Third Eye Lasik

I have been made painfully aware of my much-too-concerned attitude about my physical body and social conformity. Just the other day, I was having lunch in a local café when I looked up and noticed a man was staring at me. The strange thing was that he was not looking at me through the two holes in his face that we know as eyes. He was actually gawking at me through his third eye! As if that wasn’t enough, I clearly heard his thoughts inside my own head. He was telling me that I was mentally unsteady, lacked focus and had a dread fear of amnesia. He screamed for me to just forget about what I can’t remember. I was so offended that I flicked a forkful of cole slaw at him, targeting his brow area. It worked. His spiritual vision was blocked. The café manager quickly escorted me out, but I managed to yell at the smarmy, third-eye peeping Tom, that he should have more respect for the chakra handicapped. I’m just glad I stopped him before his inner eye revealed my fear of being evaluated negatively in social situations.
It is common knowledge that we have physical and non-physical senses. Of course, I have a very strong fifth sense about these things, but activating my third-eye or what some call, the brow chakra, has been a very arduous task. I have tried gazing into the flame of a candle for an hour or two, calming my thoughts, watching my cat’s eyes to establish a meditative state and even staring at my face in the bathroom mirror for prolonged periods. It was hard to keep a straight face during this exercise, and giggling interfered with my inner peace. I felt superior when I noticed that my reflection blinked first and reveled in the victory until I realized that my ego was becoming much too involved and turned the session into an undesirable competition.
It was this state that brought me to Swami Kapesh Kumar. I found his ad in the personals while searching for my soul mate. Swami Kumar has perfected a surgical procedure as an alternative to activating the third eye by means of meditation. It involves the use of a ball-peen hammer. With one swift, forceful and nearly painless tap, he is able to dislodge the third eye from its lazy status and instantly create a glittering star-studded aura. The giddiness usually wears off within an hour after awakening, and is followed by an overwhelming sense of well-being. The only drawback is the red dot located just above the bridge of the nose. He says it should fade in time. I’ve seen this dot on middle-eastern women before, but I had no idea it was the result of third-eye lasik surgery.

Curl Up And Dye

When I’m bored, I speak in a southern accent and dye my hay-ah. At least, that’s what I did the last time I felt bored. I convinced myself that products have changed, I’m more experienced and lightening doesn’t strike the same place twice. That isn’t entirely true. It seems that the lightener I used struck the exact same spot it did before and my hair ended up looking more like a skunk’s tail than sun-kissed locks. There’s nothing like that throaty gasp that can be heard by surrounding neighbors when you pull the towel from your head to expose a damp mop of bright yellow straw. As Saul Bellows would say, “a suicide blonde…dyed by my own hand!” What’s worse is when I went to work the next day and heard co-workers whispering and snickering in their cubicles as I walked by.
Since my hairdresser is on vacation and I was too embarrassed to see a strange professional, I decided to fix it myself. Funny how porous hair GRABS onto darker color with every ounce of follicle strength it can muster. The next day I’m walking past the same cubicles looking like Elvira, but no one recognizes me. With the aid of several hair color kits, in a week’s time, I went from skunk tail to ginger root brown, which is pretty much my natural color. I found that a good, brown, synthetic wig is easy to care for and is virtually indistinguishable in appearance from human hair except to the most practiced eye, or to the average kindergartener.
This was one of my milder blunders. It could have been worse, like the time I gave myself a perm and ended up looking like a sheep’s butt. There’s a reason they call it a permanent. BECAUSE THAT’S WHAT IT IS! I had to wait over six months for my hair to grow out before I could torture it some more. It topped any of the wondrous home perms my mother gave me when I was a kid.
Have I learned my lesson? I doubt it. Besides, you have to lose over 50% of your scalp hairs before female pattern baldness is apparent. I don’t have a very long memory when it comes to painful lessons. Once the cast is off, the arm was never broken seems to be my motto. Maybe I could embarrass myself by posting a blog on the Internet for all to see. Here ya go. Sure beats the most ruthless remedy for a bad hair day…a guillotine.

With Effects On The Side

There’s no argument about it, the side effect of life, is death. Few want to acknowledge it to themselves let alone talk about it. But, what can we do to make our living experience worth the ultimate side effect? I say laugh your ass off, or at least until it’s hanging by the remote that pins it onto the love seat. That’s usually where my keister can be found when I need a good laugh, nestled in its own little indentation that perfectly matches its size, shape and contour. That happens to be the side effect of watching too much television…leaving a posterior symbol in the cushiony fabric.
From what I can determine by watching commercials is that happiness and youth are the two most sought after conditions. There are only two drugs that I know of that can produce these states of existence. Correctitol, is a new wonder drug that decreases stimuli to the Reticular Activating System. It doesn’t necessarily correct things in your life, but in time it dulls your alertness making your life seem problem free. The longer you take Correctitol, self motivation is persistently throttled down which alters your frontal lobe. This makes reasoning unnecessary. Voila! Everything is corrected. The only side effects are, rash, tightness in the chest, swelling of the mouth, bleeding gums, rectal sores and ringing in the ears. Of course, you must agree, the benefits far outweigh the risks.
Then there is the miracle drug, Reversitol. Now this is the one that really interests me. It seems that with just a few doses, wrinkles vanish, muscles tighten, everything that dangles is made perky again and the lust for life is fully restored. Or is it just lust? Anyway, the trade off is the risk of a decrease in self control, relentless toy seeking, avoiding responsibility, of course, judgment declines and very possibly emotional outbursts will ensue. Overdose is common; a man was reported to be holding his breath at an El Pollo Loco fast food restaurant when he was told they were out of lemonade. In another incident, a woman was caught draping toilet paper on her neighbor’s hydrangea bushes in the middle of the night. When asked why, she said that showing was better than telling her neighbor that she is a poopie head. Reported side effects are acute renal failure, fatal stroke, arterial spasm, pulselessness and nausea.
Sometimes the commercials make me laugh harder than a good romantic comedy. I mean, seriously, the side effects mentioned are downright horrifying. Yet the desire to be young and happy is strong enough to dismiss the warnings and take a walk on the wild side.
I was in the grocery store the other day and strolled over to the produce section. I picked up one of my favorite apples (Pink Lady) to inspect it and there was a rather large sticker on the side that read:
May cause regularity, reduce risk of lung cancer, lower blood cholesterol, facilitate hair growth, reduce wrinkles, improve bladder function and promote bone growth.
The produce clerk thought something must have bitten me because I put it down so quickly. Honest to God. Now they’re listing side effects on the fruit.

Unique Lounge Act

Recently, in Newark, Ohio, a 28 year-old-man was arrested for drunk driving. We all know that things like this happen every day in every state. The interesting thing about this incident though, was the fact that he was driving a bar stool. He already had a suspended license and was not supposed to be driving a vehicle, so the logical thing to do, of course, is to weld a lawn mower engine onto a favorite piece of furniture. His favorite happened to be a bar stool…and, voila! Now we’re legal because technically the alleged vehicle is really lounge gear. Well, it seemed to be a good idea at the time. It all began after the fifteenth beer and he had some trouble negotiating a U-turn and crashed while going over twenty miles per hour. He was taken to a local hospital to treat minor injuries.
After doing a bit of research, I found that barstool racing has become quite popular in Wisconsin and you can even purchase motorized bar stools online. No kidding, they offer a 4.5 HP engine, powder coated bar stool with cushion seat, slick racing wheels, disk brakes and a factory warranty. You tube has a video of a V-8 bar stool. Man! You’d have to be very cautious about bellying up to the bar in that.
After studying the picture of the bar stool the man was cited on, it is clear that he was in violation of several obvious safety hazards. No seat belt for one. How on earth does he think he could safely execute a u-turn on this homemade contraption? Drunk, no less. There have been times that I wished I had a seat belt on a bar stool that I was using and I wasn’t even in motion. Another risk is riding backless. And what about an air bag?
If this keeps up, I’m sure the DMV will begin to implement bar stool driving tests. I suppose the test would include making a successful u-turn, handling an unexpected wobble, driving through three inches of peanut shells while negotiating tables and chairs.
I took this picture over to my mechanic today and asked him how much he would charge to pimp my ride. You know, hot pink, forged steel, 360-degree swivel seat, 100% faux leather upholstery on a soft cushiony seat and a wooden backrest with a cherry wood finish. He laughed and said it sounded like a sissy bar stool, and then he said he would need a stool sample.

I called my doctor today to schedule a routine, annual physical. It’s a very busy office, and just as I anticipated, the receptionist who answered my call, asked if she could put me on hold. I sat at my desk and played with my shoe, letting it dangle from the ends of my toes, bored from listening to the advertisements boasting of the wonderful services the medical clinic provided.

Suddenly, the announcer asked a shocking question, “Do you know if you have an abdominal aortic aneurysm?” My eyes dilated, my ears perked up and my shoe dropped to the floor. I pressed the receiver harder against my ear. The voice explained that the abdominal aorta is a large blood vessel that supplies blood to your abdomen, pelvis, and legs. An aneurysm can develop at any time, in anyone, but it was the next sentence that really got my attention. The monotone voice went on to explain that there are virtually no symptoms that will warn you of this condition. The larger an aneurysm is, the more likely it is to rupture. I rested a hand on my abdomen and gently pressed. If there were no symptoms, how would I know?

What the heck kind of hold entertainment is this? Why don’t they play the typical, noxious please-hold music, like every other company? This is cruel. It would be like an airline, showing continuous movie documentaries of plane crashes on a non-stop fourteen-hour flight.

“Aneurysms develop slowly over many years,” the voice cautioned. “If they rupture, treatment is needed, and thin, hollow tubes called catheters are inserted through arteries in your groin.” I crossed my legs tightly. “The outcome is good if an experienced surgeon repairs the aneurysm before it ruptures. However, less that 50% of patients survive a ruptured abdominal aneurysm.” Does this clinic even have any experienced surgeons?

I would have been more comfortable, rapidly stabbing holes into the top of my desk with a pocketknife, between my fingers. I looked at my watch. I had listened to the abdominal aneurysm warning in its entirety and now was being asked again, “Do you have an abdominal aortic aneurysm?”

My skin turned clammy, I was anxious and I felt my heart rate increase. I quickly turned to my computer and asked Jeeves for any information he had about this medical condition. Jeeves is a very knowledgeable search engine, that doesn’t bother to sugarcoat anything.

I felt around my navel. It could have been a pulsating mass, I wasn’t sure. My bladder seemed to be overfilled with fluid, but then, I was on my second cup of morning coffee, and I had been on hold, approaching the twenty-minute mark. I was dizzy and nauseous… both were classic symptoms. I took my pulse. My heart was racing. I was confused. My fingernails were a strange bluish color, or at least I think they were beneath the flaming-red nail polish I was wearing. I became light-headed and began to sweat. My breathing became shallow, and I thought I might faint.

In the next moment, the receptionist interrupted the recorded antichrist, the Nostradamus of health threats. “Can I help you?”
“I think I’m dying!” I screamed into the phone.
“If this is an emergency,” she said calmly. “Please dial 9-1-1.”