yourself with my chart before coming in to see me, thanks very much. Then we start to discuss my blood pressure and she asks me if I'd eaten a bunch of salt or what could be causing it. I look at her funny because clearly she hadn't read the notation the nurse had just made. I sarcastically ask her if it could possibly be because of the new medication and she seemed puzzled. That was when she finally looked at my chart. I wanted to throw something at her head.

Anyways, she hadn't prescribed the new meds so she asked me to call the doctor who had and ask him how to proceed. That was the moment I decided that was the last time I was ever setting foot in that office.

I did call and the LNP I spoke to there told me to hold off for 48 hours and take my BP again. It's gone down some, so it might have been the medication, but the FDA's site doesn't indicate that elevated blood pressure is the cause, so I conducted some experiments to figure it out, and turns out... I have no idea why my blood pressure is high. I have some suspicions, but that's another blog post.

I hate incompetent people. I realize that my doc might be overworked and not have enough help, but so was my OB and I never felt like this around him. Don't they teach bedside manner in medical school anymore?

I did my usual practiced jaywalk across the street to the Big Pain to get my lunch and as I was striding toward the door, something happened.

A guy took half a step to get to the door ahead of me, and held it open. Not just for me, but for the woman behind me as well. And I don't mean he walked in ahead of me and did that half-assed thing where you hold your arm out behind you so the person can catch the door. Oh no. He stepped aside and held that sucker open.

I'm perplexed: how does one deal with such a creature as a gentleman???

I'd forgotten to post about this....

A few months ago, my left wrist hurt and I was thinking repetitive stress injury of some kind. I was only a few weeks away from my annual physical so I decided to wrap it in an elastic bandage and wait it out. Problem was, certain movements hurt like a bitch, but what the hell, I'd been through labor, I could handle it.

I have the physical and the Physician's Assistant seems to think I have the right idea, but orders an x-ray just in case. She tells me to get a soft brace to keep it from getting worse. I get the x-ray and they say, "ONOZ! Stress fracture!" I should keep the brace on, but if the pain doesn't get better in 3 weeks or so, I should go see an orthopedic doctor to think about getting a cast.

You guessed it!  Pain doesn't get better, so I go see the orthopedist. The first thing he said is that stress fractures are extremely rare in bones above the waist unless you are a gymnast -- which I am clearly not. He takes an x-ray and even I can see there is no fracture. In fact, he says, I have excellent bones (yay me!). Turns out, I have tendinitis. This sits well with me, since it's one of the things I suspected anyway. Then he says that the brace I was wearing (suggested by my PA!) was making it worse and he gave me a better one and prescribed some medication that helps with inflammation, the same stuff they give to arthritics,

I have hated my doctor for many years, but this is motivation to find a new one. Bleh.

By TIM GRIEVE | 8/20/08 2:07 PM EST

A Huron Hospital spokeswoman said Stephanie Tubbs Jones, 58, had suffered an aneurysm that caused her to lose consciousness. Photo: AP