For a little while there, I was doing so well. And now I'm back to square one. I've had three gallbladder attacks in the last several days. I'm having one right now. It woke me up after maybe 10 minutes of sleep. The culprit? I'm not really sure, but I'm guessing it was the glass of milk I had with the peanut butter cookies I made. Everything else I ate wasn't too out of the ordinary. I only ate two cookies today. I had three yesterday without any problems.

Last week, I woke up in the middle of the night with an attack from having eaten steak. A couple days later, I had another attack, but I don't recall what I ate to set that off.

This is so tiresome. I'm sick of the pain. I'm sick of vomiting for relief.... a relief so minimal that it hardly makes it worth it because the churning of my stomach afterward is also unpleasant. I can feel the balloon slowly deflating, and I'll be fine in about an hour. I may have said this before, but it holds true: I wouldn't wish this on my worst enemy.

I set up my insurance a few days ago... It's crap, but it's all I could afford given the bills and expenses I see in the coming year(s). If I do wind up getting my gallbladder removed, the anaesthesia alone could cost over a thousand dollars.

Time to try to sleep again. Joy.

Sidenote: friend asking other friend out before he's even divorced from his estranged wife... and female friend's reaction... priceless. I'm sorry, but even if you've had a crush on her for a while now, just because you have a crush doesn't mean she's going to oblige you. I mean, shit, we've been trying to tell you as much for the last few months. Your wife just moved to another state last month. You just moved into an apartment for yourself. You just decided to go through with a divorce after the wife was in another state (way to be a man!). Your crush isn't interested in you at all. Couldn't you have given yourself, I don't know, a few months before asking another woman out? Seriously? You're lucky for the response you got... I would have been much more brutally honest and left you crying into your pillow. I'd pity you if you weren't so thick-headed.

You know what I love? I love it when my mom brings up morbid shit on the phone. For example: when she had her first miscarriage, my dad left her at the hospital and went to work. When she woke up, she reached up and the doctor held her hand, not my dad.

Yay. You can feel the love from here, right? It's as though she goes to great lengths to make me uncomfortable, when she should be working out these issues with a professional.... There are just some things you don't vent about to your children.

I know my dad's a ripe bastard sometimes. But he's still my dad. I feel the same way about my mom; she can be a raging cuntacular harpy, but she's still my mom. You don't get to pick your parents.

I just ripped all my Live CD's. It's been a very long time since I've listened to them. I forgot how great they are. I even remember the lyrics. Surprise, surprise.

Five months until I can see a doctor... If I get insurance in October, that is. I wonder if I'll be okay by then. Or if I'll be worse by then.

It's amazing how pain can give you a brighter perspective when it's not there. Everything mundane seems wonderful. Everything stressful is a minor annoyance.

I'm bravely going on about business as though everything is okay, while secretly worrying my fucking brains out. But sometimes, I'm quite peaceful and content with the universe. It's very zen when it happens. It's like all the bad chemicals have drained out of my head, the stars have aligned, and all is well (despite how crappy the world is).

Tra la la di da. I thoroughly enjoy my time off, even if it's spent on silly things. That's all one can ask for, right?

Oral Sex can cause throat cancer. Well, if you read the article, you'll understand. A lot of people underestimate HPV.... both men and women. But perhaps moreso men than women. The reasoning behind that is that men sadly can't be tested for HPV, and there are over a hundred different strains of it. Men can carry and transmit the disease all their lives without ever knowing they have it. Unless a man has the outwards appearance of HPV (omg genital warts) or noticed something strange when he pees or whatever, he'd never know if he has it.

The HPV vaccine that women can get only vaccinates against a handful of strains of HPV--the ones which cause cervical cancer. If you read the second link above, you'll see that the strains that can cause cancer in men do not present genital warts.

There is no cure for HPV. Even if you wrap it up, you can still get HPV.

Be cautious; don't be stupid. Know the person you're fucking. Know yourself.