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May 15, 2006
I Am Suddenly So Freakin' Productive
As I've mentioned, the semester ended Friday, May 5. To celebrate I wore a really great outfit (maybe some of my lurking colleagues will attest to the fact that my shirt, which I bought a few days prior, was indeed very cool, and my skirt, which I made last fall, was indeed very pretty) and went out for margaritas (it being Cinco de Mayo and all) with friends/colleagues. I even got a ride so I could get rip-roaring drunk, but I was stymied in that endeavor by A) the lack of tequila in the margaritas and B) the surplus of icky green margarita mix in said beverage (just makes ‘em harder to suck down) and C) a pissy attitude that kept me from ever really having fun.
The next day I felt like crap though I wasn't even hungover. And I'd gone out with such good intentions! It really added insult to a lack of injury. I was...depleted, mostly. Exhausted by some teaching-related ickiness I might blog about if I work up the nerve.... Anyway, the weather was lovely but I was having none of it. I wore ugly old sweats and sat on my couch and watched television I didn't enjoy: four hours of Grey's Anatomy, one of those shows about doctors* that can't be bothered to include genuinely sick people. The show has people who are dying of cancer in some part of their digestive system and still weigh close to 200 pounds, despite the fact that when your digestive system stops working, you tend to lose both your appetite and weight, because even the few things you manage to put in your stomach don't get broken down properly. Or people who, only hours after having their chests sawed open, are sitting up, talking coherently, groggy from neither pain nor general anesthesia.
Sunday I at least left my house, though I didn't leave my yard: I managed to go out in the evening and do a little gardening. But I was still sulky and pissy.
But last week I somehow managed to become oh so productive! Before the semester ended but when the end was in sight, I had a moment of clarity during which I Planned Ahead: I made a bunch of appointments, so that last week I was plugged into a schedule. I took my windshield to the chip repair place. I took my cat to the vet. I took my teeth to the dentist. I took my hair to the salon. (This week I'm taking my body to the doctor--annual check-up and all that, but as I mentioned, I really distrust doctors.*) I went to graduation. (God, that was boring.) I had coffee with a friend I haven't talked to in months. I finished up some school-related business. I did some research for the Buffy paper I've got to write and ordered books for another project. I made a skirt. (It's adorable--believe me.) I took some pictures with the digital camera I got for Christmas and haven't really mastered using. (One of these days, when I'm not quite so overwhelmed, I'm actually going to plug the camera into my computer and download pictures of my cat Dinah, who is very, very cute.) When I wanted a break from all that structured productiveness, I put in a movie and watched it while I ironed all my recently washed laundry, or I worked in my garden.
I like being this productive, but I seriously dislike that I HAVE to be this productive. I have all this shit I MUST do before May 25. Didn't I just get done with some big lousy deadline? Oh yeah, I did: and dealing with it made me catatonic for 48 hours and pissy for a lot more.
Oh well. This too shall pass.
*Doctors are one of the few groups of people I've dealt with in my life that I trust less than Republican politicians and Mormon priesthood holders. They can hurt and screw you over in ways few other people can. Dishonest mechanic? Well, being stuck with a huge bill for unnecessary services does indeed suck, but it sucks even more when any unnecessary procedure is done to you. "Do no harm," the Hippocratic oath** enjoins, but I've never met a doctor who truly upheld it.
**I just discovered, when I looked up the Hippocratic oath, that the old one, which begins with an appeal to Apollo, prohibits abortion and assisted suicide. The modern one states, "I will remember that I do not treat a fever chart, a cancerous growth, but a sick human being, whose illness may affect the person's family and economic stability. My responsibility includes these related problems, if I am to care adequately for the sick."
Posted by Holly at May 15, 2006 10:07 AM
Comments
Wow, a flurry of activity! I wish we could see the skirt and shirt, as well as Dinah. Here the semester refuses to end and it's rainy and 55 degrees. Since you are a reasoned critic of Daylight Savings, you'll appreciate the irony of living in a place that springs forward one hour while simulatneously falling back three months. I haven't had the nerve to make Margaritas, not yet anyway. Sigh. But the end is nigh...
Posted by: spike at May 15, 2006 1:01 PM
Sorry to be a comment hog, but I just received this story from Le Monde Diplomatique on the marketing of diseases (including erectile disfunction and the amazing "pre-menstrual dysphoric disorder") by pharmaceutical companies in order to create markets for drugs among healthy people. It was hard not to feel the synchronicity after having just read the Hippocratic Oath on your blog. Tony Blair has just signed a petition here supporting the use of animal testing in scientific research, to the apparent delight of animal testers ("do no harm"?). The success of anti-vivisectionists in getting people to recoil in horror at testing new drugs and diseases on animals reached its peak a couple of years ago. But there has been a very sophisticated propaganda campaign in retaliation, mainly portraying anyone who opposes testing as a terrorist and anti-science. Very few people mention how important biological businesses are to New Labour -- unlike manufacturing or University Lecturers.
Sorry, what a bummer, and your post was so nice! I'll be quiet now...
Posted by: spike at May 15, 2006 1:47 PM
At your sulkiest and pissiest, you're still most entertaining and productive by the sounds of it.
Being wary of a doctor is a good thing. It's a business like no other. Watch out for the potential hate mail from all the Gray's Anatomy cheerleaders I keep running into. Haven't seen it and don't need to.
Posted by: Dale at May 15, 2006 6:42 PM
That is one profoundly upsetting story you you provided a link to, Spike. I was horrified, without being really surprised, by the statement that "pharmaceutical companies take the lead, not just in branding such blockbuster drugs as Prozac and Viagra, but in branding the very conditions that create the markets for those drugs."
God. I hardly know what to say.
And Dale, I'm glad I can amuse--if you can't be a fun drunk the night before, at least be a sarcastic hangover-free cynic the morning after, I always say--or always will, in the future.
Posted by: Holly at May 16, 2006 8:38 PM
The flogging of drugs to well people is old news, but it still shocks. Prempro is the one I know most about: doctors would indicate that I was a moron for not taking these hormones, and my friends, all of whom took the stuff, thought I was just being paranoid.
It was terror of aging that I saw in my friends. But the drug did not help, that's the thing. They didn't look or feel a minute younger than I did and still had periods and mood swings and swelling that were hard for aging bodies to endure.
If it weren't for the Women's Health Initiative study, women would still be taking hormones without awareness of the harm they were doing to themselves. We were lucky. What about the other stuff: Viagra, Lipator, etc. and their long-term effects? Without double blind studies involving thousands of people, we'll never know.
Posted by: Hattie at May 17, 2006 11:33 PM
I intend to approach aging like you, Hattie--and if someone calls me paranoid, I'll deal.
Posted by: Holly at May 18, 2006 10:11 AM