May I Have an STD Test, Pretty Pretty Please?

Yesterday I went to my gynecologist for my annual physical exam.  I'd only been to this particular doctor once before, last year, and it was the first time in my life I'd ever had a female gynecologist.  After having my vagina abused for years and years by sadistic male gynecologists (It takes a special kind of man to enjoy finger-punching vaginas all day long... or does it?), I decided I'd try a female touch.  Because she was a woman and had probably had her vagina battered by male doctors before, she took great care to be very gentle with mine, which I appreciated. 

So I saw her again yesterday, and I actually arrived on time.  You'd think a gyn visit would be the one thing I'd want to arrive late for.  When the nurse initially took me to my room to take my blood pressure and go over any concerns I might have, I was frank.   I had STD tests done last year, and I really think this is something that should be done every year, so I told her that I wanted to have the whole battery of STD tests again. 

Sidebar:  The velcro on the blood pressure cuff was malfunctioning so as it got tighter and tighter, the velcro started peeling apart rather loudly.  Nurse comes back over and readjusts it.  It must not have gotten a good read the first time, so the machine reset and started taking my pressure again.  Nurse walked over whacks the machine and says, "Stupid, crappy, shitty piece of shit equipment."  After I got over my initial shock, it was all I could do to not laugh.  Unprofessional and inappropriate, but funny as hell.

Anyway, back to my request for STD tests...

"Are you worried about something in particular?" she asked in a whisper.

"No, I just want to stay on top of things and make sure I'm healthy." 

"Oh, ok.  We can test for gonorrhea and chlamydia from your pap smear." Again, the whisper.

Is the damned door not closed?  I looked.  It was.  "What about the others?  HIV, HPV, Herpes....?" I asked.  

"So you want blood tests?"  At this point, she had my chart up in front of her face, all I could see was her eyes and the whisper had dropped even lower.

I stared at her.  "Blood, pee, however you figure out if somebody has 'em or doesn't have 'em, yes." 

Duh.  But I didn't say anything else, mainly because I didn't want her to end up calling me, "stupid, crappy, shitty piece of shit patient" ...because that wouldn't have been funny at all ;)

Instead, she says, "Ok, well we can do those if you want."  

Umm, I'm asking you for them, that means I want...  Why am I beginning to feel like I'm pleading with this woman to give me tests they should be happy to give me?  Really, I have an annual every year, mammograms twice a year, why wouldn't I have STD tests done on a yearly basis as well?  Is this a request they don't normally get?  Do women not ask for these things?

Doc comes in, does my annual, we talk for a bit.  She hands me some sample birth control and bids me good day. 

"Wait, is the patient whisperer... I mean, the nurse coming back in to draw my blood?" I asked.

She give me a blank look.  I explain, "I wanted to have STD tests done...?"

"Oh!  Ok, well...", she glances at my chart, "ok, after you get dressed then head over to the lab and they'll get you all set."

I get dressed and head out the door.  Look to my right and left, see nothing but offices, no sign that says "LAB".  I walk over to the nurses station which is currently home to two patient whisperers.

"Where's the lab?" 

I get another blank look from the other nurse standing there.  My patient whisperer raises her head, "Oh!  That's right, you wanted...."  She grabs my chart, scribbles something on a piece of paper, folds it in half and whispers, "Take this, go down this hall and make a left, the lab will be on your left.  Sign in and someone will be right with you."

Good effin' grief, what does it take to get an STD test done around here?  30 minutes later, vein freshly pricked, I leave.  Just like last year, they will send me the results of the test along with the results of my pap smear in the mail as long as everything's fine.  If something's not fine, then I'll get a phone call. 

But on the way home, I'm wondering why no one asked ME if I wanted the tests done, why did I have to ask THEM? 

If it's not standard practice, it should be.  Women (and men too) need to pay closer attention to what's going on with our bodies.  I think we do a pretty good job of early detection of breast cancer with the self-checks and mammograms, etc.  However, it's just as important that we stay on top of our sexual health and well-being, don't you think?

~N

Don't Mess With My Food...

Lately I've been dining out a lot, probably too much.  Have you ever had such a bad experience with a restaurant or vendor that you just couldn't WAIT to tell somebody about it?

That was me at a restaurant called Eggheads this past weekend. 

It's a breakfast/brunch spot, new to the uptown area, looks like a family owned establishment.  Things were going along nicely until I sat down, but I won't bore you with the slow, nasty, cold details. 

That place was so bad I was trying to Urban Spoon them from my cell phone.  Now, that's bad.  Using my dumbed-down blackberry, I couldn't connect through my FB account and couldn't remember which e-mail address I'd used to sign up so I couldn't log-in to rip them right then like I wanted to.  Oh, but I tried.  When a skinny bitch is hungry, you DO. NOT. MESS. WITH. HER. FOOD.

In the end, I ended up posting a review on yahoo.  THEN when I got home that weekend I went back to Urban Spoon, who conveniently had never heard of the establishment, and kindly suggested that they add an Eggheads page so I could rip them like I still wanted to. 

Sure, let it go N, let it go.  Let it go, you say? Unh-unh.  Don't mess with my food.

Since I'm still miffed about this place and their attempted ruination of my day (don't mess with my food, especially my breakfast!)  I went back on the site to check today and the page had been created.  Thank you Urban Spoon. 

I promptly clicked "Don't Like", then went back to yahoo to find my review there, cut and pasted it into the Urban Spoon review while adding a few more colorful descriptions of my displeasure (read: it's the longest review you've ever seen on Urban Spoon - don't mess with my food, I'm trying to tell you...), clicked save and now I feel like my ire has run it's course.  Well, hopefully.  Although, if I think about it long enough, I'll get an Urban Spoon badge to add to my blog, where I can review restaurants with no holds barred.

I won't subject you to what I wrote on either site though, I'll just sum it all up with this. 

Don't eat at Eggheads.  They suck and the servers suck and the food sucks.  They better be glad that I wasn't paying, please don't get me started on tipping servers who don't deserve one...  some of you are nice like that, I however, am not. 

Which brings me back to my original question, have you ever been that upset with a place, restaurant or otherwise that you went out of your way to review them to death?

~N

The Letter S...

The other day I ran across this site that gives out weekly writing prompts for those of us who find ourselves in that writing funk. I think it was called plinkyprompts.com. Don't bank on that, I'm going by memory and I'll fix it later if it's not correct.

Anyway, one of the prompts was to write an entire poem only using words that began with the letter:

 

That was really hard, but hard in a way that got my creative juices flowing, if only for a minute.  Made me think.  So, I thought I would share a couple of the things that I came up with.

Stars supervise skies soundlessly

Sea sirens seek sinking ships

Sensual stow-a-ways survive. 

Sex, sustains. 

Not too bad, right?  Well, um, it only gets worse.  Actually, I think I'm probably MOST proud of the next one because I can already imagine your facial expressions after reading it. 

Now, imagine a dark stage with a single jittery spotlight dancing upon my head.  You and your reader-friends are in the audience, sippin' on some 'gnac.  (People still drink that, right?)  Mic in hand, I clear my throat, and then, I begin to speak.

*Ahem*

Shit stinks.

Stained silk.

Skidmarks.

*Silence*

I drop the mic on the floor and walk off the stage.  You all are too stunned to respond to the awesomeness that is my poem, but it's all good, I feel the love in the form of a thousand stares upon my back as I exit.  That's love. 

Ok, so that was nasty.  I hope you've eaten lunch already.  I'm sorry, but the first word I thought of when I read the prompt was sh*t and it just went downhill from there, lol.  The next word I thought of was "Superhead", but I decided not to go there. 

You should thank me.

*Muah*

~N

Yes, I Will Punch You in the Throat...

People get on my nerves with all their judgments about me, which are really more accurately mis-judgments.

If you know me personally, you know by now that when I don't want to be bothered, it's written all over my face.  You probably also know from reading me that I'm not a person you physically back into a corner without regretting it.  I don't respond well to aggression, and by that I mean any kind of aggressive tone in your voice, posture or movement. 

No, I don't walk up to random people and punch them in the face for no reason.  But yes, if you put me in a position where I feel like I have to physically defend myself or be hurt, then I will most certainly punch you in the throat.  Have no qualms about it.  More than likely I'll follow that up with a kick in the head once you bend over in pain, too.  I'm just saying.  

No, I don't walk up to random people and pick verbal fights with them.  Wait, I do.  No, I don't!  No, wait, I do, but that's only on Facebook, doesn't count.  So, I don't PHYSICALLY walk up to people and pick verbal fights with them.  But, yes, if they choose to engage me - then 8 times out of 10 we're going to go at it.  Verbal evisceration is my thing.  I'm very good at it.  I like it.  Sue me.  

I digress.  What I would like most in the world right now (besides a million dollars, a silent yet cooperative baby-daddy and a vehicle that doesn't currently smell like dog's ass), is for people to let me have my little moments of pissiness, anger, or literary vitriol without making dumb judgments.  Or, if ya gonna make 'em, at least keep 'em to your self. 

Yesterday, I made the bad decision to stop at the ghetto Wal-mart right after work.  It was on the way home, I needed something specific, and I would have had to drive out of the way during rush hour to get to the hoity-toity Wal-mart, not to mention pay $2.00 more for the product.  Yes, the Wal-Mart by Lake Wylie charges more, because the hoity-toity people can afford to pay more.  My bank account is not currently earmarking any hoity-toity funds and it therefore directed my black ass to the ghetto Wal-Mart. 

So, I'm in Wal-Mart, and there are masses upon masses of people.  People stepping on my foot, people banging into my cart, people not paying attention to where they were going, it was crazy.  It would have been a perfect time to bring the camera for several submissions to www.peopleofwalmart.com, but I was on a different mission.

I get my items, and head to the register.  Long line, so as I'm waiting, the lady behind me was ALL up on my ass.  If there was more than an inch between my ass and her body, that would be news to me.  I didn't say anything though, just kept trying to inch up and keep as much space between she and I as possible.  It's irritating that some people don't understand and respect your personal space, but I dealt with it.   I updated my FB status to say something like it would be a miracle if I got out of there without having to punch anyone in the throat.  Meaning, the lady on the verge of involving me in an impromptu ass-raping Wal-mart sex-tape fiasco without my permission (or contract) was gonna get punched in the throat if she didn't back off.

 But, after moving and putting a hunk of shopping cart in between us, I make it through the register and with a sigh of relief begin to make my escape.  A man suddenly steps in front of my cart, forcing me to stop walking.  From the register, I'd seen him earlier sitting on the benches in front of the bathrooms, just sitting there, looking lost and just a tad bit pointless.  As I walked past his bench, he decides to stop me. 

He says, "Excuse me, miss, I just have to say.... you're a beautiful woman."

"Well, thank you.  I appreciate it."  I replied while backing the cart up just a fraction so I could swerve around him. 

As I started to push forward again, he backs up and steps over in front of my cart again.  "You ought to let me take you to dinner."

"No thank you, I'm not interested."

"You married?"  I saw his eyes dart quickly from my face to my left hand, checking for a wedding band

Well shit, there goes that excuse.  Clearly irritated now, I replied, "No, but I do have a boyfriend, and I'm not interested.  Thank you."  I'm moving the cart now, again having to back up first so I can go around him. 

He says, "Oh, well, you're not married, so I still have a chance.  Let me help you out to your car with your groceries."

I had three bags in my cart.  Idiot.  Your game is wack, and tiring.   "Umm, no you don't and no, you can't.  I'll be fine, but thank you."  Finally, I swerve enough that he can't just sidestep and block my cart when I move. 

I'm walking past when I hear him call out, "You know you're breaking my heart right?  My heart is broken!"

I shake my head and keep walking.  As I'm about to encounter the oxygen tank wearing, hover-round riding senior citizen door greeter/receipt-cop, dude mysteriously appears by my side. 

"Well, I'm going to walk you to your car so we can talk about this."

*Record scratch*  He's about to do what?  For a split second, I thought about shouting into the door greeter's hearing aid ear that this man was harassing me.  Then, no, I should tell him I saw dude steal something, I'd probably get a better reaction that way.  Then I thought, again, he's about to do what?  Follow me to my car?  Oh, no the hell he ain't!

I stop my cart again and turn to the side to look him fully in the face.  In the most dangerous voice I could muster, "Man, if you follow me out to my car, I WILL fuck you up in the parking lot.  I promise." 

His mouth dropped, the what I'm sure he thought was a charming smile faded, and he just stared at me.  I stared right back.

He started backing up to go back to his bench I presume, and with a nasty sneer said, "That's what's wrong with black women these days anyway, don't know how to take a compliment."

I'm thinking, really?  Really?  Harassment is not complimentary, and it certainly ain't sexy!  No means no, and if you don't understand a verbal NO, then I'll show you a physical NO that has my foot attached to it.  Maybe you'll understand that. 

Game over.  I had what I needed, which was him getting out of my face and my space, and I went on out the door with just a quick glance behind me to make sure he wasn't following anyway.  On my way to the truck, I typed a quick FB status with what I'd just said to the man. 

And the commentary that flowed forth (from that and the previous status) was all about me being violent and someone asked if I needed anger management.

What the?

Do I need anger management?  I've never claimed to be a gentle soul, never.  But, I think I handle my anger pretty gosh-darned well.  I need for men to leave me alone when I've made it clear I'm not interested and don't want to be bothered.  I need for men not to waste 5-7 minutes of my life trying to convince me to go out with them when I've already said no.  I need for bustas to leave me the hell alone and not try to get aggressive with me.   That's what I need. 


I let ya'll have your moments, let me have mine, I'll get over it quickly, and everything will be all right.  I'm good, you're good, we're good, all is good.  If not, well, come over here and violate my space so I can punch you in the throat.

~N