Hooboy, here it is… Breast Cancer Awareness Month! Oh how terribly exciting! Every single year my doctors see fit to scare the shit out of me. Not this year, you soul sucking bastards! Screw the mammogram, screw the ultrasound, screw the unneeded biopsy. I’m going straight for the MRI. Take that!

For the fifth year running, a group of bloggers is promoting the Annual Boobie-Thon. The premise is… interesting. You send in pictures of your boobies. They put your boobies on their website and charge people $50 a pop to peek at them, if they are bare that is. Covered boobies are free to look at. The money is then donated to either The Komen Foundation or Children’s Hospital Boston.

According to the site, “If they’re worth looking at, they’re worth saving!”

Uh. Yeah.

Breast cancer isn’t about not being able to look at someone’s tatas for pleasure anymore. Breast cancer is about life and death. It destroys more than just boobs, it destroys lives, victim and surviving family alike. And I am more than just a place for my boobs to rest.

Needless to say, I won’t be sending in a picture. Knock yourself out if you want to, I’m not here to judge you. It’s a good cause, and while the Komen Foundation is one big marketing machine, some research is better than no research I suppose.

If you’d like an alternative, check out one of my absolute favorite bloggers, Twisty at I Blame The Patriarchy. For every person that doesn’t send her a boob shot, she’ll donate $1 to Breast Cancer Action. Her deadline is midnight Tuesday.

And don’t forget ladies, get your mammograms done. If you are 40 and over, get busy making your appointment. If you are like me and have a serious family history of this disease, start getting them done when you are 30. And get them done Every Single Year. No good comes from waiting.

As mentioned previously, I had to go in for a long over due looksee at the lungs recently. If you haven’t been here awhile here’s the short version: I found out, quite by accident, a couple of years ago that I am in the beginning stages of emphysema. Mmmm… yummy.

For quite a while, I had continued to not smoke and exercise, but stress earlier this year pushed me over the edge and I found myself lighting up more often than not. With my move over the summer, I found myself having trouble catching my breath a bit more frequently than in the past. After a bit of procrastination, I made an appointment with my doctor and we scheduled an afternoon of fun and excitement at the local imaging center.

This morning I arrived at work to see my voice mail light dutifully blinking at me (yes, sadly, even the devil’s daughter is oft times forced to maintain a semblance of normalcy and have a job.) The good news is that there has been no change in my lungs since my last scan. And as long as I can keep that up, I’ll be around to rant and rave for centuries to come.

Okay, maybe not so much the crazy life, but certainly the hectic one!

Got home from my wonderful weekend at the beach only to spend Monday morning at the DMV. Joy of joys. I’ll spare you the boring details, suffice it to say working knowledge of the DMV computer system does not appear to be a pre-requisite for employment. Neither does the ability to listen and comprehend what is being said to you. Bah.

I began taking Wellbutrin on Monday as well. I’m preparing for yet another go around at the big quit. I tried so hard last time. Okay, maybe not so hard, but I tried dammit! According to my lovely PCP, I need to take this stuff for two weeks before attempting to quit again. Then I need to cover my body in nicotine patches, and stay away from smokers. This last part is not possible. Blah. For the next three weeks I’ll be dizzy and slightly nauseous as my body gets used to the Wellbutrin. Good times.

In other mundane news, I get to have cat scans on my lungs again. Oh goody. I am not going to bitch and complain though, I brought this shit on myself. I know what my condition is and I light up one cigarette after another anyway. No one to blame but me.

The kids return on Friday, I get another year older on Sunday, and school kicks back in on Tuesday. My work schedule has kicked into high gear, and I may not see the light of day for the next two months.

Is it any wonder I smoke?

I believe I spoke with most of you regarding the biopsy, but for those who were looking for updates here, I apologize for not doing this sooner. The short version is that the second doctor I saw believes there is absolutely nothing to worry about. While I have an MRI scheduled for early December, she is quite confident that this will turn up nothing that we need to be concerned with. Yay for that! The longer version is a bit more complicated than all that, but I think the short version will suffice for the internets.

I’ve been busy busy busy (can you be *that* busy?) getting ready for the sacrificial turkey, planning some interesting side projects to work on (yes, I know I should probably finish the ones I’ve started, but I like overwhelming myself), and basically being Supermom. And then, of course, there is that whole work thing. What with them expecting me to actually, you know, work and all.

There will be more to come later… stewing on a couple of things that I need to spit out before they kill me. Some of what’s going on in my head is a direct result of the biopsy post, and some is just me being, well, me. Hopefully, I’ll have time before I have to kill the bird, but most likely not.

See you soon!

Thankfully October is over, with all of its pink ribbons and commercials and walks and other boob insanity. Don’t get me wrong, I have a lovely little pink ribbon on my car (I am such a girl!) and am all about us women taking our breasts more seriously than simply objects for sexual gratification. My mother died from breast cancer when she was a mere 36 years old. Her older sister also died from it, a little older, but still well before menopause even thought about kicking in. My remaining aunt lives by the adage of “not if, but when.”

I am faithful in my mammograms, and had one done in October like a million other women. I try to take it all in stride. But tonight maybe not so much striding, and more of panicky self-indulgence.

Read the rest of this entry »

I have remained, on this blog at least, silent over the absolute asinine way our government has handled the Katrina debacle. I have ranted and raved elsewhere, keeping my little blog clean of the profanities that have streamed out of my mouth.

Quite frankly, I was quiet because I am lazy. *hangs head in shame*

I am not going to rehash it here; if you know me, you know how I feel. It was a complete clusterfuck and I’m ashamed of my government. We’ll just leave it at that.

However, while we were all staring at our television in horror, crying and ranting in fury and shame, the FDA pulled a quiet little stunt so mind boggling that I’m still trying to figure out the why of it.

On August 31, Susan Wood resigned her post as the Director of the Office of Women’s Health. She cites the continuing limiting of access to “Plan B” as her reason. Who can blame her? The FDA continues to dink around with this, giving no clear cut reason to deny the access of an emergency method of birth control as an over-the-counter product. And just so you aren’t confused, this drug is NOT the same as RU-486. It is not “abortion in a bottle”, it is an emergency contraceptive. And it is completely ignorant to not have it available OTC. Period.

Getting back on track… I’m so tweaked out that I’m close to ranting…

As mentioned, Dr. Wood resigns. And we all sigh and say, “Who can blame her?” And then, proving once again that our government is completely out of touch with reality, on September 16 FDA Commissioner Lester Crawford appoints a new Acting Director. One Dr. Norris Alderson, the agency’s associate commissioner for science, who has spent much of his career in FDA’s Center for Veterinary Medicine. Yes, that’s right, animal husbandry. We women are, after all, just cattle.

*stream of profanities too obscene for public consumption*

Picked up quickly by women’s organizations, including Planned Parenthood, the FDA backpedals and sends out a different press release. So who’s in charge? Theresa Toigo has been named acting director, and the FDA claims they never announced anyone other than that.

WTF? How about this Google cache? Mmmm… love me some technology!

I’m not sure what frustrates me more, that it happened in the first place, that they lied about it, that there was so little reported in the mainstream media, or that I am so far behind the times that I didn’t hear about it when it happened. I’m still so pissed off that I’m seeing red.

Fucktards.

According to the American Lung Association: Over 3.1 million Americans have been diagnosed with emphysema, of which 91% were 45 years of age or older. Emphysema rarely occurs in those under 45.

I’m not even 40 yet! *shakes fist at sky*

Read the rest of this entry »