The cultural sensitivity toward Native Americans that our society is renowned for

Two instances of pop-cultural bias came to light today:

Trish and I were looking at some romance novel I fished out of the trash in hopes of selling to a used book store or giving to a library rather than a waste dump. First, the title is Savage Surrender. Second, the plot is thus: white woman is kidnapped by the Iroquois, falls for one of them, and he for her. I'm sure you can imagine the examples of female non-empowerment contained therein, and also the cultural sensitivity toward Native Americans that our society is renowned for.

We saw a preview for a movie called The Pathfinder, about a Viking orphan left behind after a raid/war against Native Americans "600 years before Columbus." The boy grows up and when the Vikings return he fights them with all the Native American skills he's acquired. I told Trish that the moral of the story is that even though they're the good guys, the Native Americans still need a white man to fight for them. She agreed.

Anyway, bedtime.

Tonight was a low-key production

Trish came over this afternoon and we were able to sit and talk for a while before we had to go to the movies. We talked about how nice it was that it's getting cold and brisk out, and how our two weeks of fall would be over too quickly. I'm just glad I'm not sweating while sitting around.

We went and saw Idiocracy, which was pretty good. Definitely the kind of movie you need to see with friends. I predict cult classic there. Many, many classic lines.

I think a fair portion of my weight gain was short term, as I'm five pounds less now than a few days ago, and it wasn't through any major physiologic weight loss. Regardless, I should work on eating healthier. Marcela said she was going to bring junk food for me; I don't think she heard me say no.

Tonight I didn't feel like doing anything. Reading, watching a movie, nothing. I finally just made myself some hot chocolate and sat on the couch and read a bit. Then I made myself some warm milk and honey, and sat on the couch and read some more. And all the while I was listening to CDs and writing reviews for the zine I'm working on. The worst part about writing reviews is reviewing the ones I don't like. Trying to fairly describe a record and its faults, while listening to a record you already know you don't like, can become irritating.

Soon to shower and bed. It'll be weird in clinic with people gone for the Tweed course this week. But before I go, some transcription:

Henry Rollins, from Do I Come Here Often?

Thank goodness for Bruce Springsteen to keep all these people in line. Hey! Go to work, be the person you hate, suck your employer's ass, come home and drink, it's all right, Bruce Springsteen wrote a song about you. If you didn't get in line and work all day and hate your own guts, then the Boss wouldn't have anything to write about and he'd go out of business.

Getting up early on a Saturday fucking kills your whole day

Silvana had her baby Friday night. Her text message woke me up twice: once at 12:45am and once at 6:45am - I guess it was a resend. I can't hold anything against a woman who just gave birth, though. After what seemed like an interminably long morning session at the ADA building, some of us walked over to NMH to see her. She looked tired, but otherwise very good. She was upbeat and talkative. Gabriella wasn't there; apparently there was some meconium present so she was on observation. But Alex showed us a picture - Silvana says she's definitely her baby since she's got so much hair. Carrie asked me how the hell I knew what meconium was, and I said I'm a big nerd. Later she asked if I learned it during my hospital residency, but no, I just recently learned that tidbit of information.

(For those of you who are wondering, meconium is what is released when the fetus defecates prior to birth. It pretty much consists of bile and amniotic fluid, and is yellow or greenish. The concern is that it can get into the airway before the first breath and cause lung damage immediately post-partum.)

I came home and pretty much crashed. I slept a few hours yesterday afternoon. Getting up early on a Saturday fucking kills your whole day. I spent a good deal of what was left copying my MySpace blog over to Blogspot.

I had dinner with my parents last night. Good food, and the conversation was pretty decent. My dad is growing a mustache, and it doesn't look good. I wonder how long this will last. I told him he needs to trim it a l ittle better, at least.

WNUR went well. I found a shitload of unopened mail in the downstairs archives, including some CDs that I went ahead and played. So I guess that was good.

I actually cleaned up a little this morning; Trish was planning on coming over this afternoon. Boy, does my life sound boring. At least I'm feeling better. Now I'm just waiting for my sinuses (sini?) to finish draining.