First Do No Harm is back up and running

Ok, I was asked to help out with FDNH almost a year ago, but hadn't been able to get all the information I needed to get busy with it, and time got away from me. I now have most of what I need to know to get started with publishing the stories readers have sent to First Do No Harm. I'm sorry it's taken me so long to get to this, but I will be reading all the emails, getting back to everyone who sent in their story, and working with you all to get your stories out there. I plan on doing a post every day this month, until I can get caught up with the backlog, so if you've sent something in and you don't see it right away, be assured that it will get posted.
If anyone has new "tales from the medical dark side", send them in and I will post them as soon as I have finished posting all the ones I currently have in line.
Thanks, everyone, for reading, and continuing to let us know what's going on with the medical establishment.

Letter to Woman Within

I used the "Contact Us" form at Woman Within today. I'm so damned fed up with their lack of options as far as pants are concerned. They finally started carrying the pants I like again (polyester/rayon/spandex, straight leg, diagonal slash pockets), and they have them in 5 colors - charcoal gray, brown, dark navy, black, and true olive. While the price is a little more than I really want to pay ($24.99 each, but I'd pay it if they had them in a 32" inseam), I would have ordered 1 pair of each color. What stopped me? The inseam, of course. They only come in a 30" inseam, which hits me right above my ankles (yeah, I'm not interested in wearing high-water pants, thank you very much). And it pisses me off because they carry the same damned pants in wide leg and boot cut in petite, average, and tall, same colors/same fabric, but guess what? No fucking pockets in them.
So this is the letter I wrote in their "contact us" form:

I would like to order some pants from your catalog, item #25-17777-842, but you only carry them with a 30" inseam and I need a 32" inseam. I would order the 25-33835-842 pants, but they don't have pockets, neither do the 25-55058-842 pants, even though the inseams are long enough in both of those. Why can't you carry pants with pockets (slash pockets, not those useless sideseam pockets) in all 3 leg styles and in petite, average, AND tall? I happen to be a fat woman with long legs who wants pockets (the diagonal slash pockets) in my pants, and would love to be able to choose from straight, boot-cut, and wide leg styles, and not be stuck with pants that either have no pockets at all, or have hems that hit above my ankles if they do have pockets.
I buy most of my clothing at Woman Within, but you are really making me reconsider that. I had purchased 4 pairs of the pants like I'm describing (32" inseam, straight leg, diagonal slash pockets, polyester/rayon/spandex) several years ago, and then you quit carrying them. Now you have them back, but they just don't have a long enough inseam.
You seem to have plenty of options in pants styles and lengths if you like the sideseam pockets, but I don't like them, every time I sit down, whatever is in my pocket falls out. Rather makes the pocket useless, don't you think?
I guess I'll have to go back to making all my clothes and you can do without the money I would otherwise be spending with you.

We'll see what kind of response I get from them, but I'm betting it's going to be a form letter saying they're sorry, but they just can't carry everything everyone wants or some such bullshit (can you tell I've written complaining letters to clothing catalog companies before and what kind of response I've gotten?).

My new passion

I'm in love with biking! I pick up my bike tonight from the shop. It was there over the weekend for an overhaul. I really missed biking over the weekend.

I had a disastrous bike ride last Wednesday, when I still had that catheter in my arm. I had the harebrained idea to take my bike off trail, I mean really off trail. I thought since it was an "all-terrain" bike I could take it down a hillside of blackberry bushes. I crashed big time and my legs were covered in scratches (I had on shorts). The bike went off on it's own down the hill, getting entangled in the bushes. I lost the speedometer I'd attached to the bike and got two flats. The flats didn't appear until I was about three miles from home. The reward was I found the coolest country road that's about three miles from my house.

The weather is awesome here in the Northwest. I have my new bike shorts ready, with the pillow built into the butt. Just what I don't need, a big, fat pillow butt--but I like comfort. I also bought a new Lance Armstrong tank top, black with a yellow band around one arm hole (only because it was on sale and very cute). My other purchase was a toolkit that attaches under the seat, and two spare tubes. Never mind that I have no idea how to change a tire on my bike. I guess I need to read my bike maintenance book and figure it out.

I'm dying to try some new trails. I have four books of bike trails in the Northwest. I'm especially interested in the Rails to Trails. The only problem is I need to convince my husband to go with me because the bike rack only attaches to his truck, not my car. He's not fond of me driving his truck (long story). I'm working on him.

Funny thing about this new passion of mine. There was an article last month in Women's Health. It said if your thighs are getting big from working out then you're probably working out too much on the bike. Biking = Big Muscled Thighs. Oh well, I can live with muscles. It's the fat I want gone, and if I can have fun doing it, that's all the better.


Goal
Goal setting is suppose to help us reach our goals. How ironic is that?

June goal: Lose 5 pounds.

I want to weigh 150 pounds by June 30. I know that's doable, just not easy. I feel like I'm trying to chip cement off my body. This is just ridiculously hard. It's a wonder anyone ever reaches goal. How do they do it? Maybe following the stupid program to the letter? That would be my best guess.