Call and Response

I have a best friend. Her name is Kara, and she has a new baby which means that sometimes she's awake at 3 in the morning, and takes the time to read my blog while feeding said baby or doing other sundry mommy things. Once in a great while she comments on my blog and once in every 30,000 views or so she makes a comment so long and so funny that there is nothing for it, but to make it's own blog post.

That is what I bring to you today.

And also my response to her... which will probably not be as funny, but hopefully will pique her enough to comment again, so that you all can get a glimpse inside the fabulous relationship that is enjoyed between my very passionate best friend and myself.

So without further ado I bring you Kara's comment on my blog post, "I'm a doctor, Jim, not a dentist!"

This is gross and scary! You are either very brave or very foolish. I can't decide which. BUT - and let me be totally clear here - despite the fact that we are best friends, I want it on record that we can never and will never be police partners. Like - if we both became police officers and the Chief was all, "Goeke, Dunn, new assignments are up and you two are partners," I wouldn't abide it. I would protest or move or quit or kick the Chief in the shins until s/he relented and assigned me someone else.

Actually - I would just sit the Chief down and show him/her this post - proof that you are one of those crazy-unpredictables and I'm sure you will get me shot or something. "Who cuts the stitches out of their own mouth!?!" I'll fume. "Crazy-unpredictables, that's who! Obviously this is a woman who doesn't know proper boundaries! She's going to get me shot! Who knows - she might shoot me herself!!!" The Chief will nod, understandingly, and yooooouuuuu my friend will be driving a desk for the rest of your career! 

Aaaaaah! I seriously keep shivering in awe/revulsion/amazement/oh-my-goodness at the thought of you doing what you've said you've done.

You cut them out yourself?!? Aren't you afraid things won't heal right??? What kind of sound did it make? Aaaah! Did it make a sound? Like a click? Did you use a mirror and a light? You don't have enough hands!

I'm a completely freaked out. 

Your blog might have to be added to the "places online that shouldn't be visited at 3am list" (so far, the list only includes episodes of Star Trek that Josh warns me ahead of time are scary and anything Janis Burton labels as "creeples", b/c I just don't take many risks while surfing - and then, out of the blue, it turns out a visit to Renee's blog IS a risk!) 

AHHHHH! 

Okay - I'm going to make sure my baby is breathing and hasn't turned into something and then I'm going to try to go back to sleep - but it's a long road ahead of me b/c I keep imagining the sound the stitches made. 

Medical mavericks are not good kinds of mavericks! Next thing I know your going to be cutting off your own moles or or or piercing blisters with a pin or or - I don't even know what. I'm panicking beyond my ability to use commas and points of ellipses! All that's left are EXCLAMATION MARKS AND THE CAPS LOCK KEY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Kara, first off, if I ever go on a European vacation without you (Though what the heck I'm doing, going to Europe without you, I do not know.) I'm appointing you as my blogger pro tempore. You will have to accept all the responsibilities and duties of blogging as I take a holiday. And then I'll come back home and be faced with a blogging coup as everyone likes you more and wants you to keep blogging and I'll be all like, "This 'ere is my bloody blog, ya blighters! Ya can't just go kickin' me out o' my own flippin' blog! 'ave ye gone daft?!"

And everyone will be all like, "We don't care. You are out. Kara is in, and also you didn't even go to England so why are you talking with that accent?"

and I shall respond, "Do you know who I am?!? I am Vader. Darth Vader. Lord Vader. I can kill you with a single thought!" (Because after my European holiday I'll have developed a greater appreciation for Eddie Izzard.)

And everyone shall be so confused that they will just wander around in cyberland bumping into each other...errr bumping into each other cybernetically.... which is to say with their cyber selves.

So yeah... ummm... anyway... *second off*

I agree that we can never and will never be police partners. Couple of reasons for this:

1) I don't want to be a police officer because
1a) I wouldn't like having to wear the same thing everyday
1b) I'm pretty sure police officers can't have candy cane nails
1c) They have to work on holidays
1d) Oh yeah they might have to shoot someone and I couldn't take it. But more importantly...

2) I really wouldn't want to be your partner because you are the feisty spirited one, so according to all the cop movie/tv shows I'm pretty sure the *best* I could hope for as your partner is to be shot in the arm and forced into that desk job by my disability... I'm actually more likely to be killed since that would fuel your quest for justice a little bit better and heavens knows they won't kill you off because you have an infant son AND you are the feisty spirited one. Nope I'd be the one to go, so I'm refusing the partnership. I'm much better as the quirky non-dead-non-cop best friend. So I hate to break it to you, but I'm leaving the force.

In response to your questions though:

Yes, I cut them out myself and no I'm not afraid of things not healing right... The whole swollen gum irritation was actually far more annoying/concerning than cutting them out. Things seem to be healing just fine... I left them in for 5 days, when the assistant said they might fall out on their own in 1 day.

It didn't even really make a sound... Just the sound of scissors closing. Trust me the sound of my wisdom teeth being pulled was *far* worse than the sound of the single stitch being cut.  I can describe that sound if you want me to.... but you don't.

I mean really we are only talking about one circle of "stitch"... It was just a glorified top knot on either side of my mouth. I cut out my right one in the morning cause it hurt, and then I waited to see what happened and then when it felt way better and the left side started hurting the same way I cut it out that night. Really my mouth was saying that the stitches had done their job and it was time for them to go 
away.

 I didn't need a mirror or a light and it really only took one hand. I have a pair of scissors that are really sharp even at the tip and I disinfected them and then just put them in my mouth and cut the stitch by feel (the stitch was semi loose already, except where my gums had swollen around it. Then I opened and closed my mouth like 3 times and the string bit came out and I looked at it and determined that it had stretched but wasn't even close to "dissolving" and I was really happy I did it.

If the nurse hadn't said that whenever my stitches fell out would be fine then I probably wouldn't have cut them out, but I wasn't going to go through getting my wisdom teeth out and have the worst part be the stitches that I just wouldn't take out so my body had to attack them.

Also: You had a natural home birth. How in the world is it that you can go through child-birth drug free but balk at me cutting out a few stitches? I was just listening to my body! You know what's holding me back from being a free-spirited hippie? ... well, yes, mainly my love of Infusium 23 and my disinclination for making all my household cleaning products out of some mixture of baking soda, vinegar, and coconut oil.

But ALSO your view that stitches are useful after your body decides it's done with them. My wisdom teeth "erupted" from my gumline because my mouth was not going to keep them hostage anymore. It would have done the same for my stitches, only I kicked them out before my mouth could get much more riled up it. My mouth thinks I'm a hero.

Viva la revolución!

Ohhh I've decided I want to be the detective/psychic/prophet. They are totally allowed, nay, even encouraged, to be the crazy-unpredictable. And from what I can tell they never have to carry a gun or work on holidays and non-standard dress is their hallmark. Plus a detective would be admired, not scorned when she told someone that she cut the stitches out of her own mouth.  It's like a right of passage.