Archive | August, 2011

Using this logic, my kitchen is now full of trophies.

4 Aug

Earlier this week I mentioned that I don’t do “sick” very well. I didn’t elaborate, because I hate it when people hijack my Facebook feed with an on-going list of symptoms. This is how that usually plays on on my Facebook Wall:

Them: Wah! Wah!

Me: Click.

Them: Permanently hidden.

Someone once told me that there are three things no one (excepting maybe relatives) really cares to hear you talk about: 1) Your dreams, 2) Your vacations, 3) Your children. I think we should amend that statement and add 4) Your health.

The only time I want to hear about someone’s health is if something YouTube worthy has happened to them. Like a botfly larvae has been pulled from their body. Or their bowel movements have crippled an entire municipality’s sewage system. You get the idea.

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When ignorance really is bliss.

3 Aug

Whenever I travel, I try to read a book set where I’m visiting. Usually I lean toward a novel and supplement it with guided walking tours so I can get a blend of fact and fiction. In preparation for my upcoming trip to Australia, I picked up something I read years ago, a non-fiction travelogue by Bill Bryson called In a Sunburned Country.

I remembered enjoying it (from the comfort of my couch in DC), so I thought it would be a nice primer.

WRONG.

Oh sure, it’s as funny and educational and telling as I remember. The problem? Bryson is fixated on takes great joy in regaling readers with tales of all the dangerous/poisonous creatures that inhabit the land Down Under. As someone who is a bit of an arachnophobe, this is NOT helpful.

(Separately, what does it mean that I’ve managed to weave phobias into EVERY post this week? I’m scaring myself. Is that a phobia too?)

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When the fear isn’t crippling, it’s freeing…

2 Aug

While I feel horrible for anyone confronting a phobia, some of the less common phobias are, um, borderline hilarious. Fear of snakes and spiders? I understand. Fear of air? Not so much.

(And yes, fear of air actually exists — it’s called anemophobia, if you’re curious. I didn’t know what it was a called, which is how I ended up on this site, doing a reverse look-up of phobias after WebMD indicated that fear of air is a symptom of rabies.)

For today’s post-lunch distraction, here’s a list of my newly-discovered favorite phobias:

  • Caligynephobia: fear of beautiful women. I think the Beach Boys named this one.
  • Deipnophobia: fear of dinner conversation. Pretty sure I’ve dated this guy.
  • Consecotaleophobia: fear of chopsticks. I’m going to guess the diagnosis of this runs pretty low in rural America.
  • Euphobia: fear of hearing good news. I want to meet this person. Sounds like a real Debby Downer: “Do you want me to start with the bad news or the –” “NO!”
  • Basophobia: fear of the inability to stand. How does this seed even get planted in one’s mind? And does it seize them only when they’re seated?
  • Arachibutyrophobia: fear of peanut butter sticking to the roof of your mouth.
  • Papaphobia: fear of the Pope. Nice to know he ranks up there with clowns for some people.

Interestingly, there is a whole list of phobias that I would argue aren’t phobias, but are, rather, NORMAL fears… like thanataphobia (fear of death) or taeniophobia (fear of tapeworms).

And of course, the men out there who are rolling their eyes, saying phobias are for sissies… I have one word for you: Medmalacuphobia.

Look it up.

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I didn’t realize WebMD was a humor site.

1 Aug

I’m really not good at being sick. In part it’s because I’m always operating off a mental schedule that leaves no room for inefficiency or incapacitation.

Take yesterday morning. I love my Sundays — I typically get up early and clean, then walk to the farmer’s market and load up on produce. I’ll hit a few yoga classes, walk to the library, run some errands, cook meals for the week and have an awesome sense of accomplishment when evening rolls around.

Instead, I woke up at 6am with a raspy sore throat and headache. I tried to rally but ended up spending most of the day in bed, hoping that the rest would force this bug to leave my system. At some point I started to feel sorry for myself (probably when I realized I’d missed the last option for yoga) so I went to WebMD to diagnose myself.

I know, you’re not supposed to practice “internet medicine” because you’ll end up believing you have a rare disease with only two weeks to live. But really, I was just trying to remember if the adage was “starve a cold” or “feed a cold” because I couldn’t decide if it was wise to inhale the pepperoni pizza in my freezer. Don’t ask why I thought WebMD would offer Mother Goose-like guidance; clearly I was sick and not thinking clearly.

Anyway, WebMD has this application called “Symptom Checker” where you can select the symptoms you’re experiencing and it will whittle down a list of possible conditions you may have. When I saw the options of symptoms, I quickly abandoned my own diagnosis and started trying to construct the oddest line-up of issues I could imagine, just to see if I could stump the system.

Here’s what I came up with:

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