anonemouse

I am trying to guage the interest of the board members in making donations to LBT to avoid ads being placed on the board.

You HAVE to come to Memphis. If you do, I'll come see you. My brother lives in Memphis, and I'm getting banded there, so I'll be there fairly frequently. In Memphis, you need to do or see: Graceland Pink Palace Museum National Civil Rights Museum (very stirring and emotional) Redbirds baseball game at Autozone Park Beale Street Memphis Zoo Memphis Botanical Gardens Ride the Ducks (amphibious vehicles from WWII) in the Mississippi River

Really, the only thing you can do to get rid of them is to get rid of their habitat. If you have any objects in your yard that are holding standing water (buckets, old tires, kiddie pools, etc.), they need to be dumped. Other than that, just use mosquito spray every time you go out, but make sure you reapply it fairly often, especially if you are sweating.

No, she wasn't. She violated her parole not once, but TWICE. If you had violated your parole, you would have been sentenced to serve time, as well. If anything, she was given an extra chance because of who she was. Anyone else that had violated their parole would have been sent to the slammer the first time they violated.

Apparently, my parents took care of informing my relatives about my surgery. I hadn't intended to tell anyone outside my immediate family until I was sure that this was going to work. Unfortunately, my dad took that out of my hands. Nice of him, wasn't it? :tired Now I'll get to deal with the well-meaning, but ultimately doubting, relatives about three weeks after my surgery, when we all get together for a stressful week of family fun (or not so much, since there are usually several fights and blow-ups during the week). Them knowing wouldn't be so bad if I could have told them on my own terms. As it is, this is going to be a TON of fun. One of my uncles actually told me that he never believed that I could have done it, when I got a summer internship on Cape Cod, halfway across the country. I knew he meant it as a compliment, but it was sort-of backwards, you know?

You did not want to be me this weekend. I went to bed at midnight on Friday night. At 2 AM, I woke up and had a quarter-sized lump on my hoo-ha. Very painful, but tolerable. As the weekend went on, though, it grew. And grew. And grew. I could barely walk because of the pain and I was taking LOTS of Advil for the pain (didn't do much more than take the edge off of it). Of course, no one was open yesterday because of the holiday, but I was able to make an appointment to see my gynecologist this morning, luckily. She took a look at it and said that it was an ingrown hair, but that the pus-pocket thing was huge, about 2 1/2 inches. So, I got to have my crotch lanced this morning. And let me tell you, that damn lidocaine shot was the most painful thing I have EVER experienced. I am normally have a high tolerance for pain, but I was whimpering like a baby.

I am a couple hours south of Cincinnati, in Richmond, KY.

Ooh, where are you? I spend a summer a few years ago interning at Monomoy National Wildlife Refuge in Chatham.

Here's what Wikipedia had to say about the whole thing. The sad part is that he probably would have won if they hadn't run that ad.

Harold Ford, Jr. was the Democratic senate candidate for Tennessee this past November. He's African American and the Republicans ran racist ads against him in the race (one had a white woman saying that he was sexy). They got heavily scolded for it and stopped running the ads, but the ads did their damage.

Very true. All you have to do is look at Harold Ford, Jr. to know that the Republicans are ready and willing to play dirty.

I think it is basically a foregone conclusion that there will be a Democrat in the White House, unless something really major happens. The Republican candidates just aren't that strong, especially considering that the ultra-conservatives are a pretty good chunk of their voting base. What, they're going to actually vote for someone whose pro-life stance is in severe doubt, not to mention that he's a divorced adulterer (Juliani)? Or someone who is apparently not considered to be a Christian by many ultra-conservative Christians (Romney)? Or someone who has pissed off a lot of moderate Republicans in his bid to win over conservative Republicans (McCain)? The rest are either not very well-known or, if they are well-known, like Fred Thompson, aren't 100% committed at this point.

Hey Jaqui, who was your surgeon? My original surgeon was Dr. Olsen at Centennial in Nashville. I had to switch because of insurance issues, though.

I usually just go to a used bookstore. There's a MASSIVE one in Knoxville called McKay's Used Books.

You are very welcome!

I can't help you with the first, because I am not banded yet. The second, though, I might be able to help you with. The long-term (well, up to 10 years post-surgery) weight loss statistics for banding are equivalent to the long-term statistics for RNY bypass. The last scientific article I saw even made the implication that banding MAY be more successful than bypass after 10 years. They couldn't come right out and make that conclusion, since they didn't have enough evidence yet, but they hinted at it. And that paper was a summary of all the results published in English-language journals that were from studies with more than three years patient follow-up and more than 100 participants. The results they showed were that the 8-year results for banding were statistically identical to the 10-year results for RNY. That leads to the question of how the 10-year results for banding compare with the 10-year results for RNY. If the 8-year banding results are identical to 10-year results for bypass, the 10-year banding results would probably exceed the 10-year bypass results.

I haven't seen her around for several days.

Apparently, I missed my first nutrition class. I was told that they are held on the 2nd and 4th weeks of the month. To me, that means the 2nd FULL week. But no. Apparently, the two days that ended the last week in May and began June count as the first week. So, my class was this week instead of next week. I called the nutritionist to confirm that the meeting was next week, on the 13th, but found out that the class was this past Wednesday. Luckily, since my surgery is going to be on July 3rd, the nutritionist is going to do a private class with just me, right before the second class that I have to go to. You know, instead of saying that the meetings will be on the second and fourth weeks, they should give DATES. Because, damn it, two days does not make a week!

Thanks! I can't wait.

Reggodess, I agree with you to a certain extent. I don't think that surgery should be the first option. If a teen was 30 or 40 pounds overweight, I think your solution would be best. But a severely or morbidly obese teen isn't any more likely to lose the weight and keep it off than you or I are. It isn't magically easier for them to lose that weight. Two hundred pounds overweight is two hundred pounds overweight, regardless if the person is 15 or 45.

You guys are great, you know that? You've got me rolling over here, picturing PBing all over my uncle.

Believe me, one glitch in your credit CAN hurt you, once it goes on your credit report. I know this from experience. I cut my hand a few years ago and went to the emergency room. Did you know that you are billed twice at the ER? I didn't. Once from the hospital and once from the doctor that you see. Apparently, the doctor failed to get my correct address and insurance information from the hospital workers (I know the hospital had it because I got mailings from them later and my insurance was billed for their portion). Since I never got a bill from the doctor, I thought everything had been taken care of. I got a couple of calls from a collection agency, telling me that I had hospital bills that had not been paid. So, I did what anyone would do, and called the hospital. Those were all paid. So, I thought everything had been taken care of. Not so, apparently. I got a copy of my credit report a few months later, and it had a delinquent medical bill on there. That one single bill dropped my credit rating from excellent (around 780) to verging on bad (around 625). And the credit rating continues to go down as long as the bill remains unpaid. So if you don't get that resolved, it WILL affect your credit. My credit is still recovering. It doesn't matter that the bill would have been paid if the doctor had bothered to get my correct address or had gotten my insurance information. Once it's on your credit report, it stays there for 7 years, even once you get it paid. It will affect your credit for the entire time it is on there.

See if you can get your doctor to give to a prescription for Chantix (or whatever it is) to help you quit. From what I've heard, it makes it very unpleasant to smoke.

I have to agree with this. Take my brother's fiance for example. The girl's about the same height as I am, eats every couple of hourse (usually junk), and weighs maybe 110 pounds. She eats thousands of calories per day, way more than I do, yet is literally half my weight. Another example is my college roommate. I lived with that girl for four years. She literally ate Pasta almost every single day, sometimes for every meal (other than Breakfast, when she ate a sugary Cereal like Lucky Charms). She loved cheese bread and would frequently make it to eat with her pasta meals. She was also incredibly inactive. She gained a little bit of weight over the four years, but not more than 20 or so pounds. And how did she take it off? She did yoga for about 20 minutes a day and the weight melted off like butter. Genetics really is the key, I believe, to a lot of peoples' weight. Some people can be couch potatos, eating thousands and thousands of calories from junk food, and not gain a single pount. Or if they do gain, it's very easy for them to lose weight. Other people watch what they eat, are very active, and are still fat. Now, I'm not saying that genetics is the entire problem for everyone. But it does determine if you are predisposed to obesity. It determines how easily you gain weight and how difficult it is to lose it.

I have no problems with severely depressed people seeking out euthanasia, as long as it is not a short-term depression. If you've ever been severely depressed, there is as much pain there as there is with physical ailments. It may be mental pain (or even physical, as depression can cause physical symptoms), but who are we to say one person's pain is any less important and worthy of being relieved than another person's? Of course, I don't think it should be allowed before seeking out all possible assistance from therapists and doctors, but if their pain (physical OR mental) can't be relieved, then I say that the patient should have the right to put themselves out of their misery.