Dr. Whothefuck?

Contrary to popular belief, cancer centers at times are chock full o'comedy.

From the 4' high candy cart filled with Twizzlers, Twix Bars, and Gummy Bears pushed around in the chemotherapy infusion rooms, to the tri-hourly inquiries about your poop's texture, tone and viscosity, in spite of it being a cancer center, you do find many instances to occasionally blast your drink through your nose in a fit of laughter. 

Take for example one of the Pediatric oncologists I recently met at Sloan Kettering. So help me God, her name was...ready?... 
Dr. Cancio. 

That's right... 'Dr. Cancio'. Pronounced like cancer grew up in Italy. 
Pretty sure I would've laughed less if she introduced herself as Dr. Frankenstein. 

The first time she walked in and told me her name, I think my face slid off my skull. 
Every time thereafter, Justin and I, in classic 3 yr old fashion, would dart our eyes at each other, hoping one of us would give the other the strength to not laugh, over her unfortunate name. Wishful thinking by us, because this never happened.

So one day, in an attempt to call attention to the obvious elephant in the room (the elephant with a giant, cancerous tumor hanging off the end of it's trunk),I felt like maybe calling attention to it, might be a better way of diffusing the bomb.  

A few days later, the Dr. came in, and I said to her: 'That's so funny, that you're in oncology and your name is Cancio'.
At which point they all just stared at me, dead-faced and expressionless, like they were in a photograph from the 1920's. 

Me: '*throat clear....You know what I mean?'

They somberly furrowed their brows, and in unison, slowly shook their heads in the 'noooooooo' direction. 

Really??? In all the years she had this name, in all the years she worked alongside people in a cancer center, no one has ever made that connection but me and my 18 year old son? Are people's brains honestly this vastly different? Or does she possibly have brain cancio. 

I'm now starting to think if her name were actually 'Dr. Cancer', they still wouldn't have seen the connection. 

They'd be like, 'What? Cancer is just a name, and the other cancer is an illness... I don't get it.'

Tell me again, how smart Dr's really are, when this oncologist, with 12 years of schooling, in the most accredited academic institution in the world, could not make a blatantly obvious (and laugh-worthy) connection. I'm an idiot, and I saw it. I don't even really mind the lack of sense of humor around it as much as I do the inability to see the irony and similarity in the words. THAT to me, is concerning. (She should see a doctor.) 
Sense of humor is the lesser of the two. Not too sure how badly I'd really want a comedian for a doctor if I had a telescoping tumor protruding out from my anus. Nor is it necessarily a time for yo momma jokes when you're in cardiac arrest. But i do expect a Dr, to be sharp. If they can't make connections between the obvious, and say, Dr. Ahbvius, how can they possibly be capable of making more abstract connections related to your health. 
I think it may be time for more creative people to start venturing into the field of medicine. Maybe less people would die as a result of, you know, thinking and laughing.

Anyway, I should probably go now. Dr Stemcellio is on his way in. 

Stay healthy, my friends. 
Love to you all.

Can't Complain

                                                       https://youtu.be/KR0q57z0v1c

Your life's not shitty. Your attitude towards it, might be though.
No matter how catastrophic you think your day to day is, no matter how broke or unfortunate you think your circumstances are, you more than likely live in a place you can call home. Personal bubbles where we have the luxury of feeling vulnerable and yet still safe. 

We have food everywhere we turn, in cabinets, in big metal boxes that astonishingly sustain their cold temps so we can eat cheese without dying, there's food in bookstores, gas stations, hanging off of trees, there's warmth emanating from our walls when we push a button, we wear clothes that protect us, that someone else made for us, hung neatly in little rooms created just for them to hang in so they don't get wrinkled, clean hospitals tending to our every ailment, cafes and restaurants with people serving you, making you food and bringing it to you, forests to walk through and wax poetically about, transportation of any type, to fly or bus or whisk us away to anywhere our curiosity wants to childishly explore, we have computers that fit in our little hands that provide us with an infinite stream of global information, inspiration and entertainment, we visit friends, just because we have free time, we go to parties, simply because we want to indulge in more happiness, we casually walk through parks because there's no land mines, trail-run with our dogs to get exercise because we have jobs where we don't have to build structures for our own survival, or live in areas where we're running out of fear for our lives, we have loving friends and generosity everywhere we look- just because we were born in the right place, with so much just magically aligning for us as a result of that happenstance. The disparity between one life and the next is tragically unfair and pretty random. Most of us, in spite of our daily mini, or even macro dramas, are gifted beyond measure. 
We have a lot.
Pay it forward whenever you can. 

12 Coping Tips To Help You When Sending Your Child To College

Step 1: Never cry in front of your child at their college. Find a utility closet, close the door, and cry directly over the mops. 

Step 2: Don't be an Italian mom, like me. Learn to let go. You don't want your son living in your basement. Then you're other 48 year old son will have no place to live. 

Step 3: Do hot yoga every day. Tears look identical to sweat, the extra long yoga mat towels are the perfect sized handkerchiefs for despondent moms, and it also acts as a wonderful sound muffler for when you finally lose your shit. 

Step 4: Stay productive. Take a trip maybe to LA, where you can provide a large supply of water to a severely rainless community just by wringing out your eyeballs.    

Step 5: Don't play sad songs. Choose melodies such as those created by bands like SlipKnot and Cannibal Corpse. 

Step 6: Embrace change. 

(Fyi...This doesn't mean crying in new places.)

Step 7: Let's try this again; Embrace change! 

Change is good! Change means growth. Growth can be painful. Really painful. Like, crippling, actually. You may not even get out of bed for a few days. Or shower. Causing your immune system to become compromised, or shut down. Where you'll potentially fall victim to some debilitating illness, and lose your ability to ever work again. And then become a raging alcoholic. 

Let's move on. 

Step 8: Rethink Step 7. (While crying, probably.)

Step 9: Fuck it. Feel your emotions. Cry it out. But be sure to alert neighbors beforehand that in the weeks to come, you are not being maimed by a sounder of wild boar.  

Step 10: Dry out tear ducts until they resemble The Salt Flats of Utah. Take pictures of your new Salt Flats tear ducts and post on Facebook as your latest vacation photos. 

Step 11: Cry scores of desert snakes and scorpions out of your new desert-like tear ducts, onto your bed until they sting and poison you to death in your sleep. 

Step 12: Acceptance. Maybe. 

Nah. 

:)

(*Enjoy your kids while they're still around to drive you crazy. Love to all the parents saying their college goodbyes..... xo)

Jawwwwwg

                       

Women are somewhat notorious for changing their minds. We all know this. But women who date will most definitely agree and stick to a few key things. Always have some type of mouth freshener on you, shave until you resemble tofu, and never date a guy whose name you can't passionately scream out in bed.

As if the plethora of guys who drown in a sea of cheap cologne and 10 dollar chinatown sidewalk sale sweaters weren't enough of a dating limitation, we now also have to contend with the annunciation of their names.

The list is endless, but let’s start by naming a few that don’t work in the bedroom, now, until the end of time.

There can’t be any Freds, Kenneths, Donalds, Abrahams, Ahmeds, Barts, Olivers, Edwards, Mervins, Jillians, Jamies, Willies, Mortons, Adolfs, Linuses, Nathaniels, Thurstons, Waldos, or Wolfgangs.

Nor anyone that has your fathers name. Or anything even remotely close to it. For example, my fathers name is Jerry. So anything even starting with the letter 'J' is even a little too eerily close for me. So just to be on the safe side, I say eliminate the letter to the left of 'J' and the letter to the right of 'J'.

So no dating 'I', 'J' or 'K' names for me either.

We're down to choosing a man from the mere 23 letters left in the alphabet and here we are, already limited beyond reason to whom we'd even consider dating. And we haven't even said fucking hi yet.

There are a few names that happen to be in the safety zone. John, David, Chris, Michael, Joe, Brian, Eric, Tom, Paul, Scott, Jim, Greg, to name a few... and i used to believe 'George'.

And if you're reading this and happen to share any of the aforementioned acceptable names, know this is sheerly a coincidence and not some twisted methodology of getting my friends to disrobe and dangle from a trapeze with me.

Back to George.

This all changed for me once I dated my first George.
At first I thought, well, theres George Clooney, George Washington, and King George the Third. Not bad. But then I thought a little harder, and realized there's also Curious George, George Bush, and Boy George. Which instilled a fear, followed by more fear. And then a rectal spasm.

The possibility of dating George came into play via an internet dating service. George emailed me every day. George got no response from me every day. Because George misspelled everything, every day. An absolute Dawn dating deal breaker. But George was unrelenting. So much so, that even seeing George's name became as irritating to me as shaving my armpits with sulfuric acid and a 40 Grade sandpaper.

Online dating sites are for hopeless losers right? They're made for the bottom dwellers of society. It's where the leftovers and people that were hit in the face with a bag of nickels converge. I know this.

And there I was, 2 years ago, loserly filling out every question of my profile like my children's next breath of air depended upon it.

However, I did but remain stoic in my position to never actually DATE anyone from there, but to rather just window shop until someone interesting should possibly emerge.

Little did I know that I was window shopping at a store that was blown up for insurance money and had nothing to offer the greater female populace but the sad, war torn tattered remains, of the male citizenry, just for the asking.

I wasn’t even sure why I signed up for this online dating act of desperation in the first place. It's so not my style. I'm sure that was my mothers brainwashing / dating contribution. The same one who every time watches Derek Jeter on TV says, “ Now THAT'S the kind of guy you need to meet.”

Really, mom? Derek Jeter? Tall, sexy, boyish millionaire? How refreshing and unpredictable. 

So out of the hundreds of ugly, emotionally bruised, player, prosthetic limbed, pot bellied, tragic, jobless, disheveled, hillbillied, arrogant, tacky, mutant, grandpas who I politely turned down by telling them I had liver failure and only 6 months left to live, George, like a plantars wart, just kept coming back. And I thought 2 things. He's either so dumb that he can’t take more than a hint, or his penis requires night vision goggles and sifting devices to find. Neither of which appealed to me.

But George was a fireman. George had 2 kids. George was relatively cute. And George lived only an hour and a half away from me. And George was persistent. So once the name ‘George’ passed the bedroom inspection test, by saying it, from every possible sexual angle known to mankind, I decided maybe Georges earnest attempts to meet me weren't something I should so quickly dismiss. His name sounded a little more annoying when I yelled it swinging from the trapeze, but I blamed that particular deviation on the Doplar Effect, and let it slide.

The day after the experiment, I get online and see yet another email from George, but this time I decided to respond to the bold request of exchanging phone numbers, and possibly go on this much offered date.

It is just a date right? How bad can it be with a relatively cute fireman. There were however, these two pictures, ( not good considering he only had 2 pictures ) where I noticed his eyes looked unusually strange, like his thyroid was ready to explode. But I second guessed it and assumed that maybe someone was just stabbing him in the back right as the picture was being taken.

So fine. I give him my cell number, and say we should talk sometime. Not even ten minutes later, my phone rings. I see an unfamiliar number and immediately know its from George. I'm a little nervous but figured we could always talk about the proper treatment for sunburns, the ' Dalmations Are Deaf ' myth, or if all else failed, i could just have an uplifting conversation about people jumping to their deaths on 9/11.

I answer the phone.

Me: 'Hello?'

George: " Hi Dawwwwwwwwwn, it's Jawwwwwwwwwwwwwg."

me: "Oh. Fuck. uhhh uhhh..I mean, Oh. Hi!"

A horrible accent resulting in an R-less George.

Now this was something I had never foreseen in my extensive Bad Name research. Not only was his accent so strong that he was destroying his and poor George Clooney's name, but now he's destroying my name as well.

Dawn. The sunrise. Pastel colors. Dewey leaves. Long shadows. I didnt think it was ever possible to ruin Dawn. But he did. I personally wouldve been happier with "Hey Gertrude" at that point.

So now, theres a new addendum to my original rules: You can't have two 'awww' sounding partner names. No Shawn and Dawn, Nor Harrys and Marys. No Jimmys and Kimmys.

No Garanimals name matching.

I also couldn't help notice, but according to my calculations, 'Ewwwwww' had the same amount of 'W's as he made 'Jawwwwwg' sound like it did. A gruesome discovery that I'm convinced was more than likely, a sign from God.

This was not looking nor sounding good. Plus it had the overt 'J' sound of my fathers name. Making this introduction more repulsive by the minute.

What am I going to do now?! Can I call him Derek Jeter instead? At this point, I'm thinking Chinwendoo is looking better than I had thought. If he really liked me, he'd change his name to Chinwendoo. Hey when i got married, i changed my last name. So what is so bad about changing his first name. Show a little commitment and willingness to sacrifice for Christ's sake. We're in the 'woooing' period. Now's your time to shine, and slay dragons for each other.

For a moment, I thought of pretending he dialed the wrong number by responding "Pardon me? This is Connecticut you've called. I think you meant to call Bensonhurst."

But instead, I opt for pulling out the Bible and decide to practice that "Do Unto Others Bullshit, and simply say "Hi!" in return.

He continues: " Hi Dawwwwwwwn, it's Jawwwwwwwg, from 'Internet Dating Nightmares? ...you just gaymee me yaw numba???"

FYI, years of being married into a Jewish family and having the quintessential Jewish in-laws, who basically would've paid front row tickets to see me terminally gag on The Body of Christ Wafer, have taught me how to be perfectly , inauthentically pleasant when all the doors are locked, and I have no way out. So I pull this learned trait out of my bag of social goodies and perk back up to my normal self, and continue conversing.

I don't really recall what we spoke about because all I seemed to focus on hearing was him say individual words like…cawwwwl… tawwwking….beach bawwwwls, and something about the Jersey Shawwwww.

We talk for another 15 minutes until I realize I can't go on and need an excuse to hang up. "I'm sorry George, my phone is breaking up. I can't seem to properly hear any vowels or consonants . Thanks for cawwwling, it was nice hearing your horrendous accent and I'll cawwwl you back when I'm less grossed out, less educated, or more dead."

But it came out more like, "...Thanks so much for calling. It was nice talking to you, but I'm kind of busy from now until Armageddon." 

We hang up and 20 minutes later, and he texts me a picture of his abs.

Who would send someone a picture of just their headless abs?! Plus now I'm growing more concerned by the minute that he has no head, you know, from the insurance job explosion.

In typical woman fashion, I quickly grab the phone and call every female I’ve ever met dating back to the Mesozoic era to shred this guy into little pieces.

My friends unanimously agree that I was possibly being too harsh, and say that accents don't mean anything. ( Nor did his chronic misspellings, bad grammar, bulgy eyes, severed stomach or Fuggetabout's either... I suppose.)

Then I was hit with this sudden pang of guilt. Maybe I was in fact, being too harsh. Maybe he was a genuine nice guy that just never received a Hooked On Phonics book as a Christmas stocking stuffer. Or his parents never introduced him to other humans.

My ‘friends’ advise me that if he calls again, I should at least be willing to meet him for a drink. Maybe they're right I thought. Plus he's a fireman. So if I pass out from boredom or stupidity or decide to set him on fire, he'll know what to do.

I eventually concede and make that pact with my friends. 
The friends that I am no longer on speaking terms with.

Sure enough, 2 days later, I get the call.

I had him in my phone log then as, 'Jawwwg'.

I hadn't seen that many 'w's in digital display since the launch of the first dot com business.

I take a deep breath and answer my phone.

Me: "Hello?"

George: " Hi Dwwawwwwwwwn, it's Jawwwwwwwg ???"

Now I'm hearing additional 'W's, right after the 'D'.

And why does he have to go UP at the end of his name.. like he's asking me a question. I just wanted to say " You called me, asshole, don’t you know your own name???" And then I realized, no. He doesn't know his own name.

We continue to talk, and he asks me out for that coming Saturday night.

I was torn between stabbing my ear with a rusty hypodermic needle or going on this date.

Stabbing my ear won, until I realized he would just keep cawwwling anyway until I lowered my standards to ankle height and succumbed to the torture.
So Saturday night, it was.

Growing up in New York City, I was always aware of my New York accent. But after one phone call with George, it occurred to me to start retracing my roots to see if I was possibly a descendant of Queen Anne.

Saturday night comes, and we're to meet in front of a local bar in CT.

I arrive 10 minutes early purely on the 'the first to come, can be the first to run like hell' concept.

He approached the bar, sees me, and emphatically waves while yelling out an embarrassing ...... " Dwwawwwwwwwn!!!"

I was surprised he had even recognized me considering I violently withdrew my head into my turtleneck once I heard him. Don't get me wrong, he wasn't bad looking, I'd say he was a 7 or 8 on a scale of one to 10.

But I'm referring to the IQ scale.

He grabs the door handle of the bar and says:

" Hea, lemme get the dawwwwwwwww."

As the alcohol took affect, all of George's small talk became white noise. But my brain dead trance was occasionally interrupted with hearing " blah blah blah dawwwgs", “blah blah blah glassa waaawta”, and "blah blah are ya ready ta awwwda."

I look to his eyes for some type of possible physical connection, and all I see looking eagerly back at me were 2 golf ball eyes precariously hanging out of his head. I kept nervously putting my hand over my glass in fear of them falling into my drink. Which I needed desperately at this point. My internal monologue being " I told you dumb Dawn! I TOLD you they were too buggy. Knife stab my ass!"

I let him talk for a while, If that's what we're calling it. Because I, on the other hand, was quite speechless. He said he was so glad that I was so 'smawwwwt' and glad that I wasn't shawwwwt, and that I was gawwwwjus.

He talked about his friend Pawwwwwl, and his 2 dawwwwwtiz, and her pet hawwwwss.

I managed to be as pleasant as I knew how, and drink as much as possible to prevent a personal suicide attempt, by me willingly beating my brains in, in the public restroom with the toilet seat cover.

After a 3 hour, R-less conversation, I lied to him and told him that I needed to wake up early the next morning to run. Because running was on my mind. Running fast, and far. In high heeled shoes.

I thanked him for the nice evening of drinks and hemorrhaging ear canals and walked to my car. However, walking is an understatement.

I actually got a $250 ticket in the parking lot for running too fast.  Who gets a ticket for running too fast? I never knew that could happen. I mean I knew you weren't ever allowed to run fast through the hallways in 5th grade, but I didn't realize they were finally cracking down on it so hard now.

The very next day, I hear my phone ringing. This time, it was ringing with an accent. I look down at the caller ID and see it's Jawwwwwgy Pawwwwwgy, and let it go to voicemail.

But my conscience gets the best of me and I realize I should return the call to say a final thank you. But the thought of talking or listening to Jawwwwg has become about as appealing as drinking hot earthworms through a straw.

"You have 1 new message."

I press play, and make a face like I just swallowed the drainage off a coronors floor.

I listen. For a second.

" Hi Dwawwwwwn, it's Jawwwwwwg?"

The thought of listening to the rest of the message doesn't even cross my mind. I press delete, and call the entire east coast once more for counsel.

I was met with a resounding "Yes, call back, that's the right thing to do."

Those friends are now listed as 'Antichrist' on my phone log.

Like ripping off a hot waxing strip from the pubic region, I decide to do it quickly and get it over with.

He answered his phone on a mere 1/8th of a ring.

After spitting the puke out that had just suddenly accumulated in my mouth, from the desperate 1/8th of a ring pick-up, I said real quickly " Oh hi its Dawn."

And just as he started saying " Oh hi Dwwawwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwn!!" , I thought "Shit here we go again" and figured I’d run out and do some grocery shopping and maybe visit some friends, in hopes of me returning to the call as he was nearing his completion of W's.

But it was useless.

He was still only on his 876th 'W' when I was done gallivanting around town.

He continues to talk and ends with a claim of wanting to go out with me again that following weekend.

That's when I knew I had to be completely honest with him. Ok 'completely' is a lie, I'm not that heartless. I mean hawwwwhtless.

Me: "George, thank you so much for coming up here and taking me out, I had an okay time, but I've decided I really need to take a break from dating for a while."

George: "Oh noooo really??? Was it sumptin' I said???"

Me: "No Jawwwwg. No. It was just one fucking letter in particular."

Let's Play Name That Porta-Potty, Shall We?

While most moms sit around and think of their kids next soccer game, I, on the other hand, take a sick interest in thinking of more appropriate names for Porta-Potty mobile toilets.

On a recent outing, after consuming 3 large bottles of water, I was in dire need of finding a bathroom. But the only thing that was around was the infamous plastic outhouse sitting in the center of a wide open expanse of grass.

As I tentatively opened the plastic door of this rocky preschool shit machine, I try desperately to not make eye contact with what appeared in the toilet to be the inners of the entire eastern seaboard.

It was unusually balmy that day, so it was hot in there. Like an Ezy-Bake oven for shit.

As an added bonus, it was also sporting an aggressive tropical humidity index as well.

I scan the walls for gekkos and tree frogs but all I find stuck to the ceiling was some mysterious brown spots and a never before seen rare breed of used toilet paper that was about 3 seconds from biodegrading onto my forehead.

But I'm desperate, so I decide to test my inner strength, as well as my waning lung capacity and go for the pee.

No joke I put my hoodie on. 

Dont particularly need the e-coli sticking to my hair thats already damp from the low pressure pee front haze in there.

I hovered over the toilet, legs squivering, saying my Hale Marys with my forehead sweating in fear of making contact with the intestinally diarreah baptized seat, ...

I cant help but think, all my martial arts training, staying in a horse stance and focusing my breathing, channeling my chi, has it's moment of shining glory...in a fucking porta potty.

If the need should ever arise again to find a bathroom where the toilets filled with community defecation and precariously shakes when you close the door....two thoughts came to mind. The first thought was, I think I'd rather crap in my pants.

The 2nd thought was, I think I'd rather crap in my pants.

4 days later, I'm still holding my breath in fear of the smell still being trapped in my nosehairs somewhere.

But as I hover over the toilet seat testing every muscle and ligaments resistance capacity, a flood of more accurate names for these......these olfactory playgrounds, came to mind.

The name of this luxurious facility that I embarked upon was comically called

'The Royal Flush'

And I think...yeah more like: 'The Colon Flush'.

I exit the Porta Potty as if someone was chasing me with an axe.

Some other desperate fool awaits me outside.

i hold the door open, and picture the group effort decay inside he's about to witness, lower my head, and say..."Dude...it wasnt me, it was all of Connecticut."

So here's my names, for a more honest Porta-Potty World:

1. Shit Outta Luck

2. The Crap Trap

3. Stop And Plop

4. The Melting Pot

5. The Fisher-Price Pietri Dish Playhouse

6. Take a Load Off

7. The Bung Lung

8. The Poop Coop

9. The Hotter Squatter

10. The Shit Terrarium

11. Take Your Breath Away Waste Management

12. The Stank Tank

13. The Shit Pit

14. Holy Crap, Mother Of God

15. Helter Shelter

16. The Last Resort

17. Ass In The Grass

18. The FeCAL LoCAL

19. The Butt Hutt

20. The Shat Vat

21. The Log Cabin

22. The Stool Shed

23. The Community Dump

24. The DUNGeon

25. You Won't Believe This Shit

Feel free to share with me your own, and next time youre in Porta-Potty hell, i hope you'll think of me. :)