The Hijacking of a Language

Okay, pretend you never heard of Apple or Microsoft -- or their products. Now read this sentence, featured in the comments on the PI's Microsoft blog:

"The reason leopard looks like vista is because vista looks like tiger."

I thought it was funny, anyways.

'A diver, huh?'

That quote, from one stop in my three-part hospital visit today, reminded me of my famous first attempt at skydiving. When we landed that day, my instructor and tandem jumper unhooked our parachutes and safety straps then looked at me and said, "Screamer, huh?" It wasn't until that point that I realized I'd been screaming for our entire 12,000-foot fall.

But I'm getting ahead of myself.

Today is my monthly oncologist appointment and bimonthly MRI scan, and also time to stop at the hospital lab for my weekly blood draw. It's a time of month that always makes me cranky, mainly because it means I'm about to start another round of chemo. On top of that, today's appointments were annoyingly split between early this morning and this afternoon, meaning two trips back and forth between West Seattle and the University of Washington across town. I had decided to avoid that by hanging out for several hours at the University Village shopping center, but after a stop at the Starbucks and quick tours through the bookstore and Apple store I got bored and tired and came back home instead.

Anyway, when I showed up for my MRI this morning the tech lady whose job was to hook up an IV for the contrast dye greeted me with a cheery, "Did you bring your veins with you today?"

I hoped so, remembering my last visit here when the rookie tech stabbed my arm five times and spilled blood all over the chair and my arm before getting a vein. This time, no problem, and the MRI was its loud but normal no-sweat self; half an hour later I was out of there.

So I stopped by the lab to get the blood draw. What would make sense, it seems to me, would be if they could use the same IV to draw the blood that they had just used for the contrast, but no, it was sort-of explained to me, that was against procedures. So the lab lady tapped my right arm and whipped out her needle.

Poke. Nothing. Poke. Nothing.

That's when she said, "Oh, you've got a diver, huh?"

Turns out that's her term, or maybe it's blood-industry jargon, for a vein that seems to dive below the surface out of the way of the incoming needle. So I guess I didn't bring my veins with me today after all, at least not all of them.

No problem, my new friend reassured me, we'll just find another spot. She went on to tell some horror tales of patients, mostly heroin abusers who had ruined all their veins and had to be poked behind the knee or between the toes. One guy, she heard, had so abused his veins but was so desperate for a fix that he was found in a bathroom with a needle stuck in his eyeball.

I could feel little beads of sweat starting to form on my forehead about that time, but she found a non-diver in my right hand and that was that.

Now I'm heading back for a consultation with Dr. Spence or his able nurse practitioner, Jennifer. Update to come.

On the skydiving, by the way: I didn't want my legacy to be "screamer," so I went again a couple of months later. No screaming. Just pure, silent, terror.

Evening update: This afternoon's appointment was no biggie. Dr. Spence seemed pleased by the new scan; no new growth equals good news, he said. We did our little routine -- squeeze my finger, look at my nose -- and then he locked and loaded for another round, still at the reduced dosage that I've been on for the past two cycles. That'll start on Monday.

Cucinare

Many years ago, back when I met Mark, he told me that he liked to cook. For years, I kept hearing this "like to cook" story, but never saw much evidence of it. Once, he made a little dish of grilled sausage, pepper and onions, and man, it was good. But that was it for years. Then he pulled out the famous family sausage and meatball spaghetti recipe. Again, delicious. But cooker Mark went back into hibernation for years.

Now, all of a sudden, Mark's a total cooker. Tonite, he made a genius rotini with eggplant and riccotta. Last week, he made the delish sausage and meetball. He's made a few other things lately. I've gotten to the point where I call hopefully when it's time to come home and ask "what's for dinner?"

If this is part of the personality change that comes with having a scoop of your brain removed, I say bring it on.

What's for dinner tomorrow?

Il Pepe

Okay, today we start our daily Italian vocabulary word feature. I have a box of 1,000 vocabulary words, and every night I will dip, without looking, into the box for our new word. Today the word is "Il pepe."

Noun: pepper (spice)


Il pepe. Maybe Kaye can use it in a sentence. I don't know enough words yet.

'Just fire me'

Last night was the final meeting of Franny's weekly acting class at Seattle Children's Theatre, and the last half-hour was open for parents to come check out what the kids have been learning. It wasn't really a performance, more like a demonstration of the theater games they've been working on -- mostly basic improvisation exercises designed to teach observation and movement onstage.

The class was all girls, eight or nine of them, all about Franny's middle-school age. The parents all seemed into it and supportive, although some weren't exactly theater savants.

Trying to jump-start one improv, the teacher, Andy, asked the audience to suggest a verb.

"Two!" shouted one woman.

"OK," Andy said. "I'm thinking more of an action verb. Anything else ...?" I heard the woman mutter to her husband: "Shoot, that's not even a verb, is it?"

Later, when Andy asked for an object, the husband tossed him his hat. Thank you, Andy said, but I really just need a suggestion of an object.

So in one of the improv games -- Mean Boss, I think it was called -- Franny was asked to step outside the room while the rest of the class agreed on the setup. They were workers in a factory, assembling basketballs, and one girl was designated the boss who would question Franny when she came in about why she was late for work. Fran's job was to pick up clues from the other factory workers, standing behind the boss, who wordlessly were trying to help her offer the agreed-upon nonsensical excuse: She was late because she had to climb a tree to rescue a cat who had gotten stuck chasing a vacuum cleaner (goofy, I know).

"Why are you late," the boss demanded.

Franny, looking over the other girl's shoulder, quickly picked up that she was late because she had climbed a tree for her cat. But with time running out she couldn't guess the bit about the vacuum, and the mean boss (in a persuasive performance, I thought) was getting impatient with Frank's fumbled excuses.

"What? Tell me why you were late!"

"Fifteen seconds," said Andy, the teacher.

Franny looked at him and then back at the mean-boss girl.

"Oh, heck," she said, "I don't know why I'm late. Just fire me."

Pretty good. The place cracked up. Franny ate it up, I could tell. The next semester of classes starts after the new year. I know she's looking forward to continuing.