Pickles & Dimes

Remember when I went to the doctor just to get a prescription refilled and walked out of there with another doctor’s appointment to get a mole checked out and a sore arm from the pneumonia vaccine? Yeah, I got charged $106 for that privilege. Jesus. You know what I’m going to do now? I’m going to refill my asthma inhaler every month (rather than every four), and stockpile those mothers so I don’t have to go through this every year. Then, when the world ends, I will have a handy pile of medicine to help my lungs deal with the radioactive fallout.

(I really do think about the end of the world a lot. Almost on a daily basis. At work, I eyeball tea and salt packets in the kitchen and think, “I should hoard these.” On my commute, I try to guess which buildings might be giant food distribution centers so I know where to go to loot forage for food. I wonder how to fortify our house against roving gangs of evildoers. I have casual conversations with Jason about our need for a generator. He then denies my request and tells me I should stop reading post-apocalyptic fiction. Currently I am reading A Gift Upon the Shore by M.K. Wren.)

Where was I? Oh yes, at my second doctor’s appointment to get a mole checked out. Both my doctor and the specialist agreed it was “very suspicious,” which equals NOT REASSURING AT ALL. So I had to have it cut out, whatever, except that I needed stitches. I have never had stitches in my life, and they are positioned right smack dab in the middle of my back (right where my bra goes, naturally). Do you have ANY idea how hard it is to put a band-aid on your own back? It is damn near impossible, even if you do have exceptional spatial capabilities, which I clearly do not, and trying to use a mirror makes things even worse, because I see that I need to move the band-aid up and to the left, and somehow I move it down and to the right and Jason wonders why I’m going through our band-aid supply so quickly and it is because 1) I have no dexterity at all, 2) my bra tears them off and 3) the stitches are directly on my spine, so that every time I move or flex or turn, the band-aid pulls, which in turn makes the stitches pull and I have to wait 10 days to get them removed (which will be a third doctor’s appointment that will probably cost me $1,000 when all is said and done, all because I wanted my doctor’s signature on a piece of paper).

On the plus side, I’m finally no longer sick, but guess who is?

Email I sent to Jason this morning:

Dear Sir,

It has recently come to our attention that you have been working extremely long hours while feeling under the weather. You have our utmost sympathy and we apologize for this unforeseen circumstance. You have our assurance that the month of February will be filled less with Work and Pestilence, and more with FUN! As a token of our sincerity, we are offering you free tickets to TwinsFest, an annual event that promotes the Minnesota Twins, the local professional baseball team. In addition, you will be receiving a free French toast breakfast this Sunday morning to help fortify your immune system against whatever virus germs still remain. We hope you enjoy your adventure at TwinsFest, and apologize for any inconvenience and/or excessive consumption of cough & cold medicine the last few weeks of January may have caused.

Sincerely,

The Year 2011

During my lunch break on Friday, I went to a nearby gas station to put gas in my car. While the gas was pumping, I used a squeegee to clean off my front and back windshields and my headlights (it’s been so cold the car washes haven’t been open and my car needs a wash so badly I continuously walk by it in parking lots because its dusty, salt-encrusted appearance makes it look identical to every other vehicle in the world). I then decided to fill up my windshield washer fluid, so I popped open the hood. Only I couldn’t get it open all the way.

So I stood outside in below-zero temperatures, with dozens of guys nearby watching me struggle, and after a few minutes of pressing and pulling and wiggling the latch that I know opens the hood, I decided my dignity was more important and pushed the hood back down. Then I went over and removed the gas nozzle from my car. Then I thought: No. I can do this. And I know if I don’t, I will run out of wiper fluid three seconds into my commute and I’ll be mad that I didn’t stick with it. So I tromped back over to my car, popped the hood and spent another minute or two fumbling with the hood latch (I finally got it open, although I have no idea how or what the problem was in the first place). Then I topped off the fluid (which took nearly the entire bottle, so it was almost empty) and drove away, victorious.

It wasn’t until maybe three hours later that I realized I didn’t grab my receipt from the gas pump. No big deal. I figured I’d just check my online bank account later and record the amount.

It was maybe five hours later that I was driving home, mentally kicking myself for not grabbing the receipt when I had a sudden realization: Not only did I not remember grabbing the receipt, but I didn’t remember even removing the gas nozzle. Oh my God, I thought. I’m one of THOSE idiots who drive off with the gas nozzle still attached to their car! So even though it was mostly dark and I was on the freeway, I craned my head to look at the passenger mirror to see if I could tell whether a gas hose and nozzle were dangling from my car. I didn’t see anything. When I finally got home, I immediately got out and checked my gas cap. It was on tightly, and there was no hose dragging on the ground, so I MUST’VE removed it.

But it was scary to me that I had absolutely no recollection of doing so.

What’s even scarier is that everything has posted to my bank account, and there’s no record of my gas purchase. (I do have a full tank, so obviously I got gas.) What was once there as a $1 pending transaction (Holiday gas transactions always say $1 until they post for some reason) is now completely gone from the system. So instead of thinking, “Hey, free gas purchase!” or “I bet it’ll post the real amount later,” I’m thinking, “I bet because I forgot to grab my receipt something happened to the machine and everyone who used that pump after me somehow managed to charge MY account and now I’m going to be hit with thousands of dollars in gas.”

Yeah. I gotta pay more attention to what the hell I’m doing. (I can already see Jason nodding his head in agreement.)

Update: the $1 pending transaction is back on the system, so I’m hoping I’ll know the real amount by the end of the day. Says the girl frantically refreshing the online bank system. So much for real-time technology!

I’m still sick. I thought I was getting better on Saturday, even optimistically telling Jason, “It’s just the dregs!” but then my cold/flu/probably-not-pneumonia-but-I-can’t-prove-it decided to act like a vengeful carny and just when I thought this kleenex-covered ride was coming to a stop, it took me around for a few more spins. Dick.

Jason and I did some shopping this weekend, and I was almost overcome by a tiny colorful display of flowers on sale at Home Depot. It was like a chorus of angels hovering over this teeny display of purple and pink and orange flowers. After living in this white wasteland, I was practically overstimulated by the excess of color. So colorful – the colors! The plants were only $1.38 but I didn’t get one (which I instantly regretted until I realized it would’ve sat in the car for 5 hours). There’s just too much snow and whiteness this year. What started as a stoic Minnesotan response: “It’s already January!” has slowly deteriorated to “It is barely halfway through this month and I WILL KILL US ALL.” I need to see color. And sunshine. And the meterologist not pointing to a graphic that says “Snow,” followed by “Snow,” followed by “Bitter – and SNOW.” That whole “too cold to snow” saying? TOTAL MYTH.

Anway, one of our stops while shopping was at a local Cheapo, which sells used CDs and DVDs and vinyl records and the best part, shelves upon shelves of used cassette tapes. Since my musical tastes tend to remain pretty stagnant, my favorite part of the store is where you can listen to CDs. They had a section devoted to local artists, about which I know nothing unless Jason tells me, so I started up a CD at random and was instantly blown away. Every single song made me tap my foot and want to start dancing. The band was one part Green Day and one part Bowling for Soup, and without knowing a single thing about the group, I bought their CD. And it’s awesome. So if you’re interested in some new music, check out Electric Anthem. Totally awesome band.

I have laryngitis today (which is fine with me), but my coworkers are taking inordinate pleasure in conversing with me, shaking their heads in mock pity (while also laughing at my plight, the jerks), while I exhaust myself with the sheer act of trying to force enough air past my voicebox to produce semi-audible noises that resemble the love child of Demi Moore and a malfunctioning robot.

The constant pressure in my voicebox also means I find myself groaning involuntarily, something I didn’t expect to happen until I was maybe 93 or weighed 750 pounds. Combined with that, and the fact that tilting my head in a slightly downward direction meant the cat got to experience firsthand the concept of post-nasal drip, I finally rescinded my “no medicine” rule last night after I eyeballed our kleenex inventory and realized it couldn’t fulfill the shipping request sent by my nose. Ironically, the medicine didn’t work anyway, which is why I spent the night with a balled-up kleenex placed strategically under my nose holes and woke up with the kind of puffy, pasty lips one would expect to have after spending 8 hours with their mouth wide open. Jason is a lucky guy, is what I’m saying.

I am having some residual effects from the medicine today though, as it is taking longer than necessary to interpret what people are saying to me. Like I know they’re speaking English, but maybe they need to talk slower. Or faster? I dunno. I just wish that instead of this slow march of fluids leaving my body I could opt to expedite the process. Kind of like choosing to take your lottery winnings as one large sum right away versus getting an annual annuity every 40 years, you know? So instead of feeling less than 100% for 4-5 days, I’d decide to have maybe 6 hours of feeling like absolute, miserable crap. Six hours where I could sequester myself in a room with a case of kleenex, a quart of cough medicine, a bucket of Dayquil capsules and a vat of chicken noodle soup to wait out the storm. And ladies, this would also work for that time of the month as well: “Hey, I’m grabbing these bags of kettle chips, these Hershey bars, this stack of magazines, a heating pad and 12 bottles of Motrin. See you in 4 hours. Don’t let anyone near me who wants to keep all of their limbs intact.”

I’d be willing to make that deal, I think. You?