Yoinked from a Sunflower...

You scored as XIII: Death. Death is probably the most well known Tarot card - and also the most misunderstood. Most Tarot novices would consider Death to be a bad card, especially given its connection with the number thirteen. In fact this card rarely indicates literal death.Without "death" there can be no change, only eventual stagnation. The "death" of the child allows for the "birth" of the adult. This change is not always easy. The appearance of Death in a Tarot reading can indicate pain and short term loss, however it also represents hope for a new future. </td> XIII: Death 100% II - The High Priestess 88% XV: The Devil 88% XVI: The Tower 81% III - The Empress 75% IV - The Emperor 75% I - Magician 69% VIII - Strength 56% XI: Justice 50% 0 - The Fool 38% X - Wheel of Fortune 13% VI: The Lovers 13% XIX: The Sun 6% Which Major Arcana Tarot Card Are You? created with QuizFarm.com

My doctor is a hypochondriac. I changed doctors in the first place because I felt Mattimoe (a very old Irish country farm-type doctor, who happens to have a tennis court in his backyard) was not listening to me. I'm tired of being tired & achy all the time, & Mattimoe was just treating symptoms, not really looking for an underlying cause. I mean, yeah, the scoliosis & knees play a part in the aches, but I feel just so whipped all the time, and really looking back, I've been tired for a long time. Not sleepy, there's a difference, but tired, like I'm dragging myself through life. So anyway, I find this woman, an internal medicine specialist (but she counts as a general practitioner to my insurance) & she's been freaking testing me to death!

I went throught the whole glucose tolerance orange-death torture to reveal - perfectly normal, if somewhat low, blood sugar. My cholesterol, normal, maybe a little out of whack as far as the ratio of good to bad, but I eat meat & have only recently switched to a lower-fat milk (which I've only started drinking more of recently anyway). Thyroid normal. I'm not a chromosomal mutant. I don't have Eppstein-Barr virus (heh, Jody does, though), and I'm nutritionally balanced, which in itself is unusual for a typical fat American. I'm pretty solid healthwise except I'm always tired, always achy & my white blood cell count is consistently high. So she's mentioned leukemia a couple times now. I started grilling her today - what else can raise WBC counts? Stress? Mold exposure? Depression? Burn-out? Whacky sleep schedule? Being in a filthy environment all the time? Cigarette smoke? Inflammatory conditions? Allergies? She kept saying no, no, no & gave me a prescription for a narcolepsy drug for my fatigue & wrote me up a referral to a hematologist-oncologist.

Most of the people in my family are dead. Most of them had cancer, so I suppose I'm genetically at risk. We all have alcoholism and various addictions, poor eating history, generally short life spans, etc. I don't come from good stock at all, but we all gotta die sometime. So I'm like, fine, whatever, I'll go, stop nagging me. But first I came home & started abusing the 'net for medical advice, which is honestly a bad habit to indulge in. So much is out there that is just misleading, alarmist and straight-up false. However, time & time again I'm finding most online sources of medical information list stress, exposure to environmental contaminants & allergens, allergies themselves, depression, falling out of synch w/the circadian rhythms, inflammatory conditions (i.e., my knees & back), etc... as all possible causes of an elevated WBC count. Rob thinks I've got 'Chronic Fatigue Syndrome', which I think is made up, or possibly another label for Eppstein-Barr - he got his list of symptoms from an infomercial, so I'm not sure of that source at all.

I think tomorrow, if I'm still awake (likely since I didn't get up til about 9pm tonight) I'm going to look up a dietician in my health plan... It wouldn't hurt to find out what else I can do to bring my good cholesterol up & my bad cholesterol down w/out consuming more carbs. Oatmeal is fine & so are whole-wheat cereals, but damn, it's a lot of calories. I've been trying to restrict my overall caloric intake while still getting my 6 servings of fruits & veggies a day. I didn't do so well today, but I wanted Long John Silvers & nothing would persuade my stomach otherwise. I even tried tempting it w/the thought of Crazy Bread from Little Caesar's but it wouldn't be swayed. It wanted fish. Breaded, battered, slathered in malt vinegar fish.

Rountuits

I'm quite proud of myself. Cleaned & organized the living room & den. Then Rob & I hit the garage. Took all the crap out of Alex's car, took a bunch of crap out of the rafters, pulled all kinds of stuff out of corners & took it all out onto the curb. The neighbors were swarming it before we were halfway finished. I also stained the dowel rods for my tatami-mat blinds for my room. It's a concept to match my bedroom set, I don't know if it'll work, but at least the biggest paint-in-the-ass part of it is finished.

Now my back hurts.

Keep Forgetting

Had a dream the other evening. For some reason, I was walking through the woods. It was autumn, the ground was covered in wet leaves. Deciduous leaves, & the woods smelled like wet leaves. The air had that grey coppery winter color, but it wasn't freezing cold. I heard a commotion & walked up to a tree where a fledgling owl had fallen onto the ground underneath it. A dog was harassing it, so I chased the dog off. I took off my coat, turned it inside out & wrapped the owl in it (to protect both my hands & the owlet from an overwhelming taint of human & put it back on the lowest branch. It was a white ragged-looking thing, all down with pinfeathers sticking out at odd angles. It looked like a soccer-ball sized dandelion puff. Anyway, it kept tumbling off the branch. I put it back on the branch a few more times & finally it seemed determined to not flop back onto the ground.

I went back the next day to find the owl back on the ground, fighting w/yet another dog. At least it was still healthy enough to put up a struggle, so I chased the dog off again & wrapped the owl up in my coat & tucked it under my arm like the soccer ball it resembled. I called it 'Bubo' & fussed at it all the way home. When I got home, Rob was looking at me rather astounded & I told him we needed to take the owlet to a raptor rehabilitation facility in New Jersey. He said, sure, it's just across the state line... I think my dream had us living in New York or something.

Bizarre. But the owl was awful cute.