tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-225674448909339292024-03-14T05:19:32.386-04:00Where the Charles River Meets Long Island SoundConnecticut girl moves to DC to try her hand at adulthood, decides she rather enjoyed being a student in New EnglandKatehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06672442036719983660noreply@blogger.comBlogger78125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22567444890933929.post-67320111847569376082011-11-11T14:50:00.004-05:002011-11-11T15:04:20.038-05:00Actual Email I Just Sent, and CommentaryActual email I just sent:<br /><br />You guys, I am failing at being productive today. All I have done is get my TB test read and my hospital ID made for my practicum, baked brownies, and ignored the screams of a person who was trapped in my building's elevator. No joke. Once I excluded the possibility that the ringing I heard was the fire alarm, I thought it was someone's call button from downstairs and that someone was harassing this girl to be let in to the building. Nope. Trapped in the elevator. My quads are going to be so badass from living in a 7th floor walk-up.<br /><br />Commentary:<br /><br />1. When I heard the voices of the men who came to free her from the elevator, I felt like a.) an idiot and b.) the most terrible person ever. Just to make it clear that I do, in fact, feel feelings.<br /><br />2. It's not that I'm a monster. It's just that I always assumed I would be the person trapped inside. Based on past experience, this is not an unfounded assumption.<br /><br />3. Public health applications of someone being trapped in an elevator: I don't know about you, but I am waaaaay more motivated to take the stairs now.Katehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06672442036719983660noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22567444890933929.post-87346263089239617252011-09-29T23:02:00.008-04:002011-10-13T08:44:39.357-04:00Reproductive BiologyI am taking a class on human reproductive biology. <br /><br />I should mention a few things about the other students. First, given that this class takes place at a medical school that rhymes with Farvard, everyone operates from the premise that the students meet some baseline level of intelligence. Second, it's about 60 percent dudes, 40 percent ladies. Third, they mostly seem pretty normal and nice and decently socialized. I don't say this last thing to be a bitch--I typically assume that people are normal until proven weirdos-- but, rather, because someone asked me the following question:<br /><br />"How many of the guys are only taking the class because it's the closest they're going to get to knowing what a vagina feels like?"<br /><br />"No! They all seem really normal and nice!" I protested, reflexively. But then I started looking for the awkward, and I honed in on one guy who kept turning around to share a giggle--yes, a giggle-- with a person sitting behind me, usually when a lecturer used the word clitoris.<br /><br />So, anyway, here I am, in lecture with some women, some mildly awkward dudes, and the guy apparently unfamiliar with lady parts. In this company I am listening to a lecture about the miracle of sperm.<br /><br />"It's really miraculous," the guest lecturer, a urologist, says. "Did you ever consider the fact that it's the only cell designed to function outside its body of origin?"<br /><br />This is really more than feminist me can take. I consider raising my hand. "Is it really miraculous that it takes two million of these amaaaaazing cells for ONE of them to get the job done? I am somehow unimpressed. NEXT."<br /><br />I decide against raising my hand. I mean, he's a urologist. It's kind of his job to be really excited about sperm.<br /><br />Blah blah blah aren't sperms the coolest blah blah blah well I guess testes make a lot of janky ones but hey they sure do make a lot of them blah blah bigger stronger faster smarter blah blah scrotum.<br /><br />Oh yes, now it's the moment we've been waiting for: time to talk about the wonders of the scrotum.<br /><br />I have a vague idea about what's ahead. I am pretty sure it will involve a lot of awkward silences between prompts to discuss scrotal physiology.<br /><br />I am so right.<br /><br />This discomfort, by the way, baffles me. We are in an elective class, a MEDICAL SCHOOL class no less, about reproductive biology. It's not as if all these people were abducted off the street, locked in a room, and told, "Surprise! We're talking about balls!" Good grief, 60 PERCENT OF THE PEOPLE IN THE ROOM HAVE A SCROTUM. Is it that difficult to talk about it in the abstract? The uterus--mine, yours, some anonymous uterus-- is one of my favorite topics of conversation. How is this different?<br /><br />The urologist is still trying to keep the class interactive. There is a quick refresher on the evolutionary origins of scrotal anatomy. I again refrain from offering an answer, since I'm pretty sure that the expected response to "Why is it so important for the male gonads to be external?" is not "To regulate the temperature of the sperm and also to make them easier to kick." Having somehow elicited an answer about keeping the little swimmers chilly, he moves on: "And <span style="font-style:italic;">how</span> does the scrotum keep the testes cool?"<br /><br />I consider rattling off three or four mechanisms, just to end the agony. As the tooth-pulling continues, I finally lose patience and call out, to the surprise and discomfort of several of the guys, "<span style="font-style:italic;">It sweats a lot</span>," in a voice that I realize is not unlike Patty Bouvier's. "Just make it stop," I think to myself. "We get it. You have said at least five times that sperm need to be at 34 ˚C. They like it cold. Aaaaaargh."<br /><br />I give up. I am zoning out a little, trying to decide which of the only-a-little awkward guys might be single and interested in dating my friends. My eyes pass quickly over the guy who is there to hear about vaginas (clearly not friend fix-up material), and then my brain senses a red flag. I focus back on him. Just like one of those games in the back of <span style="font-style:italic;">Highlights</span> when I was little, I play "What's Wrong with this Picture?"<br /><br />His laptop is not on his desk. It is, aptly, on top of his lap. Has he not seen <a href="http://www.pcworld.com/businesscenter/article/210179/male_infertility_and_other_ways_your_laptop_is_slowly_killing_you.html">articles</a> about this? Has he not been listening at all to the last 20 minutes of excruciating explanation about how heat causes male infertility?<br /><br />The laptop's fan turns on. The urologist looks directly at him but keeps lecturing. I think about raising my hand and asking if we can have an intervention. A fresh surge of annoyance about the whole "miracle of sperm" thing rushes through me, and also I consider the fact that I will sound a.) like a hideous bitch and b.) like I was thinking about this guy's testes. Nope, not me, not today. Sometimes, you have to let people figure out their mistakes on their own.Katehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06672442036719983660noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22567444890933929.post-16550381455314993502011-01-22T23:28:00.006-05:002011-01-23T00:26:44.758-05:00Kate Is Again Flummoxed By Drug AdvertisingI don't think it's any secret that I am often critical of and sometimes baffled by direct-to-consumer drug advertising. I have railed again DTC advertising <a href="http://kclew.blogspot.com/2008/04/kate-gets-annoyed-by-direct-to-consumer.html">before</a>. And then I reveled in the delicious awkwardness of the Yaz ad <a href="http://kclew.blogspot.com/2009/02/i-didnt-go-to-medical-school-for.html">retraction</a>. And I still don't get what's up with the whole <a href="http://www.cialis.com/Pages/index.aspx?WT.srch=1">Cialis</a> campaign. How exactly are you supposed to have sex with someone who is <span style="font-style:italic;">in a separate claw-foot bathtub</span>? I'm pretty sure at least one of you will have to leave your tub. And have you ever tried to get out of a claw-foot tub? I lived in an apartment with a claw-foot tub for two years. When you get out of a claw-foot tub, you are not thinking about looking sexy. You are thinking about not falling and cracking your head open on the sink or the tile floor. Although maybe when your tub is in the middle of a grassy knoll overlooking a picturesque valley, the landing is a little softer.<br /><br />Anyway, the latest drug to make me furrow my brow is <a href="http://www.beyaz.com/">Beyaz</a>. Yes, it turns out <a href="http://www.yaz-us.com/">Yaz</a> has a cousin.<br /><br />Why does Beyaz baffle me? First of all, Beyaz is only one letter away from "bedaz" which I assume is the noun form of the verb bedazzle. But, more to the point, Beyaz is a birth control pill with folic acid. You know who needs a lot of folic acid? Ladies who are preggers.<br /><br />Let that one sink in for a second.<br /><br />I struggle to understand the intent. As far as I can tell, it's "Beyaz is 99% effective at preventing pregnancy! But, um, just in case it's not effective, aren't you super excited that the fetus you didn't want will get all its Vitamin B?" That seems like a pretty weak consolation prize. Especially given the price of brand name birth control. I'd be willing to bet that, from a cost-effectiveness perspective, you're a lot better off popping generic BC and a Centrum (or a generic folic acid supplement, while we're at it).<br /><br />And can you think of any other drug that does anything like this? It's not as if you go to get a flu shot and they hand you a can of chicken soup on your way out, in case you get the flu anyway. I mean, obviously no preventative pharmaceutical is perfect, and oral birth control is especially prone to user error that compromises the effectiveness. But it seems really strange to make your product's potential failure into a selling point. Or maybe it's scathingly brilliant, and I just don't get it.<br /><br />Whatever. As long as your boyfriend/husband/guy-you're-kind-of-seeing stays in his own bathtub, you don't really have to worry about it.Katehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06672442036719983660noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22567444890933929.post-60100317319972690222010-12-06T22:22:00.018-05:002010-12-07T00:10:32.307-05:00Kate Is a Danger to Herself and Cake MixTonight, I did something of which I am ashamed.<br /><br />I baked cupcakes.<br /><br />From a box.<br /><br />As you will see, I have already paid for this act in emotional pain and suffering. Shockingly, I didn't burn myself. What? Oh, sorry, I've gotten ahead of myself.<br /><br />I should start at the beginning. Over the weekend, I acquired a box of Funfetti cake mix to make cupcakes for a wedding shower. Hey, at least I make my own buttercream (featuring little sprinkles to make it look like that alleged frosting you buy in a can). I had eggs, and the only other cake ingredients are water and oil. Who doesn't have vegetable oil?<br /><br />[Awkward silence as Kate stares into her cabinet in disbelief; notes that it is 9:45 p.m. and really, really cold outside; and convinces herself that no one will be able to tell if she cobbles together 1/3 cup of oil from a couple different varieties that were never meant for use in baked goods whose main appeal is the little sprinkles.]<br /><br />So anyway, the batter was finished. Into the oven go 24 mini cupcakes. Ten minutes later, out come 24 not-so-mini cupcakes. Apparently I struggle with the concept of "fill the muffin cups 2/3 of the way." By this time I was getting a little antsy, so I upgraded to full-size cupcakes for the rest of the batter. But did I mention that I had gone a touch overboard for those first 24 cupcakes? I stretched the remaining sprinkly goop across the 12 cups as best I could, predicting the full-size cupcakes to come out the same size as their tiny brethren, and threw them in the oven.<br /><br />At this point, I noticed that the first batch seemed a little jiggly and underbaked. Not especially interested in causing a Salmonella outbreak at a public health school, I decided to bake them a bit longer and tossed them into the oven with the other pan.<br /><br />Did I mention that I have a tiny oven? Oh, and I only have one oven rack. But somehow, it seemed that all three trays fit on the rack. I was legit shocked and delighted.<br /><br />Or not. Four minutes later, I went to retrieve the mini cupcakes. Remember your earth science class when you learned about tectonics and they showed you the picture of the plates stacking on top of each other <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Strike_slip_fault.png">like this</a>? Yeah. This was the situation on my tragic, tiny oven rack.<br /><br />[Brief moment of panic as Kate wonders if all is lost.]<br /><br />Okay. I grabbed my oven mitts and successfully extricated the subjugated cupcakes from the oven. No big deal--a few slightly smooshed, but certainly nothing that a pound of frosting can't fix (seriously, a pound of frosting; I don't kid around). Now to pull the other tray away from the back of the oven... by which I mean, push it away from me with my unwieldy glove until it falls face down into the bottom of the oven. You know what else is in the bottom of the oven? Why, you're right-- it <span style="font-style:italic;">is</span> the heating element!<br /><br />Not everyone knows this, but my mom is a really talented baker and cake decorator, and when I was four years old, she baked my nursery school teacher's wedding cake. It was beautiful, but when she baked a practice cake for my class, the batter overflowed, igniting as it sat on the heating element, causing panic-stricken little Katie to beg to evacuate the house. So you can imagine my stream of thought as this debacle unfolded:<br /><br /><span style="font-style:italic;">Son of a bitch! Shit. Okay. How do you get a 350 degree pan out of a tiny box, all surfaces of which are also 350 degrees? Turn off the oven and shut the door. Is that smoke? Shit shit shit fuck shit. Shut the door! Maybe without air, it will put itself out. If it worked for Mom, it can work for me. Okay, now open the window to let the smoke out; you cannot be that girl who sets off the fire alarm at 10:00 p.m. on a Monday when it is 25 outside. Mommy, can I go play in the sandbox? Where is my fire extinguisher... do I not own a fire extinguisher? Are you fucking KIDDING ME?</span><br /><br />Fortunately, there was only a small puff of smoke, because none of the sad remains of this shitstorm was touching the heating element. So clad in pajamas and oven mitts, I removed the oven rack-- which is now named Judas, incidentally-- and began scooping partially baked cupcake batter out of the bottom of my oven with a spatula. It either looks like a baked goods murder scene or like My Little Pony pounded a couple Four Lokos and then lost its cookies. I am super excited to finish cleaning that tomorrow.<br /><br />By the way, this was not fun. There was nothing fun about the Funfetti. This was Catastrophetti.Katehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06672442036719983660noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22567444890933929.post-41893310155899493092010-10-12T20:07:00.004-04:002010-10-12T20:44:52.173-04:00Kate Has Possibly Now Seen EverythingToday, I walked home from school. As I crossed Memorial Drive on my way up Mass Ave., a state trooper stood on the corner, looking up the road (thereby missing my brazen jaywalking). I didn't give it much thought, until I saw four others cruise through the intersection on their motorcycles... which was about the same time I noticed a helicopter circling overhead.<br /><br />There were many plausible explanations, of course-- a horrific car crash, a dead body washed up in the Charles, a Nobel laureate on the loose at MIT. But I, of course, keyed in on one and only one possibility: my long-awaited motorcade had finally come to Boston!<br /><br />I continued up the street. Just past MIT, there are train tracks that cross Mass Ave., and a crowd was gathered near the crossing, more state police waiting on their motorcycles on one side and a group of gawkers on the other. People snapped pictures and smiled and held up their small children to catch a glimpse.<br /><br />As I approached, I had a moment of doubt. After all, the police were still allowing traffic onto the street, which seemed odd. But, no, this has to be it. There's an election coming! Someone on some news station said something about the President coming to Massachusetts to campaign... or something... I think. In any case, you can understand that my rationale, though sketchy, was semi-legit. This was it. This was the Presidential motorcade. Or, even better yet, this was Joe's motorcade!<br /><br />I followed the crowd's gaze. They were all looking down the train tracks to the west. Hmm. Not sure if I would go with a <a href="http://politics.usnews.com/news/obama/articles/2008/12/15/obama-biden-plan-celebratory-train-trip-on-way-to-inauguration.html">train</a> trip in such a contentious election season, but whatever. If a White House train ride was rolling through Cambridge, I was all for it. I looked down the track...<br /><br />...and into the face of an elephant.<br /><br />No, not a Republican.<br /><br />A fucking pachyderm.<br /><br />A whole line of them, in fact. Getting off the circus train.<br /><br />The. Circus. Train.<br /><br />THE CIRCUS TRAIN?! SURELY YOU JEST.<br /><br />I didn't know it was possible to be crestfallen at the exact moment that your mind becomes boggled. But I am here to tell you that it is, indeed, possible.<br /><br />But the boggling continued. As I walked along, a guy asked me what was happening. I responded, in a dazed tone, that there was a line of elephants emerging from what appeared to be a circus train. He was completely unperturbed and proceeded to tell me--perfectly nonchalantly, by the way-- "Oh yeah, I forgot. Yeah, they have them walk across the Longfellow Bridge."<br /><br />Of course this was the day I left my camera at home. Of course.Katehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06672442036719983660noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22567444890933929.post-16287390009714782592010-09-21T23:07:00.004-04:002010-09-23T18:48:36.462-04:00Small Moments of DC WithdrawalEvery time I hear a siren, I look around for a motorcade. I live next to two hospitals and go to school near a thousand, so this happens a lot.Katehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06672442036719983660noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22567444890933929.post-62660002810060816902010-09-14T22:20:00.002-04:002010-09-14T22:52:17.573-04:00Kate Has a Laundry ProblemSo, I really, really hate doing laundry and avoid it as long as possible. "As long as possible" is typically about two and a half weeks, but it varies depending on factors including weather, traumas/moments of clumsiness resulting in stains, and how much I go running. (Socks are my limiting reagent. The months that I swam exclusively were some of the happiest of my life, because I could easily go at least three weeks without doing laundry if I really used my closet to its full potential.)<br /><br />Anyway, part of the problem with hating to do laundry and doing it, at most, two days a month, is that you really want to make those washes count. I don't only hate the effort involved in laundry; I'm cheap, I'm always almost out of quarters, and I have some vague liberal guilt about wasting water. So when I do laundry, I like to do all my laundry (which, by that point, is pretty much all my clothing) in one load of colors and one load of whites. If I'm really feeling lucky (reckless?), I try to fit a couple towels and a set of sheets into the mix.<br /><br />By the way, at no point did I say I think this is a good idea. It's not laundry best practice, if you will. But aside from one black teeshirt that once came out kind of lint-y, it has not come back to haunt me in any way. Until last Wednesday, at least.<br /><br />Wednesday morning, I got up early to go for a run. Already, I was sort of unhappy, because it was early, and also because I knew that laundry day was going to be around the corner pretty soon. It was raining lightly, which I had been expecting and which I thought might be nice running weather.<br /><br />By the time I got downstairs, it was raining a bit more heavily. Okay. Not ideal, but not the end of the world. I had planned ahead and not worn a white shirt, so it's not like there was going to be a wet teeshirt contest moment in the spring break sense of the words.<br /><br />By the time I got to the river, I could hear rumbling. Trucks? Sure, the road there is pretty busy. I thought I saw a flash, but I easily reasoned that away as a misfiring bulb in the lights on the Harvard practice fields.<br /><br />By the time I got to the bend in the road... holy shit. Remember how I said some rain wasn't the end of the world? Yeah. At this point, it actually was the end of the world. I was pretty sure this was it. I didn't want to run over the bridge, for fear of being the tallest thing around and, consequently, getting my ass smote, so I tried an underpass and ran a quarter mile on the wrong trail. This was not going as planned. In my pocket, I had keys, a CharlieCard, and my insurance card, which I realized would come in handy when I finally got hit by lightning-- someone could toss me onto a bus headed toward a hospital.<br /><br />At some point, I made it back to the trail I had intended to follow, where there were things like light posts and guys at least six feet tall, all of which I figured could deflect the wrath of God from me. But then I realized that the people passing were staring at me, and not in a good way. Dude, come on. Yes, I looked like I had fallen in the river, but so did everyone else.<br /><br />It was then that I glanced down at the front of my shirt.<br /><br />It was covered in a white, foamy substance.<br /><br /><span style="font-style:italic;">Does my shirt have rabies? Maybe this really is the end of the world.</span><br /><br />Or, maybe, if you really, really overload a washing machine-- I mean, massively overload it, to a point that even you admit isn't a good idea--no matter how hard it tries, it won't be able to remove all the detergent from your clothes. This surprise fabric content can then make its presence known at inopportune times.<br /><br />I think the lesson is that I need to adjust either my laundry habits or my running habits. It occurs to me, however, that perhaps this shirt is now self-washing, which would reduce my laundry pile by one shirt.Katehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06672442036719983660noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22567444890933929.post-67528084394883237842010-08-29T23:16:00.003-04:002010-08-29T23:50:32.612-04:00Kate Realizes that She Actually Lives in BostonWell, Cambridge, but it seems that I have gotten myself ensconced. I have a CharlieCard. I have taken the bus-- TWO buses, in fact (1 and 66, holla). I have turned on my TV and tuned in to the dulcet tones of Remy and Orsillo calling a Sox game. I have gotten lost running and found my way back home. I have even had guests over for baked goods. It seems I really live here.<br /><br />And already, in one week, I have seen more celebrities in Boston than I did in DC. I mean, real celebrities. Well, celebrity. The bar from DC was pretty low.<br /><br />Friday night, I called friends to find out where they were headed for the rest of the evening, and I received vague instructions to go to the South End to The Gallows. Having never been to the South End and lacking a smartphone, I was sort of hoping for a little more guidance than that, but I'm pretty intrepid. So I found myself in South Boston, dropped off at obviously not the right place. Fortunately, a friendly stranger who asked me for directions (which is amusing) pointed me to the right street.<br /><br />Once on Washington Street, I still had no idea where to go. Unenthusiastic about the idea of standing on a street corner waiting for someone to respond to my texts of "Help?" I spotted a valet standing outside a restaurant down the block and decided that it couldn't hurt to ask him. I set off briskly toward him, mostly oblivious to the presence of a large man chatting with the valet. And by large, I mean really quite large. <br /><br />As I opened my mouth to ask the valet my question, a guy came running out of the restaurant.<br /><br />"Mister Shaq! Mister Shaq! Can I have your autograph?!"<br /><br />What? I briefly looked up.<br /><br />Shit. It's Shaq.<br /><br />Does Shaq know where The Gallows is? Probably not. His utility for me is most likely limited.<br /><br />I refocused and asked the valet about the bar I'm trying to find. Shaq calmly signed something for the dude who came barreling out of the restaurant. I assume; I honestly wasn't paying attention. I was thinking about how, if you walk too far the wrong way down Washington Street, <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0407887/">you get shot and pushed off an abandoned building</a>.<br /><br />The valet went into the restaurant to ask the hostess if she knew where I could find this bar (the existence of which I was beginning to question). The autograph seeker had gone back inside. It was just Shaq and me.<br /><br />"Hi, how are you?" I asked.<br /><br />I mean, it would be rude not to say hello.<br /><br />"I'm good," Shaq rumbled. Seriously, his voice is really low.<br /><br />The hostess saved the day and told me how to find the bar, which obviously makes her the most important person in this story. But Shaq, it was nice to meet you, and I hope you enjoy Boston.Katehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06672442036719983660noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22567444890933929.post-27275013676281519672010-08-12T23:29:00.002-04:002010-08-13T00:00:08.071-04:00Kate Loses Her Mind, No One Reaps the BenefitsToday I lost a set of car keys. Within 30 seconds of driving the car with which they are associated. And, I was pretty confident, within the car itself.<br /><br />I've heard stories of gynecologists warning menopausal patients that they are likely to lose their car in a parking lot at some point during their perimenopausal stage. Is this some kind of warning shot across the bow? Menopause is to forgetting where you put your car in the parking lot, as PMS is to being unable to locate your keys? And if that's true, someone should alert the makers of Yaz immediately, because they could use a new ad campaign stat, since they had to pull that other one.<br /><br />The most infuriating part of losing car keys is trying to find them, and I really wanted to give up, but that wasn't even an option-- a.) they belong to Grammy, and b.) I lost them right after I pulled her car into our driveway, trapping my poor little Jetta, whose keys had not gone AWOL, so I had no legitimate way to go hunt down a spare.<br /><br />I found them eventually. There was about a 25 foot path in which they could have disappeared, and it took me 20 minutes to find them. I started out as a reasonable person, tracing my steps, double-checking every possible location where I could have set them. Then I tore apart the pile of belongings that I had dumped onto the backseat of the car, becoming increasingly frenzied, hearing over and over in my head that obnoxious adage about things being in the last place you look. (I mean, really. I'm pretty sure the first person who ever heard that particular nugget of wisdom never found what he or she was trying to find, because they suddenly felt stabby and refocused their efforts on locating an implement to inflict pain on the speaker.)<br /><br />But, shockingly, the keys were not in the last place I looked. No. Because I gave up looking. I stopped digging through my bag (where, by the way, there were two other sets of keys). I got into the car, sulked for a moment, and prepared to call my mother and tell her I was an idiot who was sitting in one of three useless cars-- one without keys and two without the tunneling or flight capabilities necessary to move past the first. And then, as I reached for my phone, the keys made themselves known to me, their little blue fob glinting under the passenger seat.<br /><br />I rejoiced. I started the car and turned on the radio and pointed the car toward the beach.<br /><br />And then I remembered that in two weeks, I have to be a functional person capable of higher-level thought. Gulp.Katehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06672442036719983660noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22567444890933929.post-25131356873538755162010-06-24T01:20:00.004-04:002010-06-24T02:10:14.222-04:00Self-Discovery Through PackingI think one of my friends once told me that he or she--seriously, I have no idea, and I don't discount the possibility that I hallucinated this conversation-- really likes packing before a move. Something about cataloging all your belongings, taking stock, something like that. Like I said, the details are hazy, and this concept of packing as an enjoyable activity is so foreign to my sensibility that I can't seem to piece it together.<br /><br />I admit, however, that packing is an excellent opportunity for disturbing revelations.<br /><br />1. I am even more idiosyncratic than I thought. I saved some of the boxes from my last move, and tonight I filled one of them with a few framed pictures and a variety of extra pillows, sheets, and towels. As I sealed the box, I noticed the label from the last time, two years ago: "Extra blankets, pillows, towels, sheets; pictures."<br /><br />2. I attach sentimental value to objects, including hideous objects. Today, I finally threw out a 9-year-old tee shirt that I kept because it was from our high school production of <span style="font-style:italic;">The Heidi Chronicles</span>. The final straw was when I put it on at the gym and attempted to stick my arm through a hole that I confused with the sleeve. And let's not even start on the neon green, strapless, terrycloth romper that we all bought as a joke for spring break senior year. I am parting with that, too, although in a possible crime against humanity I am going to donate it to a clothing drive.<br /><br />3. I should not be allowed to buy any more shoes. Or bathing suits, oddly, but they constitute a much smaller problem than the shoes. The shoes have spread across the floor of my closet and slowly up the perimeter in stacks, in the manner of an invasive plant species. There were shoes I forgot existed. It's horrifying.<br /><br />4. Finding shoes that you forgot existed is sort of distressing, especially when you read about <a href="http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/06/20/the-anosognosics-dilemma-1/?scp=1&sq=anosognosic&st=cse">anosognosia</a> the same day. And then you find a bag of sweaters you never took to the dry cleaners. Talk about unknown unknowns.<br /><br />5. The horror of discovering that you are a deadbeat who abandoned her sweaters and started a new life with her suit dresses and doesn't even send the sweaters a birthday card is easily forgotten when you find a fully functional umbrella that is at least four years old.<br /><br />Tomorrow, I face the kitchen. I just hope there isn't a family of possums living in my 11x17 pan.Katehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06672442036719983660noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22567444890933929.post-60182863908349775482010-06-22T16:58:00.002-04:002010-06-22T17:37:27.229-04:00The Harvard NetworkI have mentioned before the guy who sits on the Georgetown side of the M Street bridge. I don't pass him that often anymore, mostly because the things that motivate me to cross the bridge--<a href="http://www.bodegadc.com/">sangria</a>, <a href="http://bakedandwired.com/">cupcakes</a>, <a href="http://www.anthropologie.com/anthro/index.jsp">Anthro</a>-- are bad for me in excess. But yesterday, I needed to return some things, so off I went.<br /><br />I should note that it was really hot and disgusting yesterday. I believe some people would say it was 'hot as balls.' I would say it was like living in a sock. Yeah. You feel like you need a shower now, don't you? Exactly. Given the simile options I have presented, I think you can understand my decision to dress for survival instead of cuteness. In my case, that meant gym clothes, and my teeshirt du jour happened to be my Harvard School of Public Health shirt.<br /><br />Anyway, I dragged my sweaty, increasingly dehydrated self down M Street, considering various places I could stop to shop, by which I mean wander around air conditioned stores feigning interest in the merchandise. I noticed that, despite the heat, our friend was in his usual post, sitting on an overturned milk crate with a newspaper and a book. I stopped to say hello.<br /><br />And then I noticed his Harvard Business School shirt.<br /><br />"Heyyyy!" we both said.<br /><br />He grilled me about my interests in public health for minute or two and then wished me luck, adding, "You have a wonderful personality; you'll do well in public health." (Note that he said nothing about a good personality having anything to do with Harvard-- I bet he really did go to HBS.) I'm going to miss running into him. Do you think it's too cold in Boston for people to sit on the sidewalk at the end of a bridge, just being pleasant?Katehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06672442036719983660noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22567444890933929.post-77790684800365122222010-06-13T22:15:00.005-04:002010-06-13T23:11:49.243-04:00Kate Begins to Extricate Herself from DCJust when it seemed I would never write here again, I am back. I have missed this, and besides, I am quitting my job, soon, so I'm going to have some time to kill.<br /><br />Yes, it is the end of an era. In 17 days, my DC life will be packed away, and I will drive up I-95, have a little vacation (July and August lazing at the beach-- I feel so French), and then start my new adventure in Boston. I'm preparing already, getting my immunization records so I can prove to my grad school that I will not start a diphtheria epidemic and trying to become a Celtics fan. So far, both of these things are going well, although I am already a Red Sox fan, so I know that the Celtics' lead could blow their lead in the blink of an eye.<br /><br />It's starting to sink in that I'm leaving. We had a going away party Friday night, since it was probably the last weekend night that we'll both be here, and today I showed the apartment to prospective tenants. It was actually kind of fun, even though no one took me up on my offer of a beer, courtesy of the keg that is still hanging out in our living room. Based on everyone's feedback, either our apartment is enormous and our decorating job is super cute, or every other apartment currently on the market is a catastrophic shit hole, making ours a beacon in the wilderness by comparison.<br /><br />The best part, aside from the flattery, was meeting the people looking at the apartment. There were a few engaged couples and some girls who coincidentally went to college with my cousin, but my favorites were the girls who were looking for their first post-college apartment. As I showed them around and answered their (many) questions, it struck me that they are Marissa and me circa 2007. They had looked at a million apartments already, trekking around DC in the miserable heat, nervous about missing out on a good place, freaking out about the application ("What does she mean, "previous landlord?" Should I say 'college?' 'My parents?'). Granted, I have not really matured that much as a person in terms of apartment hunting ("Hi, Mom. I think I found my apartment, but you know how I am about snap decisions, so I just need you to talk to me a little and tell me that I'm not being a spendthrift or an idiot"). In fact, I guess the closest comparison I have is the week before the room draw in college, when the underclassmen would come look at our suite and try to figure out if their beer pong table would fit next to the futon. But it was nice to be on the outgoing side of the equation, assuring them that the utilities aren't expensive and that the other tenants don't mind the occasional party.<br /><br />In any case, this feels like it was a good warm-up for the next big event, my last day of work on Friday. Fortunately, I don't think I have to give tours of my cubicle.Katehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06672442036719983660noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22567444890933929.post-48098188909106257542010-02-02T23:47:00.005-05:002010-02-03T00:54:46.032-05:00Kate Gets Old, Becomes ReflectiveI turned 25 today. If you want to get technical about it, I turned 25 about an hour ago. It is snowing here, as it was in Connecticut that night. Punxsutawney Phil predicted six more weeks of winter today, just as he did in 1985. Actually, just as he does most years. Honestly, Phil can suck it-- there are <a href="http://www.courant.com/community/essex/hc-groundhog-day-parade-pictures,0,4883569.photogallery">much better groundhogs</a> out there. No, not you, Staten Island Chuck, but keep fighting the good fight.<br /><br />Speaking of Essex Ed, how convenient was that for my parents? If there's a freaking parade for your kid's date of birth, do you really need to throw an elaborate party? When we moved to Annapolis, people didn't believe us when we tried to explain the concept of a <a href="http://www.essexct.gov/Essex%20Ed/ed.html">Groundhog Day parade</a>. "No really, it's great. Everyone stands on Main Street, and you bang pots and pans to call the groundhog, and then they bring out the giant costumed groundhog and when it's over they place him in the middle of the rotary at the top of the street!" What part of that doesn't sound completely believable?<br /><br />People make a big deal about turning 25. "Ooooh, quarter-life crisis!" Really? I don't know. It clearly helps that I have a definite idea of my trajectory for the next couple years (grad school/poverty). But I figure I balance that out by maintaining my heading on the crazy cat lady track (minus cats). Nevertheless, I see no particular need for an existential crisis.<br /><br />Furthermore, I think the whole quarter-life thing is a little presumptuous. I'm a science nerd, and I get excited about advances in medicine, and I work out and try to consume more vegetables than beer (not hard--I've gotten really boring lately). But honestly, I am pretty sure I am not going to live to 100, so the whole quarter-life ship has sailed. [Note: I will retract this statement in 10.5 years when my grammy turns 100.]<br /><br />But I guess 25 is kind of a legit milestone. As my roommate so astutely and depressingly put it, I am now a member of the 25-40 demographic grouping, which I think means I have to eschew ironically cheering "WOOOOOO, COOOOLLLLLLLLEGE!" in favor of sincerely cheering "Hooray, fiber!"<br /><br />Even my parents seem to consider it a milestone, rewarding my existence with delicious dinners when Mommy Lew was in town for the weekend, some sweet bling, and a terrifying (read: AWESOME) groundhog puppet which you can see in some of the pictures of the Essex parade (I very narrowly escaped receiving one of those groundhog hats). Which got me trying to think of the most memorable birthday presents I have received. Don't jump all over me-- it's an interesting exercise trying to figure out what has stuck with you over the course of your lifetime. Aside from a few conspicuous consumption-type items I won't describe in detail, I came up with the following:<br /><br />Age 21: My pearls. I'm from Connecticut-- what do you want from me?<br /><br />Age 16: Driver's ed with Sal. Memorable not necessarily in a good way ("I've seen some pretty bad things happen when somebody turns away from the skid").<br /><br />Age 6: Part I: Ice skating lessons at the Naval Academy. Part II: Stitches.<br /><br />Age 4: I think this is the first birthday I remember, which might color my recollection, but I am pretty sure it is the defending champion in terms of joy. My parents made me a beanbag toss... thing. If you can't figure out what I'm talking about, you should probably step away from your computer and go play with a ball or a stick or something. Anyway, my dad built it, and my mom made the beanbags, and it was <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scuffy_the_Tugboat">Scuffy the Tugboat</a> themed, which is to say amazing. AND on top of that, my Uncle Brian brought this Sesame Street foil balloon, with which I believe I became irrationally obsessed. Anne and I volleyed with it for probably the better part of a week until we had beaten all the helium out of it, at which point my mom flattened it and put it up on our bedroom wall. Seriously, best balloon ever.<br /><br />And to think that then I got to go to the parade for my birthday.Katehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06672442036719983660noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22567444890933929.post-27607336744151235362010-02-01T22:55:00.006-05:002010-02-03T10:33:01.850-05:00Kate's Grammy Post-Game ReportI would like to say three things about the Grammys. Especially since the television coverage was clearly an attempt to turn it into some kind of three-way death match of Gaga v. Beyonce v. Taylor Swift.<br /><br />1. <a href="http://www.eonline.com/uberblog/b165011_what_was_your_favorite_lady_gaga_costume.html">I am a Gaga believer.</a> I stand by my original assertion that "Just Dance" has some questionable lyrics, and I think her subsequent work proves that she was not giving it her best in terms of the extent of the crazy in that video. But I understand that she had to suck us in with something catchy and ease into the truly bizarre outfits. And now, brilliance. She showed up as a walking homage to cotton candy and/or rhythm gymnastics. From there she went on to channel Marilyn Manson as the Wizard of Oz and got thrown into a machine that spit her out soiled and accompanied by ELTON. The last outfit was possibly the least bizarre, which is saying something. It reminded me of this terrible song I sang at chorus regionals in high school-- there was this part that involved the altos sort of chanting "lightning lightning lightning." Anyway, she is wacky and awesome and really a talented vocalist. <br /><br />Sidebar: Do you think her head ever hurts from all the head dresses? Do you ever want to take an afternoon off from being a performance artist? You know, hang out in your sweatpants, watch your DVR'ed Real Housewives, not spend an hour hairspraying your hair until it's a helmet?<br /><br />2. Beyonce has some pipes. I mean, daaaaamn (that was two syllables, in case you were unsure). She is legit talented. Which is why the army of storm troopers that accompanied her to the stage during her performance baffled me. I get that divas like a posse, but that seemed like overkill, especially when you are up against someone who specializes in performance art, i.e. strategic bizarro shenanigans. The following (abridged) conversation occurred between my sister and me during B's performance:<br /><br />KATE.<br />Is the Beyonce infantry going to face off against Gaga Laboratories?<br /><br />ANNE.<br />I feel like everyone's trying to unleash their inner Gaga.<br /><br />KATE.<br />I mean, she's killing it, but the storm troopers are a little suspect.<br /><br />ANNE.<br />Maybe they'll do something interesting?<br /><br />KATE.<br />Tase an audience member?<br /><br />3. Taylor Swift. I have been grumbling about her for a while--after she was on SNL, after I watched a whole thirty seconds of the Hope for Haiti telethon (No, I am not heartless. I already gave to <a href="http://www.standwithhaiti.org/haiti">Partners in Health</a> and there was not enough George Clooney to sustain my attention). But now, it is abundantly clear that even though she seems like a sweet person who was sincerely excited just to be nominated and gracious in victory, even though I salute her as a tall girl, even though her songs appeal to many, many people, girl cannot sing. At least not in any key that I can listen to without cringing.<br /><br />Suggestion: Taylor Swift/Kanye collaboration. Seriously. Can you imagine the publicity they would get? It would be INSANE. And more important to me, he could Auto-Tune that shit.Katehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06672442036719983660noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22567444890933929.post-3927791634011941222009-12-19T02:09:00.005-05:002009-12-19T03:40:01.724-05:00Kate's Open Letter to... Many PeopleTo my mother, who is probably reading this: At this writing, I am in my apartment, wearing sweatpants, and watching the <span style="font-style:italic;">West Wing</span> episode when it's snowing and the Whiffenpoofs are at the White House and Dulles and National are closed and Josh realizes that he's in love with Donna and the Whiffenpoofs sing <span style="font-style:italic;">O Holy Night</span>. Also, my shoes are drying out-- it looks like the two coats of waterproofing chemicals were a good investment.<br /><br />To the awesome bellman at the Willard who tried so hard to find us a cab: You are, indeed, awesome. Your heating lamps are awesome, too.<br /><br />To the cabbie who pulled up to the Willard and then sped away when we explained where we wanted to go: Are. You. Serious. Really, are you serious? To recap, a cabbie pulled up to the Willard and asked where we wanted to go. We said Dupont and Adams Morgan. He responded, "Up? I can't go uphill." Seriously? You drive a Crown Vic. I have seen these cars before. Driving around Connecticut. Frequently uphill, sometimes in snow-- occasionally both at the same time. Imagine.<br /><br />To all the other cabbies who passed us and did not stop: I do not fully understand your business model, as it seems to involve passing hoards of partygoers wandering through downtown at midnight in the snow. P.S., about half of them were wearing very tall, very unwieldy shoes and inadequate clothing. We really wanted to get in a cab. I would have paid a lot of money to ride in a cab.<br /><br />To the girls at the Willard who were considering getting a room at the Willard instead of braving the Metro: In what way did that seem like a good idea? Because getting a cab will be so much easier once a foot of snow has fallen? Because your feet will be warmer when your four-inch heels magically turn into snow boots? Furthermore, I particularly liked your logic to explain why it was unreasonable to walk four blocks to McPherson Square: "I'm sorry, but I'm a woman, and it is midnight, and I am not walking to the Metro alone. I do not want to get raped." Honestly, it is snowing. Vigorously. So much so that even cab drivers in their cabs don't want to be outside. All the rapists have taken shelter. It is probably the safest night of the year to wander the streets, unless your concern is wiping out and breaking your leg.<br /><br />To the guys we passed somewhere around 14th and New York Ave., who decided to grace us with a little Tim McGraw serenade, specifically the miniskirt line from "Bbq Stain": Thank you; I'm glad you liked my dress. I wish I had been as drunk as you were; I probably wouldn't have minded the cold as much. On a related note, my feet were freezing-- why could they still feel pain?<br /><br />To the people of the fair District of Columbia: I will see you when the snow melts and you all return to normal. Or, you know, what passes for normal here.Katehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06672442036719983660noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22567444890933929.post-8264417667616614932009-12-16T16:41:00.006-05:002009-12-16T17:16:11.619-05:00Kate Attempts to Grow ThingsSteps to becoming a vigilante gardener:<br /><br />1. Identify <a href="http://dcist.com/2009/06/photos_of_the_inside_of_the_real_wo.php">abandoned reality TV house</a>.<br /><br />2. Look for signs of an herb garden producers probably planted thinking the cast would care about sustainability. Preferably on public property, i.e., the sidewalk. See anything you think you might not kill if you transplanted it to a pot in your kitchen?<br /><br />3. Double check that you're not going to uproot a perfectly good plant only to slaughter it brutally in captivity.<br /> 3a. Hmm, <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rosemary#Cultivation">Wikipedia </a>says that rosemary does well in drought conditions. The top of my refrigerator gets very little rain, so this is excellent news.<br /><br />4. Liberate your target plant from its sidewalk home. Preferably under cover of darkness, even if it is on public property.<br /> 4a. You probably shouldn't remove the all the rosemary--that's a little greedy. And, furthermore, you're going to feel like an asshole if you kill all of it in one fell swoop. You have to pace yourself.<br /> 4b. You probably didn't plan this exercise very carefully, so chances are you lack an appropriate vehicle in which to transport your rosemary plant to its new home. Fortunately, since you're not a greedy asshole, you can carry it in one hand.<br /><br />5. Pot your exciting new plant. You might have an enormous bag of potting soil living on your fire escape, an artifact of your last foray into the wonderful world of herb gardens. Seriously-- you might have carried a 20-pound bag of potting soil four blocks from Garden District and up two flights of stairs, because you might struggle with gardening, but you try hard and you appreciate economies of scale.<br /> 5a. You might also have some concerns about that potting soil and blame it for the stunted growth and eventual death of your basil plant. Maybe. I'm just saying. If that's the case, maybe you pick up a fistful of dirt from the garden in front of your building.<br /><br />6. Enjoy your new plant. Remember not to over-water it, in the manner you over-water the Christmas cactus you keep at your desk hoping to reenact <span style="font-style:italic;">Little Shop of Horrors</span>.Katehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06672442036719983660noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22567444890933929.post-43497891545520567362009-09-25T22:49:00.008-04:002009-09-26T00:03:40.423-04:00Kate Misses New EnglandThings that have made me miss New England lately:<br /><br />1. Fall weather. It has become fall in DC. Well, not this week; this week was July part deux. But the weeks before and after Labor Day were perfection. The air was cool and mercifully dry-- the type of weather people describe as crisp. I don't really like the word crisp. I don't know why; maybe it's because my brain defaults to my cooking definition of crisp: adj., a polite euphemism for burned. But I digress. The beautiful weather--the clear, energizing air and the bright but not-hot sun--caused me pangs of Yale withdrawal, characterized primarily by regret that I was walking to work instead of WLH or the tailgate fields.<br /><br />2. Friendly people from Connecticut. No, I'm not kidding. Everyone hears all the time about Southern Hospitality and blah blah blah. Whatever. Speaking fewer words per minute than I can type doesn't make you friendly; it makes you inefficient. You want friendly? Try wearing your high school gym shirt from a small town in Connecticut-- which I do a lot, apparently, based on the number of times I've been stopped by people asking about my shirt. Which is three times in four weeks, to be precise.<br /><br />"Old Saybrook?! Old Saybrook, Connecticut?"<br />"Yes!"<br />"We live in Old Lyme!" "I have a house in Groton-Long Point!" "We just moved to Baltimore from Hamden!"<br /><br />Seriously. Delightful, lovely people. "Are you in school? You went to Yale? Good for you! When was the last time you went home?"<br /><br />3. The countdown to the postseason. There are few things I miss about New England the way I miss NESN, mostly because I mix my longing for Remy and Orsillo-- hell, even Orsillo and Eck-- with scorn for all those who try to take their place in my life. At least on Fox and ESPN, I can put the game on mute. On TBS, mute isn't enough, thanks to that clown Craig Sager and his nauseating and misguided jacket-tie-pocket square combos. And, more to the point, I don't want to have to mute the inanity of the guy who dresses like my 6th grade French teacher. I want good commentary. I want Don to gravely but sympathetically give it to me straight when Melky freakin Cabrera adopts a new offensive strategy such as lining the ball straight into poor Jon Lester.<br /><br />However, deficient Red Sox coverage aside, I admit that DC Sox fans are a devoted bunch who sometimes manifest their fandom in enjoyable ways on par with New England. I have encountered many people who give shout-outs to others sporting Red Sox paraphernalia. I usually refrain from indulging this urge, but today on the way home from Safeway, I couldn't help myself.<br /><br />"I'm sorry-- is your dog wearing a Sox jersey?"<br />"Well, I mean, we're playing the Yankees tonight."<br />"Oh, I understand. It's a big weekend."Katehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06672442036719983660noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22567444890933929.post-51178582035300068962009-08-18T22:00:00.006-04:002009-08-18T23:01:05.133-04:00The Five People You Avoid at the PoolFor about two months now, I have been swimming in the pool at the Y. I mostly go in the morning before work, and it's funny--by which I mean a little creepy--how you get to know the other regulars. There's the really nice woman who always asks if it's okay if she joins your lane. There's the guy who looks like a guy from college, to the point that I do a double-take-- hey, we're talking about 6:15 on a Tuesday; I'm impressed my hallucinations are limited to false doppelganger sightings. And there's the lady who is always in one of the slow lanes, just chillin and doing the sidestroke, sometimes with a kick board. She's great.<br /><br />[By the way, if you want to minimize your chances of being in a lane that resembles the aquatic equivalent of the Beltway at rush hour, pick the slow lane. Seriously, this works. A few people use the slow lane because they are honest with themselves, but most people are way too proud to self-select whether they should be there or not. But not you. You are ruled by logic, not some misguided sense of self worth derived from holding your own in the 'medium' lane.]<br /><br />But not everyone at the pool is great. And I say this not to be a bad person but, rather, as one who understands that my life can serve as a warning to others. Therefore, I give to you The Five People You Should Avoid at the Pool.<br /><br />1. THE PERSON WITH FLIPPERS<br />Some people who use flippers are fairly skilled in their use-- you know, they keep their kick mostly under water. As a result, they create a constant wake, which kind of sucks. But not as much as people who don't know how to use flippers. These people create splashing reminiscent of the more violent scenes in "Jaws." Overall, they are not so conducive to your ability to breathe.<br /><br />2. PEOPLE USING THE BUDDY SYSTEM<br />Red. Flag. If someone needs a friend, it means he or she is either <br />a. not that interested in swimming and thus planning to stand awkwardly in the shallow end chatting<br />b. worried about drowning. And possibly being lost at sea. In the pool.<br /><br />3. THE TRIATHLETE<br />I know several triathletes, and they are all delightful people, so don't get me wrong. All I'm saying is that I'd rather not share a lane with someone who is checking their split times and thus refuses to start their next lap until the second hand is on the 60 (you might think they're staring at you, but actually they're staring over your shoulder at the giant clock on the wall). Also, the triathletes sometimes have conferences at the shallow end, which is a little awkward. Yeah, the awesome swimmers are having a meeting. No, you're not invited.<br /><br />4. THE WIRY OLD GUY<br />Again, please do not misunderstand. But there are a few wiry old guys who have, over time, developed interesting adaptations of the traditional swimming strokes. They tend to resemble the motions of a drowning interpretive dancer. And the rest of the wiry old guys have old man strength, and nothing ruins my day like getting lapped by a 70-year-old.<br /><br />5. THE PERSON WEARING A FLOATY BELT<br />I think this speaks for itself. Especially in combination with flippers.Katehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06672442036719983660noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22567444890933929.post-35761783241122019252009-06-08T12:44:00.002-04:002009-06-08T12:52:54.306-04:00Kate Stops Being PoliteThis is <a href="http://dcist.com/2009/06/closer_to_confirmation_of_the_real.php">bad</a>. This is very, very <a href="http://borderstan.com/2009/06/07/real-world-at-2000-s-st-nw-a-halo-lounge-angle/">bad</a>.<br /><br />This is <a href="http://antirealworlddc.blogspot.com/">hilarious</a>. <br /><br />On the bright side, maybe they'll get kidnapped by the <a href="http://www.scientology-washingtondc.org/">Scientologists</a>?Katehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06672442036719983660noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22567444890933929.post-10029808672749403642009-03-25T10:51:00.002-04:002009-03-25T11:35:19.479-04:00Not Well Played, NYTMonday night (probably Tuesday in the print version), the <span style="font-style:italic;">New York Times</span> reported on a <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/24/health/24pill.html?hpw">federal judge's decision</a> that the FDA acted improperly in setting an 18-and-over age restriction on the over-the-counter availability of Plan B. <br /><br />Sidebar: Woohoo! Now, science people, don't freak out. I still feel sort of queasy about non-scientist judges making rulings about science. However, this decision was not actually about science; it was about government officials using politics to game the approval process. So I can celebrate the reproductive rights moment without feeling awkward. Besides, if Susan Wood-- who resigned from the FDA because of this issue-- is happy, I'm happy.<br /><br />So if I'm glowing from women's collective win, why am I pissed at the <span style="font-style:italic;">New York Times</span>? It's because I'm one of those masochists who reads the <a href="http://community.nytimes.com/article/comments/2009/03/24/health/24pill.html">reader comments</a>. What's worse, I'm that girl who reads the comments and then tries to figure out how the editors chose their "Editors' Selections." Allegedly, the rationale is as follows:<br /><br />"NYTimes editors aim to highlight the most interesting and thoughtful comments that represent a range of views."<br /><br />Okay, fine. I even acknowledge upfront that they are inevitably going to pick some comments with which I disagree. No problem. Of course they were going to highlight a comment from someone who thinks Plan B is going to be the end of western civilization. I was ready for that. Hell, that's why I clicked on the comments page in the first place.<br /><br />However, I have a major problem with tagging as "interesting and thoughtful" a comment that includes factual errors. I'm looking at you, Comment #10:<br /><br />"For those of us, who respect the sanctity of life and believe a soul is imputed to a human being at conception, this is yet another travesty in a series of tragedies." The poster goes on to condemn "support for Licentious behavior" (bonus point for vocab, deduction for random mid-sentence capitalization), liberal politicians, and people creating baby mama drama (not in those words).<br /><br />Fine. If the NYT editors think it looks magnanimous to give a shout-out to conservative reader, whatever. My problem is one of the following:<br /><br />a. Comment #10 guy doesn't know how Plan B works.<br />b. Comment #10 guy doesn't know how conception works (less likely, not out of the question).<br />c. Both a. and b.<br />d.-f. Repeat a.-c., but replace "Comment #10 guy" with "NYT staffer moderating comment board."<br /><br />In case I have confused anyone, here is my problem in a less passive-aggressive format. From the <a href="http://www.go2planb.com/pdf/PatientPamphlet.pdf">Plan B website</a>: "Plan B® works like a birth control pill to prevent pregnancy mainly by stopping the release of an egg from the ovary." If you read the pamphlet (linked above), you'll see that they allow that it is possible that Plan B also prevents fertilization and implantation. However, in the intended, proven function of the drug (the no egg part), conception is not in the picture. So if you're going to rail against something using only "life begins at conception" and your self-righteous recollections of a bygone time when dirty liberals weren't running the show, please direct your comments elsewhere.<br /><br />Furthermore, NYT, please step up your game. Misconceptions (ha.) about the function of a pharmaceutical product couched in pro-life rhetoric hardly qualify as "thoughtful."Katehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06672442036719983660noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22567444890933929.post-25940074624716915972009-03-24T20:57:00.007-04:002009-03-24T23:10:23.995-04:00Kate Experiments with Clothing... AgainAs a loyal viewer of <span style="font-style:italic;">What Not to Wear</span> and a <a href="http://kclew.blogspot.com/2007/12/kate-discovers-power-of-plaid.html">true life victim of my own fashion choices</a>, I am a believer in the power of clothes.<br /><br />Now, I love the Hartford Whalers. I don't care that they are no longer an NHL team. It's irrelevant. You are probably wondering what this has to do with clothes. Well, I recently decided I needed a Whalers shirt that is not the sweat-stained, paint-splattered, hole-under-the-left-arm "Top 10 Things to Love about the Hartford Whalers" shirt I got when I was 10 years old and now wear to the gym. I still love this shirt and will continue to wear it until it is no longer a shirt (my friend Becca once said, "pants are pants until they fall down"; I think a similar axiom probably applies to upper-body garments). But sometimes you want to show your love without the constant fear of people stopping you on the street to say, "Look into bleach."<br /><br />So I found myself a new shirt. It is great. It is simple-- heather grey, just the <a href="http://us.st11.yimg.com/us.st.yimg.com/I/homegrownsportinggoods_1856_3144824">logo</a> on the front. I cut off the collar, as I am wont to do, and now it is perfect. The only problem is that when you work in an office and spend the majority of your weekend hours in your pajamas or your aforementioned sweaty, painty Whalers shirt, you don't have so many opportunities to wear your awesome new shirt. You can't necessarily wear it to go out on Saturday night--it's pretty hipster to wear the tee shirt of your now-defunct NHL team (though massively cooler than wearing the tee shirt of the band you're going to see-- don't be that guy). Which is why it was so convenient that I went to a party in Columbia Heights Saturday night. If you can't dress up as a hipster to go to Columbia Heights, then I don't know when you can. Okay, when you go to H Street, but I digress.<br /><br />I should also note that this Whalers-centric outfit was a pretty daring (read: dubious) choice. Marissa almost talked me out of it, and were I a more reasonable person she would have succeeded. But as I said, I will only be young enough to make egregious fashion mistakes--like a Whalers shirt with a frilly, borderline-too-short skirt and heels--once, and I have to get them all out of my system now in case I am ever famous enough to get called out for these choices in <a href="http://gofugyourself.celebuzz.com/">a public forum</a>. Plus, I know how I react when I see people who identify themselves as Whalers fans, and I sort of wanted to see what would happen.<br /><br />What happened: people love the Whalers love. More importantly, the Whalers shirt lends itself to a conversation a little more than, say, the plaid skirt and draws comments from specific types of people:<br /><br />a. Guys from Canada ("Well, you like the Whalers, so I respect you.")<br />b. Guys from New York/New England ("Are you from Hartford?" "No!" "Oh, okay.")<br />c. Guys from North Carolina ("[slurred, drunken teasing about the Carolina Hurricanes]")<br /><br />Lesson: The Whalers shirt is always the right decision. I would never encourage anyone to pretend to be a Whalers fan. I get very upset by disingenuous wearers of Whalers gear-- really, ask the guy who was sporting a vintage-esque Whalers shirt last time I was in Front Page. When someone asks you about your shirt, the answer is never, "Oh, I don't even like them. I'm from L.A."<br /><br />But if you can hum the Brass Bonanza, you should know that proclaiming your pride in your now-lost NHL team can have positive results. And if you happen to encounter a Captain No-Fun who leans over and says, "You do know the Whalers are no longer a team, right?" you can just smile and say, "They live on in my heart."<br /><br />This will keep you from saying what you're really thinking (well, also thinking): "If you can't say anything nice, stop looking at my boobs."Katehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06672442036719983660noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22567444890933929.post-91007647916150443542009-03-20T23:34:00.007-04:002009-03-21T01:01:21.318-04:00Kate Gets Domestic, or The Importance of Power Tools in DecoratingI decided a few weeks ago to take today and Monday off. I have been avoiding a lot of chores and errands, using excuses like, "But I don't want to spend a quarter of my weekend ironing." Yes. I actually avoid ironing with such skill that the "to be ironed" section of my closet merits designation as a large-scale project/federal disaster area. But when your weekend is twice as long as usual, there is no excuse. That said, I couldn't face my wrinkly shirts on the first day of Kate's Big Productive Weekend, so I opted for domestic project number two:<br /><br />Do something with the big, awesome map I bought at Eastern Market IN DECEMBER that is still sitting on the floor next to the TV.<br /><br />Long ago, when I was foraging for Christmas presents, I visited the map man at Eastern Market, who happened to have these sweet city planning maps of D.C., including one with our apartment. Unfortunately, it is big and an odd size, and I have been too lazy/cheap/unmotivated to get it matted and framed. I decided I could get a shelf at Target and stand the map up on the shelf. I know this sounds weird, but I promise it sort of works in person.<br /><br />With this plan, I commenced avoiding a Target field trip, until I realized that this long weekend would give me the perfect opportunity to go, with the added bonus of missing the masses that descend upon Target on the real weekend. This is how I ended up in our apartment this afternoon with my delightful shelf, puzzling over the instructions for mounting it on a wall.<br /><br />Brief time-out: bear in mind that I picked "Project Interior Decorating" instead of "Project Actually Have Clothes to Wear to Work Again" mostly because of the equipment involved. DeWalt drill = way cooler than miscellaneous iron. Before I even went to Target, I unpacked my drill and started charging one of the batteries. I was excited.<br /><br />Then I came home with my overpriced chunk of particle board and was a little sad to see that the instructions called for a screwdriver. Just a regular old screwdriver without any voltage. I consoled myself with the sweet drywall anchors and the fact that with their hanging hardware, it seemed like I had a shot at making the shelf level on the first try. And if you know me, you know that whatever I build/assemble will probably end up level(ish) but that it might take four or five extra holes in a wall and at least that many expletives. <br /><br />As it turns out, the hanging hardware provided with the shelf was a complete farce.<br /><br />We will overlook the drywall anchors that were totally useless, because it's possible that I shouldn't have even tried to use them on our walls; whatever. I abandoned those and decided to screw the bracket on which I was to hang the shelf into the wall. DeWalt to the rescue! Pre-drilling was the only way those screws were going to go into the wall; I seriously hope no poor schmuck tried to use a screwdriver and elbow grease. <br /><br />So the bracket was on the wall, and it was shockingly level, considering that there were only three new holes in the wall and all of them were in use. Now to slide the hardware on the shelf onto the wall bracket, and...<br /><br />...and why is the shelf still in my hands instead of on the wall? Shit.<br /><br />Now, I have no misconceptions about my strength as a scholar of physics. But even I have a vague understanding of gravity and force and vectors-- concepts that seem to have eluded the person who designed this misnomer-ed "hanging hardware."<br /><br />Nor do I presume to be a scholar of the law, but I have some idea of what liability is and of the fact that you probably have some if the shelf you put on the wall over your couch falls off the wall and onto the person sitting on your couch.<br /><br />However, I can definitely, authoritatively tell you a thing or two about shoddy construction. And I know that in the absence of inherent structural integrity, you can just keep adding shit until all the ancillary pieces you throw into the mix hold your original thing together.<br /><br />It is with this philosophy in mind that I embarked on a field trip to the hardware store, where I acquired a variety of festive metal brackets in a delightful brass finish. And after much pre-drilling and second-guessing about whether two brackets would be enough (answer: when you're as paranoid as I am, two is not enough-- two on the bottom and two smaller brackets on the top is closer without looking like you're completely psychotic), I am pleased to report that the shelf has been on the wall and the map has been on the shelf for six hours now. It is shockingly level, at least in the plane that mattered to me. And it has yet to fall on anyone's head. <br /><br />Although if I have to fix the shelf, maybe I can put off ironing a little longer.Katehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06672442036719983660noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22567444890933929.post-13417591813120807892009-02-11T08:20:00.004-05:002009-02-11T09:17:33.294-05:00"I didn't go to medical school for nothing," or "I'm not a cheerleader for a brandname drug, but I play one on TV."I have <a href="http://kclew.blogspot.com/2008/04/kate-gets-annoyed-by-direct-to-consumer.html">railed against DTC pharmaceutical advertising</a> for a while, as you probably know if you have ever watched prime time TV with me. But even as I find myself skeezed out by the bathtub people in the Cialis commercials, few of these ads bother me as much as birth control ads do.<br /><br />Now, don't get me wrong. On principle, I think that if you're going to urge American men to Viva Viagra (okay, <span style="font-style:italic;">those</span> ads bother me as much as birth control ads), someone had better be standing by to assure American women that they won't have to spend the rest of their lives barefoot and pregnant. I just happen to think that someone should be a doctor; call me crazy, I guess. But then again, maybe this is what the women's movement was all about-- equal rights, equal pay, equal airtime?<br /><br />I digress. Given that I probably can't take down the entire DTC advertising structure all by myself today, I will temporarily allow that pharmaceutical advertising on TV is our reality. This assumption provides me a clever little segue into my actual point-- the degree to which birth control ads are or are not based in reality. First, let's remind ourselves about some terminology we take for granted-- birth control. The name suggests that the purpose is to control births, i.e., keep the user from getting prego. Simple enough. As a directly related effect, it also happens to regulate the menstrual cycle, which one probably expects when one ingests a very specific hormone regimen. But again, that's just related to the main issue-- birth control. <br /><br />So why isn't this the focus of any advertising for the Pill? Wait a minute, did you see how I switched it up there? I didn't call it birth control; I called it the Pill. Because that's how it's advertised. We're not even supposed to remember that the point is contraception, as <a href="http://current.com/items/89157733/target_women_birth_control.htm">this video</a> does a great job highlighting. We're supposed to think of the Pill as the silver bullet to make our skin better and mitigate our PMS surliness and give us the freedom to release balloons from the sunroof of a VW bug while driving in circles and listening to The Veronicas. Why is that, by the way? Is it some leftover relic of the Comstock Law? Is it because we're afraid of offending those morally opposed to contraception? Is it because, secretly, even the producers of birth control want us to be barefoot and pregnant? (Okay, that last one is pretty conspiracy theory-esque, but ask yourself <a href="http://www.fiercepharma.com/special-reports/top-17-paychecks-big-pharma">how many major pharmaceutical companies are run by women</a>. Furthermore, don't you sometimes wonder if it would be easier to meet and marry Mr. Right if you weren't a zit-covered, homicidal maniac? Yes, you.)<br /><br />Anyway, this is all a very roundabout way of saying that when I saw the first ad correcting all the previous Yaz ads (you can read about it <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/11/business/11pill.html?_r=1&hp">here</a>) I was pretty pleased. First of all, that obnoxious woman "who didn't go to medical school for nothing" (as if anyone with an MD calls it "medical school" in conversation) comes right out and says that Yaz is birth control. Second of all, she clarifies the on-label uses and doesn't hype the off-label benefits. I have a lot of ambivalence about off-label uses of drugs in general, but I'm willing to let it slide a little bit with birth control because it's relatively inexpensive (cough, don't use Yaz, use a generic, cough). Still, the whole reason I find off-label use of anything conscionable is because it typically happens with a doctor's recommendation and oversight. Therefore, while I have a big problem with people with high cholesterol marching to their doctors and demanding Vytorin (sorry, I find their ads really visually clever), I have a bigger problem with women with pimples marching to their doctors and demanding hormones. Because we all know that Proactiv is the country's number one skin care solution. Trust us; we're Jessica Simpson and Alyssa Milano.<br /><br />Finally, the Times article suggests that asking Bayer to pay $20 million to air the corrective ads amounts to a slap on the wrist in the world of DTC advertising. Agreed. But the average person who sees one of those ads probably isn't going to say to herself, "Hmm, I wonder how much that set them back... oh wait, drop in the bucket." Rather, I think she's going to say, "Hmm, it kind of sounds like they kind of lied to me." And if the new Yaz ads can do anything to undermine the credibility of DTC advertising overall, that's worth more than $20 million in my book.Katehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06672442036719983660noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22567444890933929.post-73888445268136953532009-01-29T17:49:00.001-05:002009-01-29T17:50:30.258-05:00Even Better than the NursesWe all know I have some strong feelings on the topic of karaoke, but even I have not taken it to the point of <a href="http://www.slate.com/id/2209818/">physical violence</a>. Apparently, I have more restraint than some.Katehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06672442036719983660noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22567444890933929.post-37341356364349680582009-01-29T16:05:00.003-05:002009-01-29T16:10:09.913-05:00Two of Kate's Great Loves ConvergeHealth care and karaoke-- in the form of a discussion of good karaoke songs for women with medium to low ranges (read: me)... on a <a href="http://allnurses.com/allnurses-central/good-karaoke-songs-37588.html">nursing forum</a>.<br /><br />My favorite suggestion is from the contributor who suggests "getting a little loaded and singing Willie Nelson songs."Katehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06672442036719983660noreply@blogger.com0