Ask the Tree Witch

Kevin Spacey does nine impersonations in six minutes.

I’ve decided to throw in the towel on the tree witchery practice. After years of marketing and learning to overcome my introverted nature and crappy self-esteem in order to bring in patients, I am now experiencing occasional periods of extreme busy-ness. Unfortunately, the busy-ness isn’t any less stressful than the non-busy-ness was. I seem to attract incredibly needy people as patients, and I’m flooded with phone calls daily and people who want our appointments to run on forever, or want some kind of special treatment.

So I thought to myself, “If I’m going to be bombarded with complaints and neediness all day, I might as well have a regular schedule and a regular salary,” and applied for a job at one of our local independently-owned natural foods stores, Roots. It looks, feels, and acts almost exactly like WSM, but without the passive co-op management style. I’ll be managing their supplement/HBA department, and they’re already sending me to one of the conventions I normally have to pay for myself for continuing education credit. I think it’ll be fun in a lot of ways. But meanwhile, now that my patients have gotten their “goodbye” letter, I feel like I’m breaking up with 200 people.

*sigh*

So, as everyone may have figured out, when MI and I got hitched, I acquired myself a six year old stepson. Since I grew up an only child and don’t have any kids of my own, I have been alternately charmed, delighted, amused, baffled, and frustrated by the one we call “Mr. K”. The other day while he was visiting us, Mr. K and I were playing at being Godzilla and Gidorah and having a big fight, with lots of roaring and screeching.

Suddenly, he stops, looks at me and says, “Lay down on the couch!”
“Why?” says I.
“Because I want to do something to you!” comes the response.
More wary than ever, I say, “What do you want to do?”
He gets a wild gleam in his eye and says, “Something WEIRD!”

Anyone here go camping? Before you load up the car or truck, do you have a list of items to pack that you check off? Then shouldn’t surgeons have a checklist before they operate?

I happen to see a lot of victims of emergency room sloppiness in my office: people who’ve suffered through some life-threatening infection or hemorrhage because ER staff didn’t take proper precautions. They become disenchanted with conventional medicine and try to avoid it altogether, which is a shame because they might need it again someday.

Don’t let them live in ignorance and shame.

Iran’s most popular tv show right now is about the plight of a Jewish woman during the Holocaust.

Wow! This is possibly the most pungent and persuasive analysis of our current foreign policy that I’ve read. And of course, it’s depressing.

A newly discovered dinosaur is unveiled. Happy Wedding Day!

Here’s how to know you’re being tortured.

Oh, and if you’re being tasered, you’re being tortured, too. Possibly to death.

I’m sure everyone will be delighted to know we’re on the brink of conquering hypertension. No, it doesn’t have anything to do with silly diet and lifestyle changes.

I mean, I think artificially stimulating someone’s immune system to produce antibodies to a molecule that regulates their cardiovascular system is a *brilliant* idea. What could possibly go wrong? After all, they’re in the fourth week of a six week study on it now and everyone’s fine.