Everything Is Clear…except my vision

I went to the eye doctor today; it turns out I should have gone a solid six months ago.  (Confession: I do not follow the official guidelines and am on my own biennial plan.)  I’m due for an appointment next month, but since my right contact seemed a bit foggy I decided to go early, so as to get a current prescription and buy new ones.  (You cannot order contacts with an expired prescription; prescriptions are valid for one year.)  I know my contacts are old and assumed that to be the issue.  Contacts don’t last forever, you know.  Um, there were other, greater, issues.

1.) My formerly stable vision?  Yeah, no so much.  Ol’ righty is a disaster.  My left eye didn’t change much, so it’s still all right for me to drive wearing my contacts.  (I asked.)

2.) I knew my lens were a little dated, but turns out they are four YEARS old.  Whoops.  I gave new meaning to “extended” wear.

3.) I was wearing my contacts on the opposite eyes from which they were intended.  That explains a lot.

I ordered new lenses.  Going forward, I will be following the standard “annual exam” guidelines.

No Smoking, Yes Chestbumping

On Friday night, I spent a spontaneous and spirited moment as a public-service announcement.  I left a bar (with my friend – “Safety is no accident!”) and there were two guys smoking outside of it, with their non-smoking friend.  Being me, I probably said hello and must have made some comment about smoking or something or maybe Friend did, because one guy spiked his cigarette into the remnants snow.*  The other guy said, “Well, I haven’t had a cigarette in five weeks.”  To which Friend said, “Well why start now?”  But!  I promptly quipped, “George Bush wants you to smoke.”  Well!  He threw it right down and smiled.  So, I cheered him “YEAH!” and we immediately knew we had to chestbump for that.  Then I chestbumped his buddy who previously threw down his smoke.  And then I chestbumped the guy who doesn’t smoke, because hey, non-smoker!  The last guy told me he was going to go all in for our bump.  I embraced it, committing my total mass as well, and did not vomit all over him.  And then we had a happy walk home.

The End.

*Littering is a secondary issue

Inflight WiFi

I’m flying Delta, a mistake for other reasons, who is offering free in-flight wifi through the holidays.  So far I’ve used it to:

1.) Search flights to family destination Christmas (woo!)…not on Delta

2.) Check the arrival status of my flight and email a text to the friend who is picking me up, telling her my delay has increased while inair.

3.) Play on facebook, gchat, and email.

4.) Take and post a picture of my ridiculous amounts of legroom (emergency exit row + almost a legal midget in Canada) on facebook.

5.) Blog.

Basically, what I would do at home.   I find the whole concept of in-flight wifi kind of ridiculous.  I mean, none of those things were at all pressing.  I remember the days when flights were spent with parents just threatening to beat their children with the books they were not reading, if they didn’t quiet down.

Big Day, Lights and Sirens

I’ll post more on this later, but by 9:30 this morning, I’d had my first rides in both an ambulance and a police cruiser.  (I’m totally fine.)  The distances of both rides are best measured in blocks.  Since 9:30am, I have not ridden in any emergency vehicles.  Unless I meet a studly firefighter, I’m hoping to keep up this trend.

The Image of the Invisible

I attended a discussion a couple nights back and this phrase really sprung out at me: the image of the invisible

Drugs

I loathe the taste of Dayquil/Nyquil.  I find the cup filthy and gross, even though I don’t use it.   The bottles are hard to transport, particularly to work.  Why do I insist upon buying the cough syrups versus the gelcaps?

Halloween Reflections

At expectation, I went to a couple of Halloween parties Saturday night.   I made the following observations:

1.) The Halloween crowd on public transit is less scary and more interesting than the usual crowd.

2.) Despite point one, the solitary, uncostumed elderly gentleman on the bus wanted to be my new BFF and chatted me up.  Halloween or not, I struggle with ignoring people with whom I do not want to be friends.  I generally don’t like strangers, but that seems rude.  I often remember too late to pretend I don’t speak English and just reply in Russian. 

3.) As a child, how my costume would work with appropriate outerwear was a HUGE consideration.  As an adult, how annoying my costume will be in a crowd is my primary consideration.  (This year I went for an easily removeable costume – win! – which I removed after the novelty wore off…and when I went to the bathroom.)

My Head Shows My Age

I “did” my hair a little differently than usual today, which meant some normally hidden hairs made their way to the top layer.  My normally response to non-conformist hairs is to pull them out.  Today, however, they received a reprieve as I was tired and their numbers were strong.  Instead, I am going to try to remarket them to myself.  Here are some ideas:

1.) Sparkly hairs – sort of like hair glitter for the over-30 crowd.   (Except I had my first sparkly hair in eighth grade.)

2.) SHINY hairs – who doesn’t like shiny things?  Shiny like money or jewelry.

3.) Open-minded hairs – let the top of my head be a symbol of racial equality.

4.) Way to get a bus seat hairs – the sign says to stand for the elderly.

I think I might be onto something.  Interestingly, the chemicals from hair coloring did not inspire any of these ideas.  I am just not ready to go there.

Five Good Things

1.) I made a deposit at the bank on Sunday.  My bank recently changed its hours and the teller decided to give me a random quiz on the new hours.  (I was the only person there = likely bored.)  When I got the answers TOTALLY RIGHT, the teller was not only impressed, but convinced by another teller to give me a prize.  Yay for free grocery bags!

2.) My bank is open on Sundays.  

3.) Indian Summer.  Now is the time.

4.) I booked my tickets for Thanksgiving vacation!  AND I get to cut out of town midday on Tuesday.

5.) I got lab work results and I’m all good.  (Maintenance appointment.)

Rumors Around the Bottle Warmer…

At work, we sometimes hang around the traditional water cooler, but more often we cluster around the bottle warmer. The word around the warming milk (and the train tracks…and the board books…and the half-eaten crayons…) is that EVERYONE HAS A BELLY BUTTON. Breaking news, I know.

Since the discovery of navels is new and novel, there is some concern that they might not be a permanent. Ergo, the munchkins have appointed themselves Keeper of the Belly Buttons, performing frequent spot checks to insure that no navel absconds. In practical terms, this means that at any place and at any time, a little person might lift my shirt and poke for my belly button. In addition to finding my belly button, there’s also a fair amount of belly (no button) that I hide under my shirt.