Let Me Off This Ride!

"Let Me Off This Ride!"

A familiar cry to anyone who has ever operated a ride at an amusement park that spins, like teacups or tilt-a-whirl, usually followed immediately by...well, yakking.

I woke up on Tuesday morning and got out of bed and got that you got up too fast feeling, but it lasted for about 10 seconds. I clung to the bed wondering what the heck was going on. It passed, and I dismissed it. Later I was talking to a friend on the phone, I sat on the couch and decided to recline back into the corner, when that sickening dizzy spinning feeling hit me again! It felt like it feels when you've had too much to drink and the room is spinning. Then again when I sat up. Wow, that got old fast! I became very aware of the ways I moved that brought it on, and began to move very very slowly. No help. Still happened.

When I went to bed that night, I was laying on my side and rolled over onto my back. A few seconds later, I felt like I was inside a barrel rolling down a hill. It lasted for about six seconds and that seemed like an eternity. I grabbed the bed, actually frightened. The ceiling seemed to be moving. When it was over, I slowly rolled back to my side and stayed in that position all night. I woke up sore and crippled from not moving all night.

I learned with the help of a friend, and the Internet, that I have vertigo. It has many causes. I am currently on antibiotics to eliminate infection as a cause, and I really hope that's it, and it clears up and goes away. The other causes are not so easily fixed, and would require money and time.

I can do most things, but I have problems when going from lying to sitting or vice versa, feeding the dogs, picking up anything, rolling over, and walking in a straight line is pretty much out too. I seem to lose my balance pretty easily and list a little when I walk. I guess you could say I stagger now. It gives me a queasy feeling in my stomach, probably because I am prone to motion sickness. I have always hated rides that spin, and having one inside my head is not my idea of a good time.

I'm not just telling you all of this just to complain. I merely want to inform you of the symptoms of vertigo, and urge you to go with lactose intolerance, or premature gray, or even halitosis if you have a choice.

Mom, is that you?

Yesterday morning I had an admin day. I finished a big job on Thursday and had to make phone calls, pay bills, and of course like all good admins, stack wood! I was sitting on the couch in my P.J.s and my Dogs were out on the deck catching some morning rays.
My dogs bark at every car and walker that passes by the foot of my long driveway. They put me on full alert when someone new even enters the zip code, so I don't pay much attention to the frequent half-hearted rounds of territorial barking, but then they went code red! I got up and walked out onto the deck and saw a van pulling up the driveway. One of those metallic green Dodge Caravans that half the population owns, one exactly like Mom's.

Hmm, I Wonder what Mom is doing here so early, and unannounced, I mused. The van pulled up and parked sideways to the deck and I saw an elderly woman in the passenger side window. That's odd, I thought, Mom wouldn't bring someone up here without warning me. Then the side door swung open, a gaggle of well-dressed old ladies peered up at me through five sets of thick glasses. "Hello. We're bible teachers!" the closest one yelled up. By this time Cody, my twelve and a half year old, cute as a button, yellow dog who has never bitten anyone, had reached the driveway and was heading toward the van, still barking.
"Stay in the van!" I shouted holding out my arms to emphasize the point. "I wouldn't want anyone to get bit!" They eyed Cody nervously. Winston, my ninety pound Newfie mix, who can't use stairs, but they didn't know that, was barking from up on the deck.

They continued to shout from the van, something about confidence, when I yelled back down, "I'll vote my confidence. Thanks, have a nice day! Peace be with you!" They got the message, slid the door shut and retreated. I wondered if it was possible that someone who read my Sarah Palin post had called (1-800-Bible-Thumpers) and sent them to save me. In my opinion it was the dogs who saved me. All those years of buying kibble finally paid off!

Oh Gina!

See more Gina Gershon videos at Funny or Die

Snort! giggle, this is good!

It Had to Be Done

I don't usually get all political on this blog, but I'm scared. Yes, I'm truly frightened by Sarah Palin, to my core. I know that I am not saying anything new here, but I can remember clearly back in 2004 thinking...There's NO WAY that idiot is going to get re-elected, and here we are. Our country is in the worst shape it's been in since the depression.

Palin made an interesting statement the other day about how everyone who wanted to vote for Hilary could vote for her now, and they'd still be voting for a woman. My God! Glenda and the Wicked Witch of the West were both women too. Interchangeable? I don't think so.

I also have a fondness for the statement, "We're fighting God's war!" A religious zealot is a zealot no matter what religion! You've got to be joking me. Are we seriously considering putting this puppy eating, Bambi shooting, ex-beauty queen into a powerful political office? An office second to the presidency, with a crusty old guy about to keel over any minute? Do it, and watch all the gays who so quickly registered for marriage licenses and domestic partnerships get herded up and sent of to the gas chamber as another part of "God's war". Yes, I'm talking to you, Gay Republicans!!! Wake up! Before it's too late.

For more of my opinions on this subject, given in a funnier way, by a more intelligent and better looking woman, click Susan Norfleet's link there on the right of my page.

Don't forget to vote, like your life depended on it!

If you are unfamiliar with Sarah Palin, let me introduce you:

Important, wise words...Subject: Eve Ensler on Sarah Palin

Eve Ensler, the American playwright, performer, feminist and activist best known for 'The Vagina Monologues', wrote the following about Sarah Palin.


Drill, Drill, Drill


I am having Sarah Palin nightmares. I dreamt last night that she was a member of a club where they rode snowmobiles and wore the claws of drowned and starved polar bears around their necks. I have a particular thing for Polar Bears. Maybe it's their snowy whiteness or their bigness or the fact that they live in the arctic or that I have never seen one in person or touched one. Maybe it is the fact that they live so comfortably on ice. Whatever it is, I need the polar bears.


I don't like raging at women. I am a Feminist and have spent my life trying to build community, help empower women and stop violence against them. It is hard to write about Sarah Palin. This is why the Sarah Palin choice was all the more insidious and cynical. The people who made this choice count on the goodness and solidarity of Feminists.


But everything Sarah Palin believes in and practices is antithetical to Feminism which for me is part of one story -- connected to saving the earth, ending racism, empowering women, giving young girls options, opening our minds, deepening tolerance, and ending violence and war.


I believe that the McCain/Palin ticket is one of the most dangerous choices of my lifetime, and should this country chose those candidates the fall-out may be so great, the destruction so vast in so many areas that America may never recover. But what is equally disturbing is the impact that duo would have on the rest of the world. Unfortunately, this is not a joke. In my lifetime I have seen the clownish, the inept, the bizarre be elected to the presidency with regularity.


Sarah Palin does not believe in evolution. I take this as a metaphor. In her world and the world of Fundamentalists nothing changes or gets better or evolves. She does not believe in global warming. The melting of the arctic, the storms that are destroying our cities, the pollution and rise of cancers, are all part of God's plan. She is fighting to take the polar bears off the endangered species list. The earth, in Palin's view, is here to be taken and plundered. The wolves and the bears are here to be shot and plundered. The oil is here to be taken and plundered. Iraq is here to be taken and plundered. As she said herself of the Iraqi war, 'It was a task from God.'



Sarah Palin does not believe in abortion. She does not believe women who are raped and incested and ripped open against their will should have a right to determine whether they have their rapist's baby or not.



She obviously does not believe in sex education or birth control. I imagine her daughter was practicing abstinence and we know how many babies that makes.



Sarah Palin does not much believe in thinking. From what I gather she has tried to ban books from the library, has a tendency to dispense with people who think independently. She cannot tolerate an environment of ambiguity and difference. This is a woman who could and might very well be the next president of the United States. She would govern one of the most diverse populations on the earth.



Sarah believes in guns. She has her own custom Austrian hunting rifle. She has been known to kill 40 caribou at a clip. She has shot hundreds of wolves from the air.


Sarah believes in God. That is of course her right, her private right. But when God and Guns come together in the public sector, when war is declared in God's name, when the rights of women are denied in his name, that is the end of separation of church and state and the undoing of everything America has ever tried to be.



I write to my sisters. I write because I believe we hold this election in our hands. This vote is a vote that will determine the future not just of the U.S., but of the planet. It will determine whether we create policies to save the earth or make it forever uninhabitable for humans. It will determine whether we move towards dialogue and diplomacy in the world or whether we escalate violence through invasion, undermining and attack. It will determine whether we go for oil, strip mining, coal burning or invest our money in alternatives that will free us from dependency and destruction. It will determine if money gets spent on education and healthcare or whether we build more and more methods of killing. It will determine whether America is a free open tolerant society or a closed place of fear, fundamentalism and aggression.



If the Polar Bears don't move you to go and do everything in your power to get Obama elected then consider the chant that filled the hall after Palin spoke at the RNC, 'Drill Drill Drill.' I think of teeth when I think of drills. I think of rape. I think of destruction. I think of domination. I think of military exercises that force mindless repetition, emptying the brain of analysis, doubt, ambiguity or dissent. I think of pain.



Do we want a future of drilling? More holes in the ozone, in the floor of the sea, more holes in our thinking, in the trust between nations and peoples, more holes in the fabric of this precious thing we call life?





Eve Ensler

September 5, 2008

A New Rant:

Is there some reason why my post has to begin halfway down the page?

I know I've been gone for all of August, but have I really missed that much?!

A friend of mine recently made a comment: She claimed to be apoplectic about Sarah Palin and wants to volunteer for Obama -- in a red state.

Naturally I ran straight to the dictionary to see what the hell that word meant! These are the actual results.

8 results for: apoplectic

Browse Nearby Entries

Dictionary.com Unabridged (v 1.1) - Cite This Source - Share This ap·o·plec·tic Audio Help /ˌæpəˈplɛktɪk/ Pronunciation Key - Show Spelled Pronunciation[ap-uh-plek-tik] Pronunciation Key - Show IPA Pronunciation

–adjective Also, ap·o·plec·ti·cal.

1.	of or pertaining to apoplexy.

2.	having or inclined to apoplexy.

3.	intense enough to threaten or cause apoplexy: an apoplectic rage.

–noun

4.	a person having or predisposed to apoplexy.

---

[Origin: 1605–15; <>apoplécticus <>apopléktikós pertaining to a (paralytic) stroke, equiv. to apóplékt(os) struck down (verbid of apoplssein) + -ikos -ic]

Now maybe it's just me, but that didn't help me much. Weren't we told in school that you can't use the word or form of the word in the definition? WTF kind of definition is that? It's like saying:

Rhythmic: Having rhythm. Or Hatred: Hating someone or something, to hate. To be hateful.

I was finally able to pin the feeling I was experiencing toward the dictionary definition down. I was apoplectic about it!

***Okay, When I previewed my post I saw the reason why I couldn't start my text at the top of the page. There was a freaking add running there. On my blog post! I didn't put it there! Has this happened to anyone else? What is going on?