The Daily Snark

Snot Funny, Part 3 (And Hopefully The Final Chapter)

January 25, 2012 By Mo 2 Comments

If you’re new here, here’s Part 1 and Part 2. PS: Parts of this post are totally gross.

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I know, I know. You’re sick of my snot. Me too.

But! I finally had my sinus surgery last Thursday. I had a septo and endoscoptic sinusotomy or something like that. All I know is there were three procedures done on me and I came out of there looking like I went 10 rounds with Mike Tyson, which is to say, I looked more bad-ass than I felt.

The surgery went well—once the doctor got me on the table I think I was out of there and back at home in a few hours. The nurses at the surgical center were awesome and the place offers one of the best amenities ever—warm blankets. It’s so simple and so genius. When you’re laying on a bed in a paper-thin gown and not much else, it’s fucking cold. Instead of tossing an equally paper-thin blanket over me, they gave me a big warm blanket to snuggle under while I waited.

There was a bit of a delay—the surgery before me ran long—so after sitting for an hour or so with a cold IV dripping into me, I was freezing my ass off and I was starting to freak out. Bill, my defender and advocate, had a brief Shirley McClain in Terms of Endearment moment when he chased after the nurse yelling about getting me more warm blankets. His wife was cold, goddamn it.

I never loved him more than I did right then.

The drugs were obviously good because I don’t even remember them giving me anything. I scooched onto the operating table and the next thing I knew I was waking up in the recovery room.

I felt pretty decent—but totally out of it—the rest of the day, sitting up, chatting with Bill, watching some TV and taking to my parents and brother on the phone.

Then the morphine wore off, and Friday was a completely different kind of day.

It wasn’t so much that I was in a ton of pain. But after the surgery they packed my nose with what essentially amounted to tampons—cotton plugs meant to absorb all of the blood and mucus that was flowing freely.

That’s right—I was one sexy bitch, people.

I could only breathe through my mouth, which wasn’t bad when I was awake, but made sleeping brutal. I’d doze for an hour or so and then wake myself up because I’d develop some gross film in my gaping maw that made it hard to breathe. I’d try to clear my mouth with some water, but the stuff in my nose made it hard to eat or drink. The smallest sips of water or juice made me feel like I was drowning.

Everyone told me that as soon as that packing came out I’d feel a million times better, but when they told me to come back on Monday I thought, “You have got to be kidding me. That’s way too soon.” By Monday, it wasn’t soon enough.

I had three people (including the doctor) warn me that removing that stuff feels like my brains are being sucked out of my head. And they all used that exact phrasing. Probably because it’s the most accurate description for what happens. Removing that stuff was hands-down the worst part of the entire ordeal.

I sat in the chair, tilted my head back, gripped one of Bill’s hands with my left hand and gripped the chair arm with the other. My doctor put some forceps-type thing up my nose, grabbed the end of the packing and pulled. I heard this gross sloppy wet, slurping sound and I screwed my eyes shut and tried not to scream from the pain. It felt like he had reached into the back of my skull and slowly sucked out my brain matter. Bill actually watched and said it was like he removed two slugs from my nose. I guess after 5 days of absorbing snot and blood those cotton things swelled so much they were like twice the length of my nose and certainly more than double the width.

When they were finally out of my head I sat still for a minute to get oriented again.

Within 30 minutes I started to feel human again.

I hadn’t been able to really eat or drink since Wednesday night so Bill immediately took me to McDonald’s so I could get some food in me right away. That Diet Coke was the best Diet Coke I ever had in my life.

So I’m on the mend. I’m sleeping better, breathing better (although still kind of snotty) and I can eat and drink. I’m excited because I’m looking forward to feeling good again. I have felt so meh for so long, I’ve been unreasonably exhausted, uncharacteristically cranky and sick of feeling sick.

I’m thinking this was a good way to start my year.

Filed Under: Health, Life

Wednesday Links—The Fashion Edition

January 24, 2012 By Mo 2 Comments

Okay, yeah, I know. It’s been about two weeks since I’ve posted. I’m sorry. I suck. But I have a good excuse.

Really. I do.

I finally had my sinus surgery on the 19th so I’ve been out of it for the past week. I’m finally feeling human again so I’ll catch you up on everything in a few days.

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I am addicted to fashion blogs. I don’t know when it happened, but I can’t get enough of them. It started with …Love Maegan a few months back. I stumbled upon her tutorial for diamond-tipped nails (I got so many compliments on that manicure) and got hooked. I love how she puts her outfits together, and even though the Manolo Blahnik’s are out of my budget there’s always something to inspire me.

Then I found the holy grail for girls like me. Petite fashion blogs. Apparently, there’s a slew of them out there and best part is most of the women wear the brands I wear—Gap, Banana Republic, Ann Taylor and J Crew.

I think my favorite (at least this week) is Extra Petite, which is written by a woman who is my height and shoe size. Unlike a lot of blogs that just post photos of outfits, this one talks about fit and fabric and when and how to alter a piece of clothing. She also has a pretty good list of petite-friendly brands—an awesome resource for me because I tend to shop at the same four places over and over.

One of my other favorites is Fast Food & Fast Fashion, which is similar to Extra Petite, although her style might be slightly more quirky.

One of these days I’m going to actually bust out of my style rut of jeans and T-shirts and update my ~~uniform~~ wardrobe. The weird thing is, I have a lot of awesome clothes that I’ve bought over the years, but I don’t know how to put them together so I just get lazy and comfortable and wear the same things over and over.

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Speaking of fashion, I did try to break out my boot rut and bought these today (inspired by the blogs above):

Nine West Amalia

I love Nine West. They carry an extensive amount of size 5s, which is rare. Most sites sell out of the 10 pairs they carry right away and that’s it. Nine West has adorable shoes and I can almost always find what I want on sale. These were 25% off, plus I had points saved up from previous purchases, so they ended up being about 40% off.

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I found this post (called “No Shit,” so of course I love it) through another blog (I can’t remember where), and it serves as a good reminder that no one is perfect, and we need to stop beating up on ourselves for not looking a certain way. Read it. And then “move the fuck on.”

Filed Under: Beauty, Fashion, Shopping Tagged With: Nine West, petite fashion blogs

For Love Of The Dog (Show)

January 11, 2012 By Mo 4 Comments

Back in October I went to Utah for a dog show. This was a national breed specialty, which meant Samoyeds as far as the eye could see, along with swirls of white hair floating in the air, lots of shantung skirt suits, “nude” nylons (they’re never really nude, are they?) with tennis shoes, and too many sequins for daylight. (There’s enough bad dog show “fashion” to warrant a series here.)

I was looking forward to going—and even more excited to write about it when I got back because the movie “Best In Show” has nothing on the real thing.

But nothing—NOTHING—prepared me for those four days.

The dog show itself was great. Penny did well—she made the cut in her group, which means she was considered by the judge, which was all I hoped for in such a big field of dogs from around the country. Penny’s handler had a great few days as well. Her trip climaxed with going Best in Show with a Veteran dog that she had been showing for years.

Everything went sideways for me the first morning when I went to grab some breakfast at the hotel and ran into Penny and Gracie’s breeder.

And I never shook her. Never.

I generally try to limit my exposure to her. She’s a nice enough woman, and I’m sure she means well, but she doesn’t know when to stop talking. Sitting ringside, within earshot of the handlers, judges and owners she kept up a steady commentary about who had a shitty dog, who wasn’t handling their dog well, who was showboating in the ring trying to get the judge’s attention, and on and on.

The deal with dog shows is, you never say anything about anyone’s dog. Period. You don’t criticize handlers or judges. You don’t complain that the judge looked at the wrong end of the leash (ie; chose a well-known handler instead of choosing the right dog). You don’t do any of those things. At least until you’re in the privacy of your motor home or hotel room. Then you can bitch about everyone all you want. Because you had the best dog in the ring and the judge is a moron. In public, you’re polite. You congratulate winners and console losers.

I was mortified. I didn’t want everyone to think I agreed with her commentary. It’s the kiss of death. You get a reputation and judges won’t pick your dog, handlers won’t show your dogs and “fanciers” (as we’re called) don’t want to be around you.

The long and the short of it was, she latched onto me because no one else could deal with her and she thought she found an ally. Why? Because I was too nice. I couldn’t tell her to back the fuck off like other people do. It was my version of Single White Female. So I found myself sneaking in and out of my own hotel room. I feigned exhaustion, went to my room to go to bed, and when I thought the coast was clear, I sneaked out to meet friends. By the second to last day I found myself sobbing uncontrollably in Penny’s handler’s motor home, begging people to keep her away from me.

Good times, yes?

I was so traumatized that I pulled Penny out of shows for the rest of the year and hid in a dark room while rocking myself back and forth and whimpering.

You think I’m exaggerating, don’t you?

I was never going to another dog show again. (I’m pretty sure Bill heard angels sing when I announced not only would I not drag him to shows, I wasn’t going either.)

This past weekend was the Palm Springs Kennel Club dog show, which in this area is the first and one of the biggest dog shows of the year. It’s at a beautiful location and it’s just a really professional competition. I like going but I considered sending Penny along and not going until I found out that her breeder wouldn’t be there.

I actually had a good time. Penny did well enough. On Friday she won her class and was thisclose to winning points. But, alas, always the bridesmaid…

But I think we’re close. The judges are looking at her more now than they were when she was younger. She’s matured and filled out—less gawky pre-teen and more prom queen.