jiggly

a funny thing happened to me the other day ... i felt jiggles. don't get me wrong, i've felt em before. i still remember the first time i felt jiggles to this day. i was in college, late for some class, and had to take off running. needless to say, i hadn't been exercising much at the time. anyway, off i went. and that's when it happened. it wasn't as graceful as i remembered it, running. i seemed to be bouncing a bit. and i looked down, and sure enough, i was jiggling. i put on the brakes immediately and made sure no one had noticed. then i quickly and quietly began my very first diet. and that's what i do now whenever i feel jiggles returning. i start to exercise a bit, maybe eat a little less, whatever. at least until the jiggles are gone.

back to the other day, though. every other time i've felt jiggles, i was running, or at least power-walking. this time, however, i hit a bump in the road and felt jiggles. you heard me right, a bump in the road. i jiggled in my car. maybe i've been ignoring the jiggles lately? there's no other explanation. i had to have been feeling them. i guess i didn't want to face the truth. partners have been coming into my office and telling me how pasty i look for months. i come back from lunch and constantly feel like i need to go to the little boy's room my pants are so tight. look in the mirror, jack mcdoer, look in the mirror.

something obviously needs to change. no more excuses. no more empty promises. no more dr. pepper with a side of cheetos for breakfast. this whole "car jiggle" thing has really caused me to do some soul-searching and find out what's really important to me, like weight, appearance, and material possessions. do i really need to eat barbeque three times a week? no. do i really need a large popcorn at every movie? a medium will do. this week i've been to salty iguana, wendy's, jose pepper's and taco bell. hell, i even bought and ate a 6-pound bag of gummy bears at costco. i've been telling my wife for months now that "i'm letting myself go," that "all the fat guys on sitcoms have skinny wives," and that "i'll go on a diet when i hit 2 bills." i read the south beach book and have been using it as a coaster. pathetic, just pathetic.

so i've started power-walking again. no major arm movements, though, you don't need to worry. 4 nites a week, plus 1 morning, that's the plan. you may see me scurrying through mission. many of you have probably gotten calls from me wondering why i was panting rather than talking. no i'm not stalking you. i'm just out walking. i don't wanna feel jiggles when i run anymore, but i really, really, really don't wanna feel jiggles in the car anymore.

i'm so tired, my mind is on the brink

i've gotten a lot of complaints about my last post: "it was too long," "it was boring," "i don't care about your tooth," "i hate you and everything you write about." that's not the reason i haven't been blogging, but i'll make this short and sweet anyway. it can't make for a great post when you can't see the screen. i'm a little on the tired side of life, you see, this weekend was a mcdoer family wedding. yes, my step-sister gave me a brother-in-law. tool showers were thrown, strippers were stripped down, pasties were removed, and everything was rehearsed twice only for me to screw it all up and be the only usher who ever had to bring out extra chairs. i stayed up late to see the sun. i even danced some. once all the wedding vows were made and all the appetizers eaten, i tried to work, tried to sleep, and tried to work some more. my wife called me on the way and told me that her grandma was dead. turns out her phone didn't work. now i'm even sleepier. i have a tiny house and lots of bug bites. and my wife is taking away my cds one at a time. i'll write more when i'm not sooooooooooo tired.

the never-ending root canal

WARNING - iwannabeyourblog has been the target of a ruthless hacker. do not believe everything you read. i am thoroughly investigating this incident, and any and all hackers, including my wife (who somehow stole my password, infiltrated my blog, and wrote about how pinchy would've wanted it, like she knows), will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law. for the time being, and until the investigation is completed, all authentic iwannabeyourblog posts will end with the initials "*jmcdoer*".

with that being said, it's on to this week's topic, the never-ending root canal, woh woh woh, woh woh woh, woh woh woh, the never-ending root canal, woh woh woh, woh woh woh, woh woh woh.

i haven't written much about my recent tooth ailment much since it's so damn depressing. today, however, i finally received a bit of good news. after 6 trips to the endodontist, countless ibuprofen overdoses, numerous shots directly into my gumline and thousands of dollars, i am ready for a crown, albeit a temporary one.

it all started so suddenly, but it has been dragging and dragging and dragging for months now. my tooth hadn't been hurting a lick, but during my semi-annual dentist's appointment, no cavities, i guess my x-rays showed a large gaping hole in one of my upper teeth. my utopian dentist, who only works 3 days a week from 10 to 2 in tommy bahamas, reassured me by saying that "i've only seen this once or twice in my life" and "you need to see a specialist immediately."

so i was en route to the endodonist the next day. i hadn't talk to dear old mom in a while, and i gave her a call, you know, to calm my nerves and get my mind off of my terrible predicament. of course, that's all she wanted to talk about. to make matters worse, when she found out who i was going to see, she let the horror stories start flying. she'd seen this endodontist before. over and over and over again. and there was swelling and blood, gigantic needles, and horrible and excrutiating pain. she actually told me that after her 6th or 7th trip, he told her that if she kept complaining, he'd just pull her tooth. i ended our phone conversation as i walked into his office.

sure enough, my peace-loving dentist was right about the gaping hole. as the endodontist said, while trying to put a stop to all my panic, "it's not cancer, but your tooth's eating away at itself." oh, ok, that makes sense. after that, i honestly quit listening. only this kinda stuff happens to me.

"internal resorption" is what he called it. i tried to look it up on the web, but apparently it's pretty rare because google didn't have much on it. here's the best explanation i could find:

Internal resorption is when the living cells inside a tooth attack the inside of the tooth and eat away the inside lining of that tooth. Every tooth has a hollow area that contains the tooth's nerve and blood vessels. The hollow inside of a tooth crown is the pulp chamber and the part inside the root is the root canal. These contents are removed when root canal therapy is done. This problem commonly begins at the top of a root canal but can be seen in the pulp chamber and spreads.

Internal resorption is usually painless and progresses slowly. It is often found after dental x-rays are taken but when all of a tooth is eaten away, a patient may shatter the tooth before the problem is found. If it is found early, the cells inside the tooth suffering can be removed with root canal therapy before causing more damage.

We do not know exactly why the cells attack their own tooth but internal resorption can be associated with a number of things. A history of trauma is most common. The insult could be from a blow or tooth decay. Sometimes an unfinished root canal leaves some living cells that go wild and turn on their own tooth. A tooth can crack from biting something hard and the irritation can slowly kill the tooth and damage the cells.

Internal resorption is rare since our bodies do not usually turn against themselves. Regular dental care along with necessary dental x-rays are important in finding and preventing damage. A full x-ray review should be done every three years.

how'd i get this, i kept asking myself. it certainly wasn't "from a blow." when my endodontist informed me that 99% of internal resorption is caused by an early-childhoold trauma to the mouth, all those bad memories i'd tried so hard to forget rushed to my head: the 5-iron to the mouth during junior golf; the busted chin and teeth through my upper lip from the boating accident; and ,of course, being knocked out by the middle school gynasium door. i guess i could have more internal resorption on the way.

when my treatment started, i felt optimistic, but it quickly turned to frustration and hopelessness. i'd go to see the endodontist, wait for thirty minutes to an hour in the waiting room (magazine choices: year-old sports illustrated issues or AARP), then get stuck with a big needle in my upper and lower gum around the tooth, and wait thirty minutes to an hour more for him to show back up (magazine choices: AARP or AARP). then he'd started working, shoving medicine into my tooth, but after a few minutes of this, i'd let out a horrible scream. the novocaine had worn out, and i'd get another shot or two directly into my gums. then he'd work away for a while, my mouth held open by some sort of 17th century torture device, and he'd finally finish, i'd head back to work, and within 2 hours, i'd have this ungodly pain in my tooth. to tell you the truth, my tooth only hurt after the endodontist had finished working on it. and this entire sequence was repeated 6 times. 6 times.

things are better now in toothland though. the endodontist wants me to get a temporary crown "in case" it flares up again. he also told me that if i have to come back, he'll pull the tooth. i'm not sure he means it or not. but the way i see it, i have very few options. i'm supposed to go back to my hippy dentist to have the rest of my work done, but when i told him about the endodontist's temporary crown recommendation, he said that temporary's are no good. this from the guy who shamelessly pimps colgate products before, during and after he cleans my teeth. but i'll keep you posted. something tells me this root canal's not over.

*jmcdoer*

"Pinchy would've wanted it this way"

Fox update: Three days after Pinchy was officially put up for adoption at Wayside Waifs, someone adopted him! We figured he would go quickly--as soon as someone saw his sweet demeanor and unwavering loyalty, it would be all over. It's kind of bittersweet, though. We'd told ourselves that we would adopt him if no one else did, but I think both of us were hoping that it wouldn't come to that. He was totally cute, don't get me wrong, but he also got some pee on himself everytime he went. That, plus the fact that we both work 10,000 hours a day, added up to "home no good for dogs (home barely good for people)".

But now that getting and keeping Pinchy is no longer an option, we're both a little sad. I wonder if the family who adopted him gave him a home as good as the home we could've given him. The love we had to offer would have stacked up well against the time he would've had to be in his kennel. But I guess all we can do now is think of Pinchy in a warm, loving home and be glad for the short time we knew him.

In other news, there was a huge silver spider hanging over the driver's seat when I tried to get in my car tonight. He's been living in my car unseen for days now--spinning webs in the backseat, having babies (I totally killed a baby spider that was on my steering wheel with my hand yesterday, while steering mind you, and there's no way that's a coincidence) and generally wreaking havoc on my life. After I killed the little one yesterday, all I could think was "what if one crawls up my leg while I'm driving? do I pull to the side of the road and kill it, or do I completely freak out and drive head-on into the car coming towards me? if I choose the latter, would that kill the spider or no?"

So when I see the big silver spider tonight, I'm faced with a dilemma: I've got to kill him, but then can I really feel good about driving home? I mean, this spider could be the second smallest in the car, like those wooden nesting dolls, and once I kill him, his larger counterparts could totally jump on my face while I'm driving. When that happens, I'm not even thinking twice before I throw open the door and jump into traffic.

As it happens, I killed the silver spider with my umbrella handle and wiped up his wet, stringy remains with a granola bar wrapper. I then put the wrapper on the floor in the backseat and drove home, squirming and driving fairly erratically all the way.

I bet Pinchy could've taken the spider.

if you still love rock n' roll ...

so i haven't done a whole lot of blogging about rock n' roll since the inception of iwannabeyourblog. i didn't know if anyone cared? i don't go to nearly as many concerts as i once did in my youth; i've grown to despise hipsters, opening acts, talkative crowds, staying up late and not being able to sit down in my crickety and crotchety elder years. but yes, i do still have a two-cd-a-week habit, and i'm not sure i'll ever kick it. so for anyone who's still listening, here are some the of the albums that have been clogging my ears, and my stereo, and bringing me that much closer to the inevitable hearing-aid stage of my life:



portastic - bright ideas - it's as close to the chunk as you can get these days. it's also the source of my last heated argument since the day it finally arrived in the mail, i wanted to listen to portastic and my wife wanted to tell me about her day. highlights include: "through with people," "i wanna know girls," and "registered ghost."








new pornographers - twin cinema - not as surprising as mass romantic, or as catchy as electric version, but it's still better than 99% of the pop music out there, and it's got neko case. ahhhhhhhhh, neko case.








black rebel motorcycle club - howl - i liked b.r.m.c., loathed take them on, on your own, and bought this because the store didn't have portastic and i needed two cds. i was surprised to hear that most of their jesus and mary chain thing had been replaced with country, gospel and blues, but i kinda like it.







r.l. burnside - a ass pocket of whiskey - r.l., a famous delta blues guitarist, died just last week. i was introduced to him thanks to the blues explosion, who backed him on this album. my favorite line: "i got a ass pocket of whiskey, and a front pocket of gin, if you don't open that door, i'll kick your motherfuckin."







bob mould - body of song - this one's been billed as a sampling of bob mould's entire career, and it really is. if you're a fan of husker du, sugar or his singer-songwriter stuff, it's worth buying, but be warned, he didn't leave off the last stage of his career, electronica. everybody dance now.







frank black - honeycomb - frank black holed himself up in a nasvhille studio with a bunch of famous musicians and made this little gem rather than the pixies album everyone wants to hear. highlights include: "i burn today," "sunday sunny mill valley groove day," and "strange goodbye."







son volt - okemah and the melody of riot - what i'd give for that hat to be medicine! tired of solo gigs, jay farrar brought in a whole new lineup and resurrected the volt to once and for all conquer the free world. the result is the most rocking, and political, son volt record to date. "there's no reason to be down-hearted, there's music in the wheels there to be found."








white stripes - get behind me satan - i haven't listened to this one much, mainly because my wife grabbed it and hasn't let it go. she says it's their best yet. and i do love that "doorbell" song. "i've been thinking about my doorbell, when you gonna ring it, when you gonna ring it."










foo fighters - in your honor - i've listened to this even less. dave grohl's a nice guy, though.











stephen malkmus - face the truth - it's his adult wowee zowee.











spoon - gimme fiction - can spoon do any wrong? gimme more.







ryan adams & the cardinals - cold roses - more like shit roses. at least he has two more records coming out this year to redeem himself. no more greatful dead rip-offs though. i don't know how many more records i can keep buying. i'm not asking for a stranger's almanac or a heartbreaker, but how about at least a gold?






robbie fulks - georgia hard - robbie can do no wrong in our eyes. we've already seen him three times this year, including in nashville, and i imagine he thinks we're stalking him, but we can't get enough. this is his take on 70's country. highlights include: "georgia hard" and "each night i try."






and there you have it. 3 months of records in 3 sentences or less. take that pitchfork.

i'm going over the cliff

it's been a long and lonely week. my wife's been working more than doctors recommend, making me feel lazy for working 12-hour days. she gets home just as the clock strikes 7, we grunt a few times at each other, eat dinner, mainly of the microwavable sort, and she gets right back to work, leaving me lying on the couch with nothing but buckets of popcorn and "laguna beach" re-runs.

but this week's as good as over. i'm thru with it. we're on the sunny side of a 3-day weekend, ku finally got brandon rush, jay farrar finally aired his side of the ut split (a drunken jeff tweedy hit on his girlfriend while he was driving the van and repeatedly called him a pussy when he said he was leaving the band; you can read the rest at http://www.jayfarrar.net/board/index.htm, it's on the 2nd page of the post entitled "Jay in Relix, Jeff now teh Pussy"), and

my wife's finally thru, well almost thru, with her wildebeest of an editing side project.

i guess that's a photo of a wildebeest? jumping off of a cliff? that's kinda how i feel. free and jumping off a cliff. it's been a looooooooooong week. too looooooooooong. i'm glad it's over. we don't have BIG plans. we were thinking about driving somewhere, but with gas prices at $75/gallon, i guess it'll be more microwavable dinners and popcorn and "laguna beach," minus all the work, which is just fine with me.