A Reluctant Adult

The Great Minnesota Get Together--otherwise known as the MN State Fair--began today. And if you remember back to my post from last August, you'll remember what that means: My summer is over. As I watch the local news stations offering tips for cheap state fair parking and the newest deep fried foods on a stick, in my head, all I hear is a slow, sad funeral march. Goodbye summer, old friend. I hardly knew ye. College students poured back into town last weekend, a cool breeze is wafting in my window, and my beloved MN Vikings have once again traded many of our rising stars in favor of an aging quarterback and promptly bumbled their preseason game. Fall is officially here. As always, I feel a little melancholy with the ending of the summer. For someone who has always measured life in terms of school years rather than calendar years, the end of August always forces me to look backwards at another year gone. And looking back this year, it is difficult to put into words what I

I live in Minnesota's 6th Congressional District. For those of you who haven't been following the recent news concerning the Republican Presidential Race, that means that my constituents are responsible for the atrocity gracing so many magazine covers these days: Michele Bachmann. First things first--be clear: I did not vote for this woman. Now, I understand my politics are not for everyone, and I understand that there may even be times when Republicans--this pains me to say--may be (partially) right on some things. I admit I have taken great joy over the past few years in calling Bachmann crazy (and a few other names I shouldn't repeat in public) but I've recently come to see the danger in that sort of rhetoric. And not because I'm wrong, either. Bachmann recently made the cover of Newsweek in a famously unflattering picture above the headline "The Queen of Rage." Conservatives complained the picture made her look crazy. They were right. And as m

Since having my oral surgery--the only real medical procedure I've ever had done--on Tuesday, I've learned a few things. I thought I'd share: 1. Google is a hypochondriac's best friend and is therefore inherently evil if you are sick and anxious. 2. Not eating while taking narcotics will result in being violently ill and told you are no longer allowed to take narcotics. This causes a considerable amount of pain and cussing. 3. There is a remarkable amount of food that you really don't have to chew if you don't want to. 4. Tylenol is amazing. Especially if you happen to experience the situation mentioned in #2. 5. When your dreamy oral surgeon tells you that taking out a horizontally-impacted wisdom tooth will be the same as taking out a partially erupted wisdom tooth, kick him in the shins and run. He's lying. 6. I am a coward when it comes to pain and the anticipation of pain. However, as the situation mentioned in #2 proved, I also have a relati

Thirty-two hours ago, two of my wisdom teeth (the evolution of which we discussed in the previous blog entry) were wrenched from my poor mouth. Other than the lack of sleep and tears that preceded the surgery, everything went well. I was extremely happy to find that my oral surgeon lacked the typical sadistic elements one has come to expect from those crazy individuals who specialize in ripping teeth from people's heads. He was not only a good-looking man (something even my husband pointed out to me during the consultation when my surgeon briefly turned his back on us to examine the x-rays), but he seemed to agree with my own (unmedical) diagnosis that I did not need to remove all four of my wisdom teeth. While he did persuade me to remove the one tooth I was afraid of extracting, I figured he met me halfway, so why not? I signed the forms, my husband was hustled from the room, and surgery commenced. Other than the extremely painful IV process, which entailed the nurse repeated