February 4, 2003

Sex as a therapeutic activity?

Did you know that you can tell from the skin whether a person is sexually active or not?

• 1. Sex is a beauty treatment. Scientific tests find that when women make love they produce amounts of the hormone estrogen, which makes hair shine and skin smooth.
• 2. Gentle, relaxed lovemaking reduces your chances of suffering dermatitis, skin rashes and blemishes. The sweat produced cleanses the pores and makes your skin glow.
• 3. Lovemaking can burn up those calories you piled on during that romantic dinner.
• 4. Sex is one of the safest sports you can take up. It stretches and tones up just about every muscle in the body. It's more enjoyable than swimming 20 laps, and you don't need special sneakers!
• 5. Sex is an instant cure for mild depression. It releases endorphins into the bloodstream, producing a sense of euphoria and leaving you with a feeling of well-being.
• 6. The more sex you have, the more you will be offered. The sexually active body gives off greater quantities of chemicals called pheromones. These subtle sex perfumes drive the opposite sex crazy!
• 7. Sex is the safest tranquilizer in the world. IT IS 10 TIMES MORE EFFECTIVE THAN VALIUM.
• 8. Kissing each day will keep the dentist away. Kissing encourages saliva to wash food from the teeth and lowers the level of the acid that causes decay, preventing plaque build-up.
• 9. Sex actually relieves headaches. A lovemaking session can release the tension that restricts blood vessels in the brain.
• 10. A lot of lovemaking can unblock a stuffy nose. Sex is a natural antihistamine. It can help combat asthma and hay fever.

NOW, you can take these at face-value. In my personal experience numbers 4-10 are true. Being a male, I could not tell you whether number 1 is true, but I think that my girlfriend would say that it is so. I think that that's wy girls who get around alot have got larger breasts and.... Anyway... Try it as you see fit, and take it with a grain of salt. My girlfriend told me this,or at least I think that it was something like this....

Note: If you want me to delete this, and re-submit it as a w/u instead of a daylog, then /msg me. When I get 10-15, I will do so, dem_bones so allowing.

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At dem_bones's request, I have gotten some "more solid" information on the topic, via a reference from a friend of mine, and some consultance of a medical dictionary. Summary below:

• Basic knowledge of oestrogenic effects and regulatory mechanisms are important to evaluate benefits and risks during clinical treatment. Sex effects on breast epithelial proliferations are studied in women and animal models. Altered secretion of cholecystokinin and other gastrointestinal peptides may be related to changes in appetite and weight gain. The interaction between sex and pituitary hormones are important for liver function and related to conditions like hypertension, arteriosclerosis, gall bladder disease, diabetes and hypercoagulability. Sex-induced hormones may often greatly reduce the risks of these diseases and conditions.

I am by no means an unattractive person; I have had a girlfriend, I occasionally catch girls checking me out, and i'm not a social recluse at all. I have a job, I go to post-secondary school, and at the core, I am about as average as one can get. However, I am in a bit of a rut, albeit a seemingly large one.

In the most fundamental sense, I am about as harmless and as sensitive a guy as one could get. Altruistic, loyal, honest, open-minded, and humourous are probably the most accurate words to describe me as a person. Thus ends the shameless self-promotion, but it was just for a little background, that's all. Henceforth, I present my puzzle.

I have probably the most terrible luck with women for a person in my situation (male, age 18 - 25). I've had one girlfriend so far, while my peers apparently have an assortment of rabbit's feet, horseshoes, hearts, stars, clovers, and blue moons shoved up their respective asses. Sure, it could be worse - I could be a virgin, but that's not the point. The point is, 9.99999 times out of 10, rejection is my middle name. Even the most "surefire" route for a date is more like a surefire way to lose face; the last five girls i've expressed interest in were purely platonic friends at first, and then I slowly and smoothy eased in the flirtation. Each and every time the same response ensued. "SuperApe, you're a nice guy and I like spending time with you, but i'd like to keep us as just friends."

"FUCK, I knew it all along." SuperApe thinks to himself.

And that is pretty much where any contact between myself and said girl ended. Sure, it might be a perceivably assholish thing to do, but in order to salvage a bit of pride and effort, one must just not bother again and move onward, right?

How else can one pique the interest of the "fairer" sex than by being the exact opposite of the ideal "asshole" man? Why can an a person like myself be completely civil and respectful, make her laugh, show her a good time and fail while the girl goes on to invariably enjoy a complete jerk's company? The only thing that am definitely left with is a re-examination of myself as a determining factor in the faliure. People say that getting rejected is nothing but a "learning experience", that one has nothing to lose, and that it says nothing about the character of the rejected.

I say BS.

Such blind optimism in response to rejection is as a sugar coating; you can sugar coat a piece of shit as much as you like, but in the end, it is still a piece of shit.

I'm starting to think rejection only publicizes one's undesirability to the female half of the human race; the proverbial kick in the gut while down; the pointed finger accompanied by jeers and mocking laughter.

I don't ask women out anymore.

Now when a cute girl looks at me, I sneer and think of my own voice telling her to fuck off. I laugh at myself for thinking maybe she was interested. I deny that I am a desirable person.

So, back to the reason why this node was created in the first place; what do women want? I suppose i've answered my own question already;

Not me.

I know 'noding about noding' is highly discouraged here, even though there are more nodes about noding then one could possibly count. So I hope it's safe to do a little daylogging about noding instead (since these are my thoughts for the day). If I were to make this a WU I'd title it “E2 Quicksand” - a fitting title. This is how E2 feels sometimes, like quicksand. The more you try to dig out the more you sink in.

A quick example of this would be - I just wanted to explain my name to ya'all without a GTKU type node, so I posted the reason behind it in the song Kiss This - but in doing so I thought I should also explain it's author Aaron Tippen, and in looking for links for him I was shocked to find how many of our greatest singers of all time had not yet been noded. So then what? I decide to node a few of my favorites, but then that leads to so many MORE nodes needed to explain various aspects of what I noded in each of those nodes. It's seriously a slippery slippery slope that just keeps getting slicker. It never ends does it!

I thought I could use a change of pace from my Hall of Fame bio's - so I thought {silly silly me) that I could just post a few sweet lullabies from one of our great authors, but of course NOW I need to do his bio too, and of course one song led to another... ok so then what? I needed a break from that so I tried something I truly have no interst in, thinking I could let it go there. But that won't work either will it! Every time I try to make softlinks I end up thinking, hmmm that should be covered too. (banging head on keyboard)

I have a list of things I really want to write about here, but I know I'll never get to them, this quicksand just keeps sucking me in deeper. “Get a rope!”

When I first started lurking here, I thought it was really depressing because just about *everything* worth noding has already been noded. I was wishing I'd joined here 2 or 3 years ago. Thank goodness I didn't. I'd have been committed by now!!

No matter what I try to node it just keeps leading somewhere else. I should have known better then to start on a Nobel Prize winner, just in trying to make a short little bio of him I now feel the need to explain a half dozen things I mentioned in that node, which you know will lead to another half dozen... and so on. And of course I feel I haven't yet done him justice which will lead to more info in that bio which will lead to...i n s a n i t y.

The name of this site “Everything” is a paradox!! It should be named QUICKSAND, a much more fitting name I think.

I have no doubt at some point I'll find my sanity again, until then I plan to sue E2 for mental anguish sometime soon. (looking for the lawyers on call nodes.) Oh, I know! Dialing the “McDonalds made me fat” lawyers...

I'm supposed to be the first one in to "open the bank." This means that I'm supposed to be here extra early, at least an hour before normal and to make sure that nothing has happened to the bank, no broken windows, no robbers hiding under a desk, etc, etc. The only problem is that both times people were here before me, meaning I did not have to get up so early. The only good news is I get to leave an hour early which is nice.

Yesterday, it felt odd to be home before 5:30pm. I had a lot of extra free time as well. Monday nights are usually guys night out, where a group of my friends take some time out from our significant others. This works great until one of them has a birthday on a Monday. So besides being home early from work, I was home all evening. It was odd, but I got a lot done.

Walking through white currents of snow, over bridge. I'm not cold, but the wind finds a way to shoot through my pants and sting. The river below can't decide whether to thaw or stay frozen. A big cesarean cleavage shoots through its center, leaving an exposed canyon down into the slushy water.

In class, Insert probe into warm water. Looking at what's-her-name, I don't know but I'd like to, through veils of tinted glass. Lovely exposed gooseflesh between shirt and hip. She moves, pure perfect virginy valley between groin and right hip where jeans are lax shows. She shifts, and shadows play on the rift. Observe the soft skin behind ear where hair just stops, down to the less-tender but just as tempting stuff underneath the lower right jaw.

Done. Walk home. The river's crevace is covered by snow.

Psych 112 M-W 7:45-9:15am

She doesn't know it, but six years ago, Professor Jane Dunn was a therapist of mine. This is the only topic of discussion to the students in her class. It makes me want to write an obese novel to beat her in the face with...

Cognitive Dissonance and You: The Subversive Power of Antidepressants, (Washington: Rank House Press, 1992)

Or better yet...

Dick and Jane Treat Their Cyclothymic Disorders, (New York: University of New York Press, 2003)

Edited and Illustrated by yours truly and six months of court ordered therapy. The titles, naturally, would have nothing to do with the content, much like her lectures so frequently abandon their chapter. Instead of Gustav Fechner, the unwanted poster-child of psychology, we talk about Joey Meth Freak who beats his dog, then we discuss Mr.Adamson's sexual frustration and how his wife contracted Gonorrhea. We hear all, even some names.

This makes me wonder, when she talks about that DCF case in '97, the pot-head who got emancipated after his Dad tried to shoot him with his Colt Anaconda hunting pistol, does she realize that she's talking about me?

"Mrs. Dunn?" I ask.

"Yes?"

"That last patient you were just talking about, do you remember their name?"

A puzzling stare and Jane asked, "No?"

"Do you think they could sue you if you talked about their case publicly, say, in a classroom or amongst co-workers?"

Her brow furrowed. "Why do you ask?"

"Oh... no reason. Nevermind. Sorry!"

Who do I have to bribe to get some service?

So I’m off work again, today, waiting for the cable technician to come out. It’s been an awful, stressful day. I feel almost as if I have this “fuck up” field radiating around me, making everything I attempt to do today … well, making it fuck up.

Getting off work wasn’t as easy as I thought. An instructor is coming in today to teach our students how to use Final Cut Pro. Of course, the Assistant Director tried to talk me into staying.

“I have got to be home,” I explained.

She then tried to guilt me into staying, saying that the instructor may need my assistance, such as if there’s a computer problem. The message, of course, was that I am some kind of computer-fixing magician whose prescence is direly required for all-things electronic to work properly.

”What kind of computer problem could she have?” I asked.

An hour later, I received a call at my home from the instructor. Apparently, she couldn’t get the Mac’s audio to work. I walked her through checking to see if the speakers were connected to the Mac or plugged into an electrical outlet. It was – both checked out. So angrily, I threw down the phone, screamed “Shit shit shit!” and headed back to work. I blasted into the office, pushed past the instructor, and checked the Mac. Sure enough, the audio worked just fine.

“Huh,” she said. “It wasn’t working a few minutes ago.”

I’m telling you, I’m cursed. Seriously, I must be. Either that or the Assistant Director conspired with the instructor to pull me out of my house and possibly miss the technician (no, I am not paranoid).

I headed back home and checked with the property manager to see if a cable technician had come in yet. Nope, of course not. He assured me that he would call the cable company manager and make sure someone came out to take a look at my problem.

“If they’re not there by four, then come back here, and I’ll make sure they come,” he said.

It’s now 2:30 – I have an hour and a half to go.

Heading to McDonalds for lunch, I was accosted by a homeless man: “Hey can you help me out with a quarter?” he demanded.

It’s never just a quarter. Give them a quarter, and they demand a dollar. Give them a dollar, and they demand whatever else you have. I’m a liberal, I believe in the welfare state. Some days I feel generous, other days I feel like I pay enough taxes as it is.

“Sorry,” I said, “I can’t help you.”

“I bet you’re sorry,” he sneered at me.

“Acutally, I’m very sorry,” I said as fake-sincere as I could. To which he referred to me as a “motherfucker.”

It wasn’t me that initiated the conversation. Why is it that if you turn these guys down, they feel the need to insult you? I gave a handful of quarters to a guy in a wheelchair parked in front of a liquor store yesterday. He swore that he needed the money to take the Metro home to Greenbelt. I just smiled and gave him the money, to which he assured me he was grateful. If I hadn’t given him the money, would he have also called me a “motherfucker?”

In any event, I can just feel the “fuck up” field billowing around me, just waiting to screw my day up even more. Computer works? Not for long. Inflammatory bowel disease in remission? Nope. Have a job for 20 more months? Not bloody likely.

I just want to find the asshole that put this curse on and strike them with a counter curse.

(Or, I might just bribe the cable technician – if he even bothers to show up – and maybe get my cable fixed)