I Thought I was a Cowboy Until

An oldie, but a goodie

 

An old cowboy sat down at the Starbucks and ordered a cup of coffee. As
 he sat sipping his coffee, a young woman sat down next to him. She
 turned to the cowboy and asked, 'Are you a real cowboy?'


 He replied, 'Well, I've spent my whole life breaking colts, working
 cows, going to rodeos, fixing fences, pulling calves, bailing hay,
 doctoring calves, cleaning my barn, fixing flats, working on tractors,
 and feeding my dogs, so I guess I am a cowboy.'


 She said, 'I'm a lesbian. I spend my whole day thinking about women. As
 soon as I get up in the morning, I think about women. When I shower, I
 think about women. When I watch TV, I think about women. I even think
 about women when I eat. It seems that everything makes me think of
 women.'


 The two sat sipping in silence.


 A little while later, a man sat down on the other side of the old cowboy
 and asked, 'Are you a real cowboy?'


 He replied, 'I always thought I was, but I just found out that I'm a
 lesbian.'

 

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Stomach virus kicked my butt!

Ebola Virus Ruins Christmas

An outbreak of the deadly Ebola virus at the North Pole has left scores of elves dead, bringing toy production to a virtual halt in a development that will likely spell the ruin of Christmas for millions of boys and girls around the world.

Confirmation of the deadly hemorrhagic pathogen's responsibility for the sudden, gruesome death of an estimated 1,200 elves was made this morning after Ebola was detected in samples of blood and viscera collected from the walls and ceilings of the small snow-topped cottages in which their bodies exploded.

An evidently highly virulent and contagious strain, Rudolph Schmidt of the Global Health Association emphasized that children who don't receive any gifts on Christmas morning due to the aftereffects of the outbreak should be grateful to have gotten nothing rather than being exposed to a terminal sickness as horrifying.

"Beginning with flu-like symptoms of high fever, muscle aches and weakness, the afflicted elves develop an extremely painful maculopapular rash before succumbing to violent bouts of diarrhea and projectile vomiting of blood and necrotized tissue that preceded their agonizing deaths - usually as a result of massive organ failure or spontaneous combustion," Schmidt said.

"The sheer hell these poor little people went through cannot be imaginable," Schmidt added, "And at the risk of editorializing, I'd say that anybody who thinks not getting the Nintendo Wii game or Hannah Montana whatever they wanted from Santa while he's busy burning the bodies of his dead should be very, very ashamed of themselves."

Meanwhile, speculations made by many insiders that the Ebola outbreak will spell the worst haul of presents for all but the wealthiest children around the world since Mrs. Claus's memorable decade-long struggle with post-menopausal psychosis during the 1930s were all but confirmed this morning when Santa euphemistically referenced a "trickle down" effect of gift giving during a brief press conference outside the quarantine zone that has become his village.

"Though it makes me most unjolly to have to allocate all of my remaining elfpower to work on making toys for rich kids whose higher expectations make them much more vulnerable to disappointment on Christmas morning, less well-off children shouldn't despair, but rather make an effort to make friends with kids whose parents aren't so poor so they can play with their neater toys at least from time to time," he said.

Chemical Limbo

Whoo boy. I overslept this morning, and was really late taking my daily dose of modern pharmaceutical chemical engineering. That was a BAD ride that I don't want to take again anytime soon. A good friend of mine who's a nurse at UMMC-ER had warned me about a crash if I ever stopped taking them. This wasn't a crash, but I did bump up against the wall.

I'm in limbo right now. It's interesting that our use of the word limbo stems from the Roman Catholic theological sense of Limbo as a place where souls remain that cannot enter heaven (for example, unbaptized infants). Limbo in Catholic theology is located on the border of Hell, which explains the name. The name limbo comes from the Latin limbus, which means an ornamental border to a fringe, or a band or girdle, and was chosen by early Christians in the Middle Ages to denote this border between Heaven and Hell.

On one side of this border exists my longing to be wanted, to be appreciated, to share the simple joy of being alive with someone else who understands that life and death can be dark places if we let them. But we're strong enough creatures to also mark our own path of contentment. That can be our choice, but we must want it.

On the other side of the border, exists a truly dark world of being alone, unfulfilled, and longing for more. I've flirted with that world for 12 weeks now, and it is absolutely not where I want to spend my life. I starve for companionship, friendship, laughter, joi de vivre, to be someone's Falstaff. Sentiment exaltant ressenti par toute la conscience - exciting feeling felt by all the conscience is what I long for - not dull, trudging strife to force a feeling.

I stand on this border, supported by one little white pill each day. If I forget, like today, I slip a little to the dark side. But every other day, I even wonder if the compressed powder in that little white dot in my hand each morning masks the truth of my world, which may really be darker than I want to admit.

I hate being where I am. Chemistry has never been something I've wanted to depend on, especially those medications that keep my head clear. I just thought I'd been in really bad situations before, where I was circling the drain emotionally and mentally. But this is different, the drain is gone, somebody knocked the bottom out of the sink instead, and I'm just hanging on.

I just need an answer, a finality, so I can know what step to take next; to know which side of the border to come down on.