This morning I woke up because I turned over and the room spun around. All by itself. No, I wasn�t drunk. I quickly rolled back over on my right side and the spinning stopped. It's been a year or so since my last bout of vertigo, but let me tell you, there's no fun like inner-ear fuckness fun!

I found that as long as I lay quietly and without movement on my right side, all was well. If I had the audacity to move, the spinning started again. I wasn't drunk or on a boat, so really, I'm not sure what the problem was. But there was a problem, most immediate.

I had to pee.

I waited as long as I could and then staggered my way to the bathroom, and damn, the boat was rocking. Only? Not on a boat. I said Goddamn. I peed and brushed my teeth with lightning quickness, all the while trying to hold back the waves of dizzying nausea. I did that thing, that puking chant: I will not throw up. I will NOT throw up. I WILL NOT throw up. It worked, I made it back to the bed, lay obediently on my right side and eventually the nausea went away.

Kenny went out and bought me some Dramamine which worked and by the afternoon I was able to walk around the house without staggering or puking. I was a bit of a zombie though. It was a total waste of a Sunday, I'll tell you that.

When you get something weird like Vertigo, the absolute best thing to do is to go online and self-diagnose with the help of websites like WebMD. Once it was decided that the dizziness I was experiencing was indeed of the Hitchcock variety and not that run-of-the-mill vertigo cousin, lightheadedness, it was easy as pie to figure out that my problem is absolutely one of the following:

- An Inner ear disorders, such as benign paroxysmal positional vertigo

or

- Injury to the ear or head (unlikely, as I don't recall receiving this injury)

or, my personal favorite:

- A noncancerous growth in the space behind the eardrum (cholesteatoma)

I also found a startling website (http://www.vertigo-dizziness.com/) which claimed the following completely ridiculous stats:

At our "Otoophtalmological Neurophysiology" Data Bank with 7800 patients, 51% consult on a M�ni�re kind syndrome joined to neurovegetative symptoms. In this group, 54% show migraine or headache background while 10% present diplopia or double vision.

Otoophtalmological? They totally made that up. I think Oompa Loompas are behind this whole thing. Anyway, it's clear to me that I have a brain tumor and could go at any time.

Don't cry for me, Diarylanders, the truth is I probably just had low blood sugar or something.

***************

Quick workplace update:

My new job is a dream. A lovely, amazing dream. I love it so much. I work for a really great woman who's liberal as all get out and loves to chat about things that are really interesting. She is not at all interested in the following:

- Calling me "wacked"
- Being a passive-aggressive and suspicious psycho
- Wiener dogs
- Making me stay late on purpose

I am very happy with my job and I work on a gorgeous campus. I heart it to tha X-Treme.

Many more not newsworthy updates:

- I went to a party at Noah's last night (happy birthday, Noah!) and someone brought some seriously flawed fireworks. We started with the sparklers which were unlike any sparkler I'd ever held before. They didn't sparkle so much as throw flames. They were like little hand-held flares on sticks. Super fun! Also, OW. Then the boys took turns lighting bottle rockets and flinging them into the air. One of them landed on the flinger's wife and we had a good time batting the flames shooting out of her hair. Don't try this at home, kids. Good times.

- In case you were wondering, my current favorite candy is Goetze's Caramel Creams. They are choice. (Claudia, stop making that face.)

- I bought these shoes:

- Also, this bag:

- OOH! I almost forgot. Rachael Ray is taking $40 a Day to Chattanooga! What if...no, it would be too amazing. But, but, what if Rachael were to dine with JANET and WAYNE? That would just be too good, y'all. I couldn't handle it. Rachael would be all "If I only tip $1.02, I could order a drink with this meal!" and Janet would be all "But don't you hate it when they don't "refill" your beverage at the Piccadilly Cafeteria? What if you "run out" of beverage?" (Wayne wouldn't say anything, he'd just finish off his Chicken Fried Steak and look vaguely at his Jell-O dessert.) Janet and Rachael are going to be BFF! I just know it.

Bedtime. Good night, monkeys.

2 chatty monkeys