Ow.

Last time I saw my God daughter (she's six), she told me this exact story:

"This summer we went to Mexico and we flew in a big plane and we sat in the back and I sat near the window and I kept asking my mommy, 'Are we in Mexico yet? Are we in Mexico yet? Are we in Mexico yet?' And then my mommy got a headache."

My aunt and uncle came over today. And then I got a headache.

I don't think the two are more than coincidentally related, though, frankly.


(It's a random cartoon I found on the internet while doing an image search for "headache". It really amused me. The only credit I could find was that it was filed under "Ben is a dork." I don't know what that means. God, I love the internet.)

You know those days where you wake up and think, okay. I have a plan today. I'm going to do this and this and this, and it's going to be fabulous. And then the dog vomits on your bed and the light fixture explodes and you end up washing ranch dressing off the ranch dressing. You know those days? Today was one of those days.

Oh, it seemed like such a nice day when I woke up at 6:30. Which is a ridiculous hour to be up on a weekend day, but, whatever. Mags and I lounged in bed and watched an early morning prelude to the SVU Marathon on USA today (God, I love USA, aka the all-Law-And-Order network). And I thought, okay, up, shower, go to Starbucks to work, come back, unpack a little, have lunch with the fam, come back, make some espresso, unpack again, go to the new intern thing, come back again, go to bed. What a lovely day, right?

Ha.

I went into the bathroom, and the light made this weird hissing sound. And I thought, oh, the bulb's about to burn out, whatever. And then all of a sudden, the leftmost socket (the only one with a functional bulb in it) EXPLODES in a loud, popping, shower of sparks. I ducked. And then I made sure nothing was on fire (note to self: She who lives in an old house made entirely of wood should really buy a damn fire extinguisher! Anyhow...). And then I put new bulbs in it and flipped the switch. That socket's blown, but the other two still work. When I go back to Lowes to replace the blinds I bought that are an inch too short, I'll get a new fixture. Because if I wait for the handyman to fix it, it'll never get done. ::sigh::

And then I went to Starbucks, and managed to finish all the outstanding Child discharge summaries I had (I still have a couple from the adolescents, but I'm less worried about those because I really want my attending from Child to like me. Not that I don't want the other one to, but I really liked her, and so I want her to think I'm like the best resident ever, right, so she'll take me under her wing and turn me into a really good C&A psychiatrist and vote for me for a fellowship at Baby Blue. Okay, no, that's all secondary. I thought she was cool and so I want her to think I'm cool, too. It's so...well....adolescent....). And dropped my tea. But I only spilled a little. So then I went to Target and bought a $14 rice cooker (because my $40 one always burned the rice) and some groceries. And spent a lot of time standing in the aisles going, now...what the hell was it that I wanted here? And, um...where was I going again?

It was the first of many times I would ask myself today, what the hell is wrong with me??

I came home. I swore a lot and tried to find a place for the groceries (have we talked about my lack of cabinet/counter space?). I unpacked more of the kitchen. I had to stop several times and go into the other room before I started crying about not knowing where the hell to put the glass bowls or not being able to remember the word for "toaster oven" or being a big spaz and dropping things. So I went into my room and the dog hops on the bed and is all smooches and snuggles and rub my belly until, without warning, she yaks all over the blanket.

Oy.

Fortunately, I was able to locate the OxyClean with minimal swearing and fuss. And I rinsed the blanket out in the bathtub because my uncle hadn't actually come over to hook up the washer/dryer yet. Frack.

So they showed up, with tools and a milk pitcher and air filters for the furnace (because my aunt says to me yesterday, "Have you checked the air filter? If you tell me what size it is, we can pick one up for you on our way" And then I sent her a long email saying EW EW EW EW THAT'S THE GROSSEST THING IN EXISTENCE, EW! No WONDER the place still smelled like cats!). We changed the gross filter of disgustingness and went to lunch at an Indian place in Durham. And then we came back, and my uncle and I spent WAY too much time trying to figure out my new espresso machine.

The Starbucks here had a tent sale last weekend, to clear out their old model coffee makers and make room for the new ones. My $50 Target espresso maker didn't survive the move, so I thought, you know what? This is going to be my congrats-on-surviving-intern-year-AGAIN present to myself. So I bought the Sirena, which was originally $600, marked down to $199, and then got the 20% tent sale discount PLUS the manager's additional 10% employee discount (because he knows me. Because I went to that Starbucks every single morning that I lived down the street). Wow, what a deal! And it's so nifty! And it's made by BMW! WOW! I have the BMW of espresso machines, cool!

Leave it to BMW to turn espresso into a ridiculously complicated process.

Now, part of it was, again, I kept dropping things, and I was just generally like, "what?", and my aunt kept coming in and saying "Where do you want this? Where do you want this? Where do you want this?" and I kept getting all overwhelmed and confused trying to make espresso AND arrange the kitchen. And after we finally figured it out and made some damn good espresso (what do you know? The $600 machine really DOES make a better cup of coffee than the $50 one!), then we hung pictures and moved the TV (because the one in my bedroom chose today to die, ps. Not that I didn't buy it, oh, my first year of medical school, and not like I didn't buy it off the clearance rack, but, nevertheless...) and then my neighbor came over to complain that my empty water bottles outside waiting to be picked up were over the property line (no, really! Way to meet the new neighbor, huh? She didn't even bring cookies!). And then my aunt and uncle left and Maxine came over and she and Maggie sniped at each other a lot (jealous, jealous puppies over here). And I tried to do the dishes and make a salad for tomorrow and discovered one of the neat little single-serving cups of ranch dressing I'd bought this morning had mysteriously exploded all over the refrigerator and the other little cups of ranch dressing (which then became part of the dishwashing extravaganza) and nearly wound up in tears again and for the five hundred eighty fourth time thought, Jesus, Mary, and Steve, what the hell is WRONG WITH ME?!

And then I went...

Wait....what's today's date?

Oh.

Nevermind.

And somewhere in that mess of dropping things and verging on tears and stuff exploding, my catamenial migraine hit. That's what all the clumsiness was about (I have no idea why things kept exploding).

You know, most days out of the month I really like being a woman. And most of the time I don't even mind the monthly ritual of sloughing and end up humming Ani DiFranco's well-stated and empowering Blood in the Boardroom, with it's lines like "I bleed to renew life every time it's cut down" and "Men have all the money, they have the implements of death, but I can make life you know. I can make breath". But every now and then I revert back to the real meaning of what I'm commonly heard to say, "I think God took all the souls that couldn't handle being women and made them men."

Which really means, sometimes? Being a woman totally sucks. Bleh.