The UNDERLYING meaning...

When I was roughly 7 or 8 years old, I was outside at recess playing with classmates.

I remember it was cold outside and the school allowed the girls to wear sweatpants under our skirts while outside.

I kneeled down on the ground and damn near screamed loud enough for frozen microbes on the moon to hear me.

A teacher came running over and asked me what was wrong. I remember being scared to death to roll my sweatpants up so they could examine my knee, I didn't want to know what could be so painful.

Out of nowhere (didn't have them that morning) I had 4 or 5 huge "in grown hair" looking lesions on my knee. Extremely tender, painful, red, inflamed, and terrifying to a young school girl. The teacher thought something bit me, maybe allergic reaction.

Escorted me to the office to have my parents called.

This was the beginning of a lupus diagnosis.

I don't really recall the doctor visits that transpired, but ultimately my pediatrician, bewildered by the odd symptoms, referred us to an awesome derm & allergist.

I recall him toying around different diagnosis, but mostly rubbed it off as contact dermatitis.

I was constantly embarrassed. One mother wouldn't let her daughter come over anymore because she said we were "dirty" and that I had bugs under my skin. Humiliating.

I was alienated from girl scouts, sports. I felt deprived of femininity as a young girl because I was too afraid to wear a skirt because of lesions and residual lesions.

That was until a lovely new symptom presented itself..

Fast forward to 11 to 12 years of age. Since the lesions first presented, they continued on and off. But never as severe as when they first presented. (as a child, I noted my symptoms were always worse in cold weather and healed in the sunny warm weather.)

My grannie took my to a fast food restaurant and on the way back home I was balancing a cold cup between my legs. I had on shorts from school this time.

When we got home and I walked up to my mom she freaked out.

She immediately dropped to the ground to inspect my legs. In between my thighs were HUGE welps from the cold drink.

You would have thought I laid a hornets nest between my legs and said have at bees!

Back to the derm we go. Again we leave with contact dermatitis, instructions to carry benadryl gel & pills as needed. FUN. Benadryl knocks me out. Was not fun as a kid.

A couple months down the road ANOTHER symptoms dawned.

This the scariest yet.

Again, I was at school. Again, this was in winter. Again, during recess.

I had on gloves, the whole winter outfit, running around playing.

Till this day I remember something didn't feel right. My hands felt so cold and numb. As kid, I had no idea what was going on. It wasn't until we went back to the classroom and I took my gloves off that I screamed and almost passed out. I literally thought I was dying.

My hands were paper white from the finger tips to the beginning of my palms. Both hands.

You can only imagine the humiliation I received from my freaked out classmates.

My teacher had never seen it before.

My instinctual reaction was to find something hot. I bolted out the classroom and began warming my hands in water, and slowly and painfully I regained circulation.

This time, the derm explained ANA titers and all that fun stuff... and I was diagnosed with

"underlying lupus" with secondary Raynaud's phenomenon.

He didn't deem it full blown, it was like the lupus came and went, each time with a new bag of surprises in store.

Now, as a young adult I am still plagued with symptoms that come and go.

The Raynaud's phenomenon has never gone away, I've learned to live with it. It's like a part of me. I'm used to it.. It has gotten worse, a few years ago it progressed to me toes and sometimes my nose and ears.

That doesn't stop me.

Last summer I still went on the snowy Tahoe slopes.

The thing about RP, is once I flare up, if I "cure" it with hot water, I'm not susceptible for another flare for 6-8 hours. Weird.

Till this day I don't get those weird lesions anymore but I do get hives like its the latest fashion statement.

I get hives at random. No particular reason. The amount, frequency and duration of the hives is the same with different soaps, travel, clothing, animal dander/hair, UV radiation.. you name it, the hives are unaffected.

So, Benadryl spray it is. Just a little dab and they go away.

I always have a runny nose, this my doctors have always attributed to the lupus. The runny nose is annoying and at times, embarrassing, but what can you do.

Benadryl pills impair my daily life, Claritin don't do shit, Allegra don't do shit, Clarinex don't do shit, Zyrtec don't do shit. Just good ole Puffs + lotion.

Joint pain. Rheumatoid arthritis is always an eery thought lurking in the back of my mind. Especially with the bilateral stiffness.

The pain is usually relieved with a hot bath and some advil.

Its mainly my knees that bother me. I try new shoes, avoid crossing my legs, different sleeping positions to relieve pressure/aid alignment. No relief. This is probably the most annoying symptom aside from the hives and RP.

Now something new... I have a mouth ulcer.

:(

I am stressed, but not beyond normal and I've also been managing my stress better with some biofeedback mechanisms.

After doing some research, I'm just going to blame the lupus for this one.

What a life.

Whenever I see the quote "be nice, you never know what battle someone is fighting"

I think of myself first, and wish people knew the pain I am in, and secondly I feel sympathy for that person because I can only fathom worse misery and embarrassment than what I've felt.

Anyone who reads this can react one of two ways.

1. You will label me a hypochondriac. Your choice.

I have real pain, real suffering. I hardly tell a soul I have lupus because in the past, people reacted like I told them I had AIDS and was about to belch blood all over their face.

The public is not well educated on lupus and are afraid of it.

Lupus comes in all shapes and sizes. I do however have supporting lab work that at least, puts some sense into my symptoms.

2. You will take this as knowledge and "pay it forward"

Whether it is someone you meet or already know with lupus or RP, or some stranger you see and decide not to judge them for you know not what battle they are fighting.

Albeit all that I just spilled, I am a very healthy young woman.

I'm roughly 5'1"

Around 110-115, been a while since I weighed.

I'll toot my own horn and say I think I'm pretty good looking.

I don't "look" sick. I don't have a physical amputation, hair falling out from chemo or a cast.

I have slight symptoms that easily go undetected, or I've become used to "hiding"

I hate people seeing the Raynaud's.

There is always an *underlying* meaning.

Mine is a borderline silent ailment that causes me great personal pain, but one the same token, I value so much out of fear for how quickly this "silent ailment" can turn on me for the worse.

Easily Annoyed

We all have our pet peeves, some rather extreme, some understandable.

I have one in-particular that really makes my "13th" cranial nerve pulsate.

The bathroom fan.

I HATE it. Not scared of it, just fucking hate it. So annoying. It really does nothing to cool/heat/reduce steam.

Our 1 bathroom is in the middle hallway and I can hear the fan from the bedroom and the living room. I get so freaking pissy if DB leaves the bathroom and leaves the fan on.

Okay, I don't use it. I get that other people like him use it, but if you're not in there: TURN THE FUCKING THING OFF!!! Likewise for lights, are you leaving them on for random household critters?!

The dishes don't need the fucking lights on.

So anyway, the bathroom fan just really irks the shit out of me, mostly when left on when bathroom is unoccupied.

I'm not a complete nutjob. I just had the sound of white noise, which the fan resembles.

So anyway.... study time. I feel better now.

Turkey day, southern style.

Menu:

Hors d'oeuvres: Phyllo pastry shells stuffed with shrimp dressing

Side items: shrimp stuffed mirliton/chayote, ground sirloin dressing, cornbread dressing, phyllo pastry stuffed oyster dressing, sweet potatoes & marshmallows

Bird: "Turkey." stuffed with apples and even more stuffing/dressing

Wine: Robert Mondavi, on sale!

Gumbo. You know this!

So that's a southern style Turkey day!

WhiningPuppyItis and Laundry.

The whining was cute at first, sort of, now it's getting very tiresome.

She did very well last night, albeit I kept her up till almost 4am while I was studying.

I have a bad habit of not kenneling her when I am home. I know, it's not cruel but she sits there and stares, and whines. I have her in the kennel now, she only whined for about 5 minutes initially.

I put her twisty toy in there, a toy I could definitely not leave in there when I am not home, and that keeps her a little more occupied.

The paranoia about the whining is because if I can sit across the room from the wall I share with my neighbor, and hear his entire conversation on the phone, I know he hears her at night. I just don't need neighbor wars and bitching. I barely know the guy, he's cool and we get along but I have no idea how quirky he could be. Hell, I don't even know if he knows we have a dog. Maybe he sleeps like a dead log.

Laundry.

When I was younger and a spoiled brat, my mom did my laundry for me, folded it and left it in stacks in the laundry room. The "agreement" was she would do it as long as I didn't "rummage" through it, same for my dad. She liked the neat appearance and claimed to have rather do laundry herself and not allow anyone else the opportunity to f*ck up clothing.

I've kept that mentality with dear boyfriend. I have no problem doing his laundry. It's easy enough because I hang all of his work stuff right there in laundry room and the rest is quick folding. I'd rather keep up with the laundry to maintain a clean house, and dirty laundry isn't fun.

I have a tick thought. I am quirky. I get just pissed when he rummages through it, or worse, when I find folded clean clothing on the floor or in a hamper it doesn't belong in, a dirty one or the sock hamper. F*ck pairing socks, them bitches go straight to one hamper.

So maybe I am turning into my mother, but I don't think I am being unreasonable to ask for him to just freaking leave it the way he left it! I know his time management needs improvement, he always waits till the last second to get ready for work, thus he rushes and thus he occasionally makes a mess, I come home and find it and get very pissy.

Tick/quirk re: laundry part 2: I cannot focus in a dirty house. I could be sitting here, on the sofa in the living room and lose concentration over dirty dishes in the sink. I just need order to focus. So, if I come home and have work to do, or studying, I need to cyclone through the house to get it clean before I can mentally chill. TICK!

SO, it would be very cool if he would just keep up with what I do around the house.

I sense this is a battle I will just have to lose. Teaching myself time management is hard enough, I can't be responsible for teaching a grown man. Maybe he will learn by example? I hope.

Am I a "nervene" about this laundry business?

Creature of Habit

I always go to the Starbucks in my neighborhood. I've already explained I adore the manager, they take care of me. :)

Well due to some plumbing issues, they are out of commission.

So I'm a transplant at a nearby Starbucks and not happy about it.

I'm going to be a bitchy person and gripe that its FREEZING in here (Hello, Raynaud's Phenomenon!) They don't have hot running water in the bathroom (WTF Starbucks?!) and the baristas got their asses handed to them by the manager, in front of a line of customers.

About who is on bar, register and drive through. Not cool.

And the ultimate... the little bastard on the bar made my drink like so.. (well he started to)

Cup, ice, white mocha...

ME: no! Please don't make it like that! The ice clumps up the white mocha!

(followed by sheepish smile)

Bastard gave me an attitude!!!

Thankfully, the chick on the register said she gets the same drink and told him

"She deserves to have her drink made the way she wants!"

What the FUCK! I don't understand where in Starbucks training you bastards learned to make a drink ass backwards! Having worked for the cult, I know the training. I KNOW they never ever let you do that. You're just lazy and wanted to pollute my drink with ice! Probably because you worked at some lame-ass mom & pop coffee joint that wanted you to fill it with ice to lower the amount of product.

Asshat.

- End Rant -

Okay, I feel better. Now I can finish studying.

Baby pictures!

Well, not my baby pictures and there is no embryo incubating, puppy baby pictures!

She is our baby, so as any parent would do, we want to show her off!

Little ham thinks she rules the roost and took up my side of the bed!

I had no hand in positing her, she lays like that on her own.

Closeup!

Back of dear boyfriend's head.

This was the morning after one of our first nights with her.

I wake up at ~3am & ~6am to take her out to potty.

Kennel training = my version of hell.

Anyway, I laid back in bed with her and when I woke up a few hours later

this is how I found her, too cute not to photograph!

The first night I had Zoe, she fit in my purse! Granted, its a huge purse.

We went to 24/7 store to get food.

(I know, crappy food, we got the good stuff the next day)

I had only had her for about 2 hours when I took this!

Crappy crackberry camera, but it will do!

I have another task to complete to evade studying.. my eyebrows are looking a little shapeless.

Ardvarks eat ants... did you know that?

Random, non angry post, but none the less funny.

I imagine my mother is where I get my book smarts from, and lack of common sense.

"Ardvarks eat ants" has become a family inside joke that I'd like to share with you.

A couple years ago my parents wanted to take me out to dinner for doing well in college, earned a 4.0 for a couple semesters in a row. What a little pre-med gunner I was, so cute.

I wanted to go to a local italian place, casual, bad ass traditional sicilian food.

At the time, a very big local musical festival was taking place and not too far from the restaurant.

So while trying to find parking... this conversation transpired:

Me: wow parking is a major bitch tonight.

Dad: yea, we might have to pick another restaurant.

Mom: I think :insert big rock star: is playing at :local music fest:

Dad: Okay... thats great, ardvarks eat ants.

Me: **silence**

Mom: **silence**

Mom: I don't get it? Are you making fun of me for something?

Dad: Ardvarks eat ants.

Mom: WTF asshole I don't get it!

Dad: You made a statement so irrelevant to eating dinner & parking that I threw it back at you. And that was so obvious, everyone knows :big music star: is playing tonight.

Mom: exactly you moron! (I taught her asshat, that is now her choice profanity) that's why I made that remark when you said parking is terrible! I was trying to say that since :big music star: is damn near in walking distance, parking here IS going to be a bitch!

Me: well, why the hell didn't you just say that!!

Dad: yea! You sounded completely irrelevant.

Moral of the story, now whenever one of us says something stupid or have a "hello caption obvious moment we insert "ardvarks eat ants."

Speaking of Captain Obvious, my group has nicknamed a classmate that.

In our nursing fundamentals classes, this asshat made it well known that he was in the navy.

Well, quite apparently he wasn't a navy nurse b/c he is in fact now, in nursing school.

Later in the semester we learned that Capt. O was actually a deckhand of some sort and occasionally did CNA like activities. Or something to that affect. Something that totally devalued any "nursing" theory he wanted to preach about.

One of the first nursing skill we learned was proper application of surgical glove donning. Big task. (Ya, I know the importance of surgical technique but come on, this isn't brain surgery).

Yours truly had the pleasure of sitting in front of Capt. O for this experience. The asshat was the type that would anticipate what the teacher was about to say you know like..

Teacher: violets are red,

Asshat: ROSES ARE BLUE!

SHUT THE FUCK UP AND LET THE PROFESSOR TALK YOU DIMWIT!!

Sooooo... my clinical mate & I were opening our glove kit and practicing

(mind you our seats where the old university style theatre seats that enable you to feel your neighbors heartbeat you're so close together).

Capt. O: *addressing entire class* about sterile technique tips he learned in the NAVY

Me: *to clinical mate* pretty hard huh?? (alert: sarcasm!)

Clinical mate: YEP!

Capt. O "omg ya'll in the NAVY we had to do this and this and yeah like surgical technique is sooo hard and important, I mean your sterile technique like ... "

(insert arvarks eat ants moment)

DUDE, OVER YOUR HEAD. I *INTENTIONALLY* (I know I'm an asshole) INSULTED YOU!

Poor bastard. I haven't seen him yet in level 2, don't think he made it.

Writer's note: I support our troops of all kinds, nothing against the Navy! My great grandfather served in the Navy and a cousin is an fallen Marine, Iraq.

Booksmart moments and PUPPY

Booksmart moment!

The other day at the hospital I had to hang a bag of antibiotics... it's a prepackaged 100ml sterile saline with a glass bottle attached.

You have to snap the connection (like you would a glow stick necklace to activate the contents) to get the water access going. After you snap you squeeze the water into the bottle, mix it up then use negative pressure to bring it back to the bag side.

Simple enough. I've hung plenty of these before.

But every time my instructor is near me, I goof up!

She walked me through the pyxis (they have to..) we get it out, and after I snap the connection she said "squeeze"

Now my hand was on the glass bottle. I squeezed that glass bottle.

Yes. I did.

She laughed so hard.

I have my moments. Damn right I can explain the pharmacology of the drug, what to monitor for and the patient teaching!

Anyway...

Good news! Boyfriend surprised me with a 7 week old chihuahua!

She is a long haired apple head. Zoe.

We've had her since Wednesday night and she has been a hand full and nothing short of a new born.

Kennel training is my version of hell.

The past few nights have been sleepless. She whines, and whines, and whines.

She whines!!!

Most of the time she whines when she needs a potty break. Which is 1/2 hour to 1 hour on the hour.

Update:

We've now had dogchild for one week. She brings so much joy and love!

Potty training has dwindled down to her holding it most of the night (the 5-7 hours I actually sleep).

Inner Tech Genius VS Book Smarts

Dear Apple,

I really understand times are hard and your "Genius" wanted to rape my wallet, but I fended for myself. And succeeded.

My father oddly had an extra hard drive, the exact same model I wanted to replace my MacShit's factory installed drive.

The MacBook came with a Fujistu, 160GB 5200rpm.

Basically, not the best of brands, decent size but could always be bigger (ha) and there are faster speeds available.

I wanted a Western Digital Black Scorpion 320GB 7200 rpm.

He had one.

In a nutshell, WD is more reliable, way more shock absorbent (laptops are meant to be portal and thus increase risk of potential falling). Faster speed, way more space to store stuff and overall, a more reliable piece of equipment.

I learned this through some simple research.

Thankfully, ifixit.com has great tutorials and taking the laptop apart and going through all the twists and turns of formatting/reinstalling OS X was easier than I ever thought.

Took about 2 hours, 1.5 hours of it was software doing its thing while I watched TV.

I decided against cloning the drive contents. I saved pertinent files to USB and loaded the new WD with a clean slate of OS X. I'll have to get an external enclosure for the old hard drive to finish getting my data off it. No big deal, just a USB plug!

My MacBook is working so awesome. The hard drive is reading clear, no known issues, diagnostics coming up clear, running faster. I'm not even bothered by the humming/increased vibration of the 7200rpm like some people on the internet claimed to be. I definitely sense it but it's totally liveable and not a big deal.

The optical drive.. that is yet to be conquered. I need to find one. I'm still trying to figure out if there is a better brand I can get thats more reliable. TBD.

To boot from the OS X CD, I just used an external optical drive, again USB is amazing!

I did follow ifixit.com instructions to remove the optical drive. Talk about a shitload of tiny ass screws! I got the drive out, got the CD out safely, reinstalled the drive, booted the computer back up... no more computer anxiously trying to read a CD with a malfunctioning drive.

The "Genius" told me the CD could not be removed. When he went back into Genius Land (back of store, behind closed doors) he probably just fiddled with his phone/ipod becausec taking that damn thing apart is not a 5 minute task, like it supposedly took him. It took me 20 minutes and I have tiny hands with manual dexterity. I'm convinced he didn't even try.

So when Apple sent me an evaluation, I stated what I was able to do, what I was told couldn't be done and I was able to safely, easily accomplish, and that I did it for 1/1000th of the quoted costs!

So my easily amused, book smart only, common sense lacking self managed to replace my own hard drive, reinstall a fresh copy of OS X, not loose any of my files and upgraded the hardware.

Accomplishment, I think so!

So Inner Tech Genius... meet your evil twin, Book Smarts.

Here is the funny story I promised.

A few months ago boyfriend and I were watching a movie on Cox's free movie thing.

Now, I am typically book smart only. And I also can't follow a plot for shit. I have the attention span of a gold fish on speed, sometimes, and so I easily loose track of the plot.

So, thankfully, most TV shows/movies on digital I can hit the info button and figure out where the plot is kind of going.

Or annoy the shit out of everyone in the room "wait! what happened?!" "I don't get it!"

So........

I pressed the info button.

Screen returns to select a movie.

BF: Why did you touch the remote?

BookSmarts: I've never seen this movie before, I wanted to know what it was about so I could follow it easier...

BF: If you would WATCH the movie, you would KNOW what it is ABOUT.

BF *angrily restarts movie*

He let me catch up on some of the beginning parts.

We finally get back to the point where I decided to hit the info button.

WAAAAAAAAIT FOR IT...

15-20 minutes go by.

I'm lost again.

What do I do?

INFO BUTTON!

Screen goes back to select a movie!

BF: I told you NOT to touch the damn remote! Now we have to start all over again!

BookSmarts: Sorry! I get lost and don't understand the movie!

BF: *hides remote* *restarts movie* *fast forwards*

BookSmarts: *cowards down and fiddles with Blackberry*

So I can replace a hard drive, reinstall software, not lose any files, understand how to dissemble/reassemble MacBook to replace optical drive....BUT I cannot work a remote control and follow a movie for the life of me.

Friday competing with Monday for worst day of the week.

Sleeping through an alarm is never a good start for any day.

Luckily, I was just getting up early for non-essential errands. Just irked that I have to put them off even more now.

Going to lecture was the biggest waste. Gynecology issues. Coming from a female, got that department covered. And yet again.. lecturer read the powerpoint. WAAASTE.

The real nitty gritty of the day was my Macbook.

I made an appointment with the Apple store to meet with a "Genius."

I've had a CD stuck in there for months, not really a big deal, but I occasionally want to use the CDs that come with textbooks and boyfriend has been territorial over his appliances since I've been with mine. We have a very large divided issue on using each other's computers/cellphones. Not for privacy issues, just I'm typically electronically challenged and I hate the way he leaves my laptop lying around on the sofa. I'm anal retentive.

Anyway...

The son of a bitch is out of warranty. The "Genius" diagnosed my optical drive as malfunctioning and in need of replacement.

Well, it can wait.

Since I'm already here with my laptop... can you run a diagnostics?

He gives me a saddened face.

He discovered my hard drive was "near failure."

My assessment skills clicked in..

Define near failure.

What caused this?

What could have prevented this?

How much time until I get some BLUE SCREEN OF DEATH?

Are you sure?

How can you tell?

He tells me this........."Well, it's kind of like getting a cold and going to the doctor.. they can treat you for it but can't tell you where you caught the cold."

Are you fucking kidding me? Apple products are supposed to be the holy grail of computers/phones and this is the kind of fucking bullshit you hand me when it craps out on me?!

The price tag on these fixes/labor was getting close to $500. Halfway to just replacing the whole fucking laptop and getting a new warranty.

I'm going to investigate do-it-yourself options... which probably isn't a logical decision considering how I am hated far and wide by electronic devices, but what the hell.

Speaking of being hated by electronic devices, I have a good post soon on EasilyAmused VS The Remote. Trust me, it's a good one.