August 24, 2021

A short one today! My brother called me yesterday and admitted that he had called everyone else in my family before me. I'm the last pick in the family draft! How rude. 

One of the grad students in the lab defends today. Party prep and execution is like my whole thing today. We're getting him a mitochondria cake. I'm excited and nervous to see how it turns out!  

August 20, 2021

I wanted to say something else about my IUD swap yesterday. The procedure went more smoothly than the first time I got an IUD, but the cramps afterwards were way worse. I could barely drive myself home. I felt nauseated, light-headed, and I was sweating. I was moaning and crying in pain actually out loud while I lay on the couch. I feel like it's weird to moan in pain when no one is around to hear or help -- what's the point? But I was doing it. What else was there to do? 

Anyway, I called my husband who was at work. He's very busy with work lately but I figured my intense pain rated. He called the clinic to get me a pain killer prescription. He said he'd call me back once they filled it. Shortly afterwards, I took another ibuprofen (I had already had a lot) and ate a weed gummy. I think the gummy helped the most. But once the pain subsided, I felt foolish for making such a big deal out of the whole thing. Granted, of course, I didn't know the pain was going to decrease. I was worried it would carry on like that for hours. But instead of being just relieved, I felt like I had done a bad thing for calling attention to myself. Like the situation would have been better if the pain lasted several hours. Fucked up. 

Mlog Time! 

THE LONG GOODBYE

1973

Directed by: Robert Altman

Written by: Leigh Brackett

Based on: The Long Goodbye by Raymond Chandler 

Watched: 8/19/21

Philip Marlowe receives a late-night visit from his friend Terry Lennox. Lennox is looking the worse for wear – fingernail grooves across his face and blood on his knuckles. Lennox needs a ride to Tijuana and Marlowe obliges. Marlowe’s then picked up by the police for helping Lennox, who’s charged for the murder of his wife, Sylvia. Marlowe doesn’t tell the police anything. He’s then released when reports come that Lennox had confessed and committed suicide in Mexico. Marlowe doesn’t buy the murder/suicide story. 

Eileen Wade, a wealthy wife of the author Roger Wade, hires Marlowe to find her husband. He’s been missing for several days and has a drinking problem. Marlowe finds him at a rehab clinic and brings him home. The Wades live just down the street from the Lennoxes, and Marlowe suspects Roger of killing Sylvia, as he has a violent temper. Then Marty Augustine and his goons show up at Marlowe’s apartment. Lennox had $355,000 of their money, and Augustine wants it back. He threatens Marlowe and hits his own girlfriend in the face with a coke bottle. Marlowe’s almost done for when somebody shows up with the money. 

Marlowe finds Lennox in Mexico. The suicide was a fake to get Augustine and the cops off his back. Sylvia was having an affair with Roger, and when Lennox found out he killed her. Eileen sent the money to Augustine as Eileen and Lennox are a couple. Marlowe, disgusted with all this, shoots Lennox dead. 

I liked this movie. Altman’s style of naturalistic dialogue with lots of overlap between the actors comes through here. I also love Marlowe as a character. He’s the underdog in nearly every situation, but he manages to not lose his cool, to not give in. For example, in a scene with Augustine and his goons, Augustine tells everyone to get naked. The goons and Augustine oblige, but Marlowe just keeps talking. He takes off his jacket, but after a couple of minutes, he’s the only person in the room that’s still clothed. He just seems mentally very well balanced, and he doesn’t give his power away even in frightening situations. Another example, the immediately after the first time Augustine shows up, Marlowe runs down to follow them in his car. He’s brave, level-headed, and admittedly weak. Hyper masculine but in a novel and interesting way… and the only on-screen masculinity that I can think of that doesn’t strike me as corny. 

Rating: ★★★

August 19, 2021

I got my IUD swapped out today. Last one I got was in November of 2016. The doctor couldn't get it up there so they called a second doctor in. They also did a sonogram to try to see what was blocking it. I think (after today's appointment) I just have a narrow part of my cervix. Tough to get the little booger up and in. I had never been able to feel the strings on the first one, and they didn't have me come in for a follow up appointment, so I was never really sure if the first one went in right. It turns out it had. And I guess if it had come out, I ought to have noticed. It's this spindly chunk of plastic. (I know "spindly" and "chunk" are contradictory descriptions.) But the inside of my body is largely a mystery to me. I'm worried I have a closet in there full of forgotten-about tampons. 

It was also the first time I've been to a male OBGYN. He was very nice and professional. Didn't assault me, which was nice. I got a pap smear for the first time in like a decade. (TMI on this post, but you know.) The doc asked if I got the HPV vaccine when I was little. I told him yes. Although, I got it when I was a teenager -- it had just come out. People tend to think I'm younger than I am, which I guess is good. 

My getting of the HPV vaccine is an interesting thing to me, because if I remember right, my mom was the one who signed me up for it. I grew up in a pretty conservative Christian culture where abstinence education was the standard.  Even more than birth control, it seems like an HPV vaccine would be something my mom would think -- Well, she shouldn't need this because she will only ever have sex with one person. But she had me get it anyway. It's a nice thought because I think it says she cared more about me and my health (HPV isn't so bad except that certain strains can increase your risk for cancer) than about my morality. It's a comforting thought.