There is a line in one of my favourite songs by Terry Reid, the song is called To be Treated, where he sings:

we are what we are when in danger and we are as we stand head in hand

The whole thing speaks to a place in me that just wants to be peaceful, doesn’t want to resent, to feel anger so strong sometimes it feels like my blood may boil over from my mouth, nose, eyes and ears covering me in my mistakes, disintegrating everything good I’ve managed to accomplish in its midst. The fight or flight feeling when I perceive myself to be in danger or feel I’ve been burned is normal but it doesn’t have to control me. I can’t control what other people do all I can do is continue to work on how I react to it.

In the big picture, when big problems happen in my life I don’t want to lash out, overreact, hold onto unhealthy thoughts, or allow myself to sit in the victim chair. I’ve been working on the big picture for coming on a year and it is still some of the hardest work I have ever taken on. It is up there with coming to terms and dealing with my relationship with my parents. It strikes me as incredibly odd and painful that I can forgive the man who came into my home in 2002 and sexually assaulted me and I can’t forgive two women who have wronged me from behind their computers. Why can I let go of so many other things in my life, why can I come so far with forgiving some yet have no love for a few?

I know that I like resolutions to things, I like to work things out, I can admit when I’m wrong, where I don’t think a lot of people can, it’s very freeing, like learning to laugh at yourself. I wish I could feel more compassion instead of anger, at times I do, but moving on is a struggle here. I think because I’ve been able to get my life on track regardless of how hard my depression gets in almost every other area I don’t understand why I can’t have a resolution to these two problems, I feel helpless and misunderstood, ignored, taken advantage of. I know I am NOT a victim, I’m not the only one at fault. I would assume I have to forgive myself as well, but if I had my relationship with myself listed on Facebook it would be complicated.

We all live in this technologically advanced world, even Adam and I who have only ONE computer (the horror!). Things move so fast the average person can not keep up. Yet we seem to be taking steps backwards in dealing with people and with the relationships that ensue. We act like adolescents when someone says or writes something mean about us, threaten to sue over the thought of a reputation. For real? By feeding into the trend of everyone living their lives online we don’t seem to be gaining any lasting enlightenment, we are limiting ourselves psychologically, I don’t need to even read a book or be a doctor to see that. A society where people don’t have to wear pants is doomed from the get go.

I spent most of the games feeling depressed and creatively blocked. I considered doing a wrap up post of 17 photos for 17 days but I didn’t take photos every day of the games, and even the photos I did take were pretty lacklustre, there aren’t many that I consider to be good photos. I did Tweet a lot, it went over pretty well for someone who doesn’t make a point to live Tweet a trip to the bathroom.

For me the only real highlight other than so many top ten finishes and fourteen gold medals for Canada was getting to go see the Canadian Men’s Curling team plus seven other countries. When the information on how the Olympic tickets were going to be sold and the prices were announced it became clear pretty quickly we wouldn’t be seeing any events. We didn’t even entertain the idea of getting to see anything anywhere but on a T.V., let alone see one live that both my parents and myself have played in the past and one that Adam and me watch. One that Adam is developing an odd obsession with, comparable only to when he discovered Tennis. (long story) So, when the opportunity arose from a friend who most graciously gave us, yes gave us Olympic curling tickets came to pass there was nothing else to do but go and to go wearing matching sweaters, something that we both agree is only acceptable on this one occasion. Adam wore my dad’s old curling sweater that I started to let him wear years ago because even though I love it, it is way too big for me. Oddly enough one of my closest girlfriends has the same sweater and lent me hers! Awesome. Getting to see Canada’s undefeated mens team second row right over the button is up there with best memories ever. Thanks again Steve!!

Adam went out exploring and people watching more than I did. There was also a time I didn’t think I would stay in the city for the games, and although I am glad I did, I think Adam would have had a better time had a I left. I hate that about depression, I’d been feeling so well and bam it just hit like a load of bricks almost a week in. I’m not in break down mode but I’m feeling really shitty.

It is nice that the helicopters are gone. I don’t miss the games at all, we watch golf. It’s over. We just changed the channel, there is curling on this weekend. But they left us with the cheque and the feeling remains that we are the province the country doesn’t care about. They came, they went, and now we pay.

Back on February 8, 2006 when I came out with the secret that I had been a chronic hemorrhoid sufferer from the ripe old age of 19 I never imagined it would turn into an epic saga filling my life with enough material that I could write a book on What to Expect When You’re Expecting Rhoids. Nor did I realize how much support I would receive, granted my archives for 2006 are a disaster and ALL of the comments from the whole year are gone, but at the time when I realized just how many people were suffering with ass issues of their own, or for whatever reason wanted to be kept posted on my ass, I decided I would blog the entire adventure including the surgery.

I welcome you to read the posts I’m linking to in this Prologue, I will only include the main highlights here to either welcome you to the saga or refresh your memories. I particularly love the guest post that Adam did I think he captured my fear quite well.

My first bowel movement took over an hour. I chugged glass after glass of water to take my mind off the fact it was happening fresh out of bed at 7 something in the morning with absolutely no pain killers in the system. Everyone knows that I Corinna Liscumb have a mild tendency to exaggerate but this is different and I would never do that in regards to something like this, Adam sat on a stool [haha I said stool] the whole time and basically held my hand. Although I would give anything to see my facial expressions there was no fucking way I was busting out the camera even for something as memorable as that was. In case anyone is DYING to know my second pooh was much shorter but just as painful and involved yelling and the word ‘fuck’ at times.

Even years later I often think how when I woke up all the nurses were talking about my tattoos instead of say mentioning that not only was there a lot of gauze on the outside of the area BUT that there was a piece of gauze UP inside my anus that was about the size of my thumb. I was actually told about that there piece of gauze in my comments by one of my loyal readers [isn't enough to call Sarah a loyal reader, she's a friend as well, we've both been there for each other through some heavy shit over the years, she's the bomb].

Sarah knew an ass surgeon, I can’t remember exactly what she told me but it included and was not limited to a part about how *most people* when crapping out that piece of gauze pass out cold. Not like I didn’t already know it, but that confirmed to me that I’m one tough bitch.

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Although I still mention my ass surgery on here I’ve never felt the need to give an update.

Until now.

Even though everything looked fine on my initial follow up visit two weeks after, by six months I knew I had a problem.  Around this time I phoned the surgeon’s office back and explained that something wasn’t right, I was told that it could take up to a year to properly heal but to call back and come in if I had any pressing concerns. On the year anniversary, nothing had changed. By this time we’d done some research and discovered that having the hemorrhoidectomy did not mean that I would never get the rhoids again. OK FUCK WHAT? It explained a lot but I was livid, I should have been told that when making the decision to have this invasive and painful surgery in the consultation. My rhoids had not actually returned but I had noticed a piece of skin wasn’t tucking up inside like the rest were and it was easily irritated by say a thong.

I made an announcement on Twitter that I was returning to work. The day Adam walked in and said he had been laid off, I was on the phone to my girlfriend before he stepped out of his boots; she has gotten me all of my previous work in film, my schedule was shifted around a bit but I did get hours. Last Monday was my first day. Sometime during that 16.5 hours it felt like my ass had popped out a rhoid. I wasn’t surprised, I assumed this day was coming and I was working on location outside for that entire day, it almost made sense with my luck that this would be the time that they would return.

On Monday night when I got in the shower with what can only be described as despair I pushed that piece of swollen skin as far up my asshole as I could. I didn’t even have any Vaseline to help soothe the area, I recently hucked our container because it was from 2005. And sure maybe expiry dates aren’t completely accurate but I thought that 2005 warranted being thrown out. I returned to work on Tuesday and worked all 16 hours of it in a lot of pain but being the only female PA who was I going to tell? It was day TWO I was scheduled in till the following Monday. I OF COURSE didn’t want to let my girlfriend OR my husband down. But I had no choice I woke up Wednesday morning with the added thrill of a plugged nose and my cough had returned. I texted my on location contact/boss and my girlfriend/boss, but I only mentioned the onset of the cold out of no where. As I mentioned to her later I didn’t feel comfortable talking about rhoids over text message at whatever hour it was in the morning. THANKFULLY I was not fired, but I was taken off the rest of schedule for that episode. I thought for sure I was toast but I must have horseshoes in that dysfunctional ass of mine too.

I wasn’t able to see my family doctor until Saturday morning which was half my fault because my brain was set on I DON’T WANT TO HAVE ANYTHING TO DO WITH ANY OF THIS – LA LA LA my ass doesn’t hurt so bad I can hardly sit.

I gave the doctor a quick rundown on the surgery, and my hospitalization at 19 (with a very serious case of thrombosed hemorrhoids) which began my ten year hot streak of internal and external rhoids before they were removed. I explained to him that I knew something had gone wrong with the leftover skin and prepared myself for the worst.

“What you have there is actually a yeast infection about this big [forefinger touching thumb around] causing the swelling, itching, redness”. Everything led this veteran rhoids suffer to believe they had them again. He did also confirm that the piece of skin was not a good thing and could cause me further problems down the road but that this was different. I was like “WHAT, I totally wash my ass man”, not to mention I have NEVER heard of an asshole yeast infection. He explained to me it has nothing to do with that, only not to wash my genitals with soap, I told him I hadn’t for years, I use hypoallergenic Vagisil wash. I know I have sensitive genitals, Vagisil wash is my friend. Taking this in was interesting because I don’t know the exact number of vaginal yeast infections I’ve had in my life, honestly WHO keeps track of that. It’s under five, and I’m almost 33.

This new development with my ass is both good news and bad. Good news no rhoids. Bad news FEELS like I have rhoids and right now I can’t work, I need a couple days, this stuff is supposed to work fast, which begged me to ask Adam the question(s) of “when a doctor tells you something like an ass cream works fast do you ever wonder why, like does he use it, has his wife used it, is he suffering from a yeast infected ass right now?” I guess now I’ll just keep my asshole yeast infection cream in my work bag and if it starts to act up again, take that, I have ASS CREAM.

Because I’ve been talking about them more frequently, I will introduce them to you. SIL Saz is my older SIL though not older than me, Adam is the eldest of the three of them and I’m the oldest of all six of us if you count our spouses which to me is pretty funny because in my family I’m the youngest, youngest cousin, grandchild, only grandchild on the one side BUT my dad has six sisters and one brother so being the youngest is super cool. Back to SILS. SIL Saz you may recognize from my comments, she reads the Greeper. SIL Smut is the younger of the two and has gone through various name changes, first I started to call her SIL Deux. Deux meaning two in French, and then when I got back from Bali I changed it to SIL Dua. Dua meaning two in Indonesian. Even though I know that I meant no insult with the word Dua who the hell wants to be second and technically she was third born anyway which means if I were going to keep it accurate she’d be SIL Tiga. But before Christmas SIL Smut and fiancée came over for a Wii night, Christmas spirits type visit and I didn’t even realize until they left that she had called her Mii for the Wii Smut. I enquired, she gained even MORE has the best kid stories of the three of them points . She got another one the other day, SIL Saz left a comment which begged a story. If I told you stories they’d both kill me, but from the one story I was able to FINALLY solidify a name for Tiga born SIL Smut.

Before we had dinner last night we opened gifts. All we knew was that SIL Saz was excited. This could not ever be a bad thing. I received the best belt buckle on the face of the earth and this belt buckle here is pretty bloody hard to beat. Now I am basically The Scorpion Queen. Adam received a Pan Flute that he is already playing super sweet sounds on that are not in anyway annoying. Not annoying AT ALL. And she gave us a poo calendar a Monthly Doos the 2010 dog poop calendar. It will likely go in the bathroom. WHAT? a poo calendar? Yes, picture an Anne Geddes photo but instead of babies on the leaves there is dog shit. Brilliant.

Some of the time it isn’t like we want to sit on our asses, we’ve been trying to get for photo walks for days and the weather is refusing to cooperate. I do not have a problem going for rainy walks they are rather enjoyable but when you are trying to take photos rain and photo walks don’t mix and I keep forgetting to wear contacts and my glasses get covered in water spots. Even the night walk we’ve been trying to go on has been a no go. We managed to get out one day and I took a couple shots before it started to rain they are nothing special, I like the beehive picture I got and I really like the public art displays all over the city put on by Vancouver Biennale. The red man is one of many sitting in a big circle. When I first saw them I instantly thought of Bali because almost everyone there squats like these statues do.

This one is an older one I took of another display very close to us.

We want to go for walks so bad to catch some of the insane last minute preparation for the Olympics, the energy in this city is crazy simply crazy. I did walk by the art gallery where the Olympic count down clock is and as I walked past and saw the work they were doing on it ALL I could think of was a HUGE flowered moo moo that I wouldn’t even let my mother wear for her 100th birthday. I’m really hoping we get a chance to do a rain free day walk and night walk within the next two weeks here.

While looking for the above photo I realized that I have NOT shown you all a photo of Dr. Vegas in his BRAND SPANKIN’ knew WRESTLING SUIT [from Christmas] made for him by beyond awesome friends, what a seriously killer gift.

C.J had called us on Skype and I didn’t want to get him all excited so I didn’t mention he had caught us within an hour of Phaeds coming over incase she was late or it was one of those just checking in on me five minute chats. Worked out that the three of us were still gabbing away when she arrived. I snatched this video of Gus being Gus I guess, and four people speaking about spicy topics all at the same time. I’m not going to ruin it for you other than to say that Gus is the star and it is cool that Phaeds joined the conversation some of her spicier bits got cut though.

You may want to read the original Calendar Wars post and the link in the first paragraph. Or I guess you can just take my word for it in my brief explanation to follow the end of this sentence. [this should be good, me trying to give a brief explanation]

It started innocently, no that doesn’t work, it started as a joke, or so I thought. After the Men with Buns calendar was on the wall for a full year of course it had been made clear by me that I should be allowed to pick the next years’ calendar. To say I got him good that year, would be saying I got him GOOD that year. Two words: Jeff Foxworthly. A few more words: You might be a redneck if….  [I am after all a pure bread red neck, Grandmother lived and died in a trailer park]. Poorly written, not even remotely funny jokes, with cartoons of plumber butts, clam slam skirts and shirts, but not hot ones, HOES; twelve months of them.

My husband never one to be outwitted got me back in 2009 with The Big Breast Calendar. This is where some of you are like WHAT you love tits. YES I LOVE TITS! But even he admitted he copped out and went for porn, couldn’t out horrible calendar me so he went for tits. Only backfired on him two months, Ms. September and Ms. December were a challenge for him. There wasn’t enough of the car for Adam in the Ms. September shot, although oddly I found Ms. September to one of the hottest women on there, and Ms. December just should have never happened. You don’t want a description. Both women still had big tits, they were great, it was the photos.

One day I was on Flickr and I saw the side ads which on Flickr don’t annoy me cause they are for cool shit like Moo cards. I saw, or was reminded that you could make a calendar. I wish I could tell you ladies that I filled it up with hot photos of my husband, but where would the fun have been in that? Given that we are both pretty big fans of over the top dorky photos of ourselves it was a no brainer and thus Adam Carlson in Calendar ~ #adam2010 was born.

Cover photo: taken by me up in Prince George over Christmas the last year my parents were still living in Canada. I didn’t have the heart to tell him he had the halter on wrong before taking the photo.

Mr. January: If you know Adam at all you know he is extremely calm, he doesn’t swear very often and is basically the complete opposite of me when it comes to that side of our personalities, so the fact that for whatever reason he gave me the finger while I took this was out of character for him and like nice wannabe smurf hat. Neither of us makes resolutions so out of my picks for photos I liked this one for January because it’s sort of a fuck you to resolutions or whatever.

Mr. February: Adam was sick or something so I went out and got him some treats and such and your guess is as good as mine as to why but I decided that we needed wax lips. HAD TO HAVE THEM.

Mr. March: The original photo on Flickr is entitled: impromptu C.J look-a-like contest winner C.J is family to us, he has seen this picture, and has been overheard saying :”it looks even more like me than me”.

Mr. April: This is a mish mash of classic Adam moments, Showerhawk Wolverine face with kittehs, trying to eat cardboard instead of the Pocky, He wore flowers in his hair golfing, and Potato mouth (in our apron wedding gift which states: It Takes Two Socks To Make a Monkey, stemming from a hilarious joke Adam cracked out at a friends place one night).

Mr. May: As a you just had a vas-nipper gift I bought Adam some stress balls two years ago this May 23rd. I didn’t know how much pain he’d be in and thought he’d appreciate still being able to play with some balls.

Mr. June: Last year I commented on how I continually feel ripped off by June year after year in calendars and it is MY birthday month, the 14th every year; it just doesn’t seem fair, it isn’t like I take it personally but I’ve said it once and I will say it again June is continually represented in a prejudice way against awesomeness, in my humble opinion. Again, I’d really have liked to have posted a photo of say this nature but it would have cheapened the entire calendar. This here, is the money shot. This is the day that I bought my husband the worst underwear on the face of the planet it was all my fault they were just, well, you can see the photo. One of those worst wife ever moments. There are two more prime shots that were supposed to be on this page but no matter what I did the program wouldn’t let me upload them so we are all stuck with this one gem instead of three. My sincerest apologies.

Mr. July: Classic Adam, you can see the dedication to his craft of making me laugh in his eye.

Mr. August: The photos here are taken from the day that we started what we call The Creepy Carlsons, now we go out of our way to take creepy photos like this one that Adam took. Two examples of how fun my husband makes our marriage are apparent in his dorkiness in the other two. It is also his birthday month so the photo of the crazy eyes is fitting.

Mr. September: Who doesn’t have photos of themselves pissing in the bushes. There is one kicking around of me in the Dominican Republic I just thought of now, hilarious.

Mr. October: I took this photo the morning after our wedding, he claims he is pretending to be Gus, I say either go on a fucking picnic together already or admit you were trying to run away from the marriage.

Mr. November: This time, he’s being more of a horse. Still wearing the halter wrong.

Mr. December: This photo is entitled Find the Dill-weed. Adam named it himself.

I’m the type of person who can’t buy something for someone without having to give it to them the second I buy it, this was coming via mail and was so hard to keep my mouth shut about you can’t even imagine. I was laughing at nothing constantly, I showed it to a girlfriend who was over via the photos who was very impressed by my selection knowing us both very well. Well shit, that just made it even harder to wait for it to arrive.

The day it did arrive I was doing an interview with the Liquid Inspiration Podcast boys C.J and Daz and was in the middle of telling the story when Mr. 2010 himself walked in the door from work and we were all privy to his “you got me” response right there on the taping. Since seeing it he has mostly been heard muttering to himself about how the hell he is going to top this. *coughs rubs lapel*.