in the butt

Over the years (despite my destain for Jesus-lovers) I have attracted a number of uber-Christian friends. I think it has something to do with my “uncoolness”. When you don’t particularly like drinking, partying, or large groups of people, your social options in college are limited. The other kids who don’t like drinking, partying or large groups of people tend to love Jesus (bummer for me).

This has (mostly) worked out well for me. It got me a nice “Jesus” scholarship for undergrad (don’t judge me, if Jesus had wanted it to go to a true believer, then surely he could have arranged for that). But, while I have made lots of Jesus-loving friends, I’m bad at keeping them. I move a lot, and I lose touch with people. I recently reconnected (via facebook) with one of these friends is finishing her OB/GYN residency. She is over-tired, works long hours, but seems to truely enjoy delivering babies. Which is good. Except that it makes me sad when Jesus-lovers become OB/GYNs. Because it is one of those fields where jesus-y beliefs get in the way.

One of her duties is answering the preggo hotline. And she was apparently horrified by a caller who asked how long after giving birth before she could have sex “in the butt”. My Christian friend indignantly asked me, “How do you respond to that?!?”. My first thought was, “You give the medically relevant answer?” I mean, I’m sure there is some guideline. I’m not an OB/GYN, I’ve never given birth, and I find anal to sort of resemble having an indecisive turd (which doesn’t exactly get me all hot and bothered). So this isn’t a piece of information that I know. But I’m sure (as a doctor) she *should* know the medically relevant answer. And (in my opinion) she should probably give that infomation to the people who specifically ask about it. But apparently her recommendation is that you never have sex “in the butt”.

I wish (when searching for an OB/GYN), I could be guarenteed to find one who wouldn’t allow their religion to effect their advice regarding my vagina (or my pooper).

Fat girl rides bicycle…

My husband and I decided we needed at least one joint activity that isn’t unhealthy (consuming copious amounts of curry fries apparently doesn’t count). The activity we picked was bicycling, so we headed to REI to spend obscene amounts of money (because apparently we can’t do anything without heading to REI and spending obscene amounts of money). And if I was going to start cycling, ass pads were a necessity (my butt does not agree with bicycle seats).

I didn’t want to wear spandex biking shorts (slightly chubby girls in black spandex shorts are not adorable). I was relieved to find that REI sold biking “skorts”. Someone had brilliantly thought to put a “modest” skirt over the padded shorts (yes, they used “modest” in the description). My chubby ass could be comfortably padded without being subjected to spandex bike shorts. Yays!

One of the reviews for the “Terry Flare Bike Skort” had noted that, “I work in downtown in a large, corporate building. Changing into my bike clothes to ride home and getting out of the building in a reasonably modest fashion is important to me. This skort is perfect!” (referring to: http://www.rei.com/product/765407). I was feeling better about my fitness decision already. I went to REI with high hopes for finding some non-ridiculous, non-spandex, ass-padding.

Sadly, the “corporation” the reviewer worked must have had “escort” in its title. When I arrived at REI I was deeply saddened to find that the “skorts” were as form fitting and as spandex as the dreaded shorts (and they were shorter). The brilliant person who decided to put a “modest” skirt over the spandex ass padded shorts had also decided that the skirt should be made out of turquoise spandex, and should not be more than six inches long. Clearly, the intended demographic for these skorts only included cyclist-hookers, teenage rockstars, and sarah palin’s daughters.

My ass (when clad in turquoise spandex) looked like a manatee coated in “electric blueberry” flavored jello. I ended up with a pair of men’s baggy cycling shorts (http://www.rei.com/product/781750). Apparently someone realized that not all bicycling men would want to look like 50-cent hookers with a rainbow bright fettish. So, yeah, I went bicycling this weekend. Maybe if I keep it up for the next year and my ass stops resembling jello, I will buy a turquoise “50-cent-hooker-with-a-rainbow-bright-fettish” bicycling skort to celebrate. Maybe not.

Suck It Teriyaki Skirt Steak.

My crazy-funk has reached new levels. Lately, I often find myself on the verge of hysteria for (almost) no reason.  Eight months of living with my in-laws has pushed my fragile sanity to it’s limit.  While my in-laws are fantastic people, I miss having personal space.  I miss having stuff (everything I own is in storage).  I miss being in an environment where I don’t always have to wear pants.  I miss being in an environment where I don’t have to worry about running into my father-in-law without pants.  I miss being able to cook snacks at 11PM without wondering if I am disturbing someone.  I miss being able to argue with my husband without his parents hearing.  I miss being able to talk on the phone with my parents (or anyone else) without someone listening. 

Living with my in-laws has taken its toll on me.  This has combined with the other “crazyness” in my life  (losing my friends/family when I moved 3,000 across the country, five “in-contract” house deals that have fallen through, and losing my grandpa to some evil combination of alzheimer’s and cancer).  And it has combined with the not-so-bad but still stressful things (new job, starting law school).  And the few “marbles” I had left, are now lost. 

To add insult to injury, it is BBQ season.  And there is nothing that  sucks more for a meat-loving vegetarian than BBQ season (except maybe watching people eat wings at Dinosaur BBQ in Rochester, NY – which almost makes me cry even when my sanity isn’t in a fragile state).  My husband makes the most fantastic garlicy teriyaki skirt steak.  It is tasty beef goodness smothered in sticky garlicy wonderful.  And I miss it.  Teriyaki skirt steak makes summer BBQs painful.  My stomach knaws away at itself while I watch my acquaintences devour their beef with smug satisfied smiles.  And if I’m “lucky” someone grilled some bell peppers that I can knaw on or provided a cardboard-like burger substitute (which, if smothered in enough guacamole, might be palatable). 

So this weekend I say, “Suck It Teriyaki Skirt Steak”.  I am determined to create something at this BBQ that is both vegetarian and edible.  While I might not be able to compete with skirt steak (what can?), at least I won’t be heartbroken in a corner knawing on mushy tasteless eggplant kabobs. 

I have sweet & sarah vegan vanilla marshmellows and scharffen burger chocolate for smores.  I’m armed with recipes for brown sugar glazed grilled peaches with fresh raspberry sauce.  And (because when they don’t try to resemble meat, veggie burgers can be tasty) I have recipes for three different (highly rated by epicurious) veggie burgers including: cayenne spiced bulgur burgers with lime mayonnaise, highly spiced southwest style black bean burgers, and garlicy chick-pea walnut burgers.  My goal is to survive a BBQ (in my fragile mental state) without having any sort of breakdown (or going into a psychotic range and branding people with my white hot smores stick as they stuff skirt steak in their pie-hole).

death (and why making factual information available isn’t a bad thing, unless you’re too dumb to understand it.)

I generally believe that making factual information available is never a bad thing. People should make informed decisions based on the “truth” (factual information) and having additional “truth” (data) can’t hurt, right? But I’m a statistical programmer. I deal with “truth” (data) all day long. And I forget that most people either don’t deal with “truth” (data) all day or they don’t have the available resources (i.e. “intelligence”) to interpret the “truth” accurately.  This becomes obvious when Fox news gets a copy of the “Truth” (data) and publishes something crazy about how the world is coming to an end because every progressive-democrat-women (probably all lesbians because no self respecting straight women would be a democrat) are having casual sex just so they can suck the “baby” out with a flowbee for the sole purpose of upsetting Jesus and bringing about the Apocalypse. And they back it up with “Truth” (statistics) that are totally taken out of context.   I swear.  Google “Fox News” and “Abortion” and the results are scary.  And I reconsider my opinion that making factual information available is never a bad thing.   Apparently people (and Fox News) don’t understand the difference between correlation and causation. And even if they DO understand the difference, they often don’t look at the information in the appropriate context (or have the knowledge to know what the appropriate context is). And it seems like the more “emotional” the topic is, the less likely people are to interpret the “truth” (correlation) rationally.  So maybe only rational people should be allowed to have all the data (please note that I don’t actually believe this.  I still think that making factual information available is pretty much always a good thing – even when you are giving it to fox news and they are either too dumb to correctly present the data or they are just blatently misinterpreting it because it suits their needs that way). 

Sadly, I deal with “emotional” healthcare data which often gets taken out of context, misinterpreted or twisted in some weird way so that it is unrecognizable and in no way resembles the original “factual information” (I blame Fox News).   I started my career analyzing Substance Use in Veterans.  My office overlooked the Methadone Maintence Clinic.   I moved to a new position that involved assessing hospital mortality rates (because Center for Medicare/Medicaid services (CMS) was considering making risk-adjusted mortality rates for physicians and hospitals publically available).   And no hospital wants people to be able to see that patients die there despite the fact that many people don’t *want* to die at home and go to the hospital specifically to die.  I mean, do you really want your loved ones to clean up your dead body and the feces that you expel when you die?  Wouldn’t you rather have some anoymous hospital tech clean up your death poopies?  Aren’t you glad that your loved ones died at a hospital so you didn’t have to clean up their death-poopies?  But you don’t think about that when you  look at hospital mortality rates.  You think “OMG people DIE there!  They must be a crappy hospital”. 

Anyways, after spending 2 years reporting on hospital mortality rates, I had apparently found my niche market (healthcare analysis of crazy controversial topics that no one else wants to deal with?).   My third Statistical Programming position was at a newly created government center examining Suicide in Veterans (one more topic that no one wants to touch).  Male veterans in the general U.S. population are twice as likely as their civilian peers to die by suicide.  Sad, huh?  Upon leaving that position, I found what may have been the only more controversial healthcare topic than Suicide in Veterans.   Of course I can’t tell you what it is, or you could hunt me down and kill me.  But I promise, its not abortion, but its even more controversial than Veteran Suicides during a controversial “war”.

So, while I totally believe that making factual information available is never a bad thing, I’ve spent a lot of time dealing with data that gets a lot of “emotional” attention. And I’m overwhelmed by how frequently the news media, (and then the general population) take “emotional” healthcare topics and completely misinterpret the data.   Think for a moment about Swine Flu and the media attention it has received.  National Geographic states “Experts like Johns Hopkins’s Pekosz and RTI’s Layton say there’s currently no reason to lock yourself up in the house” but fox news says the swine flu “entered a dangerous new phase Monday as the death toll climbed”  DOoooooooommmmmmed.  I mean there are an annual average of 41,400 deaths in the US from influenza (regular flu).   Swine flu now has 80 deaths internationally.  Clearly Fox is not sensationalizing things when they suggest we are DOOOOOOOOOMMMMED.  DOooOOOOMMMMMMED, I tell you.  This is why I hate Fox News (and other organizations that sensationalize things that aren’t sensational).  And 80 deaths DOES seem bad.  Unless you look at IN CONTEXT. 

Anyways, that wasn’t really my main point. Perhaps partly because of my career path, but also because of current situations in my personal life, I’ve been thinking a lot about numbers and touchy health care subjects like death. And while there are probably a myriad of things that have created my “death-centric” current mindset, there are two main reasons for the focus. So I’m devoting some posts to death and healthcare and possibly my own personal brand of crazy for the following reasons:

1. There has been a cluster of Caltrain suicides. Suicide clusters and copycat suicides fascinate me. I’m not sure if this is because I spent so much time doing analysis of suicide data, because I’ve had two people close to be commit suicide, or because I have “treatment resistant major depression”.  But suicide fascinates me. And suicide clusters / copycat suicides are even more interesting.
2. There was a recent news article about the Medicare (CMS) making mortality rates for physicians and hospitals publically available.  And there has been a lot of media coverage of healthcare in general in the US lately.  And, having spent quite a bit of time assessing mortality/healthcare data, perhaps I have strong opinions. And (after working with one of the hospice coordinators) I think the US has a really unhealthy attitude towards death (and things that relate to death, like hospice care). And it might be one of the reasons that our healthcare is so screwed up. But really, the major reason that I have been thinking about death/hospice/healthcare at this particular moment is that my grandpa (who has Alzheimer’s and Cancer) is being moved to hospice. And on a rational level I realize that this is probably the right decision, but I am devastated.  And I use this blog to process my emotions (because contrary to popular belief, I am neither a Robot nor Noam Chomsky). 

This is already too long. If you care more about my current death-centric ramblings, the next post is on crazy suicide clusters and Caltrain. The following post is on screwed up healthcare and US views of death/hospice (with some anecdotes about the most wonderful pant-less Irishman to ever tell his granddaughter she had a lovely ass). Or maybe the hospice post will be first. Or maybe I will be too emotional to actually write either (or at least the hospice one). But you should check back, just in case.

Do smarmy fake tans really make you want to buy crappy products?

A friend of mine was trying to describe this guy she had just met.  And her description was something like, “He was oily.  And not in the smooth olive oil sort of way.  In the nasty, cloying, crisco sort of way.  He had that used-car-salesman vibe.”   Used car salesmen have a bad reputation, but that reputation can often be applied pretty accurately to many different groups of sales people. 

I try not to interact with *any* people (it is why I picked a career path that involves sitting in a windowless office programming all day), but I have a specific dislike for people who are trying to sell me something.   Yesterday after work I went looking at homes with a realtor.  I’ve been interacting with a lot of realtors lately.  And I can’t think of a profession that has a stronger “used-car-salesman” vibe (except perhaps used-car-salesman or maybe electronics salesmen (but I’m probably biased because I used to date one of those)).  Anyways, if you do a google image search for “realtor”, the fifth image is “Lou”:

who looks like a smarmy used-car-salesman?

And while most of the “realtors” on google image search aren’t so obviously creepy-used-car-sales-people, there are a significant number of them with fake tans.

like this charming lady...

And I don’t get it.  Why do sales people think that we like fake tans?  Do they really help with sales?  Just so you don’t think I’m unfairly discriminating against realtors, I wanted to make it clear that I realize that the image associated with my profession isn’t much better.  I image searched “SAS programmer” and got this shining example of nerdhood:

Isn't he sexy?

But my point wasn’t actually to just make fun of realtors.   I’m actually curious why sales people become so smarmy.  I dated this guy who sold electronics once.   The more time he spent selling stuff, the more smarmy he became.   And apparently it worked for him.  He because one of the top salesmen in his region (and then he got a graduate degree in theoretical physics and became an academic or something – but from what I understand he retained all of his salesperson smarminess).  He also convinced me that smarminess sells stuff.

Why do consumers respond to fake tans and bleached hair?  It always creeps me out and makes me want to run away (without buying anything).  And I always sort of assume that most people have the same reaction that I do.  But if it didn’t work, salespeople (and realtors) wouldn’t do it.  So who are these consumers who flock to fake tans?    And why do they do it? 

Anyways, it turns out that the realtor I was dealing with yesterday was actually fairly competant.  But it took me a long time to realize that because I was distracted by his glowing orange tan.   And I think I would have taken him a lot more seriously (from the start), if both his skin and his hair were a more natural color.