Just consider it a mental upchuck [Part VIII]

Part VIII: That time at the strip club

This one is inspired by Sassy Britches who blogged about her first time in a big strip joint in Louisiana.

Well, I have a story like that too and rather than bogging down her comments section and wasting a perfectly good blog-portunity (you see what I did there?? yeahhhh) I thought I'd bang out another mental upchuck for you all.

In 2006, my boyfriend at the time and I wanted to take a little trip. It turns out that his sister has been wanting him to come visit her in Arizona since he came home from Iraq the year before and he has been wanting to see his nephews too. I suggested we fly down to see her the week of Valentines Day (because we all know how much I hate that holiday and any excuse not to celebrate it was A-ok to me). I knew before hand that his sister was a bartender but I didn't know where.

We land in Phoenix at just after 1am on a red-eye from Seattle and my boyfriend hails a cab and gives an address. Like I said before, she was a bartender so we agreed to meet her at her place of employ and grab us some free drinks while we waited for her shift to end and we would all ride home together.

I should have known something was up when the taxi driver smirked at us upon hearing where we wanted to go (with our bags and luggages...straight from the airport...at 1am on a Tuesday) but I wasn't really paying attention. 20 minutes later, we arrive at a huge HUGE parking lot with what seemed to be a warehouse in the middle of the lot. At the end of the lot facing the opposite way from the direction we were coming from were these words in great big red light studded letters: .oC hsuB naksalA taerG ehT. Oh sorry...I meant: THE GREAT ALASKAN BUSH CO.

I thought, hmm...an outdoor sporting goods store? What the hell? The driver drops us off at the front door and my boyfriend hurriedly gets out of the car and starts to explain to me where we were while at the same time getting our bags out the trunk, paying the driver, and avoiding my eyes. We were at one of the biggest strip clubs in Phoenix. We meet the bouncer at the door...he tells him that we are there to see "Raine" and the bouncer smiles wide and says "oh yeah, she told us to wait for you guys, here you can put your bags in the office".

I don't know what the big deal is and why he neglected to mention where she worked prior to us getting there. I've never been a prude and never will be and I was actually pretty siked to see a strip club for the first time. Turns out there were two halves to the building. The right side was completely nekkid girls but no alcohol, and the left side was only topless with a full bar. That's where his sister worked. So I meet his sister for the first time and we chat in between her serving drinks and I think she thought I was uncomfortable in my surroundings because she kept refilling my glass and handing me cocktails. I was having fun watching the dancers spin around the pole and give lapdances and all the pretty pink and sparkly lights. Once in a while in between dances, some of the girls would come up to say Hi and flirt with my guy (I didn't care...alcohol and dazzly lights tends to make me ambivalent). Finally about an hour and a half and many many drinks later, the last of the customers had left and they turned the lights on to get ready to close shop.

Some of the girls who were ready to leave came up to the bar to meet my boyfriend and I and after the initial greetings, one of the girls named Candy (I swear I am not making this sh*t up...her REAL name was Candy) came up to me and openly stared. I tried to ignore her for a second but finally I turned to stare right back at her. She finally leaned over and whispered "who's your doctor?" whilst simultaneously poking me in the left boob. Of course alcohol tends to encourage the smart ass in me so I leaned over, poked her in HER left boob and said "GOD".

She laughed her nylon and spandex covered buns off and happily told my bf's sister to get me another shot for the road because I just helped her win a bet. I guess her and a few of the dancers who'd met me in the last hour had a bet going whether I was surgically enhanced or it was just by some freak of nature that a 5ft tall, 110lb Asian girl could really just be that endowed. Once my boyfriend and his sister (who were watching this exchange shocked and clueless) were let in on the joke, they laughed too and deemed it time to get my liquored up self home and in bed. His sister, in the office while getting our luggage said to me "Congratulations, you've just been Bushed by Candy" and handed me an official Bush Co. tank top.

I wore it around the city a couple times while we were touring around. I got some weird looks but I figured it was for the same reason that the strippers were giving me strange looks. It wasn't until a week later when we got home that my boyfriend told me that particular kind of tanktop wasn't for sale and only "official employees" were allowed to have one.

...

And I know you guys are all dying to see the shirt so here:

Peruse, ogle, stare, drool...whatever. And please, to those of you who know my parents, they are still under the delusion that this was from an outdoor sporting goods store (tho I don't see how with that naked girl on the side) but I am in no hurry to correct them any time soon.

Just consider it a mental upchuck [Part VII]

So I'm back...and I'd like to say better than ever, but I think I'll just go with "well rested" :) Hope you all had a fulfilling Lenten Season and a great Easter! I've missed you all but not nearly as much as you've missed me!
...
Wait! I meant, you know...I've missed you AS MUCH AS IF NOT MORE THAN you've missed me.
...
Right. Anyhoo, I know this post isn't up to my usual standards but I've been out of practice so bear with me! :)



Part VII: Pain for Pain and other stupid ideas...


From the moment I turned 18 (and truthfully, even before then), I wanted...nay, yearned for a tattoo. Because it's a cool thing to have (or so I thought at the time, and still do) and because I wanted so badly to rebel against the goody two shoe nerd image that I've unfortunately embodied my whole life. To my credit however, I didn't want to just waltz up to a tattoo studio, pick a stupid design off a wall and end up regretting something for the rest of my life. Besides, if I was going to put myself thru GAD-awful pain, then it better be worth it!


As it turns out, I never could decide on a single design or color or placement so even though I had a few designs I'd tinker with now and again, the whole tattoo event was put on the back burner. Fast forward 5 years and I was dating a guy with a few tattoos. Seeing his artwork made me dust off the old drawings and doodles and earnestly begin working on them again. I was not and am not a great artist, but I forced myself to draw my own tat since I figured that way it would mean more in the long run. When I finally settled on a design, I (on another brilliant moment of absolute wisdom) decided to take the picture, stick it on a wall, and make myself wait another few months before getting it. To make sure that me staring at it day after day didn't make me change my mind or get sick of the design.


Fast forward another 4 months and my boyfriend broke up with me...broke my heart and all that. During one of those nights at the beginning of the breakup, my sleep deprived and tear clogged brain came up with a theory. Not a brilliant theory...so don't judge me! Anyway, I came up with this theory that the only way to get myself thru the emotional and mental pain was to cause myself physical pain to take its place.


...ok, don't panic! I didn't want to start cutting myself or anything like that. Rather I figured, what better time to get a tattoo than now! At the same time that my brain was coming up with the whole Pain for Pain theory, one thought lead to another that lead to another. I told myself that other women have gone thru this same pain before and lived thru it, among them both my grandmothers and my mom. If they were strong enough then darnit so am I. In fact, the women in my life are the strongest, toughest, badasses I know so what better way to honor their strength than to permanently etch their names into my back for all of eternity!


So I hauled myself out of bed at 3am, modified my design to include both grandmothers' and my mother's names and reminded myself to call my tattoo artist the next morning before finally passing out. In another stroke of luck (or fate...), a friend of mine called me up the next day because he wanted to see his friend about refreshing his tattoo and wanted to know if I could come along. I said sure! His friend just happened to own a tattoo parlor and after politely asking him (and doing some gratuitous eyelash-batting) I convinced him to do mine without an appointment and for a huge friends and family discount! 45 minutes, 2 extra strength ibuprofen, and a LOT of hand gripping and teeth clenching later, I had my first tattoo.


Even though the circumstances surrounding the event were a little strange, I have never regretted my final design decision for a moment. Not only did I inadvertently end up honoring the best people in my life in a unique way but as a bonus my mom couldn't really get too mad at me since I went thru pain to immortalize her in a way no else would.

Now if I could only claim the same amount of brilliance and fate intervention about my second one...


But that's a story for a different day!


(Names have been blacked out for privacy reasons...but they're there!)

Just consider it a mental upchuck [Part VI]

A collection of stories that I've been meaning to write about, or that other people have told me I should post, or that I've recently just remembered...all here for your reading pleasure.

Part VI: Smells Like Happy

Smells can trigger just as much memory and emotion as sights and sounds. Sometimes even more so. Some smells can trigger anxiety, depression, sadness. Maybe the smell of the perfume of a lost love... or the coffee that a relative used to drink. Some people love certain smells because they remind them of home...or of a place they have been on vacation...or a favorite food.

This is the story of two of my most favorite scents.

From the time I was 3 to the time I was 8, my mother owned her own dental practice. Her clinic was located exactly halfway between my elementary school and our home. Everyday after school, my nanny would pick me up and drop me off at my mom's and we would wait there until my dad picked us both up after work and took us home. I remember every afternoon being driven to the clinic and regardless of whether my mom had a patient in the chair at the time, she would always come out to the reception area and give me a hug and she would always smell like her favorite perfume mixed with "dentist". She would walk me to the very last room, give me some water and hand me my blanket (which was conveniently stored along with some books and videos in her office). I would crawl up on the big dentists chair as my mom lowered the back rest and I would take my afternoon nap right there. In the dark while my mother worked in the next room, the sound of the vents running...the buzz of her instruments, and her voice as she talked to her patients would lull me to sleep. When I woke up, she or one of her assistants would take me to the office and I would read or do homework untill my dad came and got us.

Even now the smell of the antisceptics and the recycled air of a dental clinic reminds me of childhood. Even the sounds of the drills and random other machines running feels welcoming to me. My mother is still my dentist and everytime I see her for an appointment I always make it a point to give her a big hug before I sit down. If anyone ever asks me to name a smell guaranteed to make me feel completely relaxed and at easeit would be this: Donna Karan Cashmere Mist and tooth polish and fluoride Gels...better than Novacaine!

My Mommy and Me

Just consider it a mental upchuck [Part V]

It has recently come to my attention that more people read this blog than I thought. Of course there are the usual suspects, namely YOU, my blogger buddies and faithful followers. But apparently I have others who check my blog out once in a while when they are bored at work, or when they can't sleep at night. For some reason or another, these people lurk in the bloggy shadows, never commenting and never letting on that I'm one of their guilty pleasures. One of these days I might have to go de-lurking but in the meantime I say: Welcome new readers...come and sit a spell! And feel free to leave me a comment if you are so inclined.

Now, onto the good stuff.

Part V: Just call me Doppelganger Daisy

When I was in high school, I had a group of guy friends who were considered to be part of the "cool clique". I think they initially started hanging around me because I was a big nerd and they thought they could charm me into doing their homework for them (fat chance) but then became my friends because they really liked me and started to think of me as a sister of sorts. That, and because they were teenage boys and I had big boobs.

But I digress.

These group of friends (P, S, K, and G) had a nickname for me: Daisy. At first I thought it was because I was so sunny and sweet, but when I really stopped to think about it, I had always been sarcastic and cranky so that couldn't have been the reason. I finally gave up and asked P one day, why it is they called me Daisy. He said that there was a girl in the neighboring rival high school who looked exactly like me, and her name was Daisy. Side note: I never thought to ask whether the kids at her school then called her "E".

Anyway, a couple years passed and I was a junior in high school when the premier and the littlest bro-hans started taking tae kwon do lessons at a local martial arts studio. I went to the studio one day to watch them and was hanging around when all of a sudden a little girl (maybe 4 or 5 years old) came right up to me, threw her arms around my waist and gave me a big hug. After I got over the initial shock, I hugged her back. When she finally let go of me I kneeled down and gave her a big smile and asked her what her name was.

She burst into huge noisy tears.

Her mother who had been watching the whole exchange came over and picked her up then stared me in the face. I was about to explain (though I don't know how since I had no clue what just happened) but she beat me to it. She says "Oh, I'm so sorry. She must have thought you were her baby sitter and she got upset when she thought you had forgotten who she was." I told the mom that it was no big deal and was about to turn and walk away when she added, "I have to tell you, I thought for sure you were Daisy until I looked a little closer. That's why I let her walk over here and hug you *giggle giggle*."

Later on, in college...the same thing happened except this time it wasn't a cute little girl but a full grown man. I was walking towards "the Ave" from class when all of a sudden some dude picks me up from behind and gives me a bear hug. When he put me down I turned around prepared to sock him in the face but...well, he was kinda cute so I restrained myself and settled for giving him my patented evil eye. He didn't notice me glaring at him because he was busy asking me how I was. Or rather, verbatum, "Hey, Dais...how ya been?" He finally stopped talking long enough to really look at me. I don't know if it was the stink eye that told his brain that I wasn't Daisy or if it was whatever minute differences in my face but when he realized he had just picked up and hugged a complete stranger he turned pink, stammered out his apologies and took off. I remember going back to my dorm room and telling my roommate (who also went to high school with me) what happened and she said she always wondered why the guys called me that in school.

So apparently, somewhere in the greater Seattle area, there prowls a girl who looks so much like me that men, women, and children mistake me for her all the time. I have to wonder if she gets randomly accosted by people mistaking her for me too. I also wonder why I haven't bothered to look her up before. Maybe I'll start, look up people who used to go to that school. Ask some friends what her last name was. Finally solve the mystery of my unrelated twin. Or maybe I'll be my usual lazy self and blog about it instead.

The End

Just consider it a mental upchuck [Part IV]

A collection of stories that I've been meaning to write about, or that other people have told me I should post, or that I've recently just remembered...all here for your reading pleasure.



Part IV: That time at the airport.



I was going thru the blog posts from the last week that I have missed and came across Poobomber's post about his unbelievable luck when it comes to air travel. At one time, I would have been able to tell you the same about me. That despite the number of times I've been on planes that I have never ever ever had a bad experience at the airport. Well...maybe not NEVER.



Let me explain...

There was a point in my life where I was seriously dating a guy (THE guy...Le HIM) who lived in California. His work sometimes allowed him to come up to Seattle for a weekend or so, but even then in the time we were together I must have travelled to Cali about 6 or so times in a year. Not only that, but I have family all over the US and Asia and when we can't road trip out a vacation, we flew. I never had any problems flying and never had issues with my baggage or my flights being delayed until the first time I flew down to see him.

The flight there was the usual 2 and a half hour naptime for me, no problems whatsoever. I spent a few days there and we had such a fantabulous visit that I really didn't want to go home. The day I was supposed to leave, we made it all the way to the airport and had checked me and my luggage in and were on the way to the security check when I turned to him and said "I don't want to go". Without even flinching he goes "ok". And we turn around and walked down an up-escalator to get back to the check in desk to see if we can get my luggage back.

No such luck. My luggage was on a carousel ride to the plane already and I thought I would have to leave anyway but thankfully the ticket agent was a really sweet woman who took one look at me and said "let me see what I can do". I think it was partially because I looked so pathetic and teary-eyed at the thought of leaving, and probably partially because my guy was wearing his Navy uniform and she probably thought he was getting deployed or what not (I didn't bother correcting her and he helped fuel the assumption by saying "she doesn't want to leave me so soon" or something to that effect). It turns out that she couldn't do anything about my luggage but arranged for me to take another flight later the next day. I didn't care (I didn't need anything in my suitcase that I couldn't buy or borrow for a day) and gave her a big grin and off we went.

The next day, knowing that I couldn't keep postponing the inevitable, I hopped on the plane. Although it was only a two hour plane ride, I had to do a changeover in Portland, OR. I got off my plane and on the way to the next terminal I stopped by the restroom. I stepped into a stall, did my business, then when I tried to slide the latch to get out I found that I was stuck.

Or rather the DOOR was stuck. SHUT...with me inside it.

I had a moment of "there is no f*ing way this is happening...no f*ing way!" So I spent the next 5 minutes jiggling the door and going thru my purse for tools to try and McGyver my way out (of course I had no sharp instruments to use because it was all confiscated at security). During my time of panic there were people coming in and out of the bathroom but I was too embarassed to ask for help. The time for me to catch my plane got nearer and nearer and I finally contemplated just shimmying underneath the stall door. I knew I could fit because I'm pretty svelte but just the thought of crawling on a nasty bathroom floor had me desperately looking for alternatives. Finally, I thought the room was empty (I was not about to implement my escape plan with witnesses) so I stood on top of the toilet to see over the door to make sure.

At the same time as I stuck my head above the doorframe, a flight attendant (who was apparently checking under the door to see if anyone was in my stall) straightened up, looked me in the face and almost had a coronary to find me staring back at her. She looked at me in silent question and I nervously giggled and said "apparently I'm stuck and I can't get the door open". To her credit, she didn't even laugh. Or maybe she just waited till she was out of the room. But she said "hold on, lemme get someone" and left. A couple minutes later she walked in with a janitor/maintenance guy who took the door off the hinges and got me out. I hurriedly thanked them both and ran to my terminal where I barely made it in the door as they were getting ready to shut it.

An hour later, I get to Seattle and went to baggage claim. I had a momentary panic attack when I couldn't find my luggage amongst the ones flying down the chute, untill I remembered that my stuff had made it home a day earlier. I went to lost baggage and showed them my pass and they typed up my name in the computer. The lady couldn't find my name. She tried different combinations and finally found me with the information from my original flight. It turns out that the lady at the check in in Sacramento had misspelled my name. It's a fairly unique name and I had id and my original flight info but apparently Seattle baggage lady was the anal-stick-to-the-rules type and she wouldn't give me my luggage until she had called both her supervisor and her supervisor's supervisor to get the ok to hand me my crap....32 minutes later!

*sigh*

The End.

Just consider it a mental upchuck [Part III]

A collection of stories that I've been meaning to write about, or that other people have told me I should post, or that I've recently just remembered...all here for your reading pleasure.

Part III: About dating certain guys...

The summer before I went to college, my youngest brother who was 6 at the time started taking swim lessons at the local pool. I, being the awesome sister that I am, would drive him there and stay for the hour...to watch him play around in the water having fun. And also to stealthily observe his hot swim teacher. For the purposes of this blog, we will call him "Fins". By the way Expat, he looked like a younger version of the Scandinavian God...

Anyhoo...

A month and 8 swim lessons pass by and although I had chatted up Fins a few times before, I got the feeling that he wasn't really interested in me. Usually when I turn on the charm full blast it doesn't take that long for a guy to get a clue. One day as I was waiting for the littlest bro-han to finish getting dressed, Fins comes up the bleachers to talk to me and *gasp* asks me if I wanted to hang out! Hoorah! We make plans to go watch a movie and have dinner etc...usual date stuff.

The day of the date comes around and it was nice enough. No real sparks but the food was good and conversation decent. After dinner he takes me to this place known locally as the go-to make out spot (for those of you in the Seattle area, it's that place near the Amazon.com building right off of Jose Rizal Bridge). I wasn't really feeling in the mood for such an event as he was obviously looking forward to, but I decided to just go along with it. Who knew, maybe sparks will ignite after all! We get there and sit around awkwardly for a few minutes when all of a sudden Fins...lunges, I guess would be the word...at me and started grabbing and groping and being really uncoordinated. I raise my hand to push him off but the heel of my hand "accidentally" (that's my story and I'm sticking to it) smacks against his nose causing it to spurt blood all over himself.

He backs off and starts cussing at me and yelling and being generally ungentlemanlike and then he tells me to "get out of the f*ing car cuz you're f*ing walking your f*ing ass home". I tell him "fine, but keep in mind my parents and about a half a dozen friends know where I am and who I'm with and I'll tell them what happened and why I had to call them for a ride...so if tomorrow morning you wake up and there's two burly football players outside your door with a shotgun..."

I guess that whole spiel about the shotgun made him reconsider his threat and he tells me that he'll drive me home but that I can "f*ing forget about us". As if I needed him to tell me that! Anyway, after the silent ride home (which now in retrospect I should have called someone else for a ride) I basically never saw him again. It turns out I broke his nose and he had to get someone else to cover his swim lessons for the rest of the season. *giggle*

Fast forward two years and I'm a sophomore in college having a nice walk thru campus when all of a sudden I see this guy jogging towards me. I wasn't wearing my glasses so I didn't recognize him untill it was too late to run away. Good ole Fins! Looking pretty damn good and happy (the bastard). He says Hi, and that he is glad to see me and he would like for us to have coffee because there was something he has been meaning to tell me the last two years but he is "finally in a place where I can say it out loud". I was ready to tell him to take a flying leap but that last little bit intrigued me (the bastard) so I tell him fine, Ill meet him at a nice public coffee house in the middle of the day with lots of people around.

I meet him at a Starbucks the next day and right away he apologizes for his actions that fateful night. He tells me " I know that nothing I can say, and no amount of apologizing will make you forgive me or forget that night but I just wanted to at least explain. As f*ed up as it sounds I did have a reason for doing what I did". All along I was thinking WTF!?! You had a reason for accosting me??? (that bastard). But I nod and was gracious and told him to go on. He says, "I was in a confused state at the time and to be honest I was trying to prove to myself that I wasn't gay and I guess in my weird mental state I thought that if I can get thru having relations with you..........."

.....

I'm sorry...Excuse me say what?!?!?! BACK UP!!! I was glazing over and starting to fade but that little revelation woke me the hell up. Long story short, it turns out he was gay and in the closet and he thought that forcing himself on me would either make him realize he wasn't or convince him that he was. Apparently I convinced him that he was. He even went so far as to thank me for finally giving him the kick in the ass he needed to accept it and to tell his parents. I told him I would have given him all the ass kicking he needed and "uhm you're welcome??". I was only being halfway my sarcastic self about the ass kicking.

The last I heard, he was happily living with his partner of...I guess it would be 6 years now...and teaching in a high school somewhere in California. Although I understood his dilemma and was genuinely happy for him that he finally accepted himself and found somebody, I'd be lying if I said I completely forgave him. Regardless of his reasons, that was one of the scariest experiences of my life and even though it ended about as well as it could have, there were many nights for a long time after when I had nightmares about being raped and maimed. Those of you (the guys) who know me in person...you know how when I meet up with you the first time and I say "I've told 50 people where I am and what car you drive so please don't rape or maim me"?? Well, that experience is where that particular habit came from.

I suppose I should thank God that I was fine and came out of it ok, thank God for happy little "accidents" *wink wink*, and damn my luck and taste with guys.

The End

Just consider it a mental upchuck [Part II]

A collection of stories that I've been meaning to write about, or that other people have told me I should post, or that I've recently just remembered...all here for your reading pleasure.

Part II: Urban Combat Zone

A few years ago, I was dating (but not living with...yet) a US Army soldier. I met him a couple months after he got back from a 12 month deployment in Iraq. That said, he was adjusting to life outside of the war zone but still slightly edgy at times.

One night as we were sleeping, he heard some scratching noises outside the bedroom window. I guess he thought someone was trying to break into the house and so very very quietly grabbed his gun from under his bed, dropped to the bedroom floor and crab crawled his way across the room and under the only window. He cocked the gun and readied himself to attack. Counting to three...he sprang up while simultaneously ripping down the shades, pointing the gun, and yelling at the top of his lungs. As the shade came down, the true nature of the sounds was discovered.

...

A big fat cat. Splayed against the window, hanging by his claws from the screen that covered it on the outside.

Given the situation and his frenzied state at the time I'm sure that laughing my ass off was probably NOT the best response. He was pretty pissed off that I found it so amusing. But on the bright side, that'd show all those damn cats not to come crawling up our windows ever again (lest they get yelled at or worse, have their heads blown off!)

The End

Just consider it a mental upchuck [Part I]

A collection of stories that I've been meaning to write about, or that other people have told me I should post, or that I've recently just remembered...all here for your reading pleasure.

Part I: It's ok to cringe...I forgive you!

When I was 19, I did what every stupid 19 year old college girl did back then...got myself a spiffy little bellyring. It was HAWT and totally worth the 2 seconds of tear jerking pain it caused me. A few months later it was summer and a bunch of friends and I decided to haul ourselves to the local waterpark to laze away our day playing in the sun. I figured since I was gonna be wearing a spunky little bikini (and since the bellyring hole was all healed anyway) that I would exchange the boring little barbell I was wearing for a sparkly pink dragonfly (complete with sparkly pink dragonfly wings and sparkly pink dragonfly tail that matched my sparkly pink bikini).

All you boys out there...are you picturing the bikini??? GOOD! Hold on to the nice thought because you'll need it for this next part.

After a long day of playing, we all congregated near the lockers to dry off and get dressed. I was standing slightly behind a friend of mine as she pulled her towel out of her locker. As she unfurled the towel and moved to swing it over her shoulders, neither of us noticed that the little laundry tag on the towel had gotten caught on my dragonfly tail.

So whoosh goes her towel over her shoulders and out ripped my pretty little bellyring...right out of my belly. It was the most god-awful pain I've ever felt (and keep in mind I have a couple tattoos although I've heard childbirth is worse). I think I was in shock for a few seconds and as I stood there, blood leaking down my front, I vaguely remember my friends freaking out/turning green and gagging/trying to herd me into first aid which conveniently enough was only a few steps away.

They patched me up with a couple band-aids and some antiseptic and a ton of advil...my friend with the towel still outside to see if she could find the ring. She came inside with it...complete with a piece of E-tummy still nicely attached. YUM!! Since it was a complete accident, I forgave her of course (partly my fault for being vain and wanting to wear fancy body jewelry to match my stupid suit that I didn't even like all that much). Long story short, it took three weeks for the hole to completely heal...two weeks of which I couldn't stretch or lie on my stomach for very long. And on top of that, I'm also a cheloid former (think puffy scars, not flat) so now I have a lovely little reminder of that sunny day 7 years ago...

The End.