Month: October 2001

tuesday

Received a call this morning from my OB/GYN in regards to my sonohysterogram that i had done a few weeks back.
This surprised me because i was ‘supposed’ to make an appointment right after i had it (and fuck, they are both in the same freaking building, i could have just walked upstairs after i had it done) but never got around to doing it. What surprised me about the call was that when I returned the call, the nurse sounded a bit, hectic to see me. As in “we need to see you right away” kind of voice. The voice that kind of made me “shit” and tell my bosses i had to leave work early this afternoon to go see the OB/GYN. I wasn’t nervous, afraid or really concerned. I just figured, well, whatever happens happens and I’ll take it as that.
Turns out my instincts (or feelings as it were) were correct. It was officially diagnosed today, October 30, 2001; that I have Polycystic Ovarian Disease (PCOD). Now the irony of this is that I self-diagnosed myself a few years back when I stumbled across a site that talked about the PCOD and it’s related symptoms (excessive body hair, missed periods, mood swings, being overweight, etc) and I said “god damnit! that is me to a T!” but the doctors I had been dealing with at Kaiser Permente have been like “well, you don’t overtly have the symptoms (seeing as my ‘excessive body hair’ was not like an ape, so i was okay according to them) and well your blood work came back normal, so, therefore you don’t have it.”
I was frustrated with KP because they seemed to take this kind of attitude with everything they do in regards to health care. It took prodding from my mother to get an ultra-sound and me going to see a highly recommended OB/GYN (and willing to shell out the 250 a visit that he charges for out of network costs) to get this resolved. But I’m HAPPY that it’s official, because now I don’t feel like I’m being psychosomatic with having these freaking issues with my period and ‘female problems’.
I went through three separate blood tests (one with KP when I was on the pill and two with the new doc before and after my period). I’m healthy as a horse. There is, chemically, nothing that indicates that I have PCOD (which was what KP was going by) and it took the sonohysterogram to prove that my ovaries were cystic to get the point across. Well bully for me for being healthy, considering I’m 80lbs overweight, I smoke and only recently have I been eating properly.
So the good doctor (who is cute to boot) is putting me on a new pill to help shed the lining of my uterus and to get everything under control. Getting a D&C is not really necessary in the future unless i don’t start shedding. I can have kids in the future (I still consider myself too young at 29 to be birthing them babies), but heck, at least i know i have the chance now, where as before, I didn’t think I could.
The other irony is that I had bounced a check, oh say a month or so ago, at the local salon where I go and get my nails done. No big deal to me, ShittyFucks is forever having problems with their “computers” (so they say). I don’t feel embarrassed to have bounced a check and I don’t think other people should feel that way either. So, anyway, I go in to get my nails filled and I tell the receptionist “I bounced a check two weeks ago, I just found out the other day via my bank and I see you have not resubmitted it yet. I can pay for it right now if you wish.” The receptionist looks at me like “Ohmygosh, I can’t believe you are publicly admitting that you are bouncing a check” and says out loud “Well, we don’t handle this ourselves, this is handled by our other office in Arlington.” And I was like “Fine, what should I do?” and she states wait till I hear from the main office.
So I waited.
I’ve been back to the salon TWICE since this (I go every two weeks to get the nails filled, I do) and I have yet to receive anything from them. So I come home today and check the mail and finally have something from the main office. Dated over a week ago — telling me “This is a serious manner and will not be taken lightly. If we do not receive payment within the time allotted, other collection actions may be taken.”
Now, if it were so damn important for them to receive the forty-one dollars from me, why did it take them nearly TWO months to let me know the check bounced? And why did they date it a week and a half ago and yet I only received it TODAY? And the best part! They are having me pay at the salon I bounced the damn check at.
Personally, I find this highly hilarious and I’m slightly pissed off. I’ve gone to this company and told them, every time I’ve gone in since the check bounced, that I have yet to receive word about said check. I value my credit and I honor my debts, and I’m a bit pissed at this letter. I don’t have a qualm paying for the bounced check, I have a qualm with thinly veiled threats when it took them two months to get back to me on this.
I think it’s the principle of the thing.
But then again it’s been said I’m weird.
——————————–
It’s 9:28pm and Paul is playing with our new sound system and I’m yawning as I have to go to bed for a 4am turn up in the morning. To get in the spirit of things, I went out and bought a cordless phone with a headset to work with customers. heh. I’m taking this on-call shit a bit too serious sometimes. But then again, a cordless phone with a headset isn’t a bad idea. God bless Radioshack.
x0x0x
Lisa
 

enough

I got on the scale this morning and when I saw how much weight I was gaining back, I decided enough was enough.
Back in late April, a friend of mine and I went to Weight Watchers and where I had lost 20 lbs in nearly two months. I had kept the weight off for the most part of the summer and while I was gone to MIchigan for five weeks — and still kept it off up to about a month ago. The 20 lbs was just a drop in the bucket to the grand total, but I’ve noticed that my weight has slowly been creeping up again and I thought to myself “Self, time to take WW seriously again”.
Lately I’ve been feeling overrun with items mainly because of school and work. My mothers situation hasn’t been helping in the slightest and I’ve also been feeling the pressure to start too many effing projects only to not finish them. I’ve got a lot on my plate right now and I’m letting the stress lead me to eat food and not think about what it’s doing to my body.
Plus my jeans are getting tight again and the irony of that is that I bought one size larger than I normally bought in the first place because finding jeans are so hard to fit. I know (and I’ve said this a million times before) that I’ll never be stick thin — and that’s fine. I like having a little bit of wiggle to my body but I want to not have so much wiggle to knock out a third world country.
heh.
So with that being said, I’m going to be working on ‘challenge’ with a few friends of mine within the next few weeks. Nanowrimo starts on Thursday and so I know for the month of November I’m going to be pretty effing busy.
I’m not awake yet.
x0x0x
Lisa

heroin is so passe

i swear, i must have ADD or ADHD or something. I got up at 4am to upgrade a customers bandwidth and thought to myself “Self! You have about 3 hours to work on email/website before you need to get ready to go to the therapists. Use that time wisely grasshoppa!” I responded back “Your right, I’ve been so busy lately that i haven’t had a chance to get caught up on the website or do email or anything”.
So I had these grandiose plans to do an entry this morning and god damnit, I WILL! I can type fast (80wpm) and hopefully I can get this done before I jet out of here before we er I go to the shrinks.
So news news news first:
Paul and I went to the couple therapist a few weeks back and that went okay. I came out of it sounding like a bitch on wheels and he sounded like a monster. I suppose that’s normal for couple therapy. I’ve never been with another person before, so this should be interesting. I think he and I are both afraid of the outcome because we’ve both been pretty passe about going back. But I’m determined to keep my end of the bargain and make us go to get our issues resolved for I am NOT marrying him or committing any further till I feel comfortable doing so. Our fighting has toned down quite a bit but to me, the issues don’t feel so resolved. I still have a lot on my mind but since we are at the point where the arguments become almost moot and I feel like we are spinning our wheels. He IS trying to make things better and I feel so am I, but we’ll see. We have another appointment tomorrow morning.
Work has been driving me nuts — and I asked for it since I was bored so I can’t complain. I’m in the process of re-writing some of our documentation for procedures since some of it is sorely out of date and it was pissing me off. I’ve also started a new project which requires me to carry a pager — starting November 1st I will be the “after-hours scheduled on-call person”. What this means, in short, is that if a customer wants to do a cut over or dns change or whatever after hours, the engineer asks his backup, if the backup declines, than he asks the group. If no one picks it up, I will. I am hoping to do this to defer the cost of my dsl (hahahah — fuckers won’t get me my t1 😮 ) and to help out cos I like doing that kind of stuff. I will be enforcing this like a sunofabitch because we have few engineers who will tell a customer “oh, just call in and someone will do this for you after hours” and this totally pisses me off to no end because it creates false expectations and we have strict after hours procedures since our install department is only open until 7pm EST. So yah, I’ll be doing that. For being on-call (sorta) they usually will install a t1 as “incentive” however since WCOM is being cheap fuckers, this is not happening in my case AND i have dsl (1.5down/384up). BUT! I don’t have static ips, I can’t do my own dns and I can’t get the business dsl from Verizon as they don’t offer static ips ANYWAY (and I’m ohh so close to the CO 😮 ). UUNet does NOT partner with Verizon so basically I carry a pager and they pay for existing dsl line and I can VPN to our network if I so choose.
Also, there was talking of finally giving me a raise in status to level 3 engineer — which means jack to you but it means a new pay for me. BUT since the damn hiring freeze, I’m not getting it and probably won’t get it till when the hiring freeze is over. fuckers.
School is also kicking my ass. I was slacking on the reading assignments for it and I was five weeks behind. But I started hitting the books right after I got home and have caught myself up. I have a paper due this weekend which I will be working on tonight or this weekend (he’s giving us a three day lap to turn it in). I’m taking ONE class right now, but I’m also taking a mid-semester class that starts this week and I’ve already started reading for that class — have to so I won’t fall so far behind.
All of my school work thus far is on-line via UMUC which offers online degrees in various subjects INCLUDING English — hot damn. I might finally get my BA/BS (they keep switching it at UMUC) at one point in my life.
My brother Jeff is trying out for the Grand Rapids Hoops a CBA/IBL professional basketball team this week. There are currently 10 spots open and I’m really confident that he’ll make it. You can read all about the Hoops on their website and cheer my brother on. Plus the mofo will finally start paying me back for all the freaking money I loaned him in the last few years.
November is gonna keep me really busy as I’m participating in National Novel Writing Month. In short, the contest is to write a novel (50k words or more) from 11/1/2001 till 11/30/2001. I can see this is already going to take up the bulk of my time and I’m really excited as the very very very few times I’ve tried my hand at writing fiction, I’ve basically, well, sucked. But I’ve been sitting here drawing out plots and story lines and fleshing out the characters. The point is about quantity not quality but hey, i know this is not going to be the ‘Great American Novel’ that I wanted but fuck, it’ll be under my belt.
Because of this, you can watch my progress at NanNoNuts, which is a blog a few of us are using for support/etc during the writing process. I don’t know, honestly, how much time I’ll have to devote to the journal during the month of November, so at least you’ve been warned 🙂 I want to do more chronicling of what I’ll be doing during that time period, but we will see.
Lets see, what else. I’ll be heading back to MI in November for a few days to spend with my mom in Port Huron. I found out that the house I grew up in is for sale — don’t know the price but my mom said if saw the house I’d cry. We got the house in the late 1950’s and sold it in 1985 when we moved from Port Huron to Grand Rapids. One day I’ll write about it and I’ll include pictures of then and now. I’m afraid as my aunt Roberta said that the house is in total ruin. ugh.
It’s 7am and I gotta jet.
love you,
Lisa

NaNoWriMo

So,tonight Paul and I are on our way home when I start telling him about doing NaNoWriMo. I will be the first to admit it that I may not finish and that I may not even get somewhat done, but damn it, I want to be able to say I tried. Now, the thing is he said to me something that was unencouraging — and I don’t remember what it is off hand. But it really made me sad (which sounds trite but true) and he said something along the lines of “Well, you have had all these opportunities in these last few months and never followed through” (uh — huh?) and then he went on how it wasn’t my fault and he was encouraging me and that I hardly write anymore — well I DO write — quite a bit. I write to myself in paper journals and I write to friends and I post on all the boards that I’m on. I’m one mad writing fool. I was just fucking pissed that he said that shit to me. This is exactly what I mean by what he doesn’t even have a clue to what I like to do and what I’m about.
Goddamn.
I’m angry.
But yah. follow my progress here on livejournal or here.
x0x0x
Lisa

house of leaves

kara was mentioning on emphamail about this book House of Leaves and how it’s fucking with her mind. ana was talking about it as well. All the time I keep thinking “goddamn it, that book looks/sounds familiar” and sure enough, buried under my other ‘to read’ books was said book.
I’ve started reading and yes, it does fuck with your mind.
frightening.

sonohysterogram

I know you were just sitting there today going “you know, i really need to know what a sonohysterogram is and i really need to know why you would want one.” i bet you even wondered what the procedure was like! well sure folks, I’ll be more than happy to help!
nothing says loving like having me laying on an examination bed, feet in stirrups and the lower half of my body totally exposed waiting for a doctor to shove a two foot catheter up my cunt to find out what the hell is wrong with me. that, i suppose is a bit more detail but hell, your in luck, you are getting more.
the procedure is where they take the ‘probe’ (this is what the nurse called it, I’m not kidding) that’s about two feet long and looks like a dildo with an a/c adaptor. She threw a condom and lube on the probe and inserted it into my vagina. From that point, I could see the internal walls of my uterus, my ovaries and you know, it’s just not the most attractive sight I’ve seen. After probing me for awhile and taking pictures, she removed the probe, had me relax and wait for the radiologist to come in.
His job was more fun. He got to take a speculum, open up the entrance to my vagina, then take a 2 foot catheter and shove that through until it hit the opening of my uterus where the endomitral opening was. There is a small balloon at the end of the catheter that he inserted that they use an syringe full of water to expand. The balloon will start to expand slowly the opening of the endomitral wall and so they can peer inside of my uterus. Now, after having the catheter shoved in, we find out that the speculum they used is ‘too small’. This is something every girl wants to hear right? That she’s gappy? Remove catheter, remove speculum and repeat procedure. Once they started injecting the water, i feel water running down inbetween my legs. It seems that my uterus is contracting and won’t allow the catheter to enter. Repeat procedure again. Still no go. OH! did i mention that they shoved the ‘probe’ back up there to watch all this occur?
Now you are probably wondering ‘lisa, that sounds masochistic’ and you know what, it is and your right. Now why would I choose to have this procedure done?
Polycystic Ovarian Disease (PCOD/PCOS) is very hereditary in my family. My maternal grandmother had ovarian cancer and gave birth to 12 children with one ovary. My mother had PCOD and was told she could never have children. I show all the classic signs of PCOD/PCOS and so at first I had to take blood tests. Turns out the tests were a false negative because I was on the pill when I took them and they would regulate my hormones. Go a few months without birth control and then they redraw the blood. Go back to the Ob/GYN and find out that the tests were still normal and nothing odd was showing up (ie thyroid, diabetes or testrosone). Doctor suggests the sonohysterogram to see physically if there is anything wrong. My periods are messed up for the lack of the better word and i betcha that it’s all caused by stress.
I bet you even wanted pictures of the procedure. I even included those in the email. Aren’t i just sweet?
http://www.webmd.com/infertility-and-reproduction/sonohysterogram
Now if you will excuse me, I’m going to bed.
My cunt hurts.
x0x0x
lisa

today and everyday

this won’t be posted on my site, and in fact, after making it plaid (and earning blog babe of the week), it’s been interesting to see that more my life becomes more complicated, the more i choose NOT to write it.
oh, it’s the twine history of mine, it is. you’ll notice (if you wish) over the last 3 years of steady journal writing, I’ve skipped over large periods when really GOOD stuff was going on — you know, the drama, the intrigue, the etc.
stuff that makes life.
what I’ve been thinking about actually, is that in the last few weeks or so, my heart has been aching. not medically but emotionally. i feel pain. pain is good, is it not? it, at least, renders us alive and verifies that we can feel. i know why i feel pain, and there are many reasons why I’ve been feeling this way but lately, it’s nothing i can talk about seeing as when i have discussed it, shit got fucked up in a major way.
looking at my life from the other side of the fence, it looks pretty damn good. I’ve got a great job (and I’ve been there two years — stable in these Internet times), i live in a great apartment, drive a brand new car, make decent money, and I’ve stated this before.
usually when writing online, i was never afraid to make it known who i was — i was me. lisa rabey. I’ve fucked up a lot, loved a lot, did a lot and was never afraid (so i thought) to show it. i wanted the attention, I’ll admit that — I’m human. Paul’s been saying this a lot. he’s been saying how much i want to be adored and appreciated and loved. I’m an exhibitionist in a very true sense of the world. i climb high, and damnit, i want you to watch me climb and if i fall, i want you to feel my pain and make me feel paid. i want to be able to have that kind of power over myself and over others. i want to control and be controlled.
I miss a lot of things. I miss Danny. I was walking around target with my neighbor Chris tonight and they have all the Halloween decorations up. He loves Halloween like Paul loves Christmas. what the fuck is it about the men that i love that love these holidays? Paul has started, since October 1st, playing Christmas music and watching Christmas movies. he says it gets him in the mood, and i say, that it drives me batty. Don’t get me wrong, i love Bing just like anyone else, but Paul takes it to a new level. I bought a T-shirt at Target that says “evil” on it. Because frankly, that’s how i feel.
i have this uncanny ability to wall myself up and for a long time i wasn’t even allowing myself to feel everyday things. i worked like a robot. this is what you get get get get get. i felt myself like a princess enclosed in a castle with the fire breathing dragon waiting outside. YOU MUST PROVE YOUR WORTHY before i will let you in.
before, I’ve said this. before everything.
the world is this mix and i used to think i was the blender. i could shake up a martini like no ones business. but it was my own special mixture. now i feel like I’ve left out a few of my own ingredients and i have to find a way to piecemeal it back together again.
hubris. i like this word.
long ago, and far away in a bedroom on Paris ave in the city of grand rapids, i still have the vivid imagery of writing in longhand with a shelf over my desk and desk light illuminating the room. flash forward a few years and I’m sitting at a desk, with the same type of wall-fabric, with a shelf over me and the desk light being the only illuminating object in the apartment. but now instead of sitting there writing with a 50 cent pen on 2 dollar notepad, I’m writing in a cracked email program on a 2000 laptop (that i have bought for 600).
i was to have grown, but i seem in many ways not to.
it was there where i wrote and it was there where i wished. it was before i met Danny. before i had gotten myself a computer. before a lot of things.
perhaps i am afraid.
i have become distracted by things that have happened while i was writing. i have often found that chain smoking creates yellow stains on the walls and water not only is a diuretic, it also cleans your face.
Today was Paul and I’s two year anniversary.
Could you tell?
lisa

hot money

Spam keeps getting funnier and funnier.

From: Bank_of_Caymens@excite.com
To: lisa@simunye.com
Subject: Money is WAITING for YOU!
Date: Thu, 11 Oct 2001 13:43:30
Dear customer,lisa,
Notification for Payment Received!
This email confirms that you may have received
a $16,000.00 Commission Payment for August 2001

amusing spam

Spam I got today. Apparently it’s old school, but hey, I’m old school to!

—– Original Message —–
From: “Comfort Sombongo”
To: Sent: Monday, October 08, 2001 9:35 PM
Subject: Investment Pact
> Compliments,
>
> With a humbled heart I commit myself this day to write and ask for your benevolence and kind consideration of my plight for assistance. I am making this contact on behalf of my family not minding
> the consequences but hoping that you would understand our predicament and come to our aid and assist us. I would also kindly apologize for any inconvenience or embarrassment this might
> cause your person, as we neither know each other personally nor have had any previous contact or correspondence.
>
> I am Mrs. Comfort Sombongo, wife of deceased Colonel Bernard Sombongo, who was Deputy Director of Finance and Budgetary Control of the National Union for the Total Independence of
> Angola (UNITA) rebel faction of Angola. He was execution by the orders of Dr. Jonas Savimbi on the 13th of April 2000 after an attempted defection from the UNITA movement. He was assistant
> to General Daniel Fuma both of whose activities centered mainly around the diamonds flown to Europe, through her connection in the London’s De Beers Central Selling Organisation (CSO) to
> dealers contracted to UNITA. The revenue from these trades was basically used for the funding of UNITA’s activities.
>
> Considering the ongoing intensified civil war between UNITA and the government in Angola, my children and I had to relocate to a nearby town in Namibia in May of 2001 after my days of
> mourning were over through the assistance of some UN Officials where I am currently. From amongst my late husband’s confidential documents as I went through them in August this year, I
> discovered a Certificate of Deposit with some other documents to the effect of a set of two boxes formally lodged with a Security Firm in Accra Ghana. A personally handwritten memo by my
> husband addressed to me indicated that he had ordered the Security Firm to have the boxes moved over to their Agent in a European country in February 2000 with order to have them released
> only upon presentation of relevant documents.
>
> As indicated in the memo, there is a total of US$27,500,000.00 (Twenty Seven Million Five Hundred Thousand US Dollars only) as the real content of the boxes, which was done so as to
> disguise the real content thereof for security reasons.
>
> With due respect, I seek your kind assistance in the collection of the boxes containing U.S. $27.5 million from the Security Company’s Agent in Europe. You will be entitled to a 20% percentage of
> the total sum as both compensation and also to cover any miscellaneous expenses incurred by you in the course of this transaction and the remaining therefore to be personally managed by you
> on my behalf. It is my sincere conviction that you will handle this transaction with absolute confidentiality, maturity and utmost sense of purpose.
>
> I am therefore soliciting your assistance in terms of logistics and materials to collect the consignment from the Security Firm’s Agent in Europe as the consignment have incurred a substantial
> amount of demurrage. All documents concerning the consignment are intact with me. Upon an approval response from you to assist me in this endeavor, as a fund manager for this fund, the
> evacuation process would immediately commence as all machinery are in place for a smooth transaction.
>
> If you are capable and ready in collecting and investing this fund on my behalf, please contact me immediately through my alternative email address at sombongo@excite.com for immediate
> action.
>
> Thanks for your anticipated understanding and cooperation.
>
> Yours sincerely,
>
> MRS. COMFORT SOMBONGO
>