Have You Ever?

I wonder sometimes if my admission into this program is really all that much of an acheivement. Sometimes when I consider the adaptive skills of some of the people I see around me, I loose faith that the process by which we were admitted had anything to do with intelligence, acheivement, likelyhood of success, or indeed basic hygeine.

There is a "person I know" who doesn't seem to believe in showering. So much to the point that I am starting to suspect that they are the Wicked Witch of the West in disguise. They always smell BAD... Bad like the B.O. of a week old corpse bad. With just a hint of some sickningly sweetish musky perfume. OMG, have they been Febreezing themselves instead of washing? How can I get a skin swab without them noticing? I have to know...

And there is another person who so seriously gives the impression of an IQ so low that they'd have to stand on a chair to raise it. I'm not just talking about being slow... I'm not talking about the silly mistakes we all make because we are nervous, or tired, or HUMAN. It's not just that they aren't the "sharpest knife in the drawer." It's more that they are an EGG in the KNIVE DRAWER. And you open up the knife drawer, looking for a knife and you're like, OMG, who put this egg in the knife drawer. And you have to call your mom and your friends because you just need to tell someone about how absurd their stupidity is.

This person has:

asked me if a banana peel is bio-degradable
got into an elevator and waited a full 3 minutes before pressing the button because they hadn't noticed it wasn't moving yet
inquired if there was meat in the peperoni pizza
freaked out about the possibility of sushi style "dragon rolls" being made of real dragon
wanted to know what "closed captioning" was (Their excuse? "I don't watch a lot of TV." Me: "Yeah, but you are aware of an invention called TV, right? And that on this invention called TV that they have things called shows? And you are aware that there is a population of deaf people in society, right?)

I should also mention that upon doing any of these or other borderline brain-injury induced behaviour, that this individual will say something like, "Hee hee hee! I'm SO STUPID!" Then giggle obliviously that they are making themselves sound even more stupid with every second.

How did this person get into a highly competetive program in clinical psychology? How do they manage to STAY in a highly competetive program in clinical psychology? For that matter, how do they manage not to fall out of windows without child locks on them? Or not choke on their tongue in their sleep? Or not mistake their car's exhaust pipe for the straw in their Diet Coke?

OMG... and why do I always seem to draw these people as project partners, office mates, or accept rides home from them? Okay, clearly that's ME being stupid. No matter what the cold Canadian lousy SMarch weather brings, I wouldn't ride with a drunk driver, so I shouldn't ride with a clearly stupid-person driver either, right? Imagine the PSA for that one:

The pirate on the pack of zig-zags takes off his bandana and replaces it with a mortorboard and says: "Don't do it please! I'm begging you. YOU are stupid. WAAAAAAY too stupid!" Followed by a shot of the same confused/dazed look on the stupid person's face as was seen on the blitzed teenager.

Ahhhhh.... so much less angry now. Thank you, dear reader.
Psyche.

Update

I suppose there is not much funny going on. I've got one major presentation tomorrow, then two tiny ones, a rather large assignment, a 10 page paper (grant proposal), and a take home exam to go. Then classes are officially over. Then all I have to do is collect my data, run my analyses, write my thesis and write a teachers' guide for a school product -- THEN I'm done for the summer.

I was not selected to win a rather large scholarship for next year. A bit disappointed about that. But I'm still up for another rather large scholarship so keep your fingers crossed. I start a spring contract at a school board next week.

I guess things are coming down to the wire and getting a bit hairy.

I keep shaving though... preventative measure.

It's my sincere hope that when all this pressure starts to ease off that I will return to something resembling sanity. Wish me luck.

Oh, I also have a bunch of practicum interviews this week and next. Oy.

Like I said, not much funny. Just an update.

Psyche

They Don't Prepare You For This

My left hand tingles all the time now. I've had two hospital visits, one day, during which the staff inserted needles into my body and sent electric charges down them. I've seen a physiotherapist who can only tell me to "watch my posture" in various non-specific ways, the chiropractor, and of course I go on and on to my therpist. My nose runs almost constantly and my poop is green. And I'm serious, it's not even St. Patrick's day and my bowels are clearly longing for the Emrald Isle. I'm jittery, I have no sex drive.

All anyone can tell me is, "Well, you are a grad student. Try to watch your posture."

Seriously? WTF? My ocaisionally slumping after 9 hours at laptop is causing me to shit shamrock shakes? Why oh why is ANYONE under the illusion that medicine has anything to offer the average individual?

So I'm wadding a bunch of Kleenex up and stuffing it in my schnoz, putting on a wrist brace, and working near the bathroom. Because I seriously do not have the time for this.

Besides, I'm feeling all little and mopey and abandoned sitting here looking out the window and the glorious sun, feeling like the little dog who has to stay in and practice the violin while the other dogs chase squirrels. I am open to suggestions for gratuitous self-care and selfish self-love.

Fucking ides of March.

This Is How Tired I Am

This morning, I fell asleep duirng my MRI.

Sunday March 7th, 2010

The Prodigal One

I’ve just returned from a week long trip to another province – where the hats are tall and the beef is prevalent. I went as a speaking to do presentations for the Org. Thinking it would be fun and well-paid, I even took the week off of school so that I could stay for the full week, speaking to groups of students, parents, and community mental health professionals about the Org and online safety. It was indeed, Online Safety Week.

I worked my ass off. I actually had to ask for a cushion on the plane ride home because I had worn off so much of my ass as to make sitting painful. Actually, that may have been due to the fact that I stood in high heels for most of the week and my butt muscles were screaming in protest. But try to put that aside. The point is, the term “working holiday” is utter bullshit. Even if you have a light official schedule, you still have to be ON all the time. You are expected to have lunches and dinners with people from the regional office, or contacts you are supposed to schmooze. (Seriously?? I’m a counsellor! I have to schmooze? WTF?) For a counsellor, this is dreaded stuff. We already spend all of our professional time listening to clients talk about their problems, now all the people we meet KNOW that we are a counsellor and corner us, admitting with teenage sincerity that they “don’t know why” but they “feel like they can trust” us and just “need to open up to someone.” In the course of a week, I had the ED of a large company tell me in detail about their childhood abuse, a computer specialist discuss at length how they were traumatized by images of illegal child images, a media specialist disclosed her many pregnancy scares and drunk driving, and an employee from a rather large airline disclose the multiple suicides in their family. I was surprised that only one employee from the ORG asked me for advice on a parenting situation (they were worried that referring their emotionally disturbed child to therapy would make the child think that something was wrong with them!) because usually I get asked a ton about this. Oh, and did I mention that absolutely none of these people were actually participants in any of the talks or presentations I gave? These were just people I met professionally – other professionals working for the Online Safety Week.

Naturally, by the end of the week, overworked, having let my schoolwork slip, and quickly slipping into an Alberta Beef coma, I wanted nothing more than to pass out on a plane (thank you lorazepam!) and wake up back home. But no... a lady I met during one of the presentations was on my plane and wanted to chat. I pled sedation and kept her well-meaning, over the top, and loud voiced self a few rows behind me.

Honk-shu.