Summer Resolutions

It's the beginning of summer, and I'm getting that feeling I get every summer. The feeling that I will have time in the next three months to catch up on the resolutions that I slacked off on from January until May. But this summer I'm taking two classes and I have a house to finish and unpack. But I'm hoping that I can downsize some of our stuff, and finally make sure that everything has a place. I decided we have way too many little things floating around when I had to label a THIRD box as "junk drawer". When every drawer is a junk drawer you have a problem.

I know all of my readers (Mom, Teresa and Zac) (no, my husband and my father don't read my blog regularly) (yes this is a passive-aggressive way of trying to make them feel guilty if they ever do read my blog) are concerned about the state of my pinky finger. It's been a wild ride, I tell ya.

I went to see the specialist, who was a lovely man despite being only 5 feet tall and slightly crossed eyes. He looked at my finger for about thirty seconds, and said confidently "I can fix this". Then he gets a needle that's about as long as he is tall and jams it in my palm. Apparently, despite refusing to ever own, fire or even touch a gun, I gave myself "trigger finger" which necessitated injecting cortisone into the tendon. My hand began to swell like a balloon as the cortisone went in, and he merrily tried to chat with me about grad school as I tried not to howl like a baboon on fire. Afterwards, he did his best to make me feel really happy I'm a social worker.

Doctor: So, you're a social worker?
Me: Yep.
Doctor: They don't make much money, huh?
Me: Nope, not really
Doctor: I know a social worker. She barely makes enough to live on.
Me: That's too bad.
Doctor: Yeah, and that's in Phoenix. It's probably even worse here!
Me: I guess....
Doctor: I always tell her "you might as well be working for free!" hehehe.
Me: Well, it's not that bad...
Doctor: Yep, working for free. She might as well just be a volunteer.
Me: Seriously...
Doctor: I mean, she lives by herself and can barely pay the bills! What if you have kids?!
Me: So...can I go pay my copay now and you can bill my insurance company $1,000 for my 30 second evaluation?

My finger started getting better almost immediately, but it wasn't done punishing me yet. Oh, no. After I was able to bend it again I could take off the tape I'd been wearing. At first my finger was itchy, but I figured that was normal. Then, the skin start peeling off, and getting all red and gross. I ignored it, hoping it would go away. Clearly, I didn't learn much of a lesson from waiting a month to get the whole "trigger finger" thing looked at. But Danny noticed my angry, mutant finger after a few days, and announced that he was diagnosing me with athlete's foot. On my finger. If you are silently gagging a little bit right now, don't be ashamed. I did to, and it was my appendage. It made sense, though. Not a lot of air was getting to it, moisture under the tape and the splint...*gag* So I purchased "anti-fungal cream" and have been frantically applying it every 30 seconds or so. It seems to be working, as the redness, itchiness and soreness is gone, and the skin has grown back. I think my finger may have run out of cute little tricks to punish me for forcing it to do manual labor, but if a tiny face grows on the tip and starts muttering satanic phrases at me, I wouldn't be surprised.

Forget social work!

When we visited Sea World last month, I decided I was going to quit my job and move to California to be the professional penguin feeder. The lady whose job I was planning on stealing got to sit on a rock and hand feed the penguins. And cuddle the penguins. One climbed into her lap and it sat there and let her pet it while she fed all the others. She was, essentially, a professional penguin cuddler. I wanted to do that.

Now? I have to find a way to get Danny to move to China with me:

Milestone

Siva's ears stood up for the first time by themselves yesterday. Our baby's already looking like a grown up doggy.

More Random Tidbits

I guess I've been too busy to formulate a comprehensive blog entry recently, but I keep thinking of little bullet points to mention:

1. The person I used to share my office with would tell me that her body would "know" what kinds of deficiencies it had, and she would get cravings to remedy those deficiencies. Her body was very helpful, and cause her to crave things like broccoli and bean sprouts. Either I have some very strange vitamin deficiencies, or my body wants to sabotage itself. My most common cravings are for cheese (usually chedder or bried), sour cream, or sour dough jack's from jack in the box. Most recently? I have been craving cocktails. I don't want to get drunk or anything, it's just that a margarita martini or a cosmo keeps sounding so yummy. Basically my body is trying to turn itself into a drunk, fat chick.

2. Danny and I have been listening to one radio station while working on the house because we keep forgetting to bring cd's, and we can't agree on any other type of music. I have now banned that radio station because they play the same five songs ALL DAY. There's a particularly annoying song by Three Days Grace called "Riot". It's a generic song by young, angry white men about how oppressed and pissed off they are. Because, you know, there are so many societal barriers that they have to overcome. And their creative solution? I quote:
"LET'S GO RIOT. RIOT. LET'S GO RIOT. RIOT" *repeat for five minutes*
Because society doesn't already have a low enough opinion about your problem solving skills. Way to be.

Pinky Update

So, after making an appointment to see my doctor on Monday, I spoke with my dad who said to skip the doctor and see a specialist. I call my doctor, and the nurse tells me he doesn't just want me to see a specialist, he wants me to see a hand surgeon specialist. Great. So, I call the surgeon's office and have yet another embarrassing conversation:
Me: Hi, I need to make an appointment to get my finger looked at.
Receptionist: Okay, what is your concern?
Me: I think I damaged a ligament or tendon.
Nurse: How long ago was the injury?
Me: .....about a month ago....
Nurse: A month?!
Me: well, yes.
Nurse: And how did you injure it?
Me: (trying to figure out the shortest explanation). I....was hammering....and hyper-extended my finger.....repeatedly....
Nurse: Okay, we have an opening on the 17th. Did your doctor take x-rays?
Me: Umm...I haven't seen a doctor yet.
Nurse: (astonished pause) But you have it splinted, right?
Me: Yes. I didn't at first, but then it kind of started locking up when I curled my finger, so I figured I should put a splint on it.
Nurse (longer astonished pause) I will talk to the doctor Monday and see if he can fit you in.
Me: (sheepishly) Thank you.

I didn't tell her that my Walgreen's splint was making my finger all shriveled and funky smelling, so Danny broke off the end of a plastic fork and taped it to my finger. I think I'll put the regular splint on before I see the doctor. I'm not sure he'd approve of picnic-ware being used for medical purposes.

Miscellaneous Thoughts

1. I was listening to NPR on my way to work, as I always do. However, I have proven myself so addicted to NPR that I will continue listening even when they do their pledge week, and spend all their time begging for money. Do I donate? No. Do I continue to listen and feel slightly guilty for not donating instead of changing the station? Yes. And I'm glad I did, because I wouldn't have heard The Worst Attempt at an Analogy Ever:
Radio guy, starting his schpeal for money: "So, in that last story we heard about how the happiest people on the planet live in colder climates. They say it's because you are forced to get along with each other because you're stuck inside most of the time. That's like the people working at the station. We're a happy family....because we're stuck here...inside...but you know, not because it's cold out. It's hot in Arizona.....it's not like we'd freeze to death if we left....(realizes he's gone drastically off script and launches back into the pleas for money).

Isn't that awesome? Public radio stations are like people living in Denmark in the winter! Except, they don't live together. And it's a radio station, not a country. And it doesn't get cold here. But other than that, exactly alike!!

2. Our new puppy is busy terrorizing the other animals. Hiccup is playing the "don't touch the floor because it's made out of quicksand" game that I used to play in elementary school, because Siva (we named her Siva by the way) can't make it onto the couches yet. Catsby likes to sit in the same room as Siva and make horrible snarling, meowling, hissing noises, but does not feel the need to leave the room. And Siva is living up to her name as the "Lord of Destruction" in the Hindu religion by trying to chew through everything. Like, arms and electrical cords. But she's still cute.

3. I saw a thug on the southside today walking a poofy little pomeranian. I would have taken a picture, but he probably would have shot me.

4. We are moving in a week, and we don't have the drywall done. I'm trying not to panic.

Just A Matter of Time

I had predicted that by the end of our house renovation project, either Danny or I would end up with some kind of serious injury. I SHOULD have predicted that I would end up with the injury, because I am clumsy and seem to fall into freak accident situations a lot. Usually, these accidents are entirely my fault, and inexplicable to the general public. For example:

When I was 5 or 6 years old I ran into a parking meter while walking down the street because I wasn't looking where I was going. I was short, so the parking meter hit me dead on and I fell over. I'm sure the camp counselors were only in high school, but I remember them looking at me without much sympathy and with a lot of astonished amusement. But then, I probably would look at a kid who ran into a stationary object much in the same way.

When I was in 4th grade we were playing a spelling game that involved sitting on the top of our desks. I leaned back a little too far, and tipped right off my desk, head first, feet sticking up in the air. Again, viewed with now familiar looks of astonished amusement.

In high school PE, I bent down right as my friend was serving the birdie in bad mitton (no, I don't know how to spell that). The edge of the racket hit my eye, and I ended up with a swollen optic nerve and partially detached retina. The benefit was that I got to miss the majority of the rest of PE because I was on strict bed rest so I didn't go blind.

This history should have been a clue that, at some point while working on our house, I would manage to do something to injure myself in a stupid way. Which leads to my explanation of the splint on my pinky. In the desert the dirt is extremely hard, almost rock-like. Danny tells me to dig 5 big holes in which we are going to put wooden pillars to hold up the patio roof. I am not fond of manual labor, I have a short attention span, and I get frustrated easily. So by the fifth hole I'm getting ever so slightly annoyed. Then I hit a layer of rock, and my annoyance turns into a determined rage. I take the claw side of the hammer and start swinging it violently against the rock with all my might, not noticing that the reverberations of the hammer are snapping back my pinky finger with every blow. When the dust settles and the hole is dug, I notice a slight twinge in my finger. The twinge continues every day, and soon my pinky finger is getting stuck in the bent position every time I make a fist. Like, I straighten the rest of my fingers, but the pinky doesn't get the memo. I call my distinguished doctor father whose stellar advice is: "It's probably a tendon. Keep an eye on it". This is the same man who, after I complained about stomach pain while he was driving me to school said "It might be appendicitis. Have a good day!" and dropped me off in the parking lot. So I don't always have the most faith in his diagnostic abilities. I resort to the best doctor of all: Dr. Internet, and find a description of my pinky problem. Apparently it's an injured ligament, and if not corrected can result in a permanent condition called "boutonniere's deformity".

The last thing I need is a deformed finger, so now it is being safely held straight by an aluminum splint I bought at Walgreen's. I call it my bionic finger, and want to make it a James Bond-esque attachment. I was thinking about having a tiny knife that could pop out of the end so I could shank someone, or maybe a deadly laser. It could release smoke so I could make a quick get-away. It could turn into a phone, or I could store a capsule of deadly poison in it. The possibilities are endless. I may keep the bionic finger after the pinky heals, because a pinky finger is kind of useless, but a BIONIC pinky finger would be the awesomest thing ever.

But this incident wouldn't be complete without, yes, the look. I was in my favorite coffee shop today, and noticed that the cashier also had a finger splint. I remarked on it, and he asked how I injured my finger. I relayed the story, slowly realizing how crazy it sounded. When I was done there was a slight pause. Then he says "were you...drunk?" "No....just, well, frustrated". And there it was. The widening of the eyes. The slight smirk. He tried to cover it up, but I knew. And I'm used to it.