Snaps To You Award: My Heart, The Rockstar

I've written before about my fear that my heart was going to explode at any minute, ruining my life and probably preventing me from posting for awhile, but I've never explained where this paranoia befitting a forty-five-year-old, smoking fat man originated. Well. To make Mini Me-short a story so long it makes Gone With The Wind look like a picture book, I went for a run in June, thought I had a heart attack, went to the ER, had a bunch of tests run, was poked and stuck like an innocent voodoo doll in really cute sandals, was determined to have not had a heart attack, and was told to come back in a few months for a cat scan because my aorta looked big.

Oh yeah. That's right. My aorta's bigger than your aorta. Think of my badass blood-flow garden hose, supplying blood to me and at least seven other people, next time you get winded on a run because your little twisty straw of an aorta starts to cry.

Right. So, my assbaggery aside, that's not actually a good thing. It's bad like "Snakes On A Plane." Thus, a few weeks ago, I reported for my cat scan, which would determine whether or not the docs needed to carve me up like a holiday ham to put a fence around my aorta (white picket, natch). I was pre-Oscars nervous about this, and high on the drugs I had been given to take ahead of the scan, in case I was allergic to the intravenous tie-dye. I got to the hospital, broke my cardinal rule of never sitting next to people who smell like tuna, and only then was told that I couldn't have the scan--the scan that would determine whether or not my heart was trying to assassinate my other organs--because my insurance company had decided that it wasn't "medically necessary."

I'd warn you away from this company, just to save you the money and screaming matches down the road, but in the interest of not getting sued, let's leave it at this. They offer an HMO and their name rhymes with I violate my clients from behind while laughing maniacally and eating chocolates.

The day devolved rapidly from there, culminating with my stoned mouth shrieking impotently at the "nurse" in charge of my case at Satan's lair, "WOULD YOU COVER ME IF I DIED??? WOULD YOU, PUNK??!?!??!?!????" Not my finest moment. But really, not my worst, either.

After all this, calls from three doctors, and possibly a cautionary visit from Death himself, the insurance death-harpies agreed to cover a cardiac ultrasound, to find out once and for all if my aorta had gone rogue. I was excited about this, because ultrasounds don’t involve needles, and I want to know if I’m going to die soon, because if so, I’m going to start eating a lot more Big Macs and taking more cheap shots at my boss. I showed up at the appointed tee time, and was walked to the ultrasound wing by a lovely little old lady who would probably be very impressed with my obscenely large china collection.

I never did learn my ultrasound technician’s name, but I did learn very quickly that he was highly uncomfortable using medical terms like “chest” and “please take off your shirt and lie down” with me. Obviously I was given a chic and stylish tie-back gown, but, also obviously, in order to scan my heart, he had to put the gooey laser glow-pen* on my chest. I was surprisingly nonchalant about this, especially since I’m normally a caffeinated Pomeranian when confronted with medical procedures, but really, we were there for my heart, and I had the gown--plus a sheet, a towel, and a blanket that he had given me, more likely for his own protection than mine.

Once he was able to sit still, he fired up the Doppler Hurricane Seeker 3000 and I got to see what my heart’s been up to. If you’ve never had any kind of ultrasound, I highly recommend them—they’re the coolest home movie ever. I have no idea how they work, but word on the street is that Dumbledore was involved in the start-up. I got to see my heart, busily engaged in keeping me alive, and I have to say, my heart is awesome, even though it didn’t look like I was expecting. In terms of what you’re used to seeing from ultrasounds of marinating babies, my heart looked like a fetus playing a drum set. Really rockin’ out on a drum set, actually, performing like a total rock star on my behalf.

I was so touched and mesmerized that I almost forgot to ask if my aorta was trying to stealth-bomb my loving heart. Happily, it’s not. I am medically sound (if not mentally), and cleared to do all manner of things, including running and continuing to hate yoga.

All’s well that ends well, and this ended…like a bad prom date. When he had taken adequate surveillance footage of my rock star, the ultrasound technician reminded me to wipe the goo off my neck before getting dressed again. I thanked him, and he looked at me, then looked at the ceiling and said, “I’m actually supposed to help everyone wipe the gel off…but I’d rather not lose my job today.”

At that point I was so glad my heart was strong enough for me to run like Forrest. Snaps to you, my heart, for doing your job with such style and flair. If you were a person, you’d totally be Cher.

*Possibly not the technical term.

Absence Made Your Heart Grow Fonder...I Know, Right?

Amigos, I apologize for my absence. I've been crazy-obnoxious busy at work like a college-town bar, which means two things: 1) I haven't been taking a midday jailbreak to let the whole wide Internets know how immature I am, and 2) By the time I get home I'm so burnt out on reading that I want to set Dr. Seuss on fire, so banging out anything remotely funny, or even English, is not really an option.

I don't blog about work for a variety of reasons, one of which being that I like being allowed to show up every day for another installment of I'm Sorry, What?, but to paint a picture of my frustration, yesterday I spent the better part of twenty minutes listening to a client agonize over whether he should sign just his first and last names, or his first, middle, and last names. Things I Wanted To Say But Probably Fortunately Did Not Say: "Your signature looks like you got lit and tried to draw a bird. Sign anything you damn well make up so I can go get some coffee and mental stability! Is that a cockateel*?"

What I Actually Said Because I Enjoy Health Benefits: "Since I'm not the attorney, I can't legally advise you in this matter." Le sigh.

Back on the home front, the most exciting thing to happen to me so far in O'Niner happened this week: Four months after moving into our very own This Old House (complete with This Old Plumbing and This Old Dear God What The Hell Is That??!?!?!) Lawyer Boy and I finally got a china cabinet, so I could unpack the dozen boxes full of my minorly concerning obsession with china, crystal, and silver that had been sitting in the corner like a bubble-wrapped dinner party. Even better, Lawyer Boy made our china cabinet with his own two hands, and the two hands of Bill, my cousin, who's my cousin in a way that no state except Massachusetts legally recognizes. Whatever. Wine is thicker than blood. LB and Bill spent all weekend in Bill's cabinet shop--yes, this was a professional endeavor; it wasn't just LB buying a few make-your-own-birdhouse kits and nailing them together.** The end result was a beautiful Mission-style cabinet, approximately the size of a school bus. I feel dirty every time I say "Mission-style," because I worry that people immediately think "missionary-style," and we're suddenly no longer talking polished wood and beveled glass in a family-friendly kinda way. I'm still amazed that the whole thing was done in one weekend, although I'm sure that if we had wanted something huge and ornate, with curvy cabinets, carved wood, and flying buttresses, it would have been a different story. Impatience is the only reason I didn't insist on a portrait of my face carved into the center cabinet door.

I was two parts excited and one part train-wreck horrified when I saw all my china, crystal, and silver together in one place, because until that point, I had been unaware that I was thisclose to being the eighty-year-old cat lady who throws tea parties for her muu-muu-clad friends with Guiding Light on for background ambience. I almost have enough to have the entire Duggar clan of crazy over for dinner, except I object to serving Tang in my Waterford crystal. Happily, it's really useful Waterford crystal. The goblets hold twenty fluid ounces of delicious (and usually cheap) wine, which means that if you can heft it up off the bar, you've got yourself one heck of a sparkly personal party. I offer that tidbit to anyone who says that wedding registries are only for things you'll never use.

By the time I had filled the cabinet with the full load of my geekery, it was completely obvious that my dining room is officially more mature than I am. It looks like grown-ups live here! I'm so intimidated by my dining room, I feel like I have to go stand somewhere else just to make fart jokes. I don't know how to handle this: I'm so excited to have my dishes back, but I worry that this might be the end of parties involving a cooler full of vodka-infused Kool-Aid (Jungle Juice, to those of your lucky enough to be Hokies) perched in a sticky puddle next to the chili dip on the dining room table.

What am I saying? We'll just move the cooler to the backyard, where the cabinet can't judge us.

*Spellcheck tried to tell me that "cockateel" should be "cockatrice." If anyone knows WTF a cockatrice is, kindly inform me. But I have a feeling it's not an appropriate word to use in front of my dad.
**Reasons I Was Not Involved: I once bought one of those make-your-own-birdhouse kits, strapped on my mad skillz, and put it together, and even though this was before the days when I discovered wine and laziness, my avian apartment came out crooked. Carpentry was out.

Duggar Themselves Into a Deep, Deep Hole

As a rule, I do not enjoy reality television any more than inmates enjoy cavity searches. I don't like watching alleged grown-ups fight for the title of Most Meaningless Asshole, and Winner Of $1 Million Which They Will Neglect To Pay Income Tax On So They Can Go On Oprah Later And Whine About Their Issues. (WOOMDWTWNTPITOSTCGOOLWATI for short, or as seen in Swedish)

I make an exception, when LB isn't looking, for shows involving babies, because I love babies when they belong to someone else and can't get their goo-goo and what-not on me. I also will sometimes lower my expectations and gag reflex, and watch shows that make me feel surprisingly normal by comparison. This is cheaper than paying to ride the city bus, which is usually the only way I feel normal when compared to other humans. It's hard not to, when you're seated between Sammy the iPod Sing-Along, and the woman who has either a lazy eye or active hepatitis.

Fortunately and for free, the Duggar Family provides both babies and squirrel-shit nuttiness on their TLC show, 18 Kids And Stop Inseminating Me Every Time I Turn Around, You Reckless One-Man Stud Shop. I don't normally spend my hard-earned free time taking fashion tips from the family that 18-handedly supports the Jean Jumper Industry, but last night I stumbled upon the Duggar Family Wedding Special and, train-wreck aficionado that I am, I handed over my eyeballs and dignity and settled in.

For those of you who missed the headlines in Bizarro Baptist Weekly, the Duggar's 20-year-old first-born Joshua married fellow Crazy In The Lord, 19-year-old Anna, in September. (Yeah, I'm behind--it's just how I roll.) This made news because train wrecks always do, and also because Josh and Anna decided to "court" instead of dating, which means their agitated, frustrated, sweaty outings to Applebee's to share Cheeseburger Sliders (but not that slippery; we're Christians!) were always supervised by some adult complaining about how his glass of Tang left a water ring on his bring-along Bible.

The weirdest part about courting is that Josh and Anna wanted their Chastity Charlie around at all times to prove that they did not kiss before their wedding. As Josh said, "We wanted proof that, yes, we did exactly what we said we would," showing the world that third graders in the back corner of the playground get more action. Well, I too have proof that I did what I said I would, mostly in the form of pictures slathered all over Facebook during college, evidencing the nights where I stayed true to my pledge to go shot-for-shot with my fratty friends, and to go home wearing at least half those used shots on my platform Candies'. (Shut up, it was the turn of the century!)

The whole day of the wedding, leading up to the Ceremonial First Kiss and Face-Mauling, poor Anna looked like a lamb being led to slaughter--probably because there was no glass of bubbly to take her mind off the fact that that night, she would be the placid victim of an extreme, but extremely short-lived, sexual monsoon. Yeah. No booze, 25 miniature squawking rednecks in short-sleeved formalwear, and at least twice that many references to the fact that Josh was about ready to nail the nearest mailbox if they didn't get this sideshow on the road, pronto. Oh, jitters!

They fiiiiiinally made it to the altar, once their 10 bridesmaids and 6 bottles of hair gel had oozed down the aisle, and they pledged to love, honor, and dress each other in poor taste so as to discourage others from looking, so long as they both should live. It was lovely and touching and when they fiiiiiiiinally went to kiss, Josh all but chowed her mouth and snapped her neck, much like I assume a kiss would go down in "Twilight," had I not been so frat-party drunk when I saw that stupid movie that I can't remember if they ever kissed or just stuck with skulking around the screen, being emo and husking, "whatever, Dad" for two horrid hours. That movie blew like a dry wedding.

Which brings me to my next point: This was a dry wedding, which I 100% believe should be illegal worldwide, so the party was basically a bake sale in the church gymnasium. Before the wedding one of the camera guys had been talking to Daddy Duggar about the party, and when the camera guy said, "So there's no alcohol?" Jim Bob Duggar (sadly, his real name) said, "Nope, no booze, no dancin', just havin' a great time!"

No alcohol? No dancing? And people are expected enjoy this? How now, church cow?

I guess I knew they didn't drink, but I had never really thought about the fact that a lot of whack jobs don't dance--I mean, clearly the mom can't dance, since it's impossible to get down with your bad self when you're constantly standing in a field giving birth. But no wedding conga line? No celebratory Macarena? I guess to be fair, I have to be real and admit that if there's no bar, there sure as hell will be no Macarena.

Watching all the Duggar merry-makers celebrate their newlyweds with pleated skirts and really bitchin' chicken salad rolls, I was reminded of my own raucous wedding reception, and I felt so blissfully normal in comparison. Because clearly you're normal if your wedding doesn't involve pleated skirts and sherbet punch, but does involve one of your aunts wandering into the garden, stripping off her "uncomfortable" panty hose, stripping off her "uncomfortable" underwear, and trying to get some of the other guests to "smoke weed" with her.

Hey man, it's all relative.

Snaps To You Awards: My Amazing Girlfriend and Vladimir Putin

This week, while not Friday, I am giving the S2U to two different individuals who are so equally deserving, in ways that make my little-girl heart soar, that I couldn’t divide my love between the two. So, in no particular order, this week’s S2U Award goes to my friend Erin King, and Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin.

Erin is the proud recipient of this week’s award for sending me the first wedding gift thank-you note I’ve ever received that included the word shit. Erin got married in October, and it took Lawyer Boy and me three months to remember to send a wedding gift. I kept meaning to, but then the whiney back-up dancer in the corner of my mind would be all, “lator gator,” and I’d be like, “okay, fine, let’s take a nap,” and it would get put off again. I finally celebrated the union of two souls by sending Erin and her husband a vacuum-sealing wine preserver and a set of cheese knives—both of which they registered for, by the way. I didn’t just pick random boozephenalia and ship it off with warmest regards.

A couple of weeks later, I received a hand-written thank-you note on lovely monogrammed stationery. It followed the standard my-mother-made-me format of “thanks for X, it’s really swell, and thanks for not table-dancing at the wedding,” but then veered off into nuptial originality with the next segment: “The wine opener looks really cool. We haven’t used it yet, but if I stop buying wine that tastes like shit and isn’t worth preserving, we hope to.” I love this for both the unexpected profanity and rare honesty it showcases. If newlyweds were more routinely honest with their thank-yous, more notes would read something like this: “Thank you so much for the place setting of our beautiful bone china complete with platinum etching and feathers from real angels’ wings. We will take it out of the box and use it once we grow up and stop eating frozen corndogs for dinner every night.”

The second recipient of this week’s award is Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, for being such a raging closeted ABBA fan that he reportedly paid $45,000 for a private performance by an ABBA cover band named (I am not making this up) Björn Again. As we all know, I LOVE ABBA, and I am so thrilled that someone as hard-edged and frosty as Putin shares my Nordic love affair. It really shows that there is so much more to our friendship than just a shared love of vodka, and of killing people with our bare hands on the secret orders of the government. Snaps to you, Puti (may I call you Puti?), for daring to bare your inner Dancing Queen and swaying to the Swedish beat in public. You’ll always be my super trouper.

My Papery Green Thumb

Today I came into the office with a renewed and unprecedented desire to charge through my work, impress everyone with my wicked-cool productivity*, and make my office a veritable buzzing hive of legal activity and research, immaculately organized and ever prepared to address the pressing legal issues that land on my desk.

So far, all I’ve come up with in terms of real steps to help me achieve this goal is to grow orchids in my office.

Did I read somewhere that keeping plants in your office promotes better oxygen flow and thus increases productivity? No. Did I read somewhere that orchids bring the soothing calm of the Orient inside, helping to alleviate stress and promote rational thinking? No.

Did I happen to read on foxnews.com this morning that President Obama is taking flack for keeping the Oval Office** “so warm that you could grow orchids in there”? CHECK.

This off-hand metaphorical suggestion planted itself deep in my consciousness like Christina Aguilera into the annals of Hollywood’s Tackiest, and I’ve been obsessed with the idea of growing orchids in here ever since about 9:30 this morning. Probably because planning my Orchidopolis beats the crap out of answering emails, organizing files, and actually doing any of the work The Orchids would help me accomplish. I have yet to figure out how to install heat lamps or a humidifier in here without my boss noticing, but please. The day is young, amigos, and I am motivated. And also wily.

Oh, incidental to this whole scheme, I’m the Morticia Addams of gardening. If it’s not dead when I get it, it’s roots-up within a week. Maybe if plants would be a little more annoying when I don’t feed them, like the cat, they’d get their way. Squeaky wheel gets the oil, bitches.

*Apparently, just like in high school, I’m still confused as to what constitutes being “wicked-cool.”
**If I lived in the White House, I would be unable to walk into the Oval Office without announcing to anyone within a 15-foot radius that I was “going into Ovulation.”