Saturday, August 18, 2007

Sweatin like a slave...




There are no words to describe how my life has changed in the past two months. I think the USC Department of OB/GYN is actually trying to kill me. I have never worked so much in my entire life, not to get into med school, not in med school, never. Here is my daily routine: wake up at 4:30, get to work by 5:15, work like a freakin slave until 7, come home and write notes on my patients from the day, go to bed at 8:30, wake up and do it again. Oh, and I forgot to mention the weekends during which I have the pleasure of staying up all night working like a slave. On the plus side, I've never had so much money in my bank account before because I never have time to spend any! Today is a good day though because I have the whole weekend off and I have a whole weekend of grocery shopping, lawn mowing, and house cleaning to look forward to!


Speaking of work, let me talk for a minute about how only certain people should be allowed to procreate. I have seen the craziest shizzle ever in the past 2 months. For those of you who don't know, the hospital I where I work is the Richland County hospital (which means people with no insurance) and has the only Level 4 nursery within a 100 mile radius (which means we get all the high risk deliveries). Believe it or not, the two kind of go hand in hand. The people with no insurance smoke crack their whole pregnancy and then proceed to have an extremely high risk delivery. Who'da thunk? And it's so funny to see the different thresholds that bring people in to the hospital. Some ladies will come in the minute they feel one contraction and think they are in labor and then some will wait to come in until the baby's head is hanging between their legs telling me to help get him out. I actually had one lady come in thinking she may be in labor so she put on a gown and sat down on a bed so I could examine her. The next thing I know she hiked up one leg and farted out a baby on me. How rude.

Anyways, enough about me. There is a way more important baby in my life who I did not deliver and his name is Alex Byars. I think in my last blog a month ago I mentioned that my sister was in labor. Well after doing everything right, not doing drugs, having routine prenatal care, taking prenatal vitamins, and giving up alcohol for 9 months, my sister ended up having an emergency c-section. Wouldn't you know? If she'da been a crackhead, she would have farted the baby out no problem. Anyways, everything turned out fine and they are settling nicely into parenthood. This is all secondhand information from my mom though because I actually haven't had a chance in the last month to sit down and talk to my sis on the phone. That is what this weekend is for though. My mom left this morning for Denver for a week to help out the new parents and I am so jealous that I don't get to go see him. Sorry the pic is so small, but isnt he too cute?

Friday, July 20, 2007

Just call me Auntie Jessie.....well, almost.

Well, I hope someone actually reads this cuz I am pretty sure all my blog-fans have abandoned me for my horrible lack of blogging....maybe I can get an anonymous out there to chime in. So I had no idea that there were so many hours in a week...I mean, now that I am not wasting them away by doing things like sleeping. Please, note the sarcasm. I have never been so tired in my entire life. And it shows. I look worse and worse everyday at work. Every morning this week I shaved off one more minute of my morning routine in order to sleep that extra minute. Today, I shaved off the mascara. Yikes. By the end of this month, I am pretty sure I am going to unrecognizable as my former self. Anyways, enough about me....


While I type this blog, my sister is laboring away in a hospital in Denver. I got the call this morning while I was on rounds that she had started having contractions last night and went in to the hospital this morning. So I'm pretty sure that my 3 weeks now practicing the art of obstetrics has ruined the "miracle of birth" for me. My sister is a couple days early and all I could think of while we were on the phone was all the things that could be going wrong. I pretty sure I didn't even say something like "how exciting" or "I'm so happy for you." All I could think of was a differential diagnosis for preterm labor. Sorry Sis. Anyways, it looks like I will be Auntie Jessie to little Alex by the end of the day! My only guess as to why he is trying to make his appearance early is that he just wants his Momma to have a friggin glass of wine already. I have no doubts that my sister will be the first mother ever to pump and dump for the first feeding.


In other news, the HLM is leaving me. She has decided to make the move to the big city. And by the big city, I mean the one and only NEW YORK CITY. And she going to be doing it Dangerous Minds style since she took a job teaching at a school in Brooklyn. She's been on the fence for the past three years about whether she enjoys teaching or not, so I feel certain that this new undertaking will help her figure that out. This Saturday she is having a "yard/garage" sale (and I put this in quotes because she has neither a yard, nor a garage) and she is having people just come in to her apartment and buy anything they want. Then, she's gonna take whatever is left over, rent a car, and drive up there. My HLM's got balls. The only upside of this move that I can see is that I'll have somewhere great to visit if I ever have a day off in the next four years. I mean, it is all about me. So I think that the HLM and I are going to have a goodbye dinner at the place where we met. Well, kind of. The restaurant where we met (Rising High) has since closed down (undoubtedly because we aren't there anymore), but there is a new restaurant in that building. The HLM is the last of a long line of friends who have recently left me in Columbia, and my last touch stone with anything nonmedical so once she leaves I am officially going to have nothing to talk about except work.


Anyways, what's going on with my blog-fans? I haven't talked to anyone in forever....leave me some love.


Cheers!


Oh, the pic shown is of little Alex's nursery. How cute is
it????

Thursday, June 28, 2007

A Penis Free Columbia


Hey guys! Time for a quick update.


So I have been orienting my ass off for 8 hours a day since last Friday. I dont start actual work until this coming Monday. Last Friday, Monday, and Tuesday were my OB/GYN orientation days and Wed, Thursday, and Friday are my hospital orientation days. The hospital orientation days are extra-painful for me since I went to school here and am already VERY acquainted with Palmetto Richland hospital. Anyways, during my OB/GYN orientation we got our rotation schedule for the next 12 months. We have 10 months on-service (OB, GYN, Night Float, or Ultrasound) and 2 months off-service (Family Practice). I had specifically requested months ago to start on-service because I wanted to jump right in and not feel left out. So what did I get assigned to first? Why, Family Practice, of course. That OK though because our family practice months are pretty chill. We are just assigned to work in the outpatient clinic everyday and take OB call every other weekend. So, I found out that because I am the resident on FP, I am also in charge of castrating (circumsizing) all the newborn boys in the hospital. I almost had a panic attack when I got this news. I got no problem operating on an old lady for 6 hours, but the thought of accidentally castrating a newborn is terrifying to me. The picture you see above is the torture device we use for removing the excess skinnage on the babies, called the gomco. I was so nervous when I found I had to start off doing this that I had one of the attendings take me over to the newborn nursery so I could practice a few rounds. Well, after the bleeding and screaming finally stopped, I noticed that I had actually created a very nice looking penis for Baby Boy X. I think he will make some lucky woman very happy one day. However, even after my success I am still extremely shaky about the whole thing, so a little word to the wise. If you are reading this blog and about to pop out a baby, you might want to avoid Palmetto Richland for about a month or so. That is, if you want to be guaranteed that your little boy will be able to have children someday. Just damn.

Saturday, June 23, 2007

Meet my New BFFs

Well, it's Saturday morning and I am super hungover from the heterosexual life mate's all girls dinner last night and also super bored because nothing is on the boob tube so I thought I would blog again! First and foremost, let me tell you about the wonderful menu the HLM prepared for us last night. The dinner started with my top 2 favorite appetizers, roasted red pepper hummus with pita chips and yes you guessed it, nuts. I think we all know about my love for nuts. After several glasses of wine and even more fistfuls of nuts, we were served our first course of feta, cucumber, and tomato salad. Yum. This was topped only by the main dish of lemon pepper salmon on a bed of spicy mashed sweet potatoes. I love it when the HLM cooks for me. I think Aurelia and Johanna enjoyed it just as much as me seeing as how we all licked our plates.

Anyways, I thought I would go ahead and introduce you to the girls I am going to be spending 80+ hours a week with for the next 4 years of my life. I was really anxious about meeting them because people who go into OB/GYN usually fall into one of two categories. There are the blonde, petite, Lilly Pulitzer wearing nice-to-your-face-but-talk-about-you-behind-your-back types and the big, butch, I-say-whatever-I-want-right-to-your-face types. How I got in the mix I have no idea. Well, there is a total of 5 of us and I already know one of the girls because she went to med school with me. She is married and just had a baby 4 months ago so clearly that is the last you will ever hear of her. So I am very pleased to say that the 3 other girls do not fit in to either of the previously mentioned categories. The first girl is named Julie and I can't remember where she is from but she went to med school in the Caribbean....St. Maarten to be exact. So while I was crammed in a small dark study room with no windows on the second floor of the library, she was lying on a white sand beach switching between her Physiology notes and the new issue of Vanity Fair. What a biznatch. Anyways, she seems really cool and her boyfriend is a vidalia onion farmer somewhere in Georgia. She said she is pretty sure he is not going to be able to move here because apparently he can't farm onions in Columbia, SC. The next girl is Allison and she is from Toledo, Ohio. She moved down here about a month and a half ago and this guy she had been dating for awhile came down to visit 2 weeks ago. She said that during his visit they got a wild hair and decided to get hitched. She bought a place out in the Northeast so they went out to the fountain at Sandhills shopping center and somewhere between buying creams at Bath and Bodyworks and eating at Wild Wings they got married. Huh. Well, she is funny because she said that when she moved down here she thought that everyone was going to be all nice and Southern and that she was surprised because none of her new neighbors had come over to meet her. I thought this was strange so I started asking her some questions to figure out what was going on. It turns out that the culprit is a "Go Away" doormat on her front porch. She said that up in Ohio this is commonplace and everyone knows that this is just a joke but I quickly informed her that that is not how we roll in the South. So I think she is going to get rid of the mat and hopefully make nice with her neighbors. The last girl is named Susan and she is from Pinehurst, NC which I have never heard of but apparently is just up Highway 1 (which I also have no idea where that is). She went to school in Israel and is dating a 7-foot tall Jew that is still over in Israel. He is hoping to get in the Masters of Business program at USC next year so he won't be around for at least a year. Well, thankfully they all seem like a great bunch of girls and I think we are going to get along just fine. Sheeewww.

So tonight is the "Welcome the New Interns" party at the home of my favorite attending, Dr. Sara Smith. It is a cookout and a dessert cook-off for the new interns. I have been testing out recipes all week long and I thought I had this shizzle in the bag until I met the girls yesterday. They also are big cooks and have been feverishly scanning FoodNetwork.com all week for recipes. Crap!! Yesterday at orientation they were talking about sticks of butter, cream cheese, Crisco, lard....I've got my work cut out for me. I found a great recipe for lemon bars and asked my roomie Todd if he thought that would be the golden ticket and he quickly let me know that if I want to win this thing, its gotta be chocolate. So its 11AM now and the party is at 6:30 and I still don't know what I am going to make. Oh, and I'm really hungover and don't even feel like getting off the couch.

Leave me some comments about what you think will win it for me. I'm bored.

Cheers!


UPDATE: I made Emeril's Ooey Gooey Chocolate Cupcakes for the party and didn't win a darn thing, but I did snap a shot of my new BFFs. Pictured from left: Allison, Susan, Mua, Julie. Alicia didn't make it in the pic cuz she was pumping or feeding or doin sumpin wit her baby.

Friday, June 22, 2007

Dayton Rocks!!



Heeelllooo again blog-fans! I have just gotten home from my first day (of 7) of orientation for my OB/GYN residency that starts on July 1st. Let me tell ya, after doing exactly nothing for almost 3 months now, sitting in a room listening to boring ass lectures for 8 hours has really taken it out of me. However, not only am I exhausted, I'm also slightly panicked. This is gonna be rough. Anyways, in an attempt to relieve some tension I thought I would blog about Julie and Jon's wedding in Dayton, Ohio last weekend.
First off, I have to give credit where credit is due. I'm fairly certain that this was the most fun wedding I have ever been to (sorry Willy and Lindsay, but anything short of leg amputation would have made this a better wedding for me). I was worried that I wouldn't get there because when I got to the airport in Charlotte, they informed me that once I flew in to Atlanta I would have to see an agent right away because I didn't have a seat assigned for the flight from Atlanta to Dayton. So of course, knowing me, what's the first thing I do when I get to Atlanta?? If you think it is go find the agent, you clearly don't know me at all because the first thing I always do when I get to an airport is find the nearest bar and order a bloody mary. You know how most people have their own little travel rituals or things that they allow themselves to do only when they are traveling?? Well, mine is eating gummy bears and/or Skittles and drinking bloody marys. At no other time will you see me eating a bag of Skittles.....can't say the same for the bloody marys. Anywhoo, once I finally made my way to the ticketing agent, he seemed shocked and appalled that I didn't already have a seat on this extremely overbooked flight. So the agent goes on the loudspeaker and kindly asks for volunteers to take the next flight. No one stands up. He offers a free roundtrip flight. No one stands up. He offers a roundtrip flight plus AirTran bucks. No one stands up. To make a long story short, he ends up having to give away 2 roundtrip flights, $200 in AirTran bucks, and a free "gift" in order for one measley person to stand up. Just damn. So I happily head towards my coach seat (I was hoping a first classer would offer up their seat but no such luck) and order myself a bloody mary.
Right after I get in to Dayton it is pretty much time to head to the rehearsal dinner which is a cookout at a country club. So Sarah, Susanj, Conrad (Susanj's boyfriend), and myself all make the 30 minute drive out to the cookout. When I got there, I headed straight for the keg and was ecstatic to see that it was a keg of Killian's!! Julie tells me that she got it just for me, but I have my doubts. She said that at Willy's wedding I was the only one who actually bitched about the keg of Bud Light but she knew that if I was the only one speaking up about it, everyone else must be thinking it. Smart girl. Anyways, then I headed over to the food table where I found an array of things that would send me straight to the ER. After deliberating for about 10 minutes over whether I was more likely to choke on an all-beef hot dog or a hamburger, I chose the hamburger. Well, I was completely grief stricken over whether to start eating or not when someone (sorry, I can't remember who) saved me from myself and pointed out the turkey and cheese croissants sitting on the table that I had overlooked. Shew....disaster averted.
Nothing much else happened at the rehearsal dinner, but we tapped the keg within a good hour and a half and then made the drunken trek 30 miles back to the Marriott. We had noticed earlier in the day that the Marriott had a pool bar so we all decided that once we got back we would all meet up at the pool for some more drinking. Sarah and I were the first to get back to our rooms, so I went out on the terrace to look at how many people were in the pool. Well, I could barely even see the pool for the 400 people that were crowded around the bar area. There was even a stage with quite possibly the worst cover band I had ever heard belting out Prince songs. I felt like I was looking down on a club from the balcony or something. Once I went down there for a closer inspection, I saw that there was exactly no one in the pool and that all the girls there were totally skanked out like they were at some LA club and not the Marriott hotel bar in Dayton, Ohio. It was totally bizarre, and I of course forgot to take pictures. Anyways, the night ended up with me finding Sarah puking in the bathroom of our room and everyone else playing Joe's Wii on the plasma TV in the hotel lobby.
On to the wedding day. It was my first Catholic wedding and it kinda seemed like we were at a church service where there just happened to be a wedding taking place also. I guess that's just how Catholics roll. After the service we all headed outside to find not only an enormous RV, but also someone dressed as the Tiger (Clemson's mascot). Apparently, Julie's dad had purchased a 1985 RV just to take the wedding party from the church to the reception. Little did he know, it would also become the drunkmobile at around 11 PM and start taking everyone's sweaty butts back to the hotel. Anyways, we saw the wedding party off and then headed to the reception which was held at a place which apparently serves as a farmer's market where you buy fruits and vegetables during the week. You know what that means, no a/c. And as you know, I am quite possibly the sweatiest person alive. I was rocking a full body sweat after being there for a solid 5 minutes. I think Sarah said it best...."talk about swamp ass..." She was wearing a thong, so she had to pick her dress off of her ass everytime she stood up. Ew.
The reception got off to a great start around 3:30 with lots of drinking, good food, and the classic Long family Goldschlager shot. This is about the time that I met my new BFF Kimberly Sims. Kimberly is our friend Slimer's fiance from Texas and she is awesome. I know by the end of the night, Slimer was wishing I would shut the hell up because I could not stop talking about how much I liked his fiance. You woulda thought I wanted to marry her, for rizzle. Anyways, the reception continued on its merry way and the only bumps in the road that I noticed were an extremely unfunny, long, rhyming poem created by the bride and groom and a bizarro taking off the garter dance that involved sunglasses and what I think was a Right Said Fred song. We managed to drink through that and I think I can credit Clapp with noticing that the centerpieces looked like great things to put beer in. They were like these 3 feet tall skinny glass vases with some flowers coming out the top. We all took bets on how many beers you could fit in one (I guessed four), but it actually turned out to be like 1.5 because the things were so freakin skinny. In the picture below you can see Clapp and Joe drinking out of them. So after drinking a few more vases of beer, everyone decides that it would be a great idea to get in the fountain. All the girls, even Christine in her bridesmaid dress, hike up their dresses and jump in the fountain because shakin' their booties in the fountain sounds like a much better idea than shakin' them on the dance floor. Duh. I gotta say, this is at about hour 6 of the 8 hour reception. To top all of this excitement off, pizza gets delivered to us at around hour 7. Oh yeah, and Sarah is smoking some random cigar with some random bow in her hair. I tried to attach a pic but it wouldn't upload. So after about 8 hours at the reception, the DJ plays his last song, and we all head outside to find the RV waiting to take us all back to Club Marriott.
It was a really great time. Mad props to Jules and Jon. Well, I am much less tense than I was when I started writing this blog but I am very worried for the life of the blog. After my first day of orientation I am fairly sure I'm not gonna have enough time to go to the bathroom, much less write my blog. We'll see how it goes though. Right now I am off to a Friday night girl's dinner prepared by Chef HLM.

Thursday, June 14, 2007

Lovin' the Dirty South


Being in ATL for the past few days definitely affirmed one suspicion that I had about myself....I am TOO BIG for South Carolina. I mean, I was created to live the fast paced city life and am saddened to think that I have been stifled for the past 26 years in country bumpkin South Kakalakey. It was so awesome to just walk out the door of Ryan's apartment and be in the middle of all things happening...awesome shops, restaurants, bars, parks...you name it and it was right there. Even the gym next to his place is a cooler gym than mine with an even cooler name, Urban Body Fitness. I want to workout there. I feel like I have been trying to get out of SC basically since I was old enough to realize that you can get out of SC, and I just can't seem to get it done. WTF?? Clemson had to offer me a full ride, then I had to go to med school, then I had to not match in any of the awesome cities I wanted move to. The forces are really workin' again me here. And since I can't seem to get out, I make a motion that all of my blog-fans move to fun and exciting cities so I can at least go visit you there. Capesh?


I got to ATL around 4:30 (should have been 3:45 but I got stuck in one of the few drawbacks of big cities - traffic) and after checking in on the blog and facebook, Ryan and I headed out to my old stompin' grounds. My sister went to college in Atlanta what seems like a hundred million years ago but was actually when I was around the ages of 8-12. While she was there I discovered the area in Atlanta called Little Five Points. We have a Five Points in Columbia, but Little Five Points is nothing like it and back when I was 12 I thought it was the coolest place that could possibly exist on Earth. It is where all the freaks in the city hang out, playing their slit your wrist music while openly selling and using their hallucinogenic drugs. I remember a time back when I was about 11 years old that a guy on the street asked me if I wanted to buy some ex and after telling my dad about the whole incident, we just continued on our merry way. WTF?? I mean for rizzle now, shouldn't my dad have yanked me out of there so fast I thought I was seeing double?? I don't think any of my current blog-fans knew me in middle school, but Little Five Points is where I bought all the black and white striped thigh highs and neon green skirts I used to wear. Anyways, after walking down memory lane for a little while Ryan and I headed over to a an Italian restaurant called Osteria for some eats. I highly recommend it the next time you go to ATL because it was affordable and just like the food I had over in Italy...oh, and it just happened to be half price bottle of wine night. Yippee! Next we headed over to Pozole for some of the best margaritas I've had in my entire life and I guess it was around margarita number 2 when I started talkin smack to Ryan. For some reason I decided to tell him that I could totally school him at a game of pool and before I knew what hit me, I found myself at a new bar with a pool stick in my hand. For those of you who have played pool with me, you know that I absolutely cannot school anyone at pool, not even my cat Doc. They always say that the drunker you get, the better you get at pool, but I I don't know who those people are because the drunker I got, the more times I whiffed the ball. I was taking a good four to five shots before I even hit the cue ball. So the picture you see of me with my shoes off in a dirty bar (ewww) where it appears that I might be about to win the game, is actually an optical illusion as I did not win any games in any normal or acceptable fashion. I would normally feel really bad for how horribly I was playing, however, sadly Ryan was not that much better. Sorry Bello. Even worse, there was some kind of championship tournament going on at the table directly beside us with people who can actually play pool. Yeah, they hated us.


You may recall, the next day was going to be our day of trivia and moneymaker shakin. After Ryan willingly carried my bags around Lenox Square for a few hours and after we caught up on Season 2 of Arrested Development for a few more hours, we headed over to this bar called Locals for a night of trivia. After stressing over a team name for a few minutes (since this is the most important and humorous part of trivia) we agreed upon the name Twin Peaks. In my opinion the funniest team name of the night went to "Paris Hilton is back in jail and the guards are cumming." Despite the fact that the questions were much easier than I am used to (who doesn't know that "Cleveland Rocks" is the theme song for The Drew Carey Show??), Twin Peaks came in at a disappointing 7th place. Alas, we needed the rest of Substance P. Trivia was over at around 10 PM and Ryan informed me that the dance club did not open until friggin' midnight. WTF?? Well, I was already tired from the night before so I fell asleep at approximately 10:01 PM and did not end up shakin my tailfeather or moneymaker or pretty much anything. I suck.


That was the trip in a nutshell. Tomorrow morning I am off to the booming metropolis of Dayton, Ohio to see Julie and Jon get hitched and will be back Sunday evening. In the words of Dave Atell and repeated to me by Clapp, "I went to Dayton, Ohio, recently. Know what's a fun thing to do there? Pack up and get the fuck out, that's what." Can't wait!


Cheers!






Tuesday, June 12, 2007

Off to ATL

Hey guys, I know I haven't updated in awhile, but I have been fairly busy believe it or not. In a few minutes, I am headed to ATL to visit none other than Mr. Ryan Bello for a few days before he makes the big move to Seattle. He has guaranteed me plenty of blogging and facebooking time while I'm there so I'll be able to update.

Quickly, the only plans I have for the trip are blogging, facebooking, and shopping to find a dress to wear to Julie's wedding this weekend. Ryan has planned for us a night of trivia and shakin' our moneymakers on Wednesday night at this bar by his apartment. Little does Ryan know that I am solely the entertainment for trivia nights here in Columbia and not actually the brains of the operation. I am nothing without the rest of Substance P. Nevertheless, I'm sure he will figure that out pretty darn quickly.

Check back later for the update.

Cheers!

Monday, June 4, 2007

"I Can't Handle the Meat" AKA The Blog About Joe


Hello there blog-fans! After a short stint of doing nothing and having nothing to blog about, I am finally back in the land of those who have a life. This past weekend one of my friends from college, Big Willy aka William Powell, got married down in Charleston. I was really excited to go down there because this was the first time since college that the whole crew (minus Suanj and the Staff) were going to be together since graduation and I knew that I would finally have something to blog about. I was sure that this was going to be a weekend full of heavy drinking and crazy antics reminiscent of our 4 years together at Clemson. Unfortunately, at least for me, the weekend o' fun quickly turned in to the weekend o'no fun.


Mel and I drove down to Charleston together and got to our friends Julie and Jon's house late Friday afternoon. The two of us were going to be staying there for the weekend along with our friends Suses and Chris Clapp. We all showered up and then headed out for the rehearsal dinner which was a barbeque out on a beautiful river on James Island. Well after I started itching all over, I realized that the so-called beautiful river was actually a freakin cesspool of mating mosquitoes. After about an hour at the party I had appoximately 400 mosquito bites and was full on miserable. My Irish heritage was workin' hard against me that night. I was totally that girl at the party who wouldn't stop complaining about the friggin bugs. Clapp advised me to just get so drunk that I wouldn't care about the pain anymore but this just led me to being drunk and itchy instead of being happily buzzing and itchy. Anyways, this is where my friend Joe and I somehow got to talking about the blog. I learned that Joe is one of those who reads the blog but doesn't comment. He challenged me by saying that no one comments on the blog because it is not about him and that if it was, there would be an astronomical amount of comments. So this is your chance Joe. I'll even post a pic of you to entice any lady friends out there to leave ya a comment. We'll see how many comments you get.


Anyways, after we all finally left the cesspool, we headed over to Justin's house for some more drinking and beer pong. It wasn't long after we had gotten there that we realized that we were actually not young and crazy, but old and tired so we headed back to Julie's house where I slept on a half inflated air mattress and scratched myself to sleep.


I woke up the next morning, showered, and got ready for the 4:30 wedding. The four of us girls decided to go downtown for a little pre-wedding shopping and lunch when tropical storm Berry hit. For those of you who don't know, Charleston is miserable when it rains because the whole city floods, not to mention the fact that the reception for the wedding was indoor/outdoor. There would be a big tent outside that housed the band, dance floor, bar, food, etc.....Well, we got drenched and continued to shop as I informed the girls that all this misery would be worth it if they had my two most favoritest wedding foods, shrimp and grits and the carving station man, at the reception. I could not shut up about how making little meat sandwiches at a wedding makes me sooo incredibly happy.


The wedding went off with only a few hitches, including a 30 minute delay due to a late 350 lb wheelchair bound grandfather whom our friend Shaun (the best man) wheeled in to the church but failed to lock the chair causing the grandfather to take a little trip backwards down the aisle before Shaun caught him. After several chuckles, the wedding began. Anyways, we all headed over to the reception and I was ecstatic to see that there were shrimp and grits AND the carving station man. I had had a few glasses of wine and was feeling good when we decided it was time to eat. I got a big ole plate of food, sat down, and took the first bite of my meat sandwich when I felt it get stuck in my throat. Now, this is not the first time this has happened. Last Thanksgiving during a party at my aunt's house I got a piece of beef tenderloin stuck in my throat. After an extremely painful and unsightly 2 and a half hours in the bathroom trying to make myself puke, I had to go to the emergency room. Well, at the reception as soon as I felt the meat get stuck I ran to the nearest bathroom knowing what was about to go down. The thing that makes this problem so unsightly is that when something is stuck in your esophagus you can't swallow anything so you have to spit up saliva every couple of seconds. Gross. So, I spent the next 3 hours in the bathroom spitting up and trying to make myself puke while everyone else got drunk. When the reception was over and everyone was deciding where to next, I decided it was time for me to make another trip to the ER. I really didn't want to go and tried to suffer through it all this time because I have the world's shittiest insurance and I knew this trip was going to cost me a small fortune. Well, another problem here was deciding which drunkard to drag with me. Drunk Julie happily surrendered herself but told me that she was way too intoxicated to drive so I would have to drive myself to the ER while spitting and puking. Awesome. We waded through the flood to the car and pulled up to MUSC's emergency room around 11PM. By this time, the pain had reached an all time high so I was quickly called back by a nurse to answer some very important questions about my religous background and my mother's maiden name. I finally get put in a "room," stripped down, put on the gown, and began to wait on the doctor when wouldn't you know it, I felt the damn thing go down. I called the nurse and told her that I felt it go down, but she told me that I still had to be seen by the doctor. After a few minutes the doctor comes in and basically tells me that I am a stoopy and need to stop wolfing down meat sandwiches. Maybe I should try this little thing called chewing.


Well drunk Julie and I leave the hospital and meet up with the rest of the now unbelieveably drunk crew out at a bar. The minute I walk through the door I am bombarded with 3 shot glasses and am being ordered to take them. Believe it not, those drunk stoopies couldn't understand that since I hadn't swallowed in 3 hours I had no desire to chug liquor. Joe did find it very amusing, however, to repeatedly tell me that "I just can't handle the meat." Needless to say, to everyone's surprise including my own, I had my first and last experience as the designated driver that night.


So, Julie and Jon's wedding is in two weeks so I have a chance to redeem myself. Before I left, all my friends informed me that under no circumstance am I to touch any form of meat at their reception. I mean.....pretty sure that won't be a problem guys. As much fun as pain, spitting, puking, and a trip to the ER are, I think I 'll be able to refuse the carving station man.


Cheers!


Note: Joe is on the far right in the above picture. The other fools pictured are Keelan on the left and Jon in the middle.

Sunday, May 27, 2007

Twiddling My Thumbs....

Ok, for real now...absolutely nothing is going on in my life. I realize it has been almost a week since I blogged last but I have hit a wall here in my 3 months off. I am ultra bored. Here is a typical day in the life of Jessie:

7:00 wake up
7:30 get out of bed
8-9:30 eat breakfast and drink cup after cup of coffee while watching the Today Show
9:30-11 work out
11-12 shower and watch Rachael Ray
12:00 eat lunch
1:00 - ??? watch endless hours of tv
10:00 go to sleep

My God, you probably fell asleep while reading my daily schedule. And to make matters worse, the HLM is leaving on Wednesday to go on vacay for a whole friggin week!! What the hizell am I supposed to do and why don't I have any hobbies??

Well, hopefully I will have some great dreams tonight and become inspired to hit you up with an awesome blog tomorrow. Otherwise, I am going to need someone to save me from myself. I mean, right now I am watching an episode of my favorite guilty pleasure show, The Girls Next Door, that I have already seen at least twice. Just damn.

UPDATE: June 1, 2007 8:52 AM

Cheers!!

This new signoff is brought to you by none other than the blogaholic Susanj.

Monday, May 21, 2007

My Life on the Wagon



Bad news everyone. This blog is about to get real boring real fast. Since I still have a month and a half left of the last vacation of the rest of my life, I decided it was time to get in shape. Yeah, yeah, I hit up the gym a few times a week already, but the reason I do this is solely so that I can continue my lush lifestyle without becoming a total fatass. I am definitely NOT in shape. So what I'm talking about now is serious shape. I even went out and hired myself a Nazi-style personal trainer named Sue Mi to kick my ass thrice weekly.


I mean, Sue Mi is no joke. We had our first meeting on Saturday before the Crawfish Festival. We spent an hour and a half just talking about what this experience is going to be like, and what I want to get out of it and blah blah blah....Most importantly, she told me that I have to keep a food journal and turn it in to her every time we train. Oh and I had to start today, the day of the Crawfish Festival. For those of you who don't know, a food journal is a book that you use to record everything that goes in your mouth every single day. I told her that I wasn't totally into that, but then she of course told me that this was not an option, I had to do it. Well, seeing as how she was going to be judging me three times weekly by this food journal, I decided to be really up front with her. I informed her that I had no problem eating healthily, but that we might run into a slight problem when it comes to the drinkie drinkie. So Sue Mi gave me an extremely detailed diagram of exactly how each page of the journal should look and told me that the beverage portion works by a hash mark system. For every 8 oz of beverages other than alcohol or coffee you drink, you give 1 hash mark. For alcohol and coffee, every 4 oz is a hash mark. Excuse me please, but when was the last time you drank 4 oz of beer? Let's just say that I got off to a bad start on Day 1 with a grand total of 2 hash marks by water and 18 by beer. Not surprisingly, Sue Mi was none to pleased with the food journal at our first training session today. And she was even less pleased that I had a dinner party last night and drank champagne and a few glasses of wine. So from here on out, I am on a strict 2 glass max diet. Now you understand why this blog is about to get really friggin boring.


So sadly, even with my 18 hash marks from the Crawfish Festival, nothing much to blog about. It was fun, but did not top last year what with Angela taking her top off at the neighborhood bar, being asked to leave the bar, Angela hiding her beer between her tig ole bitties, and then being trailed by a police car for the 3 blocks that it took us to walk back to my house. It's hard to beat that.
Last night I had a Bon Voyage Debi dinner party at my house which was attended by Team Anxiety (Debi, Blair, Kaki, and I) + the HLM. We prepared a Mediterranean feast and topped it off with a strawberries and cream ice cream cake from Marble Slab (pictured above) to send Debi off in style. Side note: The four of us are dubbed "Team Anxiety" because we got so anxious before every oral exam in medical school that we managed to stir our other group members into a state of sweaty frenzy and they all wanted to kill us. Anyways, Debi is the only one of us leaving C-town and moving up to the booming metropolis of Winston-Salem where she will complete her anesthesia residency at Wakeforest. After many tears were shed over how much we are going to miss Debi we decided to each tell our funniest memory of Debi from med school. I'll share my story so that you have a little sampling. One night when we were studying late up on the second floor of the library we decided it was time to take a dinner break because we were all starving. Debi said she had to go to the bathroom down on the first floor (which has a certain "meaning") and that she would meet us downstairs in a few minutes. So I waited about 10 minutes, walked downstairs, and didn't see Debi so I went into the bathroom and saw that she was still in the stall. I, in classic Jessie fashion, said "My God! What are you still doing in there??? Pinch it off already so we can go get something to eat!!" To my horror, I walked out of the bathroom and saw Debi sitting at a computer checking her email. Needless to say, we got the hell outta dodge. A great time was had by all and we are going to miss Debi very much, but not really because her new home has a bar and wet bar. Much love to Debi!!
Ciao Venezia!
Some BIZ-NASS: I have had many complaints from blog-fans that they have written comments but they don't post. I would totally think this is a bunch of b.s. and people pretending to comment, but it has actually happened to me too. So what you have to do is write your comment, then click "other'", type in your name, and hit publish. Any other order will not work. If you don't see your comment immediately then it did not post.

Thursday, May 17, 2007

Doc the Cockblock


Just want to give a shout out to all the blog-fans who kept the blog alive by commenting TWICE as much as the goal of 16 comments. Whoa.

One of my friends was telling me the other day about how her dog is such a cockblock. First of all, just hearing that word made me laugh, and then threw me back to all those nights in college when your roommate or your suitemate or that pain in the ass friend ended up being a total cockblock whenever you were trying to get some play. I even dated a guy for 3 years in college whose nickname was "CB" which stood for "the cockblocker." Not a nickname anyone would strive for. Apparently, he had the uncanny ability to walk in a room at exactly the wrong minute and disrupt any would be play. Unfortunately, this particular person had many other less than ideal nicknames. Fortunately, CB does not read the blog. Anyways, my friend told me that her and her male friend were hanging out on the couch getting a little smooch on when her 70lb dog jumped up on the couch and started barking directly in the guy's face. The dog was clearly not happy with this man getting a little frisky with his mom. So they decided to move to the bedroom and shut the door. Well, this solved nothing as the dog stood outside the door and barked for the next hour or so. Nothing kills a romantical evening like a barking labrador retriever. The next day, my friend (who I'm sure you have figured out the identity of by now) had me over for dinner and told me "God, my dog is such a cockblock."

I am sure most of you know my angelic little pussycat Doc. Well maybe not so much of a little angel and more of a big fat bitch. He is an angel to me, but pretty much Satan in the flesh to everyone else. When I first got him from the shelter he was teeny tiny and looked like he was about to die at any minute. It appears that after a few weeks of spoon feeding him wet cat food, he just never stopped eating because he is enormous. I'm not talking just another fat cat. He is definitely the size of a medium sized dog and his belly drags the ground when he walks.

Anyways, Doc is also a total cockblock. He doesn't follow in the footsteps of the aforementioned dog and meow my male friends to death though. He actually tries to castrate them. His favorite room in the house by far is the bathroom. Anytime someones heads for the bathroom, he's headed that way too. For such an enormous cat, he is lightning quick when it comes to getting in the bathroom. My male friends say they don't even know he's in there until they start doing their business and then get attacked by claws coming at their manhood. I am not sure if it is the stream or the actual frank, but my cat tries to castrate all men in the bathroom. Men beware if you ever come to my house. Satan lurks in the bathroom.

All this to say, if you are a single person out there looking for some love, think twice before getting a pet. You may have inadvertently let a total cockblock into your house.

Monday, May 14, 2007

A Blog about the Blog

All right folks. I hate to be a nag, but we need to get something straight about the blog. You may think that I blog to have a record of my life or that I blog for my own mental health, or maybe even that I blog because I have nothing better to do. Well, if you think any of these things, you are wrong. I blog solely for the comments. The first blog started off with a whopping 16 comments. Next blog, half as many. This last blog about my GRADUMUCATION only scored a measley 2 comments. And one of those comments was from my brother-in-law who was sitting directly beside me when he wrote the comment. This is sad.

Let me just say, all comments are welcome. Even if you are a crazy stalker person, your comment is welcome. Even if you don't want me to know that you read the blog but you do, comment. Even if you think I am the biggest loser in the whole wide world, leave that as a comment. From the lack of comments, it appears that no one is reading my blog except my sister and brother-in-law and if that is true, just damn. I talk to them enough that I don't need to blog to them. Your comment doesn't need to be witty, even though wit is always appreciated on the blog. How bout a simple "Congrats" or "I like the blog" or "I think you're stupid." All will be very much appreciated.

Soooo.... all this to say, I have made an executive decision to not blog again til this blog matches the first blog with a whopping 16 comments. I have faith and I know we can do it together.

Love to all my blog-fans,
Jessie

Friday, May 11, 2007

I'm GRADUMUCATING!!!

Well kids, the day is finally here. The powers that be over at the medical school are letting me gradumucate. At 12:30 PM today I will officially have a license to kill. Is anyone else as affected by that statement as I am??

I have very mixed emotions about this whole situation. Sometimes I feel like the past four years has just flown by, but then when I really think about it, I feel like the first day of medical school was back when women still wore shoulder pads and scrunchies. I would worry slightly about that last statement but if you are cool enough to read this blog, then you definitely aren't wearing no scrunchies in your hair. It's also kinda strange that I thought medical school was the worst thing that ever happened to me while I was going through it. Now that it is over, I look back on it and think to myself, "Self, that wasn't so bad." Hindsight is a funny thing.

I just don't feel like a doctor. One morning while we were in Italy we were having a lovely breakfast down in the hotel lobby when the mother at the table beside me started to choke. I heard these strange noises coming from beside me and when I looked over, she was standing up doing the universal choking sign where you wrap your both your hands around your neck. Her husband started giving her the heimlich maneuver and I just sat there in horror. Was I supposed to run over and help her?? These are the things they don't teach you in medical school. When the lady beside me starts to choke, do I run over? When I see a bad car accident, do I pull over?? All I know is that I completely freaked out about whether I was going to have to help that woman or not. Thank god her husband was able to wrangle the salami out of her, because I'm not sure I would have been able to. I told my friends Blair and Kaki (also in school with me) this story on the way to the lake the other day. I had to get their opinions about what they would have done. Blair said "Dude, I totally feel you because something like that happened to me the other night." Apparently, at 2AM she woke up to her doorbell ringing like crazy and when she opened the door her neighbor was standing there freaking out because her husband had stopped breathing and needed Blair's help. Fortunately, right when Blair started freaking out she saw the ambulance pull up in the neighbor's driveway so she was off the hook. Shhheeewwww. I just feel like at this point in my career I should be a little more confident in myself. Well, at least I'm not alone. There's always Blair.

So last night was Gradumucation Day Eve and I tried really hard to do it up right. For my college graduation, my sister, Jay, Jodie, and I (and the rest of the Clemson crew) got so lit on GDE that it was all I could do to even attend my own graduation the next day. After it was all over and I met back up with my family, I noticed that my sister, Jay, and Jodie all had enormous Hardee's cups in their hands. It turns out they were so hungover that they actually left my graduation and walked down to the nearest Hardee's for some refreshments. I was so mad when I found out but not because they left my graduation, because they got to leave and go to Hardee's without me. Those lucky bitches. Anyways, I went through all the motions last night and tried to recreate my college graduation eve, but it just wasn't the same. Boo. But there's always Daniel.

In other news, the Seis de Mayo party was a huge hit. The weather was perfect and it was bocce ball and margaritas galore. It was actually the most drama packed party I have thrown since college. Here's the rundown: Friend A hooked up with Friend B in the guest bedroom. Then later, Friend A hooked up with Friend C in MY bedroom. Once it got dark outside, Friend B was spotted smooching on Friend D in a dark corner of the yard. At the end of the night, Friend B went home with Friend D and Friends A and C made out in my front yard. I had to omit their real names because I am fairly sure Friend A and Friend C read the blog. I'll try to attach a group pic so you can play a little who's who. Note: I am none of the friends.

Ciao Venezia!



Saturday, May 5, 2007

Firenze and Venezia



I would like to begin this blog with an ode to nutella. If you don't know what nutella is, buddy, you are really missing out and you're gonna be really glad you read this blog. I could not think of any way to describe this wonderful gift from god and do it justice so I visited my favorite know-it-all for some help. Wikipedia defines Nutella as "a hazelnut based sweet chocolate spread." Ooooohhhhh yeah. My sister already knew about it before our trip, but I unfortunately did not. Here is the progression of the nutella obsession. At our very first hotel breakfast in Rome, my sister discovered little individual packets of nutella so she picked one up and spread it on some toast. I was shocked that someone had discovered how make eating chocolate for breakfast acceptable! So the next day, I thought hey, that would be great if you added some sliced up bananas on top of it. For our last breakfast in Rome we decided that the toast was just an unnecessary additive so we just started spooning the nutella directly onto the banana. I'm sure you can see where this is going....Well, for our first breakfast in Florence we could not find any nutella. My sister searched and searched and finally found little packets of stuff called Nutcao (which we have chosen to pronounce as "nut-cow" cuz its just funnier that way) which is a knockoff of Nutella. I'm happy to say that Nutcao is just as good as the original so we continued on with our daily breakfast of bananas and Nutcao. When we reached Venice there was no Nutella or Nutcao but there was DOL crem which appeared to be a knockoff of Nutcao (a knockoff of a knockoff) and was completely inedible. It didn't spread and it had a really bizarro semi-metallic taste to it. This just wouldn't work so we sought out a market and bought a big jar of Nutella. This is when we discovered, as you can imagine, that the banana was just an unnecessary additive also and we started spooning the shizzle straight out the jar. Since we came back from our trip we have started using the word nutcao in our everyday language because its just so friggin funny. You can say things like, "that stupid nutcao" or "why you gotta be such a nutcao?" Maybe this blog will get the word out there and then in a few months some random person will call me a nutcao. That would be awesome!

I'm gonna blog about Florence and Venice together because I'm having a Seis de Mayo party today at the hizzle so I gotta start getting ready for that. Florence was my favorite part of the trip by far. My new goal in life is to make enough money (or lets face it, marry someone who makes enough money) to buy a villa in the wine country. I didn't realize this but Tuscany is a large region in Italy and Florence is a city in Tuscany. So you just drive a few miles outside of the city and you are in the heart of the wine country. Florence was my favorite city for many reasons other than the obvious - it's in the middle of some of the best wine production in the world. It is a much smaller city than Rome but still has still has museums, restaurants, and shopping, and looks much more like a picturesque Italian city. And the people are much friendlier. For the second day we were in Florence we had arranged to have a private guide, Alessandro, take us up to the Chianti Classico region for a day of wine/cheese/olive oil tasting. I have to say, this was one of the best days of my life. The picture above is from the second winery we went to, Castello di Verrazzano, which had good wine but also had the best olive oil I have ever tasted. Check out my facebook to see the rest of the pics from this Florence.

From our day wine tasting comes one of my favorite stories of the whole trip. We started the day at 9AM at Castello di Vicchiomaggio, then went to Verrazzano, and then stopped at Montagliari for more wine tasting and to have lunch. After lunch Jay and I both had to go to the bathroom so we headed over to the water closet (what Italians and maybe even all Europeans for all I know) call the bathroom. There were two of them beside each other in a little building off the side of the area where we had lunch. Jay went in one bathroom and I went in the other. Once inside, to lock the door I had to work with some key on a chain that already was in the keyhole. I fumbled around with it for a good five minutes not knowing if I had locked the door or not before I said screw it and decided to just go ahead and take care of business. Right before I finished up and old, Italian man smoking a cigarette leisurely strolls into my bathroom and says very casually "Ooohhh, you forgot to lock the door" in a thick Italian accent and then takes a drag from his cigarette. Well, he didn't seem to be going anywhere very fast so I finished up and then asked him how to flush the toilet. Side note: in Italy, locating the mechanism to flush the toilet could be an Olympic event. Sometimes its on the sidewall, sometimes the backwall, sometimes the top of the toilet. Geez. Well, this time, as the old Italian man points out to me, it's hanging from the ceiling. So I flush the toilet, wash my hands, and then me and the old Italian man still smoking the cigarette exit the bathroom where we find a very drunk and confused Jay waiting for me. He says, "Ummmm....was he helping you???" I wish I had a picture of the look of shock and horror on this face. I do have to admit, the lack of urgency the Italian man felt to leave the bathroom once he saw me sitting on the toilet was kinda strange.

After 3 days in Florence we packed up and took the train to Venice. We got off to a bad start in Venice because my stoopy sister left her backpack under her seat on the train. I mean you're just asking to lose something when you put it under a seat. Just go ahead and kiss it goodbye. Well about ten minutes after getting off the train and hauling all of our luggage (which easily could have supplied a normal family for a year in Italy) over an enormous bridge complete with stairs, my sister remembered the backpack. She ran back there and the train was still there, but her backpack was not. Fortunately, her passport and money weren't in there but Jay's camera was along with a lot of other miscellaneous small stuff that is inexpensive but bugs the crap out of you when you dont have it....like Chapstick. We were lucky because I had also been taking pictures along the way, but it sucked because Jay had taken all the funny pics like the one of a guy wearing a shirt that said "F**k the Babysitter." We thought that was hilarious until we saw about 10 other guys wearing it throughout our trip. Anyways, Venice was great. It was much slower than Rome and Florence so it was a great place for the last leg of our trip. They say that you can't get lost in Venice because its an island, but if you have ever been to Venice you know that's a bunch of b.s. We got lost every single time we tried to go anywhere. For instance the directions we were given to get to a restaurant said take your first left. We thought that we took our first left but after being lost for a good 20 minutes we backtracked and found that the first left was actually what can only be desribed as crack between two buildings. It was only wide enough for a small animal or a human walking sideways. We finished out 3 wonderful days in Venice and then headed back to the airport for another pleasurable 11 hour flight. All in all, we had an amazing time and have even more amazing memories. I would tell anyone to take a trip over to Italy if you get the chance, just make sure you take a boatload of moo-la with you, cuz that junk is hella pricey.

All right, I gotta get ready for a day of bocce ball and margaritas. I'll try to upload a pic from the party on the next blog.

Ciao!
ps. How do my blog-fans feel about my sign-off being "ciao?" I am having trouble coming up with something non-gay sounding, but I gotta have some way to end the blog.

Wednesday, May 2, 2007

When in Rome...


Ok, so if I tried to tell you about the whole trip in one blog, you would be reading this until tomorrow so I have decided to divide the trip into 3 blogs. Blog 1 will be about Rome, blog 2 Florence, and blog 3 Venice. This pic of me and my sis was taken on Day 1 in Rome at 11am Italy time, 5am my time, after 15 hours of flying. If you check out my facebook you can a pic of what I really felt like at this time.
I'll start off by telling you about the worst part of the trip - the 11 hour flight. Twice. I'm not a great flier even on short little trips. I've got everything working against me: I have freakishly long legs for a woman, get sweaty at the drop of a hat, and am the most impatient person you will ever meet. We left Atlanta at 7 PM and were to arrive in Rome at 11AM Rome time, or 6AM Atlanta time. I was OK til about hour 5 when the bitching ensued. Actually, I think the bitching ensued around hour 3 when dinner was being served. We were informed that we had a choice of chicken or pasta. Seeing as my mom and I were seated in the next to last row (right in front of the smelly bathroom I might add) on a gigantic plane, by the time the flight attendants got to us it was 10PM and they were out of chicken so we had to eat pasta. No so bad you you're thinking, right? Well then they announce that there will be a complimentary alcoholic beverage served with the dinner. So once again, they start back at the front and by the time they get to us we have a choice of a Goldschlagger shot or a bottle of Delta Airlines Mojito mix (sans alcohol). Lovely. I mean, why they always gotta start at the front. Wouldn't it be just as easy to alternate?? Start at the front with drinks, start at the back with dinner. Then at least everyone would get one thing they want!!! Well, after dinner, a movie I had already seen, my mom squirting mustard and spilling coffee on herself, everyone started raring back, putting on their eye masks, and falling asleep. I would like to ask you, blog-fans, how can people do this?? I tried everything including drugs to fall asleep but I just cant sleep at a 75 degree angle with a pillow the size of a postage stamp. It can't be done!! So I started a cycle of sitting for a half hour and then walking around the plane for a few minutes to relieve the unbearable cramping in my freakishly long legs. I continued doing this for the next 6 hours until we were finally released from the hell that was Delta flight 7364. And don't even get me started on how long it took us to get off the plane after being stuck in the reject seats in the bathroom.
This blog is already too long and I haven't even begun to talk about the actual trip yet. Perhaps I should have divided the blog into 4 parts and given the plane its own section. Oh well, I'll hit up the highlights of Rome.
On Day 1, we were exhausted by the time we got to the hotel so we promptly crashed on our beds after waiting only an hour in a small room while a mean Italian man readied our rooms. After a quick nap we headed out for some pizza and wine and to the Colisseum and Roman Forum for a little sight-seeing. At the Colisseum there were a few questionably drunk gentlemen dressed as Roman gladiators hanging around the front so Jay (my brother-in-law) rightly exclaims "I think I feel a blog picture coming on!!" I really wanted a pic but after waiting in line behind dozens of four year olds and hearing that these highway robbers were charging 5 euro ($6.50) per picture, I gave up. Sorry guys.
Day 2 we did a whole lot of walking and our dogs were barking. Woof....woof. We saw the Pantheon and a whole lotta churches and other touristy stuff. Most importantly, I ate a lot of salami and cheese.
Day 3 was the best day. We walked to the train station and rode to the Vatican, which apparently is about 10 miles outside of Rome. We were scheduled to take a tour, which made me slightly nervous because during the previous two days walking around Rome independently I had seen many, many tour groups and they were all wearing some sort of embarrassing flare. Whether it be a neon orange bandana, a bright yellow shirt, or some sort of electronic headgear, they all screamed "Look at me, I am a loser!" Needless to say, I was very happy when we arrived and learned that we did not have wear anything other than what we came with. I failed to mention that before we arrived for said tour, we waited in a line longer than one for a Star Wars movie on opening night (I mean it wrapped around 3 walls of the Vatican) and every 10 feet or so passed by a different African trying to sell us some sort of fake designer bag, belt, or sunglasses. Well, our tour guide was a Brit named Agnes and she was awesome. I wish she could read the blog so that she could see her shout out. Not only was she extremely knowledgable, but in my mind most importantly, extremly sarcastic. She was very funny and said things like "jolly good." We had to be in line at 11:30AM and the tour was over at 5 so by 5, our dogs were barkin'. Woof....woof.
We headed over to a little pizzera to sit down and rest the dogs for a bit while having some drinks when I decided that I had to have a few knock-off purses. My sister and Jay being the masters of stragtegery that they are, helped me finagle my money into the correct pockets of my pants, and taught me the basics of haggling. I approached ready to buy 2 bags for no more than 25 euro. I found a guy with both the bags I wanted in his little display and got started. I got him down to 30 euro for both bags, but I was only willing to pay 25 so I started to walk away certain that he would come running after me offering to sell me the bags for 25. Well......he didn't. My sister and I couldn't believe it and didn't know what to do. So we cleverly hid behind some other purse stand and re-strategerized. We decided to approach his neighboring purse hawker (literally 3 feet to his right) and start the bidding. We got him down to 35 euro and he wouldn't go any lower. We tried to explain to him that his friend said he would take 30 so there is no way we were going to buy from him. As you can imagine, I'm pretty sure he had no idea what we were talking about with the HUGE language barrier. I mean he was negotiating by typing numbers into his cell phone because we couldn't even understand what numbers he was saying. Just damn. So....we left him and stepped 3 feet back to the left and began again with the first guy. After a few minutes, a new guy who seemed to be in charge came over, uttered something in the click-click language, and next thing I know, I have 2 bags for 25 euro. Job well done. We headed back to the train station fully loaded with pizza, wine, and knockoff designer bags.
Those are the highlights of Rome. I'll blog again about Florence in a few days after I recuperate from writing this blog. So sorry if you fell asleep somewhere during Day 1. I guess I'm not a very good summarizer. You can check out the pics from the trip on my facebook if you so desire.
For now,
Ciao!!

Friday, April 20, 2007

Substance P brings the PAIN





In the small world of Columbia's trivia, me and a few of my friends are known as team "Substance P" (an extremely nerdy medical term, the details of which I will not bore you, but we like it anyway). We play trivia every Tuesday night at the Flying Saucer down in the Vista. The first time we all went to trivia night we tore it up and won first place (your choice of either $50 or 3 t-shirts that say "We Kicked Your Ass at Trivia Night"). We, of course, chose the t-shirts. I'm fairly certain that that is the sucker deal. Anyways, in the next couple of weeks we did not do as well, but did end up getting second place one week which gave us two more t-shirts. There are 6 of us in the group (4 are pictured), so one person still lacked a t-shirt (shout out to Melissa!). We really want everyone in the group to have one so we can be the complete losers who show up to trivia night in all six matching t-shirts. I'm sure that will make us some friends. In the next few weeks, we really sucked it up big time and did not even come close to placing. So, we made the decision to try our luck at a different trivia night. We decided on Wednesday night at Jillian's because the pot is much bigger ($100) and I feel certain there are way more stoopies at Jillian's than Flying Saucer based on my few times going there.



Well, I was right about there being way more stoopies there (our waitress was a prime example, I can't believe she can even remember to breathe) but there was another interesting group there. I failed to mention above that at the Flying Saucer we have a slight rivalry with the team "Swallow, or it's in your eyes." We have never seen them before because they are a real quiet, mysterious team but we had been losing in the previous weeks to them frequently. Let me mention here that Substance P is not a quiet, mysterious team as I act obnoxiously when we do well and make sure everyone else knows it. Last night, we were on fire. They announce who is in the lead after each round and we were always in first place. We went into the final round (think final round of Jeopardy) in first place with 68 points. The next closest team (whose name I can't remember) was right behind us at 67. Well, you can wager up to 15 points and you have to wager at least one point. For the final question you had to put a list of five 80s movies in order according to how much money they grossed, and it was all or nothing. So we, of course, only wagered 1 point. I'm sure you can see where this is going. We managed to guess the answers correctly and were immediately pissed we only wagered one point but waited anxiously to hear where we placed. We ended up getting second place to "Swallow, or it's in your eyes" who had come from way behind by answering the final question correctly and wagering 15 points on it. We couldn't believe it. And not only that we had lost to them, but that the whole time they were the four guys sitting at the table directly beside us that I had been gloating to all night. Oops. We tucked our tails between our legs and ran out of there leaving a grand 80 cents on $80 for our tard of a watiress. So I have decided that they must do a grand tour of all the trivia nights in Columbia. Publick House Monday, FS Tuesday, Jillian's Wednesday, Harper's Thursday. I think one week Substance P should do the tour to see if my theory is correct.

If you're interested, here is the final round question. Give me some guesses and I will post the answers later (sorry Ryan, you can't participate).

Put the following movies in descending order of how much money they grossed (no cheating):
1. Batman
2. Raiders of the Lost Ark
3. Return of the Jedi
4. Ghostbusters
5. ET
Ok, blog-fans...this is my last post before the big trip to Italy. We leave tomorrow and will be gone for about 12 days. I hadn't planned on blogging while I'm over there, but if I get really hard up I will check out a internet cafe and give you an update. I expect some quality comments while I am gone and you can expect one hell of a blog when I get back.

Ciao!

Wednesday, April 18, 2007

life is NOT better on the beach

So almost a year ago I had really packed on the LBs so I made the extremely unwise decision to go on the South Beach diet. The premise of this diet is that for the first two weeks you don't consume any alcohol, caffeine, sugar, or carbs in order to get rid of your sugar cravings. Well, I'm sure all my blog-fans know this was beyond difficult for me. After the first two weeks you can slowly add back in some carbs and one glass of wine per day, but absolutely no beer or sugary liquor drinks. I ended up dropping some major poundage (which I of course gained back the minute I went off the stinkin' diet) and vowed to myself that I would never participate in the South Beach diet (SBD from here on) again.

In approximately 3 days, me and the rest of the McCullough/Byars clan will be beverly-hillbillyin it over to Italy and in an attempt to not be the fat American in Italy I again made the extremely unwise decision to go back on the SBD. I am anticipating a 10 pound weight gain while in Italy from what I can only guess will be a gorge fest on pasta, pizza, wine, bread, and gelato so I thought that maybe I should drop 10 before I go. This time around I decided to modify the diet ever so slightly by continuing to drink wine throughout the first two weeks. Well, let's just say I figured out why you are not supposed to drink any alcohol at all during the first two weeks. It has nothing to do with alcohol spiking your blood sugar or any of that crap and everything to do with what you eat when you're three sheets to the wind. Let's just say that I think I have managed to gain 10 pounds in two weeks on the diet so when you add in the 10 I plan on gaining in Italy, I have really gained 20 pounds while dieting. Is this even possible??

Which leads me to the title of this blog. Have you seen those commercials for the SBD where there are all these beautiful people at this amazing party standing around eating appetizers and drinking out of pineapples with little umbrellas talking about how great the SBD is?? Well, that is a load of crap!! They can't drink those drinks! Life WOULD be much better on the beach if that was what the diet about. Anyways, I digress. Don't do the SBD. Period.

Goodnight blog,
Jessie

UPDATE from previous blog: My mother really enjoys the blog but thinks that it is very inappropriate for a doctor to have a blog entitled "My Life as a Lush." I, however, think that my blog title is very indicative of my life and appropriate. What do you think blog-fans?? Should I change the title of my blog? If so, any suggestions??

Sunday, April 15, 2007

in the beginning....


So I'm sure most of you reading this blog have thought to yourself at one time or another, "why is it so hard to get in touch with Jessie?? I mean, I call her, I email her, text her, snail mail her, and nothing." Well, my friends and family, it has nothing to do with how much I love or hate you and all to do with my sheer laziness. However, armed with 3 loooonnngg months off and a new digital camera and facebook, I am making a full-hearted attempt at staying in touch. Here it goes....


This weekend myself, Jodie (my heterosexual life mate or HLM) and Aurelia (friend from high school who I lost touch with but recently have gotten back in touch with due to her wise decision to move back to Columbia) took the 3 hour car ride up to the booming metropolis of Waynesville, NC for a girls only mountain weekend. First things I noticed as we entered Waynesville: we were the youngest people there by a good 30 years and a full set of teeth is absolutely not necessary to reside here. All fine and dandy by me as I packed only comfy clothes and had no intention of leaving the moutain house until Sunday when it was time to leave. I know Aurelia was stressin over planning stuff for us to do the whole time we were up there, but clearly she did not know of my ability to fully enjoy myself doing absolutely nothing. You know how there are some people that gotta be doing stuff all the time and seeing all the sites to have a good vacay?? Well hey, that ain't me.


So we stopped at the local Ingles on the way into town to pick up some necessities and then headed to the house. We popped open a bottle wine, I cooked us up some bleu cheese hamburgers, and the fun began. In the hours that followed, we basically played special olympics trivial pursuit 90's edition (I am pretty sure one pie piece was earned in two hours), Aurelia fell off her chair (which I didn't get a pic of in my drunken state because I couldn't figure out my new camera), and a random dog scared the living day lights out of me when he showed up in the window. Think, Cujo. All in all, a great night.


The next morning I woke up at 6am to the sound of 4 million birds wanting to mate. Literally, I thought I was inside a bird house these freakin birds were so loud. As soon as the loud leader of the crew would shut it, a new and louder bird would chime in. In classic Jessie fashion, I could not be the only one annoyed by the birds so I casually called Jodie's name as she was sleeping in the twin bed beside me. As soon as she woke up, I asked her if she heard the birds. "What birds?" she asked. It only took her about 10 seconds before she was soo annoyed by the birds that she wanted me to die. Well, she couldn't sleep anymore so she got up at 6:15 am and made coffee and did all that and I, of course, peacefully went back to sleep 'til 9. Sarah, does this remind you of anything???


The rest of the weekend was spent drinking, relaxing, and talking and we sadly made our way home tonight around 7. A great weekend was had by all!! All right, I'm off to cap off my weekend with the Food Network Awards and then some bird-free sleep. Comment, please!!