Girls Games Night...

forced myself to get out and be social, went to Out Word Bound for games night. pretty big crowd, a dozen of us playing and more coming in and out to say hi...don't know why it's so hard to do it, when i really enjoy going out and seeing people, but ugh, it can just be soooo draining...*shrug* question for the shrink to answer, i suppose...

white noise...

that seems to be what's filling up the gaps between the neurons these days - my brain's working, but there just doesn't seem to be much going on of any consequence - just kind of going through the motions...

lah de dah...

Saying the F-word...

Hot bifem babe Betty Blue sent out this msg with some info that y'all might find interesting:

Nobody seems to be talking about it, Democrats are afraid to whisper the word for fear of looking like fools (guess what? we *already* look like fools)...but some of us are starting to say the F-word outloud: FRAUD. My position? Um...they did it once, badly, and yet it worked...why wouldn't they learn how to do it better the next time to gain an air of legitimacy?

I'm putting out these links in case anyone else thinks something smells bad about this election and wants to help or find out more. Feel free to read or not.

http://www.blackboxvoting.org/ (I'll be donating money to the effort to launch a complete investigation into the vote as soon as I get paid.)

http://www.democraticunderground.com

http://pages.ivillage.com/americans4america/id20.html

At least one mainstream journalist is reporting on this:

http://home.comcast.net/~hugh.moore/countdown_on_voting_irregs.wmv

Olbermann's blog today on the responses to last night's show:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6210240/

Ongoing liberal talk radio about this and other current issues (particularly Mike Malloy and Randi Rhodes...listening to Randi right now): http://www.airamericaradio.com

And some members of congress agree that something stinks:
http://www.wired.com/news/evote/0,2645,65623,00.html (note: three more congressmen have signed on since this report)

Off to get my black bracelet...
Betty

=====
betty@backseatbetty.net http://www.backseatbetty.net

more to add to the wardrobe?

damn, and here i'd just sent off for a new batch of t-shirts from tshirthumor.com - john baynham's designs are pretty cool...i get quite a few comments on my "Have a Pheasant Plucking Day" shirt...now they've just added a page of shirts relating to the election - i particularly like the 4 more years and blue person messages...

7 doctors in 5 weeks...

feeling a bit overwhelmed right now, as i look through my date book and realize that, between appointments with doctors to determine my eligibility for social security disability, as well as consultations with doctors for the upcoming brain surgery (which should be a slight hint that i might be a wee bit disabled), i have SEVEN APPOINTMENTS WITH DOCTORS IN A FIVE WEEK PERIOD! and five of those doctors i've never even met before, and want all the pertinent records, et al, to properly analyze me. sheesh!

think i'll avoid the mass exodus...

what with all the changes coming with the influx of neocon ultrareligious homophobes into the federal government, a change of address and citizenship is a naturally occuring thought. i think that rather than heading north to defect to canada like most of my fellow bloggers write that they'll be doing, perhaps i'll go visit the ol' relatives in norway...

immigration to norway isn't really on my agenda yet - let's hope it doesn't ever come to that - but it is nice to be in the know about it: "A person has a right to asylum in Norway if he or she has a well-founded fear of persecution in his or her country of origin. The cause of the persecution must be race, religion, nationality, membership of a particular social group or political opinion...Persecution that particularly affects women and persecution due to sexual orientation may also provide grounds for asylum."

so, i could look up my granddad's family, do some skiing, maybe try some lutefisk...Uff Da!

the morning after...

alas, it was nice to be at matt's election night party and be amongst others that were as depressed and discouraged as myself about the impending election results...

the guy on CNN had it right...

a guy in the crowd behind the set of the CNN election coverage wore a t-shirt that very adequately expressed my feelings on this whole election cycle...it read:

FUCK THIS SHIT

rather amusing to see that popping up on television (quick, someone call the FCC!!)...

*yawn* ugh, still too close to call on the kerry/bush race, but it looks like mitch daniels is the new governor of indiana. *8-P

happy halloween!

no big costume events or anything this year, going to a little get-together with kat at her soon-to-be-roommate sherry's soon-to-be-former-living-space...

i suppose if i HAD dressed up this year (in a costume, that is, for some halloween-related festivity) i woulda done some warped takeoff on a brain surgeon, what with the surgery coming up next year and all...

the Erotic Arts Ball...

Kat and I just returned from the Erotic Arts Ball - rather interesting evening, i must say. i'm soooo totally exhausted right now, but i did have a very good time, even if Kat and Brandy did their best to girlify me and put makeup on me and such. i told them it really didn't bother me, and it doesn't - just because i don't choose to wear the stuff on a regular basis doesn't mean i'm vehemently opposed to it or anything - my not wearing makeup isn't a major political statement or anything like that. and as i told kat, i'm comfortable enough in my womanhood to allow her to put girly stuff on me if she so chooses. *8-) she seemed to find a contradiction in the "comfortable enough in my womanhood" and not wearing makeup part, but i don't. it just ain't my thang, but what the hell, every once in a while, do something different!

those red kettles will be a little lighter this year...

this conversation on fark about Salvation Army bell ringers brings up an interesting point that i hadn't thought about before - their stance on homosexuality. in a nutshell, they don't want ya to pick on gay people, and they'll help you if you need their services, but dammit, you queers need to not be havin any sex or expectin to get married or try for any of that equality stuff. sort of a take-off of separate but equal - "not separate, but not equal either"...

the change i usually throw into the kettles during the holiday season will go elsewhere - to a charity that doesn't have such a discriminatory policy - and i'll drop them a little note to let them know the reason they're not getting my money.

one thing that irked me about the fark conversation was the comments made by several people to the effect of "of course they discriminate against gays - they're a CHRISTIAN organization" - ummm, the two are NOT automatically joined together...

Just in case you were still undecided...

100 Facts and 1 Opinion: The Non-Arguable Case Against the Bush Administration

Not Fooling Anybody...

i might just have to accept a position as a Not Fooling Anybody Ranger - seems we have lots of locations around Indianapolis that would fit in well at this site...now where's that digital camera?

announcing my candidacy...

well, isn't this special, a week before election day, and it becomes official...i've just received word that i'm a candidate! lucky for me that it's not an office that i've earned candidacy for - it's brain surgery!

just got off the phone with my contact at IU and she says that it appears that we're a go for brain surgery at the beginning of next year! just have several more consultations with docs and a couple of tests to get out of the way, but the big questionable things are outta the way!!

one thing i need to do before surgery is lose some weight - now i hafta figure out how to do that - i'm debating whether or not i should do the dietary supplement thing like mom's done...i just don't know that i have the will power. whatever weight i lose, i want it to stay off for good, i don't want to just lose a ton of weight just for the surgery and just put it all back on once it's all over with. it's gonna have to be a major change, and i'm not sure that i can put 100% into it right now. gonna talk with my endocrinologist and see what her opinion is on the situation.

also have to have a consultation with a psychiatrist - since i have a history of depression, they wanna see me and get a history and an idea of what my baseline is so that they have something to go by after surgery, since depression is a possibility after surgery. i'll be meeting up with dr. bowman, (the IU shrink) the day before thanksgiving.

i know my regular doc will be okay with the brain surgery idea, so they're gonna send me to one of their internal medicine docs to get another opinion - haven't found out when i'll be meeting dr. pettigrew for this consultation, but it'll probably be sometime before the year is over...

dr. worth is the surgeon that will be performing the surgery - i'll probably be meeting him for a consulation before going under the knife as well. he'll be the one to administer the Wada test (where they put half my brain to sleep and make sure i can still function) in January.

it's becoming even more real...scary as hell, but really exciting too.

redheaded...

well, sort of...i'm definitely not blonde anymore. kat got rid of all the blonde remnants in my hair, and put in red streaks (not red - RED. magma red!)...took a couple seconds to get used to, but i like it - i think it'll surprise a lot of people, particularly codi. fine by me though, i like to keep people guessing. *8-)

the neuropsychological evaluation...

friday's neuropsych evaluation went alright, i think. made me realize my memory's not as good as i'd like to think it is, although i think some of that may be attributed to the fact that i didn't get any sleep the night before.

first off, i met with dr. kareken, gave him the whole brain history, story of my seizures, et al...

then he sent in an associate to administer all the tests.

she'd read off a list of numbers to me - 2 4 9 1 8 - and i'd have to say them back to her in order. then lists of numbers - 8 3 4 6 2 - that i'd have to recall back to her in reverse. then i'd have to tell her what the definition of certain words meant - democracy, catalog, and so on. she told me a story and i had to repeat back as many details as possible. then she told another story, and i had to repeat as many details as possible on that one. she gave me a picture of an abstract drawing to copy. then she had me try to draw it from memory. then i had to remember details from the first story, then the second story. then i had to try to draw the picture again. then she showed me a series of photos in an array on sheets of paper and i had to tell her if the people were on the paper and if they were, which position they were in. she gave me a list of words to remember, then i had to tell her which ones i could remember. then i had to tell her which ones in the list were vegetables, which were modes of transportation. then she gave me another list, and we repeated the process for that list - tell her what i remembered, tell her the veggies, tell her the transportation. then she wanted me to go back and remember what i could from the first list.

i must say, i'm very curious as to what all the results say about me neuropsychologically...

testing...

ugh, hafta be downtown tomorrow at that ungodly hour of 8am for more pre-surgical evaluation/testing. this time i'm headed to Riley Hospital to meet with a Neuropsychologist - David Kareken, Ph.D. the info that's been sent to me tells me the exam will measure brain functions such as memory, attention/concentration, language and visual perception. fun fun fun!

slowly getting back to "normal"...

now that i'm outta the hospital, it appears that i'm getting sick - head's all stuffed up and i'm coughing up all sorts of crunchy things in my chest - blech.

yesterday, kat treated me to some belated birthday celebration activities - we went and saw Shark Tale and had dinner at Steak & Ale (wow, that rhymes!)

time for some more sleep...

HOME!!!

yay! home from the hospital! i was there a little longer than expected, but eventually had the seizures the docs wanted, got them captured on video and now i'm home, 9 days later! i'm gonna be picking glue outta my hair and adhesive off my body for who knows how long now...

amazing how exhausting lying in bed, hooked up to computers and 28429 wires can be. *yawn*

line of the day...week...hell, a GREAT line, period.

James Spader's smarmy lawyer Alan Shore on "Boston Legal" (a spinoff of "the Practice") is a trip...i didn't think he could be as weird in a lawyer role as he was in Secretary (that movie ROCKS), but i just may be mistaken...Alan Shore is quite a character...

tonight, as he offered to rub an uneasy co-worker's feet, he said:
"Don't worry, it's nothing personal, it's just a fetish."
might hafta use that line myself sometime - kat liked it so much she wrote it down, we were both rather amused.

Elizabeth Mitchell is playing his crazy ex-wife, apparently in a recurring role - damn, she's hot! and she's got a knack for getting roles with other hot people as well - with angelina jolie in gia, again doing the lesbo thang on er with doc kerry weaver, now the alan shore character...lemme just say the woman can eat crackers in my bed any time she wants...