The stigma of living with Crone’s disease

You’ve no doubt heard of Crohn’s disease, a chronic inflammatory disorder of the bowels.  My heart goes out to people with Crohn’s because it can be very debilitating and difficult to live with.

However, there’s another condition with a very similar name, and this is the one I want to talk about today.  It’s not easy to discuss, but I need to face my fears and tell my story.

My friends, I suffer from Crone’s disease.  I don’t have full-blown Crone’s yet, but it’s just a matter of time.

Medical literature on the subject is scant; patients generally present with very vague signs and symptoms.  Because there are no tests for Crone’s, proper diagnosis can be made only when the disease is already advanced.

I vividly remember when I noticed the first symptom.  I was at a bar and the music was really loud.  Probably no louder than the music at other bars I had been to, but on this night the volume really bothered me.  I was seized by the overwhelming urge to tell the bartender to “turn down that fucking noise.”  This was accompanied by a strong desire to reflect loudly and at length on how much better the music was when I was in high school and college and how “bands today all sound the same.”

I had never experienced anything like that before.  It scared me.

Several years later, another alarming symptom reared its ugly head.  I was out with some friends.  We had a great time carousing but after so much debauchery I needed to call it a night.  I looked at my watch.  It was 11pm.  That can’t be right, I thought.  It’s got to be around 4am.  My watch must have stopped.  How could this be, that after only a few hours I was tired and wanted to go home?

I didn’t know it then, but I was in the early stages of Crone’s.

Other symptoms emerged recently. Not long ago I used the phrase, “Kids today have NO IDEA.”  I sometimes mutter under my breath at loud groups of young’uns in their 20s and 30s.  And when people discuss celebrities, I frequently have no clue who they’re talking about.  Blake Lively?  Who’s he?

I babble about how U2 was really great “back in the day.”  I bemoan the fact that people born in the 80s and 90s are co-opting The Breakfast Club and calling it a movie for their generation.  Yeah, well, I’ve got news for you, you little punks:  you can’t possibly know what it was really like back then.  I was there, bitches.  So why don’t you just run along and play with your Xbox or something?

Doctors don’t talk about prognosis when it comes to people with Crone’s.  But I’m not stupid.  I know what’s in store for me.

“Get off my lawn, you rotten kids!”

I’ll start saying “I’m too old for this shit” more often.  My joints will make odd cracking noises, like an old house settling.  It will take me ten minutes to get up after sitting on the floor.  Certain foods will no longer agree with me but I’ll insist on eating them anyway and complaining when my stomach hurts and I can’t sleep.  My glasses will crap out and I’ll be forced to read stuff by holding it either really far away or right in front of my eyes.

I won’t even get into the visible manifestations of Crone’s disease because they’re too numerous and horrifying.  But I will say this: grey hair is associated with an increased risk of Crone’s.  As you know, I already have a touch of hag.  My future is grim.  Eventually I’ll have to accept my fate.

For those of you who think you might have Crone’s, please know you’re not alone.  You shouldn’t suffer in silence.  Instead, you should bitch and moan to anyone who will stand still long enough to listen.  It’s the only way.

Fuck you, Republican wingnuts

[Disclaimer: This is not aimed at my Republican buddies here, who are intelligent, thoughtful human beings.  This is for the members of the GOP who are hell-bent on fomenting hatred and encouraging discrimination, among other things.  Anyone who is offended by this, however, is exactly the type of person I’m referring to below and should be offended.]

[Note: I’m not generally a politics person.  I will probably never write another political post, so I wanted to make this one count.  I’m coming out swinging.  I might lose some readers, and that’s okay.]

Hey, wingnuts.  You don’t know me but you hate me.

I’m from New York City.  To you guys, that’s just another name for Sodom.  Y’all hate us city slickers because we’re not honest, hard-workin’, church-goin’, “real” Amuricans.  Yet my city, along with 3,000 people, took a big hit for you 11 years ago.  Fuck you.

I believe that a person’s race, religion, or sexual orientation has absolutely nothing to do with a person’s right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.  You, on the other hand, cloak yourselves in your “Christian faith” and use it to justify your perverse views on humanity.  And you’re fine with people enjoying freedom—as long as they’re white, Christian, and heterosexual, and as long as they think exactly as you do.  You’re fucking hypocrites.

I care about the earth.  I know global warming is real.  I oppose drilling in the Arctic, fracking, and everything else that messes with our fragile environment.  I support the Kyoto Protocol and I’m ashamed that we are one of the few nations not to ratify it.  You hate that hippie shit.  As long as you make more money, who cares what happens to the planet, right?   You clueless fucking idiots.

I’m a woman.  I’m everything you dislike in a woman, too.  I am child-free by choice.  I didn’t take my husband’s last name.  I have my own career.  I believe all women should be able to live without the government dictating what we can and cannot do with our bodies.  You think we should be smacked around and put back in our place.  A lot of you don’t even seem to believe rape is a real crime.  That’s how much you hate us.  Fuck you, you sick misogynist bastards.

I say women should have equality in the workplace and get equal pay for doing the same work as men.  You hate that idea with a passion.  Let me tell you something, wingnuts.  The first women in my family to work outside the home were my grandmothers.  They were working their asses off when Lilly Ledbetter was still just a gleam in her daddy’s eye.  My grandmothers worked because they had to.  One of my grandmothers was an immigrant from Sicily.  You would have hated her just for that.  The other was a Rosie the Riveter—she worked at Fairchild Camera, manufacturing bomb sights and reconnaissance camera equipment for the war effort. (You’re welcome.)  They had difficult lives and few options.  Today, American women have opportunities that my grandmothers couldn’t even have dreamed about.  And you can’t handle the fact that women are now outclassing you and challenging your authority, can you?  Fuck you, you deserve it.

One of our greatest Republican presidents, Theodore Roosevelt, was a champion of women’s rights.  He also spoke out against racism.  His unorthodox views didn’t endear him to a lot of people, but he was a very forward-thinking guy.  I suspect that if he were alive today, he would have been just as open-minded on the subject of gay rights.  Meanwhile you halfwits are trying to drag us back to much darker times.  You’re a disgrace—not just to the Republican party, but to the whole country.  TR would kick your sorry asses back to the Stone Age.  Fuck you.

You disgust me.  You’re vile, arrogant, and pathetic.   I hate how you’ve given my country and my people such an awful reputation around the world.  Because the Americans I know—immigrant, American-born, gay, transgender, hetero, black, white, Latino, Asian, Christian, Jewish, Muslim, Hindu, atheist, whatever—are decent, kind, open-hearted souls.  They’re better Americans and human beings than you will ever be.

You’ve rewritten history to suit your agendas.  You’ve twisted the truth to such an extreme that it’s not even recognizable anymore.  Some people say you’re insane.  I disagree.  You’re not insane, you’re just evil.

The only good thing is that the more you talk, the more you reveal yourselves as hate-filled, ignorant troglodytes.  And the more that happens, the more people will want to stop you.  Because you need to be stopped.  You need to go back to your caves and pick bugs off each other, and leave my country alone.

Fuck you.  Fuck you all.

The Insomnia Monologues

List of Characters:
Madame Weebles, your performer and insomniac
Mr. Weebles, who can fall asleep just thinking about sleep
Cupcake, a beautiful, un-declawed, 18-pound kitty

Setting:
The bedroom, in the middle of the night.  It’s dark.  Mr. Weebles is asleep.  My alarm clock is taunting me with those giant glowing red numbers, pointing at me and snickering.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

I can’t believe this is happening again.  I’m so tired.  Why can’t I just go to sleep?  It’s 2:00am.  If I get to sleep by 3:00, that’s still four hours of sleep.  I guess that’s not too bad.

I could read but I’m too tired for that.  And I’m too tired and lazy to get up and go to the computer.  But my brain is spinning.  I don’t get it.  How can my brain be spinning when I’m this tired??  Maybe I’ll try that deep breathing thing I read about.  Innnnnnhaaaaaaaaaale.  Exxxxxxxxhaaaaaaaa—forget it, this is boring.

What’s on television?  Hey, Law & Order: Criminal Intent is on!

Ooop, someone just jumped on the bed.  It’s Cupcake.  Hi Cupcake!  Such a good girl.  Come here, let me pet you.  Ow, don’t stand on me, you’re concentrating all 18 pounds on one paw.  It really hurts.  Just lie down, pumpkin.  Come on, lie down.  No—please, don’t walk on me.  Ow, the claws.  Oh no.  Please, not there, Cupc—oww, NOTTHERENOTTHERENOTTHERENOWOWOWAWWWWW, look at you, you’re so cute!  See, isn’t this nice, lying down?  Yes, this is much nicer.

4:00am.  If I fall asleep in the next half hour, that’s two and a half hours of sleep.  Sigh.  At least it’s something.

Uh oh. There’s that poor limping dog—it’s that ASPCA or Humane Society commercial again. I need to change the channel.  What did I do with the remote?  Dammit, now I have to grope around for it with my eyes closed, I can’t watch these animals, it’s too sad.  Where’s the remote??  WHERE IS IT?!?!  I have to switch channels immediately!!  Lalalalalalalalalalalala I’m not listening lalalalalalalalalalalalalalala oh here it is.  **click**

4:30am.  Yay, I’m finally getting really drowsy.  I should be asleep pretty soon.  What a relief.

BRRRRRROOARRGGGGGGGGGGHRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR!!

Fucking motorcyclist.  I hope he wraps his bike around a lamppost and it bursts into flames.  Asshole.

5:15am.  My heart is still racing from that motorcycle scaring the shit out of me.  I want to find that motherfucker, tie him to a stake, baste him with honey, and set fire ants on him.

Look at Mr. Weebles, sleeping so soundly.  That smug bastard.  How does he do that?  He looks so peaceful and cozy.  I really hate him.

6:00am.  If I fall asleep RIGHT NOW, that’s an hour of sleep.  That’s barely even a nap.  Fuck my life.  Is it possible to smother oneself with a pillow?

I want to make a voodoo doll of that biker and puree it in the blender.

6:45am.  Sonofabitch.  I can’t believe I haven’t slept all fucking night.  This is BULLSHIT.  I may as well just get up now since my alarm is going to go off in fifteezzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz……….

THIS is why the world hates America

I’ve just seen a commercial for a new TLC show called Here Comes Honey Boo Boo.  This Honey Boo Boo creature, who is 6 years old, is one of the stars of another TLC train wreck, Toddlers & Tiaras, and is a regular on the children’s beauty pageant circuit.

Now this little monstrosity has her own fucking show.  Because when TLC deliberately scraped the bottom of the barrel last season, they apparently still weren’t satisfied.  I haven’t checked the weather forecast for the week yet but I’m expecting locusts and frogs.

Here’s a video clip to give you an idea of what we’re dealing with here.

That “special juice” she’s talking about, by the way, is a mixture of Mountain Dew and Red Bull that her mother concocted for her.  She calls it “Go-Go Juice.”  No wonder the kid has the crazy eyes.

This is going to be one hell of a show.  A children’s beauty pageant contestant, her nightmare pageant mother, and the rest of her trailer trash family (although they don’t actually live in a trailer).  The daughter is an obnoxious, mumble-mouthed brat who’s cruising for a bruising if the parents continue to encourage that attitude of hers.  Mom is a brash, ignorant fame whore and a diabetes disaster waiting to happen.  And one of her other daughters proudly proclaims that they’re not rednecks because “we have all our teeth.”  With all that Red Bull and Mountain Dew?  I doubt that, honey.

And if that weren’t enough, the mother is a self-confessed “coupon queen” and one of the teenage daughters is pregnant.  TLC won the Extreme Reality Jackpot with this crew.  They must have wet themselves when they realized they hit the dysfunctional mother lode.

And before anyone starts yelling that I’m unfairly going after Southerners, rest assured that I also have plenty of venom for Snooki and her vacuous, sun-fried friends on Jersey Shore, the shrieking harpies on Real Housewives (all of them), the snarling shrews of Bridezillas, and most other reality-show “celebrities.”  They’re the worst of every possible stereotype.  I’m sure the producers edit the footage so that they seem as appalling as possible, but surely that doesn’t require much effort in most cases.

Networks will continue to put this dreck on the air as long as we keep watching it for our guilty pleasure.  Reality shows about well-adjusted people sitting around reading on their Kindles just doesn’t make for riveting television.  The problem is that these programs end up spawning legions of increasingly self-absorbed, brain-dead lemmings who want their 15+ minutes of fame.  They celebrate and encourage ugly behavior.  And they make us look bad as a country.  It’s embarrassing.

Sure, the world hates Americans because we’re big bullies and we know think we’re better than everyone else.  But big deal—that’s been the case for decades.

No, it’s these literacy-free cretins who really ruin it for us.  They’re why people in other countries think we’re fat, lazy, arrogant assholes with the intelligence of a speed bump.  For better or worse—mainly worse—in today’s world, these reality shows, like Hillbilly Handfishing, My Teen Is Pregnant and So Am I, Bad Girls Club, etc., end up serving as our nation’s ambassadors.

So forget about our ham-handed approach to world affairs, our penchant for going to war, and the fact that McDonald’s can now be found in even the most far-flung locations on earth.  Our reality shows are why everyone hates us.  Can you blame them??

Hey, nice rack

Yes, this post is about what you think it’s about.  It’s about boobs.  Cans.  Hooters.  Melons.  Jugs.  Sweater meat.

My friends, I am not a flat-chested woman.  I’m packing heat.  I’ve wintered well.  My cups overfloweth.  Mind you, I’m not complaining.  It comes in handy quite often.  I’ve got a built-in popcorn catcher.  And it’s a convenient place to keep a tissue or money when I have no pockets available.

There are, however, some drawbacks.  The most annoying being unsolicited comments from representatives of the XY chromosome pairing.

I started getting comments and catcalls when I was a teenager.  Now that I’m in my 40s I don’t get as many but it still happens occasionally.  And it’s not like I’m pulling a Sue Ellen Mischke, walking around wearing just a bra.  I can wear the baggiest of sweaters and some slack-jawed idiot will still zero in on my chest.

Do I find it icky when guys make lewd comments?  Ewww, yes.  Do I think it’s sexist and degrading?  Fuck yeah.  I can’t tell you how many times I’ve fantasized about launching asshole-seeking missiles at these knuckle draggers.

But my other feeling is, if you’re going to make a sleazy remark, you should put some thought into it.  Make it memorable.  Pithy.  Because I’ve heard a lot of really lame stuff.  Loud kissy noises, a variety of animal-type grunts, many yells of “Woooooooo yeah!!!!” or words to that effect.  Once a guy came up real close to me, gaped at my torso and said, “BIG ONES!!” in a voice that sounded eerily like that of Cheech Marin.  And for international flavor, I’ve gotten a lot of “Ayyyyyyy mami!!!”

Come on, fellas.  Don’t phone it in with a disgusting noise or a wolf whistle or something juvenile like that.  Those are all really played out.  You can do better.

I’m not saying you should doff your hat and proclaim, “My dear lady, your mammaries are quite bountiful and luxurious indeed.  Good day to you!”  But if you’re going to be a douche, at least make an effort not to be a stupid douche.

The best line I ever heard was when I was about 17 or 18.  Anyone remember those t-shirts sold by Haagen-Dazs back in the glory days of the 80s?  They had the H-D logo on the front and an ice cream flavor on the back.  I had one (mine said Coffee).  One day when I was wearing it, I was walking down the street and saw a guy ahead of me leaning against a parked car.  I had a feeling he was going to be a problem.  I just looked straight ahead and hoped he would leave me alone.  He didn’t.  As I passed him, he said, “Haagen-Dazs, huh??  Nice scoops you got there, honey!”

Now that was clever.  Respect, bro.

Bless me, bloggers, for I have sinned…

My friends, it’s time for a deep, dark confession.

Many of you, here and on other blogs, have remarked on my kindness.  And I appreciate that very much.

I’ve looked at some of my recent posts to see how I might come across to someone reading them.  I suppose I do seem kind of kind.  And I am.  Sometimes.

But then there’s this post.  As well as this post.  And this one and this one.  Also this.

You see, dear readers, I’m really not all that nice.  I am not a people person.  I get ticked off extremely easily.  I’m one of the most impatient people I’ve ever met.  I have a temper that goes from 0 to 60 in 2.5 seconds.  I get road rage as a pedestrian.  So I think I’ve done the world a great service by choosing not to have a driver’s license.

The message on my cross-stitch pattern is not strictly tongue-in-cheek.

I have no qualms about ripping someone a new one.  There are few things more satisfying to me than taking an arrogant asshat down a few pegs or dressing down an incompetent co-worker.  I enjoy it a lot more than I should.

And then there are my interactions with tourists.  I’ve given plenty of them something to tell their friends back in East Buttfuck:  “Hey, I was cursed out by a New Yorker on the E train!”  If you congregate in front of an escalator or subway door, or if you walk aimlessly while staring at your giant maps, I’m going to make sure you get the hell out of my way.  I’ll start by being polite, but after that all bets are off.

Just the other day someone told me it’s not healthy to be so type A and that I should really slow down and chill out.  But that’s the thing—slowing down and chilling out is what annoys me.  I don’t want to slow down.  I want everything else to speed up.  I feel most Zen when I can go at the speed I want.  Richard Belzer did a great stand-up bit many, many years ago, about how someone said he talked too fast—to which Belzer replied, “No, Sparky, you just listen too slow.”  I understand this completely.

But I digress.

I wanted to share all of this with you because I actually like you guys and want you to know more about who you’re reading here.  So yeah. I’m not Mary Sunshine.  Unless Mary Sunshine is a bitchy 40-something who can be recreationally confrontational and gives basilisk stares to people who piss her off.

Now who wants cookies?

A Touch of Hag

I’ve written a few uplifting/poignant/maudlin posts over the past few weeks.  Now I have to let out the snark because it’s been backing up on me and seeping out of my pores in a most unsavory manner.

Today’s rant is about this product:

You’ve no doubt seen commercials or ads for this stuff. Men can use this dye to get rid of most of the grey (I prefer this spelling, I don’t care how it’s spelled on the package) in their hair, to give them that distinguished look. Because if you get rid of all the grey, you might not be taken seriously.  And if you have too much grey, you probably won’t get a lot of hot young tail.  Touch of Gray gives you that happy medium—the look that says, “I’ve been around the block a few times but I’m not too old for another few laps, if you know what I’m saying.”

You’ve also no doubt noticed that there’s no Touch of Gray for women.  That will never fly.  They’d have to call it a Touch of Hag.  Maybe they could market it to women who are tired of getting hit on all the time or who want to be taken more seriously at their jobs.

Because grey isn’t usually considered hot on chicks.  You don’t hear a lot of women say they don’t mind the greys around their temples.  Sure, there are women who have no qualms about letting their greys show—some even flaunt them.  But they’re the exceptions that prove the rule.

Yours truly has been going grey since she was 18.  If I don’t touch up my roots regularly, I get that white/grey halo effect that really isn’t attractive on anyone who hasn’t been beatified by the Catholic church.  If I went all grey, I’d probably look something like this:

On the other hand, men who are all grey fare much better.  Look at these smokin’ hot Silver Foxes:

 

One might argue that I’ve bought into society’s beliefs about what’s attractive/not attractive on women.  It’s true, I probably have.  I’ll probably keep coloring my hair until I’m too lazy or just don’t care anymore.

Maybe that’s when Touch of Hag would come in handy: when you want to look like you’ve been flying on the broomstick for a while but aren’t too old for a few more rides.  If you know what I’m saying.