Remember the scene from Bad Boys where Sean Penn beat the living shit out of a blonde-haired villain, with a pillowcase full of Cokes? Well, I feel like the blonde-haired villain, post-beatdown. I won’t bore you with the details, but it has to do with the crazy schedule I’m working, and the number of hours.
I worked twelve hours on Monday, and got to bed about 5 a.m., with the birds chirping and the sun coming up. It was disconcerting. Plus, I worked on Saturday morning at 6 a.m., on about 90 minutes of sleep. So, some days I’m going to bed at 5, and others I’m getting up at 4. It’s playing havoc with my central nervous system.
But enough of my whining. Let’s get to it. I have to leave early for work (go figure), so this one’s gonna be pounded out like an email. I know you guys come here braced for half-assery, and are sometimes pleasantly surprised. Today is not going to be one of those days.
Yesterday somebody sent me a link to this page, which features a vintage news report about the toll being abolished at the Dunbar Toll Bridge. As some of you probably know, I worked there as a toll collector for several years. It was pure nepotism… my dad got me the gig.
In any case, the people in the video are just as happy as crap that the toll was going away. But it cost me my lucrative slacker job! Thanks, assholes. Party it up, as I’m being shit out like yesterday’s Baconator. That werewolf guy bugs me, especially. He can’t even talk. He seems stoned.
But, during the report you’ll get to see rare footage of the old booths where I collected quarters for about three years. They’ve been gone for a long time. About 40 pages of my next book will chronicle those years. Heh. It’s an important, historic work.
A few years ago a Surf Reporter “revised” the commemorative plaque at the bridge, to include my name. That’s not Photoshop, by the way. It’s paint.
For today’s Question, I’d like to know what things you suspect are greatly exaggerated. Remember back during olden times when people would just suck things up, and finish their shift following a heart attack, etc.? Well, the pendulum has swung in the opposite direction, and it seems like everybody now suffers from some questionable condition.
Here are a few, off the top of my head, which I cynically believe are exaggerated. Not fake, just greatly romanticized.
migraines
carpal tunnel
peanut allergies
ADD, ADHD, etc.
writer’s block
being offended
Help me create a definitive list, won’t you? They don’t necessarily have to be ailments, just stuff you notice people exaggerating for dramatic effect. Use the comments link below.
And I’ll write more tomorrow. Maybe not better, but more.
Have a great day, my friends!
Now playing in the bunker
Use the Surf Report’s webhost: HostGator!
I don’t like BS pop-ups I am already a member of your mailing list. and if I was not it is pretty easy to figure out how to sign up. Well maybe I am exaggerating my dislike of pop-ups. 😛
Yeah?
2?
Yeah… Removing the tolls didn’t help the town any. It just cut the distance between I-64 and the titty bars in Jefferson.
I agree with your list of over exaggerated medical “conditions” except for migraines. I am a sufferer and they are debilitating. I average 2 or 3 per month and without expensive prescription drugs, I am useless when down with the sickness.
Ever try the herb butterbur? One of our patients (I work for an acupuncturist) takes it and the frequency of her migraines has really decreased. Well worth a try.
My favorite is the garlic and rosemary kind.
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Steve…have you ever given Botox a try for your migraines? Botox can be injected at the point of origination. We’ve had a couple patients in which Botox has really been a godsend.
Thanks for the suggestions, all. I will look into the butterbur. I have not heard of that.
As for the Botox, I know it would help because I have TMJ, which triggers headaches as well. However, my insurance will not cover it and I can’t afford the injections.
Relpax helps me a great deal. It’s expensive but with their co-pay promotion, I pay only $10 for a 6 pack, which isn’t bad.
Migraines are not exaggerated, they are one of the worst pains I have ever felt. I seriously lay in bed and cry when I have one.
I have to have the room completely dark and quiet and I can’t cry because I have to lay as still as possible and keep my breathing as shallow as I can. It’s good when I can fall asleep for the duration, but I’ve woken up in the middle of them and that’s worse because there’s no warning. I started having migraines in 5th grade and I’m 49 now and they’ve gotten more complicated over the years. I don’t know how old you are or how long you’ve suffered migraines, but I hope they don’t get worse for you.
Here’s another vote for migraines being real. Granted, there are people who will claim they have migraines when they really don’t, and it makes life rough on those that really have them. I walked around a couple of weeks with a fracture without knowing it because compared to my migraines the pain wasn’t that bad.
Food allergies? Again, fakers make it hard on the real sufferers. People die from food allergies.
I’m with you, m. I suffered with migraines for close to 40 yrs. They finally let up when I reached 50. I only have one or two a year now.
They are indeed horribly painful–I too walked around with a broken tibia because I didn’t recognize the pain as severe as I thought a broken bone should be. Compared to that electric drill in the right side of my head, it was nothing.
People who call a regular headache a migraine should be taken out and spanked!
Being disrespected.
Erectile dysfunction. Just an excuse to take the pills and go all night long.
Fibromyalgia (seriously, WTF is this? Never heard of it until a few years ago.).
OCD (most of you are NEAT, not Melvin Udall’s)
Rickets, scurvy and scabies are all debateable.
Hoof in Mouth disease. Just brush longer and use floss.
Delirium tremors. 2 nips of bourbon should help.
OCD is a very real disorder. I work with “mental” kids and one is so OCD even I shake my head in disbelief (I considered myself mildly OCD on certain things until I met this nutball). Even though we (as staff) are required by law to count medicine at every dosing he refuses to take his medicine until he has counted every pill at each dosing for morning and night time meds, 3 times each. He has to step over and back across the threshold 5 times each before he can leave the premises. Oh, and don’t forget how ballistic he goes every time he leaves his room because there is no lock on the door. He has so much anti-anxiety medication in him I don’t know how he stays conscious. His money (which is kept in a lock box in the office) must all be facing the same way. Even his change is put in the box all “heads up”. If he needs money and a coin has flipped tails-up he will refuse to take that particular coin from the box.
Scabies are no fun. Trust me.
Agreed about OCD beng very real. I just hate when some nmrod claims to be OCD but really isn’t. I like things a certain way but I wouldn’t say I was OCD.
I suffer from The Willies and from time to time get a good case of Rockin’ Pneumonia. My wife gets the Boogie-Woogie Flu all the time.
An answer in true wvsr form. (thumbs up)
Sleep apnea
Allergies
Food poisoning
Yes, yes, a thousand times yes to allergies. Especially peanut, milk and gluten allergies.
YES – where did all this gluten shit come from? If I had to give up bread, just do me in with a hollow point. No questions asked.
My 7-year-old has a peanut allergy. It blows. She literally can’t breathe and starts puking if she eats peanuts or peanut butter.
A couple of weeks ago we ate at Texas Roadhouse – one of those extablishments where everyone eats peanuts and throws there peanut shells on the floor – and by the time we left she was coughing and hacking and could barely breathe. I had to dope her up on Benadryl. It’s f*@ked up, I tell ya. JIF is one of the all time best human inventions and she can’t even smell it.
Sorry about your daughter’s allergies, but shouldn’t you keep her away from places were people throw peanuts on the floor?
Guilty as charged. We’ve eaten at places like that before and never had a problem but it seems her symptoms worsen each time she’s exposed. After that last dinner, places like that are definitely off the menu.
If your daughter is that allergic, why would you even put her in a position or location knowing it could make her allergy symptoms go haywire or even possibly kill her (you yourself said “she literally can’t breathe”) ? Seems like pretty shitty parenting to me. Risking your kid’s health for a meal. Pffft. *SMH
That’s like saying “my kid is allergic to bees but, we’re gonna go harvest some honey”. It’s just stupid.
God Skippy lighten the F up. They dont need a lecture.
That’s awful. No Reesie cups, either!
Sprains and strains. Shut up and get your ass to work.
Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, the Fibromyalgia of the late 20th century.
I suspect the number of folks who think they’re bipolar probably aren’t.
Most kidney stones (I’ve had them, it’s just a belly ache. Shut up and go to work. You’re exempted if you need a stent or lithotripsy.)
Depression seems to be a bit fashionable too. It’s real and it’s dangerous and debilitating, but I think it’s over diagnosed or possibly just over prescribed for.
Erectile distinction. If you’re that old or so sick from not taking care of yourself that you need meds, just say the hell with it and leave the girls alone.
PMS.
If I seem a bit uncharitable, we have a saying at home: “Sorry sweetheart, Daddy’s a nurse. We don’t go to the doctor unless we’re dying.”
*dysfunction
But what if, like me, you really do have erectile distinction?
Please describe the distinction. Permanently down or permanently up?
They have a pill for both distinctions. A blue pill makes it go up. A healthy dose of blood pressure medication keeps it down.
Do elaborate.
The distinction is in being the first penis ever to go undefeated in sword fighting.
Please put one of those glow-in-the-dark- condoms on so it will look like a light saber…much cooler than a plain old sword fight.
ED – has anyone plotted supposed ED vs. weight and age of sexual partner? I have a suspicion that men with supposed-ED and 200lb middle-aged wives could be cured non-pharmaceutically by a 25 year old lingerie model.
Limey…I would gladly volunteer to help prove your theory, In the name of science of course but the sooner we get started…the better.
Applause !!!
Jorge…
No preventative medicine? No inoculations? No panels for cholesterol and other risk factors? No mammograms? No prostate exams?
And why the hell would you need a doctor if you were dying?
jtb
Also, anyone suffering from the heebie jeebies is a goddamn lying wuss.
Hi. I’m a goddamn lying wuss. I also have the willies, the whim-whams, the dithers and persistent, recurring skittishness. I think the underlying cause is the Republican congress, but it could be polluted water.
jtb
My money’s on Congress. They make me sick too.
Congress does indeed cause the heebie jeebies.
I’ve been plagued with complicated (also called complex) migraines for about 40 years…I was too shy in school to raise my hand to ask to go throw up so when it was “time”, I’d just run out of the room and down the hall. I have to agree about the exaggeration, though. I wanted to call bullshit many times when people were laughing and carrying on while gathering their stuff to leave work with a migraine. I can’t even drive while I have one and it’s certainly no laughing matter. I have to question whether those people have ever had a migraine because they aren’t even close to faking it convincingly.
As a migraine sufferer (the real kind – the lie in a dark room and take Imitrex and sometimes end up in the ER kind), I’m always irritated with the people that have no clue what a migraine is and will jovially say, “Oh my gosh, I have the worst migraine right now!” Really? And you’re walking around, drinking a Diet Coke, chatting on your cell phone? I seriously doubt that your headache that you just cured with ONE ADVIL was a migraine. But then again, those are usually the same people that get a minor electric shock and tell everyone they were just electrocuted. They just don’t know the real definition, I guess.
So in that respect, I agree with Jeff about migraines being romanticized.
I also get a little irritated with people that say, “I’m totally OCD.” Really, because you check your bank balance twice a day and your bookshelves are neatly organized? That’s not OCD. OCD isn’t something people strive for. Did you just wash your hands 74 times in a row? Did you check to make sure the door was locked 94 times today? No? Oh, you just like your kid’s socks to match her headband? Yeah, you don’t have OCD.
And how about those that will further their Advil (or more often, Excedrin) crap with, “Have you ever tried that?”. I want to scream, “Oh thank you, asshole! If only I’d talked to you 10 years ago, I could have saved so much money and pain! Why hasn’t my neurologist told me about? All those years of preventatives, triptans, rescue meds, and all I needed was Advil.”
One of my coworkers invited me to try some medicine he picked up at Dollar General Store. He said it works very well on his “headaches.” I looked at the bottle… yep: generic Tylenol.
I am barely able to raise my head and he’s offering me fucking Tylenol. Good god.
Shouldn’t that be CDO? Ya’ know…so the letters are in order.
NO….THE C IS AN OPEN LETTER AND NEEDS TO BE PROTECTED….IT MUST BE IN THE MIDDLE…AND THE D IS ROUND ON THE RIGHT SO IT SHOULD BE ON THE RIGHT. THAT LEAVES THE O FOR THE FIRST LETTER…THAT LEAVES THE O FOR THE FIRST LETTER…THAT LEAVES THE O FOR THE FIRST LETTER.
TJB
That sharp “T” is kinda scary out there on the end. It really does belong in the middle.
I should’ve been clearer. I don’t think actual migraines are exaggerated. I think people like to exaggerate normal headaches and CALL them migraines. Same with the flu. If somebody has an upset stomach, or the sniffles, it’s called the flu. Bullshit.
Or they go one step further and call it an upper respiratory disease because that sounds so much better than a cold. Gets them 2 more days off.
Point taken, and thank you. I get pissed off at the same things.
Yep. I agree. As a sufferer, I can spot those pansy fakers from afar.
I was going to comment similar to what you just said. You know migraines exist but you aren’t going to tell us you got a migraine from listening to squeaky door girl.
Fibromyalgia? My sister in law claims this. I say bullshit.
Also I feel allergies are 1st world problems. They exist but if you are starving you’ll eat the shit out of that gluten.
Currently listening:
E from Eels on Jay Mohr podcast.
Whoops. My reply to suz was supposed to be its own comment, not a reply. My bad.
*Also irritated with people that say “my bad” all the time.
Broke both ankles (2 1/2 yrs apart) and both times I missed no work, hell I got the job I have now by sucking it up & acting like I was fine for the 3 interviews. guy here just left cuz he broke a toe…. WTF?
Whoa! I broke two knees in 1984 and they wouldn’t let me come back to work until they healed. Heck, I could still walk and would have been back within a few days to remote Alaska. However, I fell in love for the first time and got to spend a fully paid month with her.
Gluten and lactose allergies/intolerance BS. In my experience people use it to try to control their weight – “I’d love to eat that fettuccine Alfredo and pizza, but I’m allergic”. BS you are. That’s like me saying I’m beer intolerant because it makes me drunk, fat, fart, and hungover.
I sometimes suffer from bad vibes, the shanks, irregularity and the blind staggers.
I was back at work less than a week after having emergency gall bladder surgery. I was walking on a broken ankle the same day.
I have no respect for people who try to milk an injury or other condition. When I was a kid, you couldn’t stay home sick from school unless you were shitting blood or there was a bone protruding through your skin.
Claiming to be allergic to a food, when the fact is you just dislike it.
.
Could not agree with you more. My sister claims to be allergic to tomatoes when she is at restaurants because she doesn’t like them and thinks she has a better chance of them being left off her food by claiming “allergic reaction.” It mortifies us all at Mexican restaurants when she claims this “allergic reaction” then proceeds to ask for more salsa. WTF?!
(purely based on personal experience, but) ADHD seems to affect the children of parents who spend hours and hours per day using their cellphones while ignoring their children. I wonder why? Probably food additives…
fellow Surf reporters I offer up
Restless Leg Syndrome
Chronic Dry Eye
Social Anxiety Disorder
I don’t know much about dry eyes, but, like migraines, the other two disorders are only scoffed at by those who don’t have them.
jtb
My fiancee, her dad, and her sister all have RLS. It is a very real medical condition. You don’t know the number of times she’s woke me up in the middle of the night crying because her legs hurt so bad that she is in tears. She has a desk job but spends about 60% of the day standing and moving trying to relieve the pain that comes from this problem. Before you say it, bananas do NOTHING to help. This is not a deficiency (sp?) of some kind, and she doesn’t need to eat more of anything. All three of them have been known to walk around the room for hours on end to try and relieve the symptoms of RLS.
Skippy – Have them ask their Drs about generic Mirapex (pramipexole). Their mileage may vary, but I got 100% relief starting the FIRST NIGHT.
For several years 0.5 mg did it for me, but now I’m at 1.0 mg. Dr says that’s the limit.
The other drug that may work is called ropinirole, which is generic Requip. Neither generic is expensive, but there may be side effects.
Folks with RLS are called the Night Walkers, but we don’t have to suffer anymore. Tell them today!!
Thanks Buzz, I will.
Weight loss. You can exaggerate all you want, but don’t tell me about all the weight you’ve lost after dieting and “living” at the gym when your ass still looks like a sack of laundry on the way to the dry cleaners.
Looks like about 250lbs of chewed bubble gum.
To Jorge on kidney stones being like a belly ache: if they feel only like a belly ache, you have a fucking belly ache. Man up pussy. Kidney stones are for real.
Jorge,
You’d know it if you’d had kidney stones: Involuntary, uncontrolled vomiting, inability to walk, inability to take a normal breath, full-torso cramps. Man, I thought you were some kind of nurse assistant or something. Have you never seen someone with kidney stones that are moving inside the kidney?
I’ve had the “mild” attacks also, when the stones are not moving. Those constitute more than a “belly ache”. Wow, your patients must love you.
jtb
I’ve had kidney stones that were considered very small, and I was still vomiting from the pain. I wouldn’t wish that on anybody. I couldn’t even man up and go to work!
I think my kidney stones were brought about by all the extra calcium doctors always insist on. Now when my dr. asks if I’m still taking calcium supplements, I just say yes (and then don’t take them).
Oh, I’ve had kidney stones, but they showed up on an MRI before I passed them. I had them laser blasted, but to aim the laser beam they had to shove a camera up my man parts. It looks small, but once it gets to the prostate, it feels like a Polaroid Instamatic. Fot some reason, I stupidly allowed my wife in to view the procedure. She actually had the nerve to laugh at me and remind me she had given birth to our two daughters.
Could have been worse. If you had gone to the 1973 doctor, that would have been a Norelco PC-70.
.
Yikes!!!!!
I was convinced that migranes were bullshit until I had one in my late 30’s. I was convinced that I was having a stroke and went to the ER, where they just laughed at me.So, bottom line – if someone is well enough to TELL EVERYONE they have a migraine, they sure as fuck DO NOT.
I suffer from CRS. Its horrible having to ask the same question 3 or 4 times an hour.
gluten sensitivity
fibromyalgia
A buddy of mine once told me he had the dickdo disease. Said his gut hung out further than his dick do.
POLIO! WTH, yeah, you have one leg shorter than the other, but get over it and wear corrective footwear!
Oh, you don’t EVEN wanna get me started on Thelydomide! (Before you burn me at the stake, it was all tongue in cheek)
Occasional lower back pain.
Whiplash.
(Both in heavy use for insurance & Medicare fraud.)
Sinus infection (maybe).
…Oh, and Lou Gehrig’s disease. If your name isn’t Lou Gehrig, I ain’t buying it!
On a more serious subject, to sunshine_in_va, I didn’t get a chance to express my condolences on Monday’s update. She was your Mom, and in that she has reserved her place in Heaven. I just lost a good friend of our family to cancer earlier this week. I prayed and thanked God for finally relieving her from her earthly burden. Before she was hospitalized, she used to get scared at night and my wife and I would go pick her up and have her spend the night at our house. It was so amazing to see this older woman fast asleep at our house, so content and without pain.
Keep your Mom in your memories. I lost mine 5 years ago, and there are still times (at age 57) that I have questions on life, or need a recipe, and I pick up the phone and start dialing…. My thoughts and prayers are with you.
Maybe we just need to bring back some of those 19th century diseases like brain fever or the vapors to give people more choices.
There’s so much seriously judgmental anger above it’s given me a migraine 🙁 I’m going to get a Starbucks and take an Advil to make it go away.
Periods. There are even commercials about them now. Cover your manhole and go on.
*Ladies, this was my attempt at humor. Please don’t murder me in my sleep.
Like I tell my wife at “that time of the month,” get a tampon and let’s go play tennis! The tampon commercials make it look so good!
Okay, going back to the “Gone With The Wind” era, what in the heck were the “Vapors” that these Southern women came down with. Was it a fainting spell, or just the urge to let out a big fart?