So last night while I was laying in bed, it suddenly occured to me that Ouch, normally the bedsheet does not cause me any pain in the knee. So why was my knee all sore and tender now?

Today I had a look and my knee is all black and blue and purple, like someone had at it with a stick or club or something.

Now I don’t recall any kind of beat-down, nor for that matter do I remember taking any unexpected trips to the ground. So this can only be the result of one thing:

Evil Invisible Garden Gnomes.

They’re sneaking into my house at night and beating me with sticks while I’m asleep.

I know they’re invisible because I can’t see any garden gnomes in the neighborhood when I look for them. And I surmise that they are evil because they’re invisible, and therefore they can be evil and get away with it.

Plus, if they were friendly or visible garden gnomes, I’d like to think they would sneak in and clean my house while I slept, rather than pummel me with blunt objects.

Here is photographic proof: You can clearly see that no friendly or visible garden gnomes exist. Therefore the only garden gnomes in this photo are the evil invisible variety. It is conclusive!

Another dentistry day. I guess I’m paying my dues for having avoided dentists for so long. Ok it’s not a guess, it’s a fact.

I knew this was coming back in November – that was the plan. Once the wisdom teeth were out, he could get at the trio of cavities that were hiding at the back. Well, today he got at them.

To be fair, the actual drilling wasn’t so bad. The needles were worse, as usual. Jabby jabby pokey pokey in the gums. Then he accidentally squirted some of the freezing into my mouth and wow that stuff tastes toxic. It tastes like what I imagine drain cleaner would taste like. Just a horrid, horrid nasty medical waste kind of taste.

The other thing that I really don’t enjoy is the sensation of being tipped upside-down, in that scary mechanical chair contraption, while they fill my mouth up with stainless steel and water. Being in that position triggers my sleep apnea only not while sleeping, so my throat keeps trying to close up and I can’t breath. So they’re busy excavating, one pipe bringing water in, another pipe taking water out (but not as fast as it’s coming in) and all the power tools and stuff, I’m clinging to the chair to keep from sliding headfirst out of it, and gagging for air… Actually that might be slightly worse than the needles. Or not. I’m not sure.

Oh and the other other thing is, just before he started working he cranked up his radio to full blast. He thinks that music blaring at full volume helps people relax and takes their mind off the drill. Maybe for some people. I can’t stand loud noises. I hate going to clubs and stuff like that where there’s noise and music blaring away. The loud blaring music was as relaxing to me as, well… it’s just not relaxing at all.

Think about taking a cat to the vet then the vet turns on his shop-vac and sets it next to your cat, to help the cat calm down. Yeah. Loud music. Car horns. Jackhammers. Crying babies. Chainsaws. And for that matter, vacuums. They all have the same effect on me, and that effect is not a calming one. Fortunately at one point I was able to ask them to turn off the radio.

That was all this morning though. Now the freezing has worn off, and I’m just left with a nagging ache in one of the teeth he worked on. Or maybe it’s all three of them, but one is worse than the others.

I really hate going to the dentist.

In the TV series Buffy the Vampire Slayer, the character Anya had been a normal person who was recruited by demons to become a vengance demon specializing in scorned women. There was also another vengance demon in one episode, who specialized in neglected children.

Just on the off chance that there are any demon recruiters cruising teh interwebs, I’d just like to mention, I’m available.

I’d specialize in asshats who didn’t know how to use turn signals or stop signs. When innocent drivers wind up in prangs because some asshat cut them off, failed to signal, or didn’t stop, they could summon me, and I’d make sure that Horrible Things happened to the Asshole in question.

I’d just add one thing to my demon contract, that I wouldn’t have to do my evil against my family.

Otherwise, I could totally get down with the live forever, perform evil horrible deeds against assholes who can’t drive, and generally just being nasty.

So, evil demon recruiters – get in touch. I’m available.

I’m absolutely exhausted, and the servers and routers and switches and cables are all conspiring against me. They laugh at me when I’m not looking, they’re dropping packets all over the floor and leaking bits down the back of the shelves.

At night they must have little fights — or maybe they’re getting up to something naughty — because the cables all get twisted and knotted up into a big tangle.

I don’t know why they hate me so. I try to keep them happy and well-fed. I only get tempted to pour soda pop onto their CPUs after they’ve been acting up. They started it. 

They’re mean and nasty and evil. Stoopid computers.

p.s. Next time someone mentions the dust on the server shelves, I’m going to tell them that it’s not dust, it’s all the bits we keep losing from the packet collisions. And I’m going to try and keep a straight face. “Don’t touch it! It’s digital!”

Great song, great video, great fun.

Ultimate Showdown of Ultimate Destiny

Just when I was getting used to it being light out when I woke up in the morning, they go and change the time zones on us. Throws my circadian rythms all out of whack, and I have enough trouble sleeping as it is. It’s even worse since they tinkered with the time a year or two ago – now standard time is only like 4 months long and savings time is 8 months? What the hell? Why not just shift everyone by one time zone and call it a day?

I didn’t even know the time had changed this year – the clock in my bedroom updates automagically thanks to the WWV broadcasts, and so does the big clock in my livingroom. The computers all update themselves too. Appearantly so does my cellphone and PDA. So I didn’t know the time had changed till I was talking with my sister and she mentioned it – here I thought I had slept in an extra hour, because when I got up on Sunday it was an hour later than I usually wake. But no it was me getting up at the normal time and the clocks all changing while I’m not looking.

To be fair, they didn’t all change. The teeny clock on my thermostat didn’t, but I never look at it. And the clocks on my stove and microwave are always wrong anyways, so I never look at them either. (The stove always has something whacky going on, like 5 3/8th hours fast or whatever and the microwave is just always…12:00 12:00 12:00..)

Of course, Monday morning I found out that one other clock didn’t get updated – my alarm clock. So I was an hour late getting out of bed — or more accurately, I woke up at exactly the same time as always, it was the rest of the world that was an hour fast. This was a good thing though because I couldn’t sleep Sunday night. Couldn’t sleep last night either – I had some down-time between about 6 and 8pm, then was wide awake till 2am. So even though I remembered to set my alarm clock, I was still an hour late this morning because I was able to sleep through the first hour of noise.

Oh and one other clock that is being obstinate – the clock in my car is *supposed* to automatically update, but it didn’t. So I switched it to manual and set it myself. And 5 minutes later I notice that it has switched itself back to automatica *and* switched itself back to the standard time. Dammit. I know what’s up with it though – it’s running some flavour of windoze and bill-knows-best. So my car will stay on Eastern Standard Time until it feels obliged to change itself.

Personally I’d like to just abolish this whole time change nonsense and be done with it. For that matter, everything’s global anyways, so my 9:00 is less relavent because then you have to coordinate what time zone everyone else is and try and figure it out. Maybe we ought to just all switch to UTC. Just have a standard global time standard that doesn’t bounce around from season to season.

At the sound of the tone, the time will be 14:19 Universal Coordinated Time.
Tick.
Tick.
Tick.
Tick.
BEEEEEEEEEP.

12:00
12:00
12:00
12:00
12:00
12:00
12:00
12:00
12:00

So much going on, so little posting about it.

So I had a CAT scan last week. (CAT scan? CT scan? Whatever it was, no cats were harmed in the process.) They fed me into a giant whining machine and examined my head – a process which some will feel was long overdue.

The head-exam was ostensibly to see if there is a cause to the short sharp stabbing headaches I have been getting in the back of my head. It feels a lot like someone stabbing the back of my head, but when I check there’s noone there, so it could be a medical thing. I can’t help but wonder, however, what else they might find. Certainly there’s lots of things that it would be interesting to explain – could they find a reason for….
  •  my depression?
  •  my insomnia?
  •  the constant ringing in my ears?
  •  my sometimes-’quirky’ behavior?
  •  my prosopagnosia?
  •  the odd compulsions I get sometimes?
  •  the occasional self-destructive tendancies?
  •  the way I don’t feel like I relate to anyone and don’t understand normal human emotions or behavior?
  •  any of the other neuological oddities I’ve presented over the last 20 – 25 years?

Or will they find….nothing at all?

I know, ha-ha-ha they looked in my head and there was nothing there. Seriously though, for most of the other problems I’ve got, they can’t find any explanation. So why would any of this be different? Short stabbing headaches in the back of my head, might just be a normal natural thing for me. Who knows?

But then, if they do find something what will it be? A tumor? A mystrious ‘dark area’ that they can’t explain? Demons? A tiny alien controlling me? Worms?

Then I wonder, if they do find something, who’s to say they will tell us? The way these things work here is a technician runs the machine, he sees the pictures but is not allowed to tell the patient/subject what he sees and the patient/subject is not allowed to see the pictures. The pictures then go to an ‘expert’ who looks at them, and without any direct access or information from the patient, the ‘expert’ decides how to interpret the pictures. Then they type up a written report and send that to the doctor, so the doctor also doesn’t see the pictures. Then the doctor reads the report and files it away then tells the patient (paraphrases) what was in the report. At any step along the way, they could just decide there’s nothing noteworthy. So if there are demons or tiny aliens or worms or a mysterious dark patch, they could just say there’s nothing, or it’s inconclusive. So if the report is that there’s nothing, or it’s inconclusive, how do I know that’s really the case? It’s quite possible that the tech or the ‘expert’ is in on it!

Realisticly though, what do I hope they find / what do I want to learn? I mean, if it’s a tumor (or demons or aliens or worms) then what? This is a whole different philosophical area for me. What makes me, me? If I am who I am because of some wierdness going on in my noggin, then if they fix the wierdness will I still be me?

Being me has some downsides (see the list above) but there are some cool things too, I think. Would I risk losing the good things, to get rid of the bad? That’s a question I don’t have an answer to. Though if I had to make a snap decision, right now I’d probably say no. Take the good and the bad together and stick with what I know.

So in that case, then what’s really at stake is not fixing things, but just understanding them – getting the why’s. And ultimately I think that is what I’m about – understanding, learning.

There – I feel better now, I’ve resolved something. Take care, be well, stay sane.