apparently no breakthrough, just a breakdown

"your luck will change starting now"

The fortune i received at the chinese restaurant we ate at where Jen claimed i could get "magical chinese healing soup, no msg!" Seriously, jen is chinese so she says things like this all the time about teas and balms and random herbs and foods and it's kind of why i love her. I really thought that this fortune meant my luck would get better since i really seriously think i have terrible terrible luck. But thinking that probably perpetuates the bad luck and so my week of hell continued and i made my best attempt to blaze on.

So there was my first hospital stay which was not very dramatic. Then came 6 more days of a new antibiotic. Then came more wretched back pain, vomiting and fever. Then came my 2nd hospital stay which lasted much longer. Nishi took me and we had a very meta moment as we were sitting in the waiting room after having watched an episode of ER then watching michael moore talk to jay leno about how terrible the american health care system is. I was like...i really don't need to hear this right at this very moment. 5 hours later i was seen by a doctor, given all kinds of tests only to find that my kidney infection had only worstened and they were keeping me over night and the whole next day for 3 treatments of IV antibiotics. The hospital has it's moments of awesome like sleeping and having people take care of you and sassy nurses. but after the 10th hour when your arm starts to get bruised from the needle and you keep having to roll your IV to the bathroom every 10 minutes and you've watched your 4th hour of "a baby story" on tlc and you realize no one is coming to visit you it gets a lot less awesome. It becomes down right depressing. Even more depressing was the meatball stroganoff i was fed. so gross. They discharged me and then jen and fernando picked me up and took me to have this magical soup. i was so tired and worn out. i had literally had every bacteria in my body killed, even the good ones. I got home hoping to just shower, turn on the tivo and just sleep. But of course there happened to be a black out. i took a shower in the dark and sat on the couch naked flashing my yoko ono flashlight crying to myself because seriously it was that sad. Oh and my phone is broken too.

My friends have been really good to me here. Jen and Nishi have let me sleep at their houses in case i need to be rushed to the ER and big O's girlfriend cooked me dinner. So now i'm still on bed rest apparently for the next 2 weeks which totally sucks. being sick and out in the middle of fucking michigan with no family is really depressing so i've decided to screw this bitch and just go home next week and let my parents take care of me for a bit. Besides i think i might be developing a stomach infection. i guess this is pretty common that people who have had this many antibiotics will get a stomach infection. Right now i have really bad cramps and horribly heart burn which is why i'm up blogging instead of sleeping.

Well all this has really made me hope that i never get a real serious illness. They say that people who have good attitudes survive but seriously i can't handle being sick and i'd probably not have a good attitude so i just pray to baby jesus that that never happens to me.

So now i have 1 more day of antibiotics (yay!!! they have been tearing my body apart since i'm on some really strong ones) and i have a friend coming into town on thursday so i am going to try really hard to drink that night. so i am asking the blogosphere, those of you who believe in something or pray to something to please pray that my urine culture comes back negative for infection tomorrow. If it doesn't i'm going to have to go back to the hospital. Pray that i can hold down food. Pray that i GET BETTER!

best of PR!!

as i wallow in kidney failure i figured i'd look on to better times and pick the top PR pics!! no text, because in the end, no words, should have sent a poet. you know. Ok wait maybe just brief text,

Old San Juan, i liked the colors and ivan's pose.

Bobby and i trying to recreate old pictures of my mom and dad when my mom had a jumper. I threw this jumper on in the elevator right before taking this picture. Note bobby's crazy calve muscles. two words, "up stroke!"

the terrible shirt ivan had to buy at walgreens because he needed a collard shirt to get into club Brava. Club totally worth it. Also totally worth it to see ivan throw a hissy fit and scream "i'm wearing armani!! that man is wearing airwalks!! airwalk shoes! fucking heternormative rules! this would never happen at a gay club! never!!"

fraburous... oh. me and ivan with totally awesome rainbow that turned into a double rainbow later

posing for our fake brangelina W type spread where i am the scorned wife who knows she is married to a homosexxxxual but still stays with him for the money.

and finally, my favorite picture, my life's work if you will. The true fabulous transformation of cathy in to Kate Kikoman. Who knew palazzo pants could look so good on a short asian girl. i applaud you.

breakdown....breakthrough

So all week long I had been super excited about the new harry potter. I had also been diagnosed with a UTI which was making me feel like shit (not to mention making me have to pee like every 5 minutes). But i was still going to trudge on and go to the borders pre party to get my early copy. None of my friends here seemed to be as hardcore as me and didn't seem to really care. my plan was to buy the book at midnight and come home and read it all night until i finished. the plan changed. Lucky for me david "the cuban" and his boyfriend decided to come with me to check out all the hocus pocus of the event. Thank god they were there because otherwise i would have had no one to take me to the hospital when i started to have a bad reaction to my antibiotics. I was having terrible back pain, cramps, nausea, clamyness, and chills all down my arms so i kept telling them "just wait till they call my group!! then we can go to the ER but just let me get my copy of the deathly hollows!" Finally it was when i nearly fainted that they made an executive decision to screw the book and go to the ER. ER's are wierd at like 1am. There was no one really there and they saw me right away. They did all kinds of tests and hooked me up to an IV and asked if i was allergic to saline. I had no idea so they went and did it anyways. So there i was, in my hospital gown, with an IV in my arm and 2 very large gay men passed out on my side. At one point they injected this anti nausea medicine directly into my IV drip which shot all through my veins and got my heart pounding like it was going to shoot out of my chest. It was really scary and i thought i was having a heart attack. I wasn't, apparently that is normal and they forgot to tell me. So after making you feel liek you are dying the anti nausea medicine knocks you right out and i started talking like paula abdul. I was liek "wy doen's anone appriciiatef muuu" i was like slurring up a storm and then i just passed the fuck out. Something i didn't know, when saline is being dripped into you it feels like vics vapo rub on your veins and then suddenly you get the chills all up and down your body and you need like 5 blankets to make it go away. Also saline makes you have to pee really bad which is hard to do when they leave you now bedpan and you can't take out your own iv. it was drama. So yeah, my antibiotics were apparently making the infection worse and now i had a full blown kidney infection. They let us out at 7am and gave me a prescription for a new antibiotic which so far has not made me feel liek i am dying. this is a good thing.

so now i've been in my room for 2 days reading harry potter in between 3 hour "naps," peeing every 10 minutes, having spats of nausea and trying to find a comfortable spot where my back doesn't hurt. basically i feel like shit, but i feel less liek shit than i did on the other stuff so it's a welcome vacation from that.

and so now i've been in my basement for 2 days, the only person to relaly call has been my dad and i feel like samantha in sex and the city when she gets sicks and say "without a man you have nothing" or something liek that. Anyways it is in moments of sickness when we sometimes realize how alone we are. And sometime you just want someone to come over and fill your brita and bring you cranberry juice and watch "side order of life" or whatever other fantastic show lifetime has concocted. I feel my lonliness when i am this far from my family and there is no one really to care for you. I think the next time a friend is sick i am going to go to their house and take them soup and crackers and a movie and just spend time with them because sometimes that is all you want. And in the end the only people that i can really count on, are the gays, as always

alright, 200 more pages to go

ridiculous

later i will tell you all how i did NOT actually get to pick up my preordered copy of harry potter last night because i ended up in the ER. It's a good story actually, and it was not due to Potter Mania/Fever. but right now i have more important fish to fry, namely reading the book.

my ailments

god i am such a mess healthwise. for the past 3 months i have had malfunctioning eustacian tubes which basically means my ears don't pop. I had a really bad cold one time and topped with my allergies and sinus problems it caused my ear to clog up and be unable to pop. So for the past 3 months my head feels like it does when an airplane is landing only constant and wretched. It gives me terrible low pressure head aches and makes me all fluffy in the head. This all makes doing research really hard to do since it messes with my concentration and ability to focus. It's really wretched and doctors seem to say "just wait it out" and i want to tell them "do you know what it's liek to have 2 ears that haven't popped for 3 months!! it will drive a person mad!" On top of this i somehow got the idea that i have diabetes because i saw an episode of scrubs and i had teh same symptoms as turk. i am so ridiculous sometimes.

I am going to get acupuncture to get myself right. i have an apointment this week. I was telling emily that i don't knwo what is wrong wiht me but i just feel like something is very very off and that if i fixed it i might somehow have a totally wonderful, happy, ailment free life. could you even eeemagine me without ailments?? And then emily said something that struck a chord with me. she said "I don't know the thing is i kind of always feel weird and out of sorts and i never really know why. so i've just had to assume thats what it's like to be an adult." so maybe all this adulthood is making me feel liek i have diabetes and allergies and anemia and adema in my legs and malfunctioning eustacian tubes. all i have to say is watch out guys, cuz you all aren't even 25 year. just wait.

formal shorts, who knew!

So this weekend i am heading out to chicago and dan and emily are flying in and we are all going to go to the pitchfork music festival with orges. informative segue, pitchfork is this super hipster super elitist music reviewing website that swear like what. Well they are putting on a music festival and it is going to be awesome. For the event emily and i agreed that the outfits we choose to wear are v. crucial to blending and not being the butt of some hipsters joke. "look at that girl. is she wearing...an ironic t shirt! how lame!" That type of thing. So after much discussion we decided that two crucial additions to our wardrobes would have to be a vest and formal shorts.

Now i make the next statement with the full knowledge that there are many many fashion trends throughout my life that have looked absolutely terrible on me. A few examples: tube tops and strapless things in general, long hippie skirts and frocks, bell bottom pants. Having prefaced with this I have to confess i was made to wear mini pleated formal shorts. goddamn i said goddamn!! The mini short is just fantabulous and since i'm only 5 ft tall i don't look like a total whore wearing these types of things.

So i've been trying to channel kate moss and sienna miller as my style icons for this event (yes, i make this statement will a full sense of irony since these two women are mildly ridiculous. But this is a hipster festival and thus must we must go to that level). ths is kind of the look i'm going for on day one
but i'm gonna do a wife beater and possibly a denim mini, mainly because i couldnt' find the rightcolor of shorts to go with the vest. I will also not be wearing the boots because a) my legs are short and b) hello it's like 90 degrees outside! Add to that some aviators and BAM! ridiculous fashion!

Outfit option number 2
linen formal shorts with some kidn of top, not sure yet

outfit number 3:
i have a mini free flowing sleeveless dress that i could wear with leggings. yes, i said it, leggings. I might even wear my silvery sheer ones from american apparel. I"m gonna go try all this on right after i take a shower.

basiclaly i'm treating this like it's a costume party because that is the only way that i can rationalize wearing a vest. but seriously trust me on the mini formal shorts!

Shameful Confession # 55939393

There are moments in life where I feel completely ashamed to be me and these moments tend to happen quite frequently. One such event occurred on Monday night. Confession: I really love Disney original movies like “The Lizzie Maguire Movie” and “The Cheetah girls” parts 1 and 2 and “Gotta kick I up” a movie about a young group of Latina cheerleaders who learn the meaning of “si se puede.” I also love olsen twin movies but that would require a whole other entry to explain.

So I was really bummed out when I missed the showing of “high school musical: the movie" last year. Basically i was really off my game as far as television goes. I decided that I would use this flight back to Michigan as my opportunity to watch the movie so I planned on buying it from best buy on the way to the airport. Of course best buy was sold out, which made me want to see the movie even more. apparently all of those adolescent teenage girls had all got their copies and there i was, 25 and empty handed. tragic really. When I got home I decided to download it, but on the version I got the sound was not synched with the movie. It was 9:45 pm and I made a quick decision. I would jet out to target to see if I could make it before 10 so I could buy the movie. I was really determined to see the movie. I rolled into the lot at 9:55 and ran inside to grab what was the last copy. somewhere in ann arbor a 12 year old girl is crying.
(based on this cover doesn't it look like such good times! Guys, seriouslythought, it was awesome!! Everything I had imagined it would be! Zac Efron is hot! Sad confession number 2, this is not the first time I have lusted over zac since I used to watch him regularly on the show summerland. True story.

yummy. So this movie is like the Lizzie Maguire movie meets Grease (minus all the sexual innuendos). So the plot goes that this guy troy and a girl named Gabriella meet over winter break at a ski lodge where they are forced to sing karaoke together. They realize how much they love singing with each other but then lose contact. What thy don’t realize is that Gabriella has just transferred to Troy’s school! (are you seeing the grease similarities?). But come to find troy is a huge basketball star and Gabriella is a huge nerd. They both want to try out for the high school musical and find the magic they had while singing together. but in the rough world of high school you are relegated to your social circle. So the whole school breaks out into this song about how people should stick to the status quo and not rock the boat by trying to be what they are not. And a few kids gain the courage to confess their true passions. A black basketball player confesses that he also loves to bake. And a fat nerd confesses that she loves to dance hip hop music and seh starts to grind on top of the lunch tables and everyone is like "stick to the statu que!" And Ashley tisdale (suite life of zach and cody anyone?) has this ambiguously gay twin brother who is a drama geek and wears lots of hats and colorful t shirts. But in the end it’s like everyone learns that they can be whoever they want to be! And the star basketball player can also be good at singing! Aside from being suuuuper campy it also had a really nice message and I appreciated that. Seriously can’t wait for high school musical 2: summer break! It’s supposed to be about how they all get a job at a beach resort (a la 90210’s summer season and saved by the bell) and I’m going to hope that there is also singing involved.

"jesus camp"

well shagoodness, it has been ages. i have lots to say about puerto rico, but it is all still a big blur and i'm trying to process it in a succinct way. two words

lies and luxury!!

so anyways i just got back from sf. I flew a stunt kite which was awesome! ok but onto topics i want to discuss. Last night when i got home my mom had rented Jesus Camp and told me to watch it since it might have some relevance in my life. for those of you who don't know despite the fact that my mom is an athiest and my dad a bad catholic they decided to send me to what we now realize was a fundamentalist evangelical christian school. My mom just liked the fact that they taught the bible and had day care. So anyways I became relatively involved in the youth ministry as it was called and even did 1 or 2 week long "christian camps." this experience kind of fucked me up for a good part of my life for various reasons and i'm sure i am still recovering. Obviously i am no longer a fundamentalist evangelical christian but that is not the point. So anyways i had heard lots of terrible things about this movie. Not that the movie was terrible but rather that it depicted some really crazy, scary shit: children being raised to be literal "soldiers for christ" etc etc. The people who told me this had not been raised around such things so what they were describing sounded liek this awful satanic movie about evil people.

About 5 minutes into the film i started to become really disgusted but not for the reasons you would think. What disgusted me was how familiar the whole set up was. The christian flag flying high above the church, pledging allegiance to the bible, physical science books based on creationism, being taught how "logically" evolution cannot be right, people speaking in tongues (i never did and they made me feel bad like i was not close enough to god or some shit like that), the fucked up way that they teach about abortion and make you make "commitments to christ". that was my life!!! and i am totally freaking out!!!!!

what makes it even more strange is that i can see how from teh outside looking in this seems totally creepy and cult like, and i even find it a bit nauseating but at the same time i totally understand what they are saying. I had this flashback of our teachers telling us how despite the fact that darwin had thought up this whole evolution thing, on his deathbed he recanted and was believed to have said "i was wrong" and asked for god's forgiveness. ahh! does this give a little glimpse into why i am so crazy now!

but all of that aside i confess i watched these people and didn't think they were evil or crazy. They were really real to me and they just believed what they believed. They reminded me alot of my friends' parents growing up, and i feel like if you were to show a radical liberal family from berkeley raising their kids it would seem just as foreign as being taught that the bible is the truth. so what is scary is how can you change a persons ideas when they truly in their hearts believe that they are right? what if what i believe isn't right? it was just a truly uncomfortable experience all around for me. so if you all rent this movie, rent it with an open heart. all this stuff may seem weird but it's just as weird as you telling me that you weren't raised learning anything about god or knowing anything about bible stories and such.