Donate Life

by David Goldman

The kidney transplant I had in 1986 finally quit working this past November. From all accounts nearly 25 years is a really good lifespan for a transplanted kidney. I started dialysis in early December and have been on it since.

As soon as all the dust had settled I started thinking about another transplant. A transplant has its risks and downsides but (in my opinion) it certainly beats being hooked up to R2D2 for three and a half hours a day, three days a week. The quick summary of how the transplant process works is that first, I have to be evaluated and approved for the transplant. They don’t want to waste a donated kidney. Once approved, you get put on the waiting list for a cadaver kidney. At my transplant center and I believe most transplant hospitals in the U.S., the wait is currently at least five years. A better option is a kidney from a living donor (For more info on the benefits of living donation please see the Living Kidney Donors Network). To have a living donor someone first has to volunteer and then also be medically approved.

My first choice, like anyone in this situation, would be to find a living donor. The transplant can be done sooner and both immediate and long-term results are better than with a cadaver donor. But you can’t ask someone for a kidney. All you can do is tell your story and hope someone offers. I decided to send out a mass email to everyone I knew to update them on my health but first there was a handful of friends and relatives that I wanted to tell personally. One of the first people I called was my friend Pi. I’ve known Pi since college when we were roommates.

The moment I told him he said, “Okay, what do I do?” I honestly wasn’t sure what he was talking about so I asked him what he meant. “How do I donate a kidney?” he responded. His reaction was so immediate that I assumed he hadn’t really thought this through. I told him he had to talk to his wife first and they should discuss it. “We’ve already discussed it. We both want to be tested to see if we can donate.” I was completely overwhelmed. I had no idea what to say. Saying thank you seemed so small and meaningless, but those were the only words I could come up with. It’s funny because I have no problem talking about illnesses and setbacks I’ve had with my health. I just wasn’t prepared for someone to offer this so quickly.

Pi and Tuna (Pi’s wife) weren’t the only ones to offer. Many friends and relatives did. And I can’t thank them all enough. I count myself as being very fortunate to have these people around me. After the preliminary blood tests it came down to two people as the best matches. The match is determined by blood type and antigen antibodies. The donor has to be the same blood type as the recipient and antigen antibodies are something you don’t want. The fewer, the better off the match will be. The best matches were Tuna and Diane, another close friend. I wanted them to wrestle to decide who would go to Minneapolis for the evaluation but they discussed it instead.

They decided that Tuna would go for the evaluation. It was done this past Monday and we’re both waiting for the results. We should hear sometime early next week.

Again, I’m very fortunate. However, in the meantime, nearly 111,000 people in the U.S. are waiting for transplants. Many of them will die waiting. Please become an organ donor by signing up here: Donate Life

Snooki's Weight Loss Tips

by Roberta Durra

I may have mentioned this before. It irks me that Snooki has a job and I'm still looking. But now “The Snook” has done the unimaginable. This time she’s hit me where it hurts… in my belly and upper thighs. Yes, Snooki has lost weight!!

My doctor recently said my cholesterol is nothing to write home about, and it’s time for me to lose some weight.  So I’ve decided to look to the Snookster, not as an enemy but as a formidable weight loss consultant, and find out exactly how she went from a “Mallomar” to a “Thin Mint”.

Snooki says she lost pounds by curbing her drinking and going on a cookie diet. She eats one meal and 6 cookies a day. The cookies contain beef protein. I find this extremely encouraging because beef chocolate chip is my favorite!

Fully committed to following Snooki’s lead, I wake up ready for my new life, ready to cut back my liquor consumption! (I don’t drink liquor) If it worked for the Snook, it will work for me. (It won’t work for me because I don’t drink liquor)  I will also eat 6 cookies a day to suppress my hunger. And until I find Snooki’s cookies, I will start with Chips Ahoy. They’re small. I will eat seven.

Possibly eight.

Drew Carey, another weight loss warrior, recently lost a massive amount of weight. He formerly wore a very pudgy frame and thick black rimmed glasses. He probably shed 10 lbs switching to wire frames. What else did he do? He stopped drinking beer! I hear you Drew. I will take your advice and eliminate beer entirely. No more lagers and ales. I will officially abstain from all Pilsners, Stouts and Heepweizen’s. (I don’t drink beer). No more “Old Speckled Hen” or “Dogfish Head Snowblower” ale. (I don’t even LIKE beer). I will say a tearful goodbye to Heineken and Bud light. If it worked for Drew Carrey, it will work for me. (It won’t work for me).

Kloe Kardashian, now there’s a weight loss success story. Actually, all of the Kardashians have lost weight. Even, Bruce Kardashian. I think they take diet pills that help them battle the bulge by pooping it all out. Wait! Stop the presses! I won’t even CONSIDER this. I already pee in my pants a bit when I laugh too hard. I will not risk leakage from both ends!

Jenny Craig seems to attract celebrity clients. Look at Valerie Bertinelli and Jennifer Hudson. They both look fabulous. I look for Jenny Craig food recommendations and happen upon this…

 “Treat yourself to the sinfully sweet taste of our Cookies & Cream Cheesecake loaded with rich, creamy filling and crunchy bits of chocolate cookie. On top there are even more cookies, drizzled with rich white chocolate. Indulge in a treat that is also a good source of calcium. Jennifer Hudson and Valerie Bertanelli have”.

BINGO! I LOVE CHEESECAKE, but stupidly have never considered it dietetic. I don’t know where to find Jenny Craig, but I DO know a “Cheesecake Factory” nearby. I’ll add one of their cheesecakes to my midday snack, staving off hunger and shedding pounds like there’s no tomorrow. You can’t beat those insider tricks!

But just because stars are rich and fabulous doesn’t mean they‘re the only ones with secrets to weight loss. I found this creative recipe from a woman online, using “Jenny Craig Bell Cookies”.  She tells us…

 “I take one serving of the Jenny Craig Ginger Bell Cookies and crumble them into the bottom of a small, shallow microwavable dish. Then I add a serving of applesauce and strawberry jam on top of the crumbled cookies with a sprinkling of cinnamon. I microwave for one minute and then drizzle a touch of maple syrup and two tablespoons of whipped topping. Yummy!”

Yay for the common folk!  Nice low-cal recipe, anonymous Internet person.

50 Cent lost a ton of weight for a movie role. GOOD IDEA Mr. Cent. I’ll get myself a starring role in a mini series, pronto. I’ll pitch Oprah a 12 episode “Twiggy” biopic, starring ME!  I’ll be groovy and thin in no time and then during production Oprah and I can lunch with Snooki. We’ll hear diet tips straight from the horse’s mouth.  Both Oprah and I will benefit greatly.

Kelly Osborne lost 3 dress sizes and a face size by criticizing people with Joan Rivers on the “Fashion Police".  Apparently bitchy is slimming. I will tell all my friends I hate their clothes and post their pictures on national television. This should yield a quick 12 lb weight loss when they dump me and I’m too depressed to eat.

Kimora Lee Simmons recently lost mega weight and a saggy neck, to boot. She credits her amazing transformation to putting down the Doritos bag and walking her baby up the block. I don’t have a baby, but I’m willing to put down the Doritos. (You're right. I don’t eat Doritos).

Contrary to all the inaccurate fluff out there, it seems weight loss is much easier than the “experts” let on. Listen to the celebrities who know.  Ignore boring exercise, 8 cups of water a day, healthy food choices and silly portion control propaganda. Put down the beer, hide the Doritos and whip out cheesecake and beef cookies! We’ll all be running with Snooki in thong bikinis in no time!

A Horse of a Different Color

by David Goldman

Here’s a statement that I believe to be true regardless of who is reading this: I am the most color blind person you have ever heard of, read about, or encountered.

A Horse of a Different Color

I see colors – bright, vivid, colors. They just differ radically from the colors you see. An example? To me, some shades of green look like neon orange. For years I’ve been telling people that if they were to put an orange on a lawn, the two colors look identical. You’re asking yourself, “how does he know what color orange is? He doesn’t know green and orange could be blue for all we know.” You are correct, Grasshopper. I don’t know what orange is. All I do know is that an orange (the fruit) is allegedly orange and that’s what I go by.

I used to play golf and because my vision wasn’t great to begin with, my friends suggested I use those orange golf balls rather than white ones. They said they stick out like a sore thumb on the fairway. You can’t miss ‘em! Foolishly, I believed them. I teed off on the first hole, watched my ball sail through the air, hit the ground, and vanish before my eyes. No bounce, no roll, nothing. It was gone. Vanished in plain sight. I asked my friends if they saw it and they all said they hadn’t been watching. Great. When we finally located it I could stand above it and barely see it. From that point on someone was assigned to follow my ball on each shot. It made for a LONG day. I’m sure the foursome following us was quite pleased. My only hope was that someone in their group was also color blind, and from the look of their pants, at least one was.

 

I first found out I was color blind when I was in kindergarten. We were drawing and coloring. I was damned good at drawing (if I do say so myself) but the coloring part? Not so much. Miss. Olenick looked at my picture of stick figure kids playing in a field and with a chastising tone asked me, “why would you color the grass orange, the leaves brown, and the tree trunks gray?” I gave her my honest answer: “Because that’s what they are.”

After a few similar episodes my mother took me to the eye doctor to get checked. Indeed, I was color blind. Technically, I’m red-green color blind which is the most common form. But I’m more than capable of screwing up just about all colors. Blue can look purple, gray, green, pink, or surprisingly, blue. Red can appear as brown, orange, or green. There is no difference between neo green and yellow. The list goes on and on. There’s no cure or glasses that can solve my dilemma although occasionally I read an article saying glasses to correct color blindness are being tested. I’m sure they’ll be perfected just as my cold body is being laid in the gray ground and covered with orange turf.

When I was in college I had a summer job and a complete physical including an eye exam were part of the hiring prerequisites. I breezed through the physical and most of the eye exam until it came to the color blindness test. I could tell the nurse who was administering the test was perplexed. When concluded, she said to me, “You are by far the most color blind person I’ve ever seen!” The only response I could muster was, “Thank you! I really appreciate it! And please tell me, where did you get the green shoes?”

I don’t drive anymore but when I did, people who knew I was color blind would constantly ask me what colors the traffic signals were. I’d explain that it was easy. Orange meant stop, green meant either stop or hurry up depending on where you were, and white meant go. Not a problem! For some reason though, after I told this to someone and they found themselves in the passenger seat of my car, they’d constantly be yelling “The light’s red!” or “STOP!” If they were especially nervous I’d regale them with the orange golf ball story just to increase their panic level a bit.

You may recall that in my introduction I mentioned that I work as a web designer. Now this is an occupation where color plays a critical role. When I begin a new site I always ask my client if they have a preferred color scheme. If so, I have a starting point, if not, there are plenty of online color and color scheme websites where I laboriously evaluate the color schemes, compare them, and then ask my wife to pick one. Where I run into trouble is when the client says, “can you make that red in the sidebar a bit more like fuchsia?” You might as well be speaking Swahili. I can’t tell fuchsia from firebrick, indigo from ivory, or chartreuse from coral. It is at this point that I refer the client to an online color chart and ask them to pick a color they like.

So if you find yourself walking down the street and see a guy wearing brown pants, a black belt, and a green shirt, please stop and say hello to me!

Fancy Party Wear

by Roberta Durra

  
Caroline's Birthday Celebration      

Where: Malibu Cove Colony

When: Saturday, April 16th 6pm

Dress Code:  Party Wear

I received a birthday invitation to be held on a Saturday evening at an exquisite beachfront property in Malibu, CA. Guests will gather from the UK, Canada, Holland, and northern California for the event. It looks like it will be a lavish evening.

I don’t usually go to fancy parties. Some Saturday night's my husband and I go out to dinner at the Quizno’s next door to the movie theater and skip the movie because we are too tired. Most Saturday nights we skip BOTH the Quizno’s AND the movie, for the same reason. 

But now I have 8 weeks to to prepare for a gala event. As far as dress requirements go, you can see the invitation reads: “Party Wear”.

What is party wear? Mile high Christian Louboutin heals? A glimmery, shimmery L’Wren Scott gown with plunging back and neckline, $500,000 worth of borrowed Van Cleef & Arpels Jewels, and a Judith Leiber clutch? Three words come to mind…No Can Do.  I’m suddenly humming Hall & Oates, “I Can’t Go For That” and thinking Amy Winehouse’s answer to rehab…NO, NO, NO.

I ask a friend close to the party planning brigade to define “party wear” and she says, ‘It’s really just fancy cocktail wear” Ahhh…fancy cocktail wear! Let me say that what I’m wearing now and pretty much every day of my life is as far from “fancy cocktail wear” as Glenn Beck is from President Obama. Imagine a white t-shirt with a splattering of yellow from last nights curry, a touch of pink from pasta sauce the night before, and a dash of red from Tuesday’s tacos. My blue jeans are stretched to a new and unusual shape, and my sandals are made by one of those comfy brands that promise you a day without a ruptured disc. This doesn’t mean I don’t have a fancy dress or two waiting in my closet for a sparkling night on the town. But I don’t.

So I do what I do best when I am in a quandary. I ignore it. That is until Friday, the day before the party when I call my hairdresser and cry…

“April! Can you believe it’s been 4 months since you last cut my hair?  I look like Helena Bonahm Carter and Donald Trump’s love child. HELP!”  

I BEG for an emergency cut. And, God love that girl!! At 10:30am I’m in her house. After she closes her gaping mouth and reprimands me with “haircuts have expiration dates”, we do what women do. We tell each other (virtual strangers) our most personal stories while she cuts volumes of frizz off my head. She takes me from Russell Brand to something a bit more Katy Perry-ish! Sweet!

 I happen to know that the party’s guest of honor has been having a chichi designer whip up a one-of a-kind, belle-of-the-ball, aren’t-I-the-bomb, dress for herself. But I’m just a guest at this prom so I head off to Macy’s. They’re having a clearance sale! It’s like a trading scene from the "Chicago Board of Trade", only with polyester instead of corn futures…women knocking into each other and pulling dresses from the sale racks. I manage to pick 5 dresses, 4 of which look fabulous on the rack, and like hell on me. Number 5 is the charm. A beautiful, “Fancy Cocktail Wear” dress, a bit low cut for my taste, but nothing I can’t cover with a strategically placed wine glass.

Shoe departments are notoriously slow. Shoe departments having a “one day sale” can be like the DMV on tranquilizers. Bring a book. Bring a miniseries. You’ll get through both before an employee comes back with your shoe in green, the only color left, 2 sizes too small. Try it anyway. It could be months before the salesperson returns with another shoebox. I was lucky enough to choose such an UNPOPULAR shoe that I was able to try it on in sizes 7, 7 ½, and 8 before I decided to buy it in both black and blue. Walk to the beat of your own unstylish drum, and you’ll be richly rewarded.

I glance down... my hands, my feet.

It’s definitely mani-pedi time. I say this like it’s something I do often. I have made an occasional trip to the manicurist, but let’s just say I wasn’t surprised when they had to take out an extra garbage bag for my cuticle clippings. And my feet look like I have walked barefoot alongside Arthur Blessitt who's in the Guinness Book of Records for having walked 39,060 miles, through 315 countries for 42 years. When they finish buffing my callouses, my feet have shrunk 5 inches. I probably need different shoes, but I’m not going back to Macy’s.

I come home exhausted having been shorn, fitted, squeezed, massaged and painted. I walk in to see my husband ironing his shirt for the party tomorrow. I shake my head in judgment and righteously think to myself…why do men ALWAYS leave everything to the last minute?!

Quiet Please!

by David Goldman

I’m a normal kind of guy.

Mostly.

I freely admit I’m not perfect and that I have minor idiosyncrasies -- the toilet paper MUST come over the top, I do not respond to text messages or phone calls while watching sporting events, and I consider putting ketchup on a hotdog blasphemous. But there is one thing that drives me absolutely nuts.

It’s loud eating.

Let’s be clear. Food was meant for to be chewed until it is in a semi-digestible form. However, I do not need to take part in others’ mastication by listening to it. Music, babies cooing, and birds singing are pleasant sounds. Crunching a baseball mitt sized amount of potato chips with your mouth open, smacking one’s tongue, and groaning while eating are not.

The Blob Fish

We consider ourselves civilized – the most advanced species on earth. We have evolved past a time when we slept in caves. We bathe regularly (except, of course, the French). We participate in cultural activities that both entertain and stimulate our minds. And we strive to improve ourselves in any way we can. So why in the world would we emulate the eating habits of the blob fish?

The Blob Fish

So if you’re replenishing your depleted fuel supplies by eating out, please don’t try and entertain me with the sound of you sucking the meat off an artichoke leaf. And what brought you to the conclusion that I, and the rest of the movie theater would rather listen to you chomping a mouthful of popcorn than hear what was being said in the movie? The answer to this and other similar questions is: nothing. Nobody needs to hear another person eat. The reason it’s done is basically laziness. It’s easier to eat slack jawed than it is to maintain full contact between the lips. Again, I cite the blob fish.

By this point you’re probably saying to yourself, “Geez, this guy really has got a problem! What’s a little crunching?” My response is, “Yes. I have a big problem.” So do me a favor. Either eat in the privacy of your own home where you can make whatever noises you want, or if you insist on eating in a restaurant, please keep your mouth closed and the decibel level down. Maybe we’ll hear a baby coo or the guy at another table choking on a piece of pesto chicken stuck in his windpipe because he was eating like a blob fish.

And, I thank you.

I Want What Snooki's Got

by Roberta Durra


Snooki’s working and I’m not. This is a fact, and it bugs me. It bugs me like an itchy scalp, or the theme music on Dancing With The Stars.  I have nothing personal against Snooki. I’ve never watched Jersey Shore. I don’t know Jersey Shore from Pauley Shore, or Dinah Shore, for that matter. I just want what Snooki’s got… a job.

 

Every morning, with new hope and renewed enthusiasm I meticulously scour each offering on Craigslist willing my next job to jump off the page, as the lights dim and a choir of angels surround me singing “Robeeeerrrrttttaaaa. You start Monday!  But as a formality, please send resume and cover letter – no attachments!”

I agonize over the requirements in each ad detailing the employer’s every want and need. They don’t ask for much…

 “We are looking for the current administrative champion of the world, a conqueror of frenzy, a thick-skinned warrior of rolling calls, ivy-league graduate maxima cum laude, discrete with confidential info, as not to break under water-boarding, adept and accomplished with the initiative to develop and implement a measure of complexity and agent-based modeling with fellow workers with pattern formations including nonlinear dynamics and algorithms and vehemently PASSIONATE about BOTH social media and booking restaurant reservations.”

It’s like they KNOW me! 

“You must be willing to work 23 hours a day and available by Blackberry that extra hour. Principled, well read, a vision of perfect loveliness, able to compose magnificent letters for highest level humans on planet earth, willing to travel when the employer calls from tarmac to say the plane leaves in 5, wonderful sense of humor, exquisite table manners, able to converse with politicians, actors, activists, scientists and cleaning crew. Fluent Mandarin preferred but not necessary.”

 

$8.00 an hour. Contract work. No benefits.

Snooki received $32,000 for her college speech at Rutgers. When asked what her advice was for Rutgers students, she said: “Study hard, but party harder.” 

Snooki, do you need a party planner?  I’m available.

Ron Santo

by David Goldman

As another opening day comes and goes, I can’t help but think back to the summer of 1969 - a time of freedom, a time of magic, a time when anything seemed possible ... especially for me, a 13-year-old kid with diabetes.

I was diagnosed when I was a year and a half old. It was 1957 and the prognosis for a child diagnosed that early wasn’t good. I was facing the likelihood of blindness, kidney failure, heart disease and a host of other complications. But without him ever knowing it, one of our favorite Cubs helped me through those times.

Opening day in 1969 -- April 8 -- was cold and nasty -- a typical opening day at Wrigley Field. The Cubs let the Phillies tie the game in the 9^th but Willie Smith won it for us with a home run in extra innings.

It was a wild summer – from what seemed like an insurmountable division lead to the black cat in the on deck circle and blown call by the home plate ump at Shea. I lived and breathed the Cubs that summer.

That summer was the first time my friends and I could go by ourselves to see the Cubs play. We were 13 years old -- old enough to be able to take the bus to the El and the El down to Addison, just half a block away from Wrigley.

We’d go all the time. Things were different then at the ballpark. For one, you could afford to go. To sit in the bleachers at Wrigley Field in 1969 if you were under 16 years old cost 50 cents. Public transportation cost us 34 cents -- round trip. I don’t remember how much it cost for a hotdog and Coke (Diet Rite in my case), but it was probably under a buck. And tickets were available. We’d walk up to the ticket window an hour and a half before game time (we had to see batting practice, of course), buy our tickets and walk in. We didn’t have to get our tickets through someone who had a couple extra or through ticket brokers. You just went to the game, bought a ticket and you were in.

With a couple of dollars, we could go to Wrigley, watch our heroes and have a great time. It seemed to almost always be warm and sunny, our Cubs were in first place and everything was going right. I even got to see Ken Holtzman’s no-hitter, in which one of the Atlanta Braves hit a ball that everyone knew was gone, only to be brought back by a friendly breeze that deposited it directly into Billy Williams’ glove for an out.

But for me, the greatest thing of all was that the Cubs had a superstar third baseman who was a diabetic.

I don’t remember how I found out. I think one of my friends told me he had read it in the newspaper. How could that be? He was the best third baseman around at that time. He hit towering home runs, was a great fielder and was one of the team leaders. He’s got diabetes? He takes shots everyday? I just couldn’t comprehend it. Somehow, somewhere deep in my head, it had been implanted that if you’re a diabetic, you couldn’t do this sort of thing. A diabetic shouldn’t be able to be a major league baseball player, let alone an All-Star. But he was. I saw him play all those times. Good ol’ number 10. I saw him hit home runs, always have a dirty uniform, and jump in the air and click his heels every time the Cubs won during that season.

I sat there all of those warm summer days watching him. He played for the National League All-Star team nine times in his career, including that year.  And like me, he was a diabetic.

He became my hero – a true role model. If he could do this, I could do whatever I was destined to do. This disease was going to take its toll, but now I knew I could fight it. Because Santo did. I could do whatever I wanted in my life. Because Santo did. It was an awakening for me. While I never thought about the disease holding me back, I also never thought that I could do anything in life and be a diabetic. I felt like there was a new freedom for me.

I once read an interview with him. It was, I think he said, his rookie season. His teammates didn’t know he had diabetes. I think he said he was either afraid or embarrassed to tell them. He was in the on deck circle and he felt an insulin reaction coming on. He didn’t have any candy or sugar with him or in his uniform, so he decided he’d go up to the plate, swing three times, strikeout and go back to his locker where he had a candy bar. Well, on one of the swings he made contact and hit a home run. He said by the time he was rounding third and heading for home, he was feeling really weak and disoriented. He tagged home plate and headed back into the dugout, past his teammates who were all congratulating him, and straight back into the locker room to get that candy bar. After that, he told his manager – and, I believe, his teammates -- that he was a diabetic.

My first thought was, ‘why did he keep it a secret?” I thought that if others knew he had this disease, they would look out for him and help him if he needed help, just like my friends and family had always done for me. I guess that naiveté goes along with being 13. I thought that if others only knew, he could be a role model for them like he was for me. In time, he did become just that.

After baseball Ron had a second career in the radio booth for the Chicago Cubs. With all the medical advancements, he wasn’t able to dodge all of the ills that diabetes serves during one’s lifetime. He has had both feet amputated and has other complications from diabetes. Yet through it all, he remained the picture of courage. And every year he sponsors a fundraising walk for the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation along with other work to raise millions of dollars as well as awareness.

When you’d hear him on the radio he always sounded like he was in a good mood. He was always  happy. He didn’t complain, didn’t blame anything on being a diabetic.

I never got to meet Ron, but there are things I’ve always wanted to tell him -- how much hope he gave a diabetic kid, that I learned something about how to carry myself because of him, and that I learned something about dealing with adversity.

During the last vote he  was denied membership into the Baseball Hall of Fame. Again. I don’t know why -- he was a better player and has better statistics than most third basemen already in there. Forty two years ago though, he became a Hall of Famer -- and a hero -- to me.

In the past, on Opening Day, I’d turn on the radio to listen to him doing the game.  And when I heard him, I’d be reminded once more why he’s remained a hero all these years. Now he’s gone, but he will always be my hero.

Ready,Set, Pick a Mate

By Roberta Durra

There’s a game I play when I’m standing in a long line at the post office. I pretend that I have to choose someone to marry from the bunch of guys standing in line. If it’s slim pickings’, and it usually is, it’s too bad for me. I’ve still got to choose someone.

Today for example, I stood in line behind a short, well-groomed man who was a strong contender in my game. Suddenly he turned towards me and made a contorted face. Thinking it was in response to the ruckus at the stamp counter, I nodded in agreement.  Then he made the same face again and again and I realized he had a severe facial tic. Then I looked at a guy who had a gigantic stomach hanging to his knees with shirt buttons popping off in all directions. Behind him was a guy with bird’s nest hair, arguing with himself.

Finally my eyes settled on the best of the bunch, a nerdy looking guy with squinty eyes, no visible upper lip, and a Bob Hope nose. The one redeeming quality was the gold band on his left finger. If someone else thought he was good enough to marry, why not me?

We go to great lengths finding our perfect mate. We spend precious time getting dolled-up and going out to restaurants, nightclubs and bars, looking for “Mr. Right”. And when we think we’ve found him our investigation really begins. We spend countless hours deciding if he’s “the one” by becoming our own private gumshoe and picking apart the poor guy’s life. We check medical records looking for anything unusual. We scan his dental charts making sure he’s not loaded with mercury fillings and in the early stages of gingivitis. And then we evaluate our information using the opinion of others. Finally, we put our prospective husband through the ultimate water torture and present him to our family and friends. If by now he hasn’t picked his teeth at the dinner table or shown an inclination towards public farting, we decide to change our last name to his. Let’s remember that fifty percent of the time we marry Mr. Right and eventually he becomes Mr. Late On Alimony! So why be so picky?

Marriage is only going to work because you’re hell-bent on making it work. It doesn’t matter how you meet someone, how well you know him, or how long you dated before you tied the knot. Look at childhood sweethearts, loving each other through grade school and acne doesn’t give them the edge on happily ever after.

The minute you marry your spouse, he automatically changes. Quirks we never knew existed suddenly appear, and your perfect mate looks more like the perfect mistake. But that’s fine, because a good marriage isn’t about being with the perfect mate. There is no perfect mate! A good marriage starts with picking someone…anyone, and deciding you’re not going anywhere. It’s about making a decision to view your tangled crab grass as fine quality sod. It’s about ignoring the clicking noise your spouse makes when he gets to the bottom of his cereal bowl. It’s not about picking the right guy! You could marry a greyhound and make it work if you wanted to.

 

Couples who marry for love aren’t any better off. Even if your spouse was a hot stud before you married, one day you’ll pick up his dirty socks and ask yourself why you married him. It wont matter whether you say, “Because I loved him”, or “Because he was #5 in line at the post office”. His socks will still stink.

I’ve come to believe there’s something right about picking a spouse from a line at the post office. If you’re not sold on this quick-pick idea, remember that just by being at the same post office at the same time, you’ve got a few important things in common. You probably live near each other, you both need stamps, and neither one is currently in jail. It’s a nice start.

So don’t sweat the small stuff like thinking you need to find the perfect mate. Next time you need stamps, park in the ten minute only zone, run into the post office and pick up five dollars worth of stamps and a husband.

Another Day at Dialysis

by David Goldman

I decided that today’s entry would be written from the dialysis center since that’s where I spent close to four hours every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. I’ve been in three dialysis centers in the four plus months since I developed the need to have my blood sucked out of my body, run through a filtering machine, and pumped back in again. This one is the nicest and the main reason is the people who work here. There’s Sheila, a Filipino nurse who sings Need You Now by Lady Antebellum. And she sounds good! There’s also Vera, the Russian tech who’s picked up a good deal of Yiddish from one of the patients. Give her a hard time and you’re likely to hear, “Kish mir in tuchas” which translates to “kiss my ass” But it’s always said with a smile on her face! They’re all SO nice all the time and they work really hard. They’re on their feet all day long running back and forth and dealing with, well, sick people.

Before you get all grossed out from hearing about the dialysis process, I have to say, it’s really fascinating. Currently I have a temporary port in my chest. It’s on my right breast (a couple of inches above the nipple if you want to get personal). It consists of two tubes that just dangle down about three inches and each has a cap at the end and a clamp above it. Think of a smaller version of those cow milking machines you’ve seen with tubes that latch onto the cow’s udders.

When I first arrive, I get put on a scale that looks like an industrial meat scale. It’s a metal platform built into the floor and a box on the wall with a digital readout. I’m told it’s an extremely accurate scale. I have no reason to doubt their word on this.

I get weighed and that figure is compared to what’s called my dry weight. My dry weight is what I weigh with all the excess fluids sucked out of me. I usually gain between 2 - 3 kilos. Remember about 30-some years ago when we were going to change to the metric system? Dialysis centers fell for it! Yeah, they use it! For the rest of you, 2 – 3 kilos translates to 4.4 – 6.6 lbs. The reason for the weight gain is that when your kidneys fail, you don’t pee or don’t pee much. Consequently, you retain fluids. They see how much I’ve gained and know how much fluid to remove to get me down to my dry weight. It works better than a Slim-Fast shake or liposuction people. Take that Jenny Craig!

Next they hook me up to the machine, set it to suck off my excess fluid, set the time for three and a half hours, and hit the start button. My blood flows out of one tube, into the machine, through the filter that removes the toxins from my blood, and back into me. It’s kind of like a car wash for blood. See, fascinating!

During the time I’m there I usually read, check emails, and play a game or two. They do have little flat-screen TVs for all the patients and wireless Internet access so there are options. I notice a lot of other patients sleep. The treatment makes a lot of people tired but it doesn’t affect me that way. I’m not sure why this is. Perhaps it’s the woman whose snoring is on par with an air hammer. I might snooze for 15 or 20 minutes but that’s about it. The time passes slowly, that’s for sure and I do a lot of clock watching. But I always remind myself that there are far worse things to endure.

No complaining from me.

Roberta's Intro

By Roberta Durra

I was raised in Chicago in an idyllic, suburbanish pocket called “Peterson Park”. We weren’t wealthy like those in the real suburbs, but I sure didn’t know. We had all we needed…a 1 mile wide radius filled with kids who walked to school together and hung out afterwards. Boys and girls riding bikes, throwing snowballs and just being kids. Girls getting crushes and boys, well, acting like boys.

It was in 5^th grade when our classes merged that David and I met. He was a teacher’s pet kinda guy…that is, if the teacher had a scheming weasel for a pet. David tells it as though I liked him “as a boyfriend”. Ok…maybe for 5 minutes, but certainly NOT on the day we triple dated. The girls rode sidesaddle on the back of the boy’s bikes to play miniature golf. When we arrived I was rudely greeted with a jarring “David Loves Helayne” boldly graffitied at the front entrance. The highlight of this, our first (and last) date, at the tender age of 10 was when David, trying to look macho, climbed over a chain-link fence and ripped open the back of his pants. He played the 18-hole course constantly trying to cover up the gaping view to his tush. Not cool, David…not cool.

In high school David and I sat next to each other in band. While I attempted to play the flute, David sat to my left with his trombone. I can’t count the times I was channeling my inner Ian Anderson when David would slowly disconnect the end of my flute, rendering my brilliant performance, and me mute. That, or he would open his trombone spit valve over my shoe. He feels badly about this now, and has graciously said next time we get together I can drool on his shoe. That’s the kind of guy David is. Thank you Davie. I forgive you.

We’ve been friends ever since 5^th grade. The kind of friends who share a past, haven’t always been involved in each others present, but care a heck of a lot about each other. Oh, and we make each other LAUGH. A lot. So we figured since we think we are such amusing, interesting and talented people, why not share our musings with the rest of you and have you decide if we are any of the above.

Who am I?? My name is Roberta Lynn Goldfine Falck-Pedersen Durra. David calls me Bertram. I don’t know why. He made it up about 45 years ago and has been calling me that ever since. And why do I have such a long name? Is it because I wanted to make it difficult for old friends to find me on Facebook? Nah. It’s because I’ve been married and divorced a couple of times. Hey…nobody’s perfect. Now I live with a great guy who makes me laugh and doesn’t care about adding his last name to the list. I also have an 18-year-old boy, raised in Venice Beach, California.  Surfs up, dude!

David's Intro

by David Goldman

A little background on me. I’m married to Debbie for 28 years and we have a son named Lenny who’s graduating from college in a month. I work from home as a web designer, and I love it.

Underlying all of that is the fact that I was a diabetic from age one and a half until 41 when I had a successful pancreas transplant. I also  had a kidney transplant almost 25 years ago. That transplant was working great until a few months ago when it blew a gasket and stopped working. Now I need a tuneup. I have ESRD (end stage renal disease for you newbies) and go for dialysis three times a week. I'll be having another kidney transplant soon if everything goes according to plan. I said if everything goes according to plan because I'm superstitious and I'm covering my bases. 

So I had just gotten back in from walking Homer & Frannie  when the phone rang. The caller ID said it was my friend Roberta. I’ve known Roberta since 5^th grade. Her cousin Lee and I were best friends then, and he told me that Roberta liked me. To this day I don’t know if that was true. Lee, if you’re reading this I believe you were telling the truth. Probably. As a fifth grade boy my reaction was mixed. At 10 years old a boy has the “eww, a girl!” behavior colliding with the newly forming “hmm, a girl!” behavior. I decided that I liked her just at the same time she decided she didn’t like me. 

We’ve been friends ever since.

We went to high school and started college together. After college she moved away and eventually found southern California the place she wanted to be. Kind of like Eva Gabor on Green Acres. I’ve remained in Chicago my whole life. There were times we went for years without talking to each other, and other periods where we’d talk often. But the one constant was that when we did talk, it would be as if there had never been any interruption in the friendship. We could pick up a conversation about anything and go from there.

So, back to today, Roberta called and told me she had an idea. She said she thought I was funny. I think she meant it as a compliment. I have always thought she was funny and I told her so. “We should do something together”, she said. Her idea was for us to start a blog where we’d take turns writing, doing some videos, and whatever else we think might amuse or interest you, our new bff’s. 

I’ve often thought about writing something. My friends have urged me to write about life as a diabetic - its complications, how my life has been affected by it, and so on. When Roberta brought up the idea of doing a joint project, it really felt right. So, we’re going to do it and see what happens. All in all, some of it will be funny (we hope), some serious, and some a mixture of the two. Enjoy, and let us know what you think.

Roberta will do her own introduction. I am smart enough to not even attempt that one!