thatt's right folks, on monday i turned 26. it has been 7 years since i came out to the east coast.
enough reminsicing. i have some complaining to do.
no, not really. i mean i could, but nothing grinds my gears right now.
instead i will share with the world, the uncurable disease i fight daily:
crohn's disease.
specifically crohn's (granulomatous) colitis as it only affects my colon.
this grand ol' website tells you all you need to know.
but a quick run down is this: uncurable, terrible, meds for the rest of my life, and fear of going #2.
if i miss a dosage of pills (3x daily), i have to worry if i'll exhibit symptoms, if i skip a whole day of pills, i know i am going to be in big trouble in the next couple days.
it all started this past spring when i noticed blood in my bm. that freaked me out. so i went to the doctor to see what it was. he thought hemorroids, but there was no evidence of, so i was shipped off to a gastrointerologist to see what was there. he couldn't figure it out in the office, so i was signed up for a colonoscopy.
so while i was waiting for the scope to happen, i'm looking up my symptoms on webmd and google and such, and i find i have crohn's, colietis, or RECTAL CANCER.
christ almighty, i am freaked the fuck out.
in may, i had the colonoscopy. my first. here's my most vibrant memory of the procedure. they give my the sedatives, not strong enough to knock me out, just enough to make me not feel my body, or quite be aware of the 3 foot tube up my ass. now, the doc is watching his work on a tv, and i am angled in such a way that it is all i can stare at. i hear the doc say that he is taking a biopsy from the colon wall (a biopsy is a small piece a tissue so they can test it for various things).
"that is my colon," is what i'm thinking. "he just ripped a piece of my colon off." my next thought. "i didn't feel a thing!"
the colonoscopy found signs of inflammation and evidence of coliteis, so we threw me on the meds i'm still on. asacol, 2 pills 3x daily.
next was my upper gi and intestinal series.
but we'll save that for the next installment of
reger: his health and why you should care
everyone thinks of changing the world, but no one thinks of changing himself.--leo tolstoy
10.04.2006
twinkies down 2-0
it bothers me when people complain about the free enterprise system or capitalism.
well, more so when they complain about it being a terrible system and how its destroying the earth and society.
i'm pretty sure it's not the capitalism, but the inaction of the citizens that is destroying the world.
while academic and military research has started a lot of the major technical and societal changes we have witnessed (the internet, psychology, etc), it is when somebody figures out how to make a profit on it that is when it begins to make an impact on the regular person.
what company doesn't advertise it's website nowadays?
what person doesn't pay a market to make them a sandwich (which, beyond being the most perfect food, may be the easiest to assemble)?
it is inaction and lack of will power that lets corporations and the system get away with fucking us over.
take exxon mobil. i actively make sure that i do not fill up at a exxonmobil station. if i'm lost in conneticut and i've been on E for 50 miles, that's a different story. but for my everyday commuting gas, i refuse to give my money to exxonmobil.
those silly internet petitions that go around saying "today is no buying gas day," those would work if everyone actually listened to them and took part.
we could drive that company into extinction. if everyone really cared enough about it, we could make sure exxon never made another dime.
but we don't.
because we're lazy.
or with voting. voter turnout for the 2004 presidential election was 55.3%. that was the highest since 1968. where are the other 45%? if they got out and voted for one candidate? in '04 bush received 50.7% of the vote. that's 50.7% of 55.3%. do you know how much that is?
my calculator says just over 28% of eligible voters picked w.
isn't anyone else outraged by this?
this blows my mind and pisses me off.
i may not cast a vote in every primary (i do in governor and president years), or for county clerk, but i do vote.
but at least i am out there trying to make a difference. if an extra 1.5% of voters that didn't vote went out and voted for kerry in 2004, bush would have lost.
not even 1% would have made the difference in 2000.
how can people just not care?
well, more so when they complain about it being a terrible system and how its destroying the earth and society.
i'm pretty sure it's not the capitalism, but the inaction of the citizens that is destroying the world.
while academic and military research has started a lot of the major technical and societal changes we have witnessed (the internet, psychology, etc), it is when somebody figures out how to make a profit on it that is when it begins to make an impact on the regular person.
what company doesn't advertise it's website nowadays?
what person doesn't pay a market to make them a sandwich (which, beyond being the most perfect food, may be the easiest to assemble)?
it is inaction and lack of will power that lets corporations and the system get away with fucking us over.
take exxon mobil. i actively make sure that i do not fill up at a exxonmobil station. if i'm lost in conneticut and i've been on E for 50 miles, that's a different story. but for my everyday commuting gas, i refuse to give my money to exxonmobil.
those silly internet petitions that go around saying "today is no buying gas day," those would work if everyone actually listened to them and took part.
we could drive that company into extinction. if everyone really cared enough about it, we could make sure exxon never made another dime.
but we don't.
because we're lazy.
or with voting. voter turnout for the 2004 presidential election was 55.3%. that was the highest since 1968. where are the other 45%? if they got out and voted for one candidate? in '04 bush received 50.7% of the vote. that's 50.7% of 55.3%. do you know how much that is?
my calculator says just over 28% of eligible voters picked w.
isn't anyone else outraged by this?
this blows my mind and pisses me off.
i may not cast a vote in every primary (i do in governor and president years), or for county clerk, but i do vote.
but at least i am out there trying to make a difference. if an extra 1.5% of voters that didn't vote went out and voted for kerry in 2004, bush would have lost.
not even 1% would have made the difference in 2000.
how can people just not care?
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