sundries

The headache and associated issues (it was like this combo migraine, sinus and tension headache) have finally gone. Nothing north of my shoulders hurts, and that's glorious.

Just about everything south of my shoulders hurts though -- a combination of lots of walking, sunburn and other activities. That's pretty damn okay too.

Today we are going to the beach. Yesterday we rowboated in Central Park, strolled, had good dinner, came home with the plan of going 'round the corner to see fireworks and then discovered, WHOOPS, they moved to the other river. So Patty encouraged me to go out, was quite sure it would be fine and the crowds wouldn't overwhelm us and was right. We had an amazing view, lying on a lawn at night, and I always forget how damn martial fireworks are. They get me in a place, not of patriotism, but of the tenuousness of existence.

Friday we spent first doing an errand to the West Side and having a snack at the cafe on the pier behind Lincoln Center, and then went down to Soho for snacks and shopping of the oddest and broadest variety imaginable.

To continue telling this out of order, last night after the fireworks, we made mayo-free potato salad and miniature gluten-free chocolate-chip muffins for the beach.

I've needed these three days more than I can describe.

so, I went to the doctor....

Right, so just went to the 24-hour clinic, because I have a UTI and that was too unpleasant not to get drugs for RIGHT NOW.

As per usual, there are a billion questions, including things about sexual orientation and how I know I have a UTI. These things are related, as women often get UTIs after penetrative sex, so the whole thing sort of came up in a context of "I've had these before, but not in ages because it happened more often when I was having it on with boys, but trust me, I know what this is and exactly how I got it" and also because the paperwork asked.

I was wearing, for the record, a white t-shirt, black pants and a black jacket. And a push-up bra ( really only have tow type sof bras -- push-up bras and bras I use for binding. There is no neutral). Sure I have short hair, and when I'm at the doctor's office and not freaked out I'm pretty calm and in control and authoratative and when I don't feel well, my voice tends to pitch lower, but seriously folks, if you've met me, and while it's easy for me to read as masculine, it doesn't really happen without effort. At all.

So imagine my "WTF?" when the doctor, very deliberated maked an x on the little line dividing the male and female boxes on my perscription form. Was it a 60+-year-old doctor trying to be cool about bisexuality and not quite getting it right? Was it bad hand-writing? (althugh his handwriting mostly didn't suck? Was it someone having a gender clue? Or was it more of the variety of the poeple at Citibank who call me "sir" even when I'm wearing lipstick and high heels.

The world may never know.

But now I'm home. And I have Cipro.