Now With 55% More Migrain!

Sorry for the dearth of posts lately. You see, I made a trip to Tinytown this weekend (in observance of Martin Luther Junior Day, naturalment) and, during my brief stay, was exposed to a a pair of cocker spaniel puppies.

Now I know that cocker spaniels are bad. I know they are neurotic and have fantastically poor bladder control. I know that, as they age, their inner ear becomes calcified and must be removed before it spreads to their little doggie brains. Heck, I even know they defied evolution and only exist because some veterinarian Frankenstein thought it would be fun to blend together a monster hound that, like kudzu, people would see and initially think, "How pretty", allowing them to thrive until it was too late.

But how could I know that cocker spaniels are also well-known triggers for migraine headaches?

Maybe I'm being too hard on those puppies. After all, they sure were cute (but then, so was Lucifer--and we ALL know what happened there). So whether it was the fault of the puppies or the flashing police lights or the stress from the long drive--duddin' matter. Point is, I had my first migraine headache in months and months.

What? You've never had a migraine? Well, you've come to the right place, because, in typical 42nd Floor fashion, I'm about to tell you about them.

Migraine headaches are a lot like snowflakes: Nobody really knows where they come from and no two migraines are quite the same. So since I'm only one person and I've only experienced the headaches that I've had, the best I can do to help you understand what they're like is to personally describe what happens to me. Personally.

You only get migraines when you really wouldn't want to have one. Your birthday party? You'll get one. The swordfight scene in Hamlet and you're playing Laertes? Count on it. Meeting the Queen? Indubitably.

And you know you're getting one because you'll be bopping along with a smile on your face, talking to your friends about how swell life is, and suddenly you can't see their face anymore. You look somewhere else, let's say at their portrait of dogs playing poker. You try to focus on the bulldog slipping cards to the dachshund under the table (that ol' cheat!)...but you can't see him. A ripple of panic runs up your spine.

This is the point where you can either say nothing and start praying, or you can spoil everybody's fun by saying, as I do, "CRAP! I'm getting a migraine!"

At this point, you have a narrow window of ten to fifteen minutes before the fun REALLY starts. It's kind of like being executed, only the governor never calls. If you have anything to say to anybody, say it now. If you have any medication, take it now. At this point the blind spot begins flashing in bright colors and spreads over your field of vision like some sort of amoeba from hell. Your stomach gets a little queasy and the place directly behind your right eye begins to throb as if the migraine is knocking on the door to your brain, saying, "I'm heeeeeeeeere!"

Do you remember 'the Exorcist'? You know how all kinds of different things happened to Linda Blair? How you were never quite sure what was going to happen to her next, but you knew that, since she was possessed by the devil, it wasn't gonna be good?

The pain. The pain. L. Ron Hubbard, the pain! You thrash about in your bed in utter agony, smacking your temples and wishing you owned a gun or a big cartoon mallet so you could make a hole in your skull and release the pressure that seems to be building up inside your brains.

At this point, the demonic amoeba is out of control. Sometimes it'll be little, sometimes it'll be huge, sometimes it'll be over your right eye, sometimes over your left. If you're lucky, you'll be able to talk. But that depends entirely on how sincere you were in the bargaining you've been doing with God since the headache began.

Let's say you want to say something. Something like, "I want to die." You'll know that you want to say it, but in the process of your brain selecting the words to communicate this idea, something breaks down and instead of saying "I want to die," you'll probably say something along the lines of "Zoo when the fuuhh."

It's like Alzheimer's. Only not fun.

Then you'll feel half of your face go numb. Then your arm goes numb. Then half of your body goes numb. Feels really weird. Then the numbness moves to the middle of your body, then to the other side. Then it goes away. Then your head rotates 360 degrees.

If you've made it this far without killing yourself, hang on! You're almost there!

Here's where you go into the bathroom because you think you're going to throw up from all the pain and all the weird numbness and demonic amoebas. You lie on the floor and feel a little better--

( There's just something about lying on bathroom floors, isn't there?

Guy: Doc, I've tried everything! I've taken the medicine like you told me but nothing seems to help!

Doctor: Did you lie on the bathroom floor?

Guy: Well...No...

Doctor: Why don't you go home and lie on the bathroom floor for a while, then tell me if the cancer is still bothering you. )

--before the urge to purge seizes you again and you sit up quickly--ooh, bad move. At this point your brain is so swollen from all the blood vessels spazzing out that the slightest move of your head will send you screaming in pain. In other words, DON'T SNEEZE.

The only way to finally shake one of these things is to go to sleep. And YOU try sleeping when just HEARING things makes you want to throw up.

Of course, this is a worst-case scenario. Pour moi, anyway. Doesn't that sound awful? When I was a kid I read somewhere that Paul's "thorn in the flesh" that God wouldn't take away had something to do with migraine headaches. I believed it! Then they found that new Rosetta stone and discovered that it wasn't migraines; he was gay. But still!--sucks to be him!

So since I had two of these bad-boys in as many days (thereby RUINING my Martin Luther Junior Day!), and my peripheral vision was only running at about 80% yesterday morning, I decided to take the day off and spent most of it in bed.

What?! But you already took three days off for Forko's wedding! And now you took ANOTHER? You just used up a huge chunk of your PTO! And it's only January!

Meh, who cares? It's not like I'm going to be here all year anyway.

Oh really? Where ARE you going to be?

I don't know. But I can't stay on the 42nd Floor forever. There are any number of things I could do.

Such as...?

Next: Forky Becomes a Technical Writer