Vitamin P... For Poison

I don't know how to tell you guys this so I'm just gonna come out and say it: Flintstone's changed their vitamin formula to poison!

Remember when you were a kid and Flintstone's chewables were delicious, and so taking your vitamin was exciting because they tasted like Pez and you hid under the kitchen table and gobbled down as many as you could?

Well, not anymore my friends.

Last week I excitedly bought a bottle of Flintstone's Complete ("now more complete with choline!" whatever that is) and eagerly handed them out to my coworkers in an effort to boost their immune systems and make them owe me for life. As we chomped down on the red and orange and purple Bam-Bams and Barney's we smiled at how delicious and fun it was to take our vitamins.

YUM! We. Are. So. Healthy!

But then, OMG... The horror! Our smiles quickly turned into poison yuck faces, y'all. It tasted like Fred Flintstone pooped in our mouths. Wtf?! We cursed the bottle - why has thou forsaken us, Flinstone's vitamins?! - and spent the next 20 minutes scrunching up our faces in disgust and attempting to extract the awful, iron-tasting chalky grit from our tongues. All to no avail.

Thanks for ruining our childhoods, Flintstone's. These things are little torture pills now. Give them to your kids (or coworkers) only if you want them to hate you.

UC Has... Fans? Buh-lieve It!

Saturday the University of Cincinnati played Oklahoma at Paul Brown Stadium. I was pretty excited to be one of the nine people there cheering.

Short beer line. Stadium at sunset. Some dudes playing college football. What's not to appreciate.

I think I went to one game during the time I spent at UC in grad school, and I'm pretty sure I only went because several of my classmates were athletic trainers and I thought it would be cool to wave at them.

So we roll up to Paul Brown on Saturday and, What the what?! The joint is packed with people sporting black Bearcats t-shirts and doing some weird UC chant... kinda like the YMCA dance only more tribal-y sounding.

*whoooaaaaa... *whooooooaaaaa... *whooooooaaaaa.... clap-clap-clap-clap... UC!!

The whole time I am fascinated and stunned. I went to UC - hell, I even taught there - and I don't know anybody who went there who was really pumped about it or super excited they exited its dilapidated buildings with a diploma.

But what the hell do I know - nothing apparently - because Paul Brown was filled with all manner of super-fans. Kids and women with little Bearcat logos fake tattooed on their faces and dudes with C-paws on their shirts and hats.

There was even a student section, y'all. A HUGE student section. When it was time for the YMCA, er, UC dance party chant, it was freakin' ON. A whole end-zone of arms shaping the letters "U" and "C."

I was there with an alum who is also a legitimate fan. Like, went to games even when they really sucked. (I am told this was mostly to drink beer. But still.) The whole thing somehow swelled me with a surprising alumni pride.

I might even buy a Bearcats t-shirt now. Or get some C-paw temporary tattoos. 'Cause that's how we fans roll.

Anyway, UC lost by two. At least this is what I'm told... I was busy eating nachos... because that's also how we fans roll.

He Nags Because He Cares, Right?*

Me: Sign my PTO slip

Boss Man: I just one signed for you!

Me: This is important.

Boss Man: Is this girl stuff?! Then I don't want to hear it.

Me: I have to have the hole in my bladder cauterized.

Boss Man: I didn't hear that.

Me: CAUTERIZED, I said. BLADDER HOLE!

Boss Man: You should be healed by now.

Me: I had radiation.

Boss Man: Stop playing the cancer card! You should be healed by now. You need Vitamins D and K. And probably some B vitamins.

Me: Why, so I can pee them out? Show me the data on vitamins having any value.

Pa-pow, NOW who's asking for the data, Mr. Scientist?!

Boss Man: Your diet sucks. All you eat is fast food and frozen meals.

Ooh... busted.

Me: And cookies! You just gave me a chocolate chip cookie!

Boss Man: Google Vitamin D, you're capable of doing that, right?!

Wow... nutrition advice coming from the man who puts fake chicken broth through his coffee maker and calls it a hot "lunch."

*No, he nags because he's emotionally exhausting.

Dreaming Is Free

When I grow up I want to be Deborah Harry.

Tgif!

What Hemingway Also Probably Said During A Bender

A few beers, some wine, a few pink lemonades with vodka and I said:

"Let's say you live to be 80. You read a book a month. That leaves you only what... (drunken fuzzy math pause) not that many books! There are so many great books you could never read all the perfect, enchanting, heart-wrenching and lovely stories out there. Then someone you like, who you trust and think highly of, and who supposedly should know you, recommends a crappy book. They've totally screwed you out of something spectacular you could have been reading instead. Then what?!"

So he said: "Then they're an a-hole! How $hitty!"

"Exactly!"

"I would never steer you wrong like that!"

"God I hope not because then I would probably have to really hate you!"

Booze: Fueling great thoughts on litch-rah-cha since... forever.

Summer, Wait! Please, I Can Change!

I spent more time at the pool this summer than I have in years. In that way, the summer turned out exactly as I'd anticipated. But in every other way, no.

If someone would have told me in May that things would turn out as they have, I wouldn't have believed them. In fact, I might well have punched that person in the face. (Unless it was you, then I wouldn't have, because I adore you.)

The events, people, friendships, everything, has been... unexpected. Just when you think you have it all mapped out, life decides to go off-roading with your deliberate self.

There have been some Main Events - peach crisps, hospital visits, old friends, fireworks, lakes. But my favorites are the little moments over the big ones. The small things that added up to it feeling like a real summer, the long kind from when you were a kid, when the days and nights and seemed endless and enduring.

Summer 2010 was all iced-tea, grilled vegetables, sunscreen and surprising new partners-in-crime. I got to know better people I thought I already knew. And I watched twilight spread across the sky from many a vantage, always in generous company... and often with someone else doing the grilling. And that, my friends, is foam finger, summer pennant worthy.

So, Happy Labor Day, y'all. I guess.

Wait, it's Labor Day... Wtf?!

Getting There

Earlier this summer my doctor informed me of her deep desire to put me under anesthesia and poke around on me a bit. And so I needed a ride to the hospital. I lined it up accordingly - a friend to drop me off, a friend to pick me up. The procedure wasn't a big deal and I figured I'd be trying on shoes at DSW by 3 p.m.

Anesthesia usually has minimal residual effects on me.

Hell yeah I want some more crackers! and When are you gonna wheel me out of this staph-infested hell-hole! is typically my attitude post such procedures.

And such was the case this time around. I was talking all kinds of smug smack in the recovery room, rolling my eyes at weaker, lesser minded patients, eating graham crackers and sucking down corn-syrupy Sprite like it was my job, scoffing at the suggestion I might want to nap later.

Hahaha, weaklings. Apparently you don't know who I am!

But anesthesia had different plans for me when they wheeled me out. Sinister, evil and totally bitchy plans, which consisted of handing me my ass for about 36 hours for my recovery room hubris.

Even though we weren't really there yet, my schmoyfriend was all, "I'll take you to the hospital... I guess." I believe his thought process went something like, "Well damn, she needs a ride to Christ. If I take her and act all nice then I'll get super duper schmoyfriend brownie points. But if she gets sick in my car, it's freakin' on."

Because the thought of him seeing me in a backless hospital gown (sexxxy!) and an operating room hair net was exactly what I thought we needed, I took him up on the offer and let my friends off the hook.

Hey, you guys, want to know a real quick way to get there with your schmoyfriend?! Nearly throw up in his fancy European car. Better still, nearly throw up in it about 5 times. Ooh! Ooh! Ooh! And demand he pull over each time you feel sick on the 1.6 mile drive from the hospital to downtown so you can puke… in the 'hood, y'all!

As I heaved alongside the car I thought, I am going to be so PISSED if I get shot just trying to vomit on Sycamore Street.

Suddenly, we were there.

What is the blue book value on vomiting in someone's car? What do you owe them for letting you suffer all their couch all night and move the rug around in the bathroom so you can more comfortably puke in their toilet?

Outside of the influence of being vomity, vulnerable and in a post-anesthesia death wish, I don't know what that price is. But under those influences I offered "something nice... how about dinner at Jeff Ruby's."

This sounds self-less, but it wasn't. I happen to love well-done filet mignon (don't hate), potatoes made with heavy cream (read, crack) and fancy wine. And for the generosity of letting me vomit at his place, the price tag was worth every penny.

I think we toasted to hospital gowns.

Sometimes you just need a ride. Like to the airport.

But sometimes you need more than a ride, sometimes you need someone to be there... to help you out of the car and to put the trash can beside the couch so you can throw up.

The Weddings I Attend Are Boring...

compared to this one. TGIF!