Mashed potatoes on the wall

2004-05-06 - 8:36 p.m.

I was good today until my mom got home. My dad was out late having a "plant walk" for his students who are making plant collections for his class, so my mom wanted to go out and "party." Yes, we went to WinCo. What, grocery shopping isn't your idea of playing? Anyway, it was all good until we hit the bulk food section with the barrels of food and the scoopers. We bought some bags of trail mix. They have a whole bunch of different kinds so we tried several. The idea was that we were getting it for this upcoming weekend's travels, but when we got out to the car we decided to keep the trailmix baggies with us in the front seat so we could munch on them. And there was a lot of traffic on the way home so we munched quite a bit. And then when we got home they stayed open on the kitchen table for quite a while too. If I lose any weight this week it'll be a miracle. And dammit if those bags of trailmix aren't still calling my name from the cupboard. La la la la, not listening!

I'm having another one of those how-in-the-world-did-this-day-go-by-so-quickly days. I got up relatively early, too. I got up and ate breakfast while I chatted with Flik on MSN Messenger. Then I wrote a birthday card for DeenPo who's birthday is on Sunday and drove down to the post office to mail it. I'm not sure that one is going to get there on time, but it should. It doesn't have very far to go. Then I came home and wrapped Mother's Day presents for my mom. I ended up with a book, a DVD, and a shirt. My dad hasn't mentioned Mother's Day yet, but I know he knows it's coming up. I don't know if he's planning on flowers or if he's gotten her a card. I don't know if I should worry about it or just let it be his problem.

At noon I drove down to the BloodSource and donated a pint. It was my 8th donation in Sacramento County. For those of you who aren't familiar with the U.S. system of fluid measures, that means that as of today I've donated 1 gallon here. Not so much in the grand scheme of things, but not really something to sniff at either. As a token of appreciation I got a keychain. It's a pewter star and on one side it says "BloodSource" while on the other side it says my blood type, O+. (When I showed this to my mom later she asked me why it said "zero plus." My dad wondered what the female symbol was for. Sometimes I worry about my family...) Anyway, I had no problem with my hemoglobin (although the lady had a heck of a time squeezing enough blood out of my finger to do the test. I could've told her when she pricked my finger and it didn't hurt that there was no way that was going to do the trick.) and my blood pressure was up 10 points from last time, 94/68. She asked me, "Are you a runner?" I told her yes. I don't know why I said that, I can't even remember the last time I ran. Sometimes, when it doesn't matter one way or the other, I just say whatever's easiest. In my opinion the worst part of donating blood (usually) is answering those questions at the beginning. You know, the ones like "Have you had sex even once with a man who's had sex even once with a monkey who was born in Africa before 1972?" I wish they could just just ask "Have you had sex since the last time we asked you all these questions?" and I could answer no and be done with it. But instead we have to go through the whole list. And it bugs me how embarrassed I get. I sit there answering no, no, no, all the while trying madly not to blush. But anyway, today that was not the worst part. If today had been my first time donating blood, I most likely would never go back. I've never been a hard stick before. I mean, they always talk about it like I'm going to be, but then the needle seems to go right in and all is well. Today, though, all was not well. Supposedly when she stuck the needle in my arm my vein moved. Do you believe that? Something about hot weather making people's veins roll. Such bullshit, I was cold all morning. But regardless, when she stuck the needle in my arm she did not hit the vein. It seems to me that the thing to do in that case would be to withdraw the needle and try again, but then I'm not a phlebotomist. She decided it would be better to just leave the needle in my arm and dig around with it. I was focusing all my effort on not puking from the pain and looking around for a trash can should I be unsuccessful when the needle-wielder said, "Can you do me a favor?" You know things are not good when your phlebotomist needs you to do her favors. She had me move my arm into various positions to see if that would help. It didn't. Eventually she got someone else to help her and that person got the needle in the vein right away. I have to say though, the whole ordeal got my blood pressure up there and I managed to pump out a pint of blood in a third of the time it usually takes. And afterwards the lady in the recovery area was really nice to me and I had a diet coke and popcorn for a snack--low calorie for once.

What do you call it when you meet someone and you want to be their friend but you're not yet? If I met someone and I wanted to be their girlfriend I'd say I had a crush on them. But what if I just want to be friends? Anyway, there's this girl who seems like she would be really fun to hang out with, only I have no excuses to hang out with her. I've met her through aerobics class. She's about two years older than me--at least she wore a shirt that had a high school name and "Class of 1995" written on it so I assume so. But to make things a bit weirder, she's my mom's co-worker. She teaches 5th grade at my mom's school. We talk twice a week before and after class. You know, not only do I not have any excuses to hang out with her, I can't even think of things we would do if we did hang out. I don't hang out anymore. I just putter around all day. I'm such a dork!