Flotsam

• I began the week in keeping with my long tradition of making an ass of myself. On my way into work yesterday morning, a woman ran up behind me in the parking lot. It was a beautiful morning, and I was striding ahead of a group of people on my way towards the shiny glass doors of my workplace.
“Excuse me!” said the woman behind me, “Excuse me, Ma’am?”*
I stopped and smiled back at her, fairly certain she was about to ask me where I had purchased my lovely handbag.

“You still have the size sticker on the back of your pants!” she murmured helpfully.

Sure enough, a sticky strip of plastic ran down the back of my thigh, shrieking “Size VAST!” over and over again.
How charming. Incidentally, my mother is fond of saying “You know, Alexa, no one would never guess you were a Size VAST just by looking at you!”
I think this is supposed to be a compliment.

• I am on day four of 1000 milligrams of Metformin, and I feel perfectly fine. My lack of desire for alcohol, however, continues. I keep trying to tempt myself with different drinks–I have sampled sips of dirty Martini, four kinds of wine, and something that had vodka in it. It is no use. I am broken inside.

• As I have mentioned before, my landlord and I have an ongoing debate regarding whether heat is a luxury or a necessity. When it is bitterly cold, and our radiators stand icily in the corners of our rooms, actually making things worse with their cold-metalness, the Nearly or I will call The Landlord and request heat. Or rather, we will call The Landlord’s answering service and request heat. The Landlord’s response to this is invariably to ignore it. Well, not invariably, because the first time it happened his response was to LEND US A SPACE HEATER. Which I found offensive, as we pay for our electricity, while heat is allegedly “included” in our rent. I try to be understanding, as I realize it must cost The Landlord a lot of money to keep himself in black turtlenecks and suit jackets, not to mention the quantities of product he slicks through his hair. Probably all the fire and brimstone down where he lives keeps him nice and toasty, and he genuinely doesn’t understand why we are complaining.
Anyhow, it is now the season which occasions the opposite problem. We are having a bit of a heat wave—by which I mean temperatures in the high 40s—and our apartment is like a sauna. I think The Landlord waits for this time, waits and then says nastily to himself: “They want heat? I’ll give them heat!” and stokes the boiler, laughing maniacally as sweat drips off his face and flames flicker on the walls. Of course now we will call, and ask that the heat be lowered, and there will be a snit wherein I am compared to Goldilocks/The Princess and the Pea, and The Landlord will say “I thought you liked heat.” And I do, but within reason. I woke up every hour last night, panting, and was too hot to put on my winter coat this morning. I was out scraping frost off my car coatless, and it felt WONDERFUL, that is how hot it is in our apartment.
Here is a picture of Irma a few months ago, when it was bitterly cold inside. She tries to keep herself warm by standing as close to the space heater (see above) as possible. Or sometimes she crouches in the bend of the radiator pipes.

• It looks like the next Twin Cities Confabulous will be Sunday, April 23rd. At noon! Chez Moi!
As god is my witness, I will have a glass of champagne and I will damn well enjoy it, Metformin or no.

*“Excuse me, Ma’am?” Ma’am? So…what is she saying, that I look old from the back?

I have been reluctant to post something new for fear of stopping the flow of comments on my last entry. Honestly, you people fascinate me, with your cow-milking and spiny-lobster-catching and sausage-making! Did you know that fisher queen loves to ride a good cow pony? (Ha! I am twelve!) Or that Ornery took the gold in an ice-cream eating contest? I didn’t. But I am so glad that I do now.
Another reason for the long gap between posts is that I shopped for NINE HOURS on Saturday, and spent the next few days nursing a nasty case of Shopper’s Elbow*. It has been a long, long time since I have shopped seriously, and I am out of condition. Thanks to the wonder of Saks Off 5th, I made out like a very fashionable bandit. I found a $498 Elle Tahari jacket for $120! Also, I nearly bankrupted myself at Sephora, found a red sweater at H&M that makes me want to have sex with my own self, and bought a “suede” jacket that I am fairly sure is constructed entirely out of the skin of babies, it is so soft.
The Nearly bet me that I would be unable to spend a day shopping without purchasing at least one pair of housepants–and, well, I lost that bet, but I can afford to lose bets because I FOUND A $498 ELLE TAHARI JACKET FOR $120! Besides, there were extenuating circumstances (long-coveted pair, on sale, makes ass look fabulous).
I skipped my workout on Monday (Shopper’s Elbow) and ordered takeout all weekend instead of cooking (SE is quite debilitating condition), but am back to posting frivolous blog entries, so surely recovery is imminent.

***

Overheard in the Cafeteria on Monday:
LADY1: …well, my sister is pregnant with twins, but they’re not due at the same time
LADY2: Really?
{ME, IN HEAD: Really?}
LADY1: She went on her honeymoon and got pregnant and then she came back and got pregnant again…
{I have now STOPPED DEAD in the salad bar line to listen.}
LADY1: …and the babies are due a week apart.
{I drop the cucumber tongs.}
LADY2: But how would they even know that?
LADY1: Well, now they have all kinds of tests they can do, you know.

***

Remember the friends of Billy and Jeanie? Well, last week the Nearly was listening to our phone messages and he got the strangest look on his face…
“What?” I asked. He pressed a button and handed me the phone.
This is what I heard, in a familiar, drunken, female voice:

“Happy Birthday to you,
Happy Birthday to you,
Happy Birrrthdaay dear Jeaaanieee,
Haaappy Birthday to yoooou!”

***

I am still on a paltry 500 milligrams of Metformin. Originally I was going to up my dosage to 1000 last Saturday, and then I planned to do it Monday night. Both times, however, I was stricken by The Cramping Intestines: Harbingers Of Doom. I have been on Metformin for ten days now, and mostly it has been fine. Unnoticeable, even. I have only had three episodes of TCI: HOD. Unfortunately, Metformin appears to be like that girl with the little curl right in the middle of her forehead. As in, when it is good, it is very very good, and when it is bad DEAR GOD HELP ME.
In all fairness, I have not been particularly good about my eating (Shoppers Elbow! I had to keep my strength up!) and it is probably my own damn fault.

I must tell you that there is a very sinister side effect of Metformin that no one will warn you about. Except me, because I love the truth above all things: Metformin has caused me to lose my desire for alcohol.
I have had maybe three glasses of wine since starting the medication. One of those glasses I was unable to finish—not because I was already pleasantly tipsy, but because I looked at it and thought “Meh.”
If you turn me against cheese, Metformin, so help me god we are through. I don’t need a baby that badly. You can’t spread a baby on toast points, after all.

***

And lastly, if you have not played this game, you have not lived. The Nearly and I are consumed by “Bookworm.” I think I played it in my sleep last night.

*You know how when you shop, you drape the clothes you are going to try on over your left arm whilst flipping through the racks with your right? And after a whole day of this your left arm is frozen in a painful crook? That is Shopper’s Elbow, and it is no laughing matter, so please try to control yourself.

Psst!
Today is my fourth day on 500 milligrams of Metformin.

I know! I didn’t tell you! I didn’t tell anyone, because I was fairly certain that I would quit once again, because it was too hard. And then I would have to retire from blogging in shame. And wear ashes and sackcloth—which would probably be more attractive than the rumply clothes from my dry-cleaning bag I am wearing at the moment.
But never mind that now.

Here is a recap (or just a “cap” as I haven’t posted about this before):
Saturday night: Took first Metformin pill before bed w/milk and hunk small piece of cheese. Awoke during night to incredible gurgling, roiling noises from intestinal region. But no corresponding side effects—all bark and no bite, so to speak.
Sunday morning: Felt…meh. Nothing specific, just…meh. Thought about going back to bed a few hours later, but resisted, as I think napping was my undoing last time.
Sunday afternoon: Experienced unpleasant fullness after eating lunch, but feeling quickly dissipated. Felt healthy and energetic, like athlete or young person.
Sunday evening: Took second pill before bed w/milk and hunk small piece of cheese.
Monday morning: Felt perfectly normal.
Monday afternoon: Decided to tempt fate by eating bacon cheeseburger and French fries. Still felt fabulous, as I was obviously invincible.
Monday evening: Was taking a bath when assaulted by breathtaking intestinal cramps and the immediate need to remove self from tub to toilet. Emerged from bathroom half-an-hour later shaky and depleted. Spent remainder of night nauseated on sofa, having panic attacks. The Nearly shook his head and said “You flew too close to the sun on wings of bacon and cheese.” Alas, he was right.
Tuesday morning: Slight intestinal distress upon waking.
Tuesday afternoon to Present: Continued to take Metformin. No further side effects.

Of course this weekend I am ramping up my dosage, so perhaps my post after the dose increase will be titled “Pride Goeth Before A Fall (to the floor in pain clutching one’s stomach).”
But I hope not.
I had planned to restart Metformin in August. Theoretically, I re-started early in order to avoid the pressure of knowing that I must be up to (and tolerating) 2000 milligrams by September. This way, I can increase my dosage more slowly without a scramble to get in three months at my full dose (for egg-quality and miscarriage risk-reducing purposes) before the IUI.
Secretly (well not so secretly, I suppose, as I am writing about it here) I am hoping Metformin will turn out to be all the punishment my slut ovaries need, and that the Nearly and I will have the option of conceiving on our own. And I am having a hard time waiting until December to find out if that will be possible. Also, even a small dose of Metformin is likely to improve my insulin resistance—and the health effects that accompany it—and that can only be a good thing.

It’s odd—I never thought I would miss charting and peeing on inscrutable plastic oracles, but in a way I feel like the Nearly and I missed the “fun” part of attempting to get pregnant—or at least the part that doesn’t involve a third party, stirrups, and me hearing “Ride It, My Pony” playing in my head several times a month as I submit to the dildocam.
Most couples have a year of trying on their own before ending up with an infertility diagnosis. I’m not saying that is always a good thing—obviously a year of charting is pretty useless if you don’t ovulate, and tooth-grindingly stressful even if you do—but I think it gives you some time to transition. Our year was derailed by a miscarriage and then by over six months of tests, finally revealing that I do not ovulate on my own–we could have unprotected sex until our hip joints give out and not end up with a baby.

I thought that didn’t matter one whit to me, anymore. But now things with the Nearly are better than they have been since before the last miscarriage—we can look at “Baby’s First Spjorklatt” at IKEA without me getting sad or him getting edgy—and I feel slightly melancholy. It is a small thing, I know, but wouldn’t it be lovely if we could gaze at one another across a room of cheap-but-well-designed Swedish children’s furniture and then return home to make a baby in our own bedroom? If I can buy both a stylish armoire and a set of six cocktail glasses for $100, surely anything is possible.

I seem to have lost some weight. Not a lot, mind you—about seven pounds. Still, seven pounds is as much as a Rat Terrier weighs. I have rid myself of an entire small dog’s worth of extra weight. But how, you ask? Where did the Rat Terrier go? Did I Stairmaster it off? Deprive it of sustenance?
To be honest, it all began with the bewitching Manuela’s entries about the South Beach Diet. She lost so much weight her clothes were slipping off her at work! And it was easy!
It was this last bit, the “easy,” that caught my attention. Also, as someone with PCOS, I know that low carb diets are supposed to help my insulin resistance. Obviously it wouldn’t be as easy as The Wormtini: Weight Loss Sensation, but I didn’t think it would be particularly difficult, as I don’t care for sweets and have already cut down on refined carbohydrates. I shimmied off to Target to buy a paperback copy of the South Beach Diet book.
Right off, I noticed a few problems with “Phase One.” During this phase you are not allowed full-fat cheese. It is suggested instead that you eat cheese that has had its fat cruelly and artificially stripped from it. Now, I have strong feelings about cheese—I do not think it would be overstating the case to say that cheese is my soulmate. I once shed actual tears after being served a heartbreakingly tasty Taleggio. I do not eat “low fat cheese,” unless by “low fat cheese” you mean cheeses that are naturally lower in fat, such as parmesan. So right away I added “full fat cheese” to the list of allowed foods, with the stipulation that I would primarily eat cheeses naturally low in fat.
The next problem I noticed was a reference to “cooking spray.” Again, mock me if you will, but I do not care to cook with “cooking spray,” preferring the timeless taste of butter. So I added “butter” to the list of allowed foods, with the stipulation that it was to be used only in small amounts in cooking when olive oil simply would not do.
The third problem with “Phase One” was one I’m sure we all saw coming: No Alcohol. I vowed not to consume beer or any mixed drink with juice as an ingredient, but considered the insistence that I abandon the health-giving tonics of gin and white wine overly zealous.

Thus my diet was born. I decided to call it The South-by-Southwest Beach Diet.
I lasted four days.

The first day was easy. The second day was fine, except for a disturbing dream during which I was sliding down a towering mound of macaroni and cheese, laughing, my arms in the air. The third day I burst into tears when invited over for my brother’s famous Bacon Pasta. I declined the invitation and went home to sulk, gnawing desultorily on a piece of steak. What is the point of living if you can’t have the occasional helping of Bacon Pasta? I wondered.
The fourth day I woke up ill. I was weak, nauseated, and cranky. My hands were clammy. I felt panicky and preoccupied with thinking of unpleasant ways to end my life using only the materials at my disposal, like a suicidal MacGyver.
It was a familiar feeling. As it turns out, I was suffering from ketotic hypoglycemia—a charming side effect of “Phase One” of the SXSWB Diet.
Body: 1,000,000. Alexa: 0.
Glum and defeated, I went back to my old, insulin resistance diet—which is much like “Phase Two” of South Beach, except that I very occasionally have a small portion of refined carbohydrate, balanced with protein.

And then something unexpected happened. The day of the Nearly’s graduate reading, I bought an outfit. Trying it on at home, I was so startled to see myself looking attractive that I flew into a power-mad frenzy of strutting around the apartment and gazing at mirrors and ultimately enticing the Nearly into an impromptu sexual encounter.
Now, this wasn’t a magic outfit—it was merely a pair of expensive jeans and a structured top. However, it had been months since I viewed my body as anything but a lost cause. My philosophy had become “If You Can’t Beat It, Join It (in an orgy of cheese and makeuplessness and cheap, ill-fitting clothing).” But seeing myself look curvy rather than chubby gave me hope. Perhaps it wasn’t a waste of time to try to look presentable. Perhaps I wasn’t irredeemably schlumpy after all.

That weekend I dug out an old exercise book I used when I weighed 95 pounds and was desperate to make my body look less like kindling, vermicelli, or similar. My mother had used it to lose a little weight and tone her muscles, and at the time—five years ago—I told everyone about this program. It was a miracle, I enthused, the way it helped me to gain weight and my mother to lose it. It was challenging and simple at the same time, varied enough not to become boring, yet something you could do at home with minimal equipment. It was also the only exercise program I managed to maintain for over a month, probably partly because of the rapid results.
The regimen is basically fifteen minutes of weight training with three-pound weights, six days a week. I use five-pound weights now because they are all I have and besides, I weigh 50 pounds more than I did five years ago. There are different exercises each day working different muscles. The book is from the late eighties and the pictures…well, here’s the cover.
I wouldn’t actually recommend reading the book, as it is rather annoying–I merely follow the exercise program as a supplement to my sensible diet. Interestingly, the author, besides being a professional healthy-person, has a PhD in English Literature from NYU. I like a little brains with my brawn. Though I think she might be insane.

So that is how I lost the Rat Terrier. I have been doing the weights for two weeks—after work, in front of the television. The weight loss seems to have stopped for now, presumably because of the whole muscle-weighs-more-than-fat thing, but I am still seeing a noticeable difference in how I look, how clothes fit, and how I feel. It is excellent for one’s posture. And even through I would like to lose another Miniature Schnauzer or so, it has never been the scale that bothers me. It is the mirror I have a problem with. I have started to take more time with my appearance and am able to think about clothes without muttering about silk purses and sow’s ears, which helps.

I am sure you are all bored to helpless tears by now, and I apologize.
The End.

I have been busy. Actually, saying I have been busy is a bit like saying that ketchup is a vegetable (thank you, Mr. Reagan) in that it contains a kernel of truth but falls pitifully short of a full explanation. Actually, as tomato is a fruit, I don’t think that analogy holds up particularly well, but as previously mentioned, I have been very busy—too busy to come up with alternate analogies.
I called the TDOTP, and the answer, unsurprisingly, was No.
However, rather than being the steel-fisted crusher-of-fates I had imagined, TDOTP was quite charming and complimentary. It is hard to dislike someone whilst they are saying nice things about you, especially if you are burdened with a crippling insecurity and the need for validation from others, as I am. Anyway, the story is this: when the BA-Less MFA Candidate snuck into The Program, there was a different Provost, a kinder, gentler Provost, and apparently requests such as mine live or die at the pleasure of the Provost. So there was nothing to be done, and the quality of my writing didn’t even come into the matter, as Provosts do not concern themselves with such things.

The Nearly urged me to view this as a blessing—not even in disguise, but rather, as he put it, having just been “roughed up a little.” After all, he was a student of The Program for three years, and found it lacking–this was the source of his conflict with TDOTP, in fact. The Nearly asked me, quite reasonably, whether The Program would have made my list of MFA programs to which to apply, had my credentials not been an issue. I was forced to admit that it would not have. It has no teaching fellowships, and no professors whose work leaves me moist with excitement.

I have found a reputable school that offers a BA in writing, and will allow me to complete said degree online. Before last week, the only online programs I had found either a) were not reputable enough for me to deign to attend them (ha!) or b) offered only degrees in disciplines such as “Marketing and People Pleasing” and “Businesslike Managerialness.” It is only thanks to the Nearly’s uncharacteristic purchase of the magazine “Poets & Writers” (with scary Franz Wright on the cover!) that I learned of this–quite new–program. The unfortunate side effect of its reputability is that it requires an actual application with essay and letters of recommendation and a phone interview.
Also, in order to get a transcript from one of my previously attended universities out of hock, I will have to pay a hefty fee to the Bursar’s Office of said previously attended university, where apparently I have a five-year-old outstanding balance of over $1000. Of course, I didn’t find out about this until I requested my transcript. Apparently they have been sending threatening notices to a five-year-old address of mine. My position is that if they cannot get my address right, they do not deserve to be paid their $1000, but we have agreed to disagree on that point and in order to move things along I am probably going to have to write them a large check.

So here is the new plan, which I am referring to as Operation: Mortar Board or Operation: Hairshirt, depending upon my mood:
1. Write large check to previously attended university
2. Apply to BA program for May term
3. Use BA program to perfect manuscript for MFA applications
4. Speedily finish BA (I am hoping to finish in a year—we will see how realistic that is.)
5. Apply to MFA programs (I can apply when I am within one semester of graduation.)

This plan will give me the advantage of being able to apply to any program I like, as once I have my degree I will actually be a rather attractive candidate. So that is delightful. Also delightful is the fact that the Nearly and I have decided not to change our “plans” to have a baby.
Or, no, that seems a bit optimistic, at this point. Make that “plans” to get pregnant.
Or, okay—“plans” to ovulate.

So I have been very busy with all of that, as well as with social engagements–my nights-out-per-week index is hovering at “five,” up from my usual “zero.” It is exhausting, transforming from a social chrysalis into a social butterfly. In addition, I have been Working Out (very pleasing because now the Nearly can say “You look good, do you Work Out?” and I can say “Yes, as a matter of fact I do.”) and have a whole post brewing about my recent odysseys in the world of diet and exercise, and dozens of blogs to catch up on, but all of that will have to wait until at least tomorrow afternoon, because I have a friend of the Nearly’s coming over for cocktails in a few hours and THEN, tomorrow morning, I am having breakfast with my mad-scientist father whom I haven’t seen in over a year and who unexpectedly called last week.
And that is at least one whole other post right there, as well.