Friday morning post from retrohaven!

My internet is down. Has been all morning. So I came over to borrow a cup of internet from karlita. She's giving me coffee, too. Karla = doubleplusgood!

Administration
Happy birthday to gegenschein!

Happy early birthday to iroshi!

Medical
The usual. The pain has been manageable these past two days, though - yay!

Blogathon!
Thanks to chaoticmatter and Anonymous, we're up to $615 for RAINN! :) (Remember, if I haven't listed you, I just don't know who you are - tell me! :))

Please sponsor me!

Daily Science
Okay, so, string theory. Superstrings vibrate in the 10th dimension, creating subatomic particles.

And you say, "WTF, mate? The first dimension is length, the second is width, the third is depth. Okay, the fourth is time. WTF are all these other dimensions?"

And I say, "Just look over here, y0."

Other cool links
An excellent post on LJ etiquette

The Museum of Food Anomalies

Ballon molecules. Like balloon animals. But molecules.

Peoples Archive: Videos of "the great thinkers, creators, and achievers of our time."

Daily BPAL
No daily BPAL today, because I did not bring any to Karla's kitchen. But! My box is finished. :) I decided not to do the mosaic. I took the box to the table this morning and gave it a good luck. And the box said to me, if you do the mosaic, I will be ungepachka.

So I said hmm. And I cleared away the glass and looked at what was there. Rosewood-stained box with recessed lid. Lovely thick art paper in beige with puzzle-pieces outlined in brown. Skeleton key glued to the dead center of the box.

Very simple. It works. It does not need any more. And it is now filled with BPAL. *nod* It could use some dividers so the imps stand upright, but otherwise, we're good.

Friday memeage!
Wearing
Grey pirate tee (white skull and crossbones on lower right side, beaded-butt jeans, Happy Bunny panties and socks.

Reading
Crown Duel, by sartorias.

Planning
Doctor's appointment at 1:30 is the big thing. Other than that, nothing really. Adam and I need to work on the basement, if my pain-thingie allows it. The problem with the basement is that all the comic-boxes are lined up there to be sorted and purged. Very organized. But they take up a hell of a lot of space. And the only place there was room to line them all up was in front of my altar, filing cabinet, and built-in writing/art desk. So I have had little to no access to those areas for like a *year*, and messes have sprung up accordingly. Nyargh. This must stop.

You?

Friday Audience Participation

As further evidence of things slipping my mind... mangosteen and I discussed my need to post this in June!

Assignment: Fill in the blanks: "Rule number one of _______________ is __________________."
Extra Credit: What's rule number two?

Leave your answer in the comments.

Note: Any mention of 'Fight Club' will be mocked.

(His post is here.)

EDIT: See songwind's comment for an excellent example!

(no subject)

Happy birthday to Max!

Birthday tribute here. With pictures.

*growl*

Dear Universe:

Lay the fuck off of my friends.

NOW.

--'song

EDIT: And to this friend: We are here. Whatever you need. We are here.

Medical Update

I'd say "First, the good news", but... there's not really any bad news today. Yes, I pretty definitely have fibromyalgia on top of everything else. But I have a doctor who listens. And those are pretty damn rare.

The best news, then.

97 pounds.

*grin*

Healthy weight range for someone my height is 95-105. So I'm there. I am finally back at a healthy weight for my body. I am very happy about this.

(And I'm pretty sure I'm a C-cup again. Must go get measured.)

Now I can just eat til I'm full, and not past that point into nausea. I'd been bordering on an adversarial relationship with food again, and this nips that in the bud.

So on to the fibro news.

I talked to Dr. Z about Neurontin and/or Lyrica. She didn't like the idea. Unlike other doctors, though, Dr. Z will explain why she doesn't like an idea, and tell you why her recommendation would probably help more. Direct quote: "We're a team on this. You don't tell me what to do, I don't tell you what to do. We decide together." And we decide with all the information on the table.

I don't deal well with "Because I'm the $AUTHORITYFIGURE and I say so." :)

Her reasons for not liking Neurontin or Lyrica as a first line of fibro treatment for me -

* The "two birds with one stone" thing? Not so much. Neurontin and Lyrica are apparently crap at treating seizures, and she doesn't think either would work well enough to be a standalone treatment for the epilepsy.
* The primary use of both of them = diabetic neuropathy, which is a different sort of pain. It'll treat pain. But there are other things that treat fibro pain better.

We talked about her recommendation, which is Cymbalta. We talked about theoretically why antidepressants help fibro pain. We talked about the chemical differences between Neurontin and Lyrica - not many; pretty much, Lyrica was developed because Neurontin's in the public domain now, so the company wanted a shiny new drug for diabetic neuropathy to make mad cash off of. (Dr. Z = not a whore for Big Pharma.)

"I will give you Neurontin if that's where your faith is," she said, "but I think Cymbalta controls chronic pain better." And since the Neurontin would not get me off the Trileptal anyway, I went with the Cymbalta. So. We'll see.

Hey! 97 pounds. :)

EDIT: Oh, and I got some omega-3 fatty acid pills, since a bunch of you recommended them. *nod*

Confession

In going back through my old entries, hughcasey found the old Anonymous Sex Confessions threads, where I'd enabled anonymous commenting and elicited confessions. He asked me to do a new one; I declined, because there are people who are real dicks about abusing that, and I feel that it's important to have a safe space for people who are confessing.

So he opened one.

And got rather a lot more than he bargained for.

I think - and tell me if I'm wrong, Hugh - that Hugh kinda glossed over the heavier confessions in my posts in favor of the titillating ones. But he couldn't ignore them when they were in his LJ. He wanted sexy fun. He got a bunch of serious stuff, including some stuff that he probably didn't want to know (I know I don't like it when I get that sort of confession). So he backed off and shut it down and, well... it is clear that he did not realize what he was in for.

My comment to him...

The idea of the confessional is sacred.

And I'm not just talking about Catholicism. Confession is universal, even when it's not stated as such. Saying "It is safe to confess" unlocks something inside people.

It is Necessary.

It is not easy for the person in the booth, behind the screen. Which is why I only do my "tell me a secret" polls every so often.

Confession is sacred. In requesting and receiving confession, you act on behalf of deity; you are deity's vessel.

Whether you meant to be or not. :)

There is something near-primal in the very idea of confession. Especially anonymous confession. To lay your soul bare, completely anonymously... to get things off your chest that you could never say out loud, not to anyone. To be assured that this is a safe space, that this goes no further.

A whisper into the night.

It is an extremely powerful concept.

If you say "Tell me anything," you will get anything and everything. It won't all be kinky fun stuff. It'll be the darkest things, too.

I'm not kidding or exaggerating when I call it a sacred duty. To me, it is.

The world needs confessors. The world needs sin-eaters.

Read the job description before you apply. :)

My next "tell me a secret" is coming. It will be a particularly interesting and special one.

(no subject)

...and on a less priestessy note, I totally forgot I had a Frappucino, and it has melted, and lo, I pout.

*pout*

(no subject)

Note: I need this slip, in raisin, for my Halloween costume.

Now I need to find my Victoria's Secret store credit slips. Which may or may not still be good.

PSA

With my time- and brain-crunch...

It's easy to fire off glib little LJ comments.

If I don't respond to something? It's because it will take time and thought to do so, and I do not have that right now. Also, I am good about keeping people posted (NPI) via LJ, because it is a broad communication tool. I'm sucking at one-on-one right now. And not in the happy fun way.

So if I am not responding to your e-mail/question/serious comment in a timely fashion? It is because it deserves to be allocated brainspace, and that's not one of my talents right now. It's a good thing. Not a bad thing.

As evidence, I point you to the stack of wonderful long involved e-mails from Spooky that have little stars at them so I can give them my full attention and equally thoughtful replies. Some of which have been sitting there for a solid month. (*wince* Sorry, Spook...)

So. Do not take this personally. It may actually be a compliment.

(no subject)

Omigod holy crap this movie is going to be amazing.