handshakes, hugs, and humiliation

There are many reasons why I consider myself one of the most awkward people in the world. Yesterday, for example.

I was just doing my whole intern thing, entering data into the computer for Eye Doctor. This particular patient was no different than any other. He was an elderly man - not too old, probably in his late 60s early 70s. He was very nice. When we were all finished in the exam room, he extended his arm to shake Eye Doctor's hand. He turned to me and extended his arm, so I just figured he wanted to shake my hand, too.

"Well, that's not what I meant," he said to me after I shook his hand. His arm was still out.

I was kind of weirded out. I had never met this man in my life before and he wanted to give me a hug? Whatever makes the patient happy, I guess. I gave him a hug, and it was super awkward.

"That's not what I meant either, I was just offering to let you leave the room first," he said.

Oops.

katie dreams, episode 4

I was at my neighbor's house. I had blisters all over my toes, and a few on my chin, and a huge one ON MY EYE BALL!?!?! It was awful, but I had to pop it. I couldn't touch it or use a pin, what if I accidentally poked all the way through to my eyeball? So the obvious solution was to squeeze my eyelids as tightly as I could. It worked, but it made my foot start leaking. I was so scared to look, so I made my mom look for me. "What's wrong with me!?" I asked. "OMG Katie you have pink poison!" she cried. This was a disaster! I needed to call my cousin, Allie, to see how we could fix it. She knows the treatment to every single illness, ever. Or at least the ones dealing with feet, she's studying to become a podiatrist (in real life she's in audiology, not quite sure how the two are related). I called her up, and she was like "Katie, why are you bothering me? Why can't you just Google it?" I knew she would say that, so I already had the webpage up. But before it loaded, Allie told me that the only thing I could do was to hold a cool, wet rag over my forehead and hope for the best. Basically, I would die. I was so scared.

the chair in room 20

The chair in eye exam room # 20 is so comfortable that I wrote a poem about it.

Room 20's my favorite, and I'll tell you why
The chair in the corner's so comfy, no lie
After standing up tall for what seems like twelve hours
Sitting there on the pillow lets me regain my powers
It makes me want to fall fast asleep
It's cause I'm not using either of my feet
If women are patients, my heart does tear
When I see their purses sitting on the chair
That's why men patients are my favorite
They leave the chair empty, so that I may sit
It's like I'm on a cloud that's puffy and white
It makes my buns smile, such a delight
Day after day I want to take the chair home
I think it's as comfy as memory foam
Each day that I leave it, I let out a sigh
See you tomorrow, I tell it good bye.

only the best and brightest allowed

While I was on my quest to try and figure out Google+, I came across this message:

– An important note about Field Trial –

You're a part of a small group of people who are helping to test Google+. When you share something with people who are not yet able to use Google+, they will receive it via email but won't be able to comment or engage with the content like other Google+ users. They'll be able to join Google+ as we let more users in over time.


This is how I interpreted it:

– An important note about Field Trial –

You're a part of an elite group of people who are so awesome that we are asking you to help test Google+. We want your approval before we can possibly allow anyone else to use this social networking site. When you share something with people who are not yet awesome enough to use Google+, they will receive it via email but won't be able to comment or engage with the content like other Google+ users because, honestly, they just don't make the cut. They'll be able to join Google+ as we lower our standards over time.

katie dreams, episode 3

I was Skyping with a friend, Alex, from elementary/middle school, when it started to storm. It was a pretty hardcore storm. So hardcore that a lightning bolt struck the bird feeder right outside of my kitchen window! As the feeder went up in flames, I shouted to my dad that he should so something! He was like, uuhhh, and walked upstairs. I had to take matter into my own hands because my mom was doing the dishes. Luckily for me, she had just finished filling up a watering can and a pitcher with water. I told Alex hold on, grabbed the water containers, and went outside to extinguish the flame. It took two trips to extinguish completely, but I prevailed in the end. Inside the bird feeder, we found three birds. Two words: rigor mortis. They were struck by the lightning and killed, it was sad. At least our outdoor fish in the cruise ship fish tank were still alive. The guy who installed the fish tank, however, did a terrible job, so the water circulation was a failure. This resulted in miniature lampreys attaching to the sides of our fish, sucking out their guts (one of the many reasons I hate lampreys). My dad came outside and tried to swipe the lampreys off of our fish, but I woke up before I found out the fate of our swimming friends. Or I had the chance to say goodbye to Alex.

Then, it was snowing. I was in a strange town. Marisa and I wanted to go sledding, the hills were fantastic. As we approached the hills, we saw that they sloped at a 90 degree angle and were actually really tall buildings. I was like, no way Jose I am not going down those hills. Marisa was like, come on Katie don't be a wimp. I was like, ok fine. We began our journey up the hill. I'm not sure what happened next, but we ended up crashing into an a cappella concert. Oops. Then, we saw this arts program going on with very questionable things happening. I walked away and entered into this contest; whoever could translate the sub titles of foreign movies the fastest won a prize. I beeped in first and answered "November 6." Not sure what the movie was or what it had to do with November 6, but I won.

katie dreams, episode 2

This dream began in my dorm room, which was actually on the 34th floor of a world-class hotel, nbd. I went out on my balcony with my friend, Devon, when all of a sudden, we saw Katy Perry jump over the waterfall. What the heck, Katy Perry, why would you do that? We followed her by jumping down the waterfall, and as we struggled to keep up with her blazing pace, she shouted back to us "I'm hiking around the entire world!" She darted over lots of rocks in her hiking boots, but we were like, "No, Katy Perry, you can't go that fast. You'll get tired too quickly!" But in an instant, she was gone. It kind of annoyed us, since we had to go all the way back up 34 flights of stairs. We decided to take the elevator. The jerks on the elevator didn't hold it for us, but luckily the handicapped button brought the elevator back down. Devon decided to take the stairs. I decided that he was crazy. I pushed the button that said "All the way to the top (34)" and began the ascension to my room. This girl got on and was very confused because there was no button for the 48th floor, so she got out and took the stairs.

I got off the elevator right in front of the fresh smoothie bar, which was totally fine with me. For some reason, we were all outside now, and I was in the pool. All of a sudden, a shower of tiny, fingernail-sized bullets rained all over us. Luckily, when the bullets hit the water, they were useless and couldn't kill us. We were like, what the heck people from overseas, why are you attacking America!? I made it to the lifeguard room safely. The news people said that we weren't going to fight back to show our peacefulness. They were weary of the rebellious teenagers fighting back, though. I decided to make a smoothie, watermelon and blueberry. Strange combo, but it was delicious nonetheless. Especially when I put it in a coconut shell. We may be under terrorist attack, but at least I was enjoying my smoothie.

rock-a-bye, tummy

I've read multiple articles where they tell you not to eat dinner/heavy foods less three hours before you go to bed. Makes sense, but never would I have thought the repercussions were deadly. Am I sick? Maybe. Am I crazy? Probably. I'm just stating the facts, so it's up to you to believe me when I say my stomach needs a bed time.

Pancake House. Spring semester 2011. (side note: pancake house is something my InterVarsity chapter does for the college where we make thousands of pancakes for the entire campus on the last day of classes. Some of the people are very, very drunk.) We were cleaning up, but there were extra pancakes. I hadn't eaten any all night, so of course I had to have some. Three. Three measly chocolate chip pancakes at 12:45 a.m. were what did me in. They were delicious, but they were absolutely NOT worth throwing up my guts the next morning. Heaving in a trash can in the ceramics studio at 10 in the morning is not a pleasant situation to be in, especially if someone walks in while the near-death experience is happening. Luckily for me, she was nice and got me a cup of water and helped me put my things away. She probably assumed I was hungover out of my mind. I was too sick to explain that I ate pancakes after my stomach's bed time...hey, it's a believable story...no. I was bed-ridden the rest of the day (not to mention robbed from a whole day's worth of finals studying). As I laid in bed, nauseated at the thought of moving, I vowed to never eat food that close to bed time ever again. If only I stuck to that promise...

Summer. July 5-6, 2011. It was two-job-Tuesday, where I worked from 11 a.m. until 8 p.m.; my only break was driving from the pool to the gym. That meant I had to eat dinner when I returned home, around 8:30. This normally wouldn't have been a problem, but since I was out in the sun all day, working at the pool, and then playing with wild children at the gym for three and a half hours, I was beat. I crashed at 10, not even thinking that my food hadn't had time to digest (I haven't mastered the whole digest quickly thing yet) before I slipped off into a sea of wild dreams (my boss's 7th grade son in my college history class, baking gluten-free rocket ship cupcakes with my sister's friend, over cooking bacon so much that it turned into crackers that I used to make a bluish-colored gravy for omelets...hm). I woke up the next morning feeling fine, at least for the first 20 minutes of being awake. Then it hit me. My stomach turned for the worst, but I sucked it up and went to work. Long story short, I left at noon when I couldn't stand anymore. I was so nauseated I wanted to cry. I made it home, ate lunch, and took a 4 hour nap (for some reason, lunch has no effect on me). I got up to go to the gym, but I was still sick to my stomach, so I watched Iron Chef America instead. It is now11:54 p.m., 5 hours and 9 minutes after dinner. I should be good to go, but I might stay up for a few more minutes, just in case...