Return of the Queen.

PEASANTS!

No, ahem. Just been caught up with all the other websites and health stuff and school.

So! Item of business number one: My father is running against Mike Winder for WVC Mayor and it's been crazy on the war front. Every space is occupied with papers, maps, signs, and now buttons. I'm lactose-intolerant, so sorry Winder, but you can keep your tasty udder juice to yourself! Did you know there's pus in milk anyway and the FDA regulates how much can be allowed? But there's 11% bugs in chocolate or something, too...

Anyway, I don't really pay attention to politics, so be it dictator or anarchy, as long as I can sleep in, I'm ambivilent. Ambivilent, of course, meaning that Winder is a Weinie.

Item of business number two: I had my procedure done. Here's the account:

"I woke up and couldn't eat anything except clear fluids until midnight. I mostly had vegetable broth and jello. Instead of drinking a gallon of stuff called "Trilyte," I got the pill version. Four large, salty pills every fifteen minutes five times that evening and then four times at 5:oo in the morning [arg!]. And each time I had to drink 8 ounces. After the third time, you start getting sick of force-feeding yourself pills and water. I could feel them in my stomach bubbling.

So less than an hour after my first dose, I was running back and forth out of the bathroom faster than you could say "food poisoning." And after two hours you think "There can't possibly be anything left in my intestines!" but there is. Another two hours. I was starving and I couldn't eat and the cranberry juice I had didn't quench my thirst. I think it's what having your water break feels like. But every thirty seconds and out your rear, hah.

Went to bed. Lousy sleep. At 5:oo AM my mum came in to start the cleansing pills over again, but this time I could only drink the required 8 ounces for the pills. I was so frakking dehydrated-I could feel it. And my veins had disappeared [usually phlebotamists compliment me on such plump, protruding veins I have].

We got to the surgery center at 8:30. Did a little paperwork. Sat for a minute, and then I was called back by a teeny nurse. I was shown to a bathroom where I could change into a hospital gown [I can never get those right], put my stuff in a bag, and give a urine sample. WELL I couldn't give a sample because of how dehydrated I had to be for the whole thing. It was only a required pregnancy test and they said, and I quote, "All we need is a meager four or five drops." Bah! I couldn't. Too dehydrated.

So I was shown my bed and they brought in my mum when they put in the IV because I don't do well with needles. Especially those ones. I was surprised they'd be putting it in my hand because all the past ones have been in my arms. Took a long time-they had to smack the veins a lot to make them pop out. And then "You're gonna feel a stick." More like a tree. It bloody hurt! And then they pushed it in another inch! And it was taped so many times it looked like I was dying or something. When the fluids started dripping [water with elecrolytes and potassium, basically Gatorade without sugar or flavor], it felt like my arm was being flayed open with a salty, cold piece of metal. It was a tiny bag of fluid-like the size of a Capri Sun. And they kept asking me when I thought I'd be ready to produce a urine sample, but wasn't it obvious other organs needed those two tablespoons of fluid before taking a piss? So I asked them to up the ante. And after nearly an hour, I was able to produce those "four or five meager drops." I was so thirsty.

After that we waited for a while. I guess the man on the other side of the curtain was before me, so when he finally got wheeled out [the doctor was twenty minutes late], it meant only twenty or thirty minutes before my turn.

Then they came to get me, wheeled me in a room, where I saw a television screen and was able to see where the camera was sitting on the table.

And then a nurse pulled out a giant syringe of anesthesia. She told me it would burn a little. Burned a LOT. It was thick stuff she pumped in-it looked like Elmer's glue. So I just turned into my pillow with these annoying oxygen nose tubes saying, "OW. OW. OW. OW."

And then I woke up in the recovery room what felt like hours later but was only twenty minutes. I wanted to sleep, but I wanted to pretend I was more alert than I really was, so I forced myself to stay awake by asking questions. The procedure went fine and everything looks normal. They took the biopsies and sent them off. I don't know when I get the results. They gave me some orange juice and proved my thirst by chugging it down. And then I got my IV taken out [along with plenty of arm hair], got dressed, and had my mum drive to Barnes & Noble because I wanted a caprise sandwich and Jones soda, after which, I went to bed for four hours.

Now I'm just catching up on rehydration and stuff. I lost five pounds overnight from those pills. Juice, juice, juice. "

Item of business number three: The final art assignment. We have to do a graphite self-portrait...by looking at ourselves in a mirror. And you can't do it all in one go. You have to do the points and the midline and triangulation before you even thing of rounding the edges. We were suggested to draw a midline down the mirror so we can line up our heads each time. And then we have to put two sheets of tracing paper over, one for the skull and the other for the muscles. "Hey Mom! I drew a picture of myself without skin! Put it on the fridge!"

I think that's it for now. Cheerio.