My world is crashing down on me.

I visited the allergist today, and they did an allergy test on my back, poking me with 72 different allergens to see what I reacted to (this is my favorite style of medical treatment - when medical professionals are actively trying to cause me discomfort). I'd had the test before - they'd done the same thing on my forearm, which I think was a little worse. Not that it hurt more than this one did, the discomfort is minor in both cases, but in that situation I had to see it happen as it went along: watching my arm start to turn red, seeing sections of my arm swell up into little mountains of angry allergen reaction and then start to spread across, seeing those sections start to take over other sections until my arm look like a bubbling see of angry allergens intent on conquering my whole body. This time I just lay there, quietly trying not to scratch and wondering how things looked on my back.

The nurse came in at about five minutes in and glanced at my back, started to walk out, then looked again.

"Wow," she said, an exclamation I am uncomfortable hearing from anyone in the medical profession unless it is immediately followed by the sentence "you are one healthy individual, Mr. Wyman." In this case, it was not. It was simply, "wow."

"What's going on?"
"Well, your dust allergen has already started to really show."
"How bad is it?"
"We rate allergies on a scale of one to four." She paused, looking at my swollen back for a minute. "This is a six."
"Well, what else am I allergic to?"
"Let's see, you've got allergies to Scotch Pine... Mesquite..."
"Like... barbecue sauce mesquite?"
"Yes, but just the pollen. Don't worry. Let's see... oak... cats... dust... and dust mites... chocolate..."
"I'm sorry, what was that last one?"
"Chocolate. You're allergic to chocolate."
"Like, eating chocolate?"
"Yes."
"So I can't each chocolate?"
"No."
"Ever?"
"No. Also, nothing that has cocoa in it, so no hot cocoa, or Coca-Cola."
"I'm sorry? What was that?"
"No Coke. It has cocoa in it too." She paused, looking over my back one more time, and left the room for another ten minutes for me to choke in my despair. And also for the allergen test to complete.

Now, I know there are a lot of worse things I could be allergic to. Wheat, for instance. Or corn. But I just can't get over the list of things I can't eat anymore.

Cocoa Krispies. Chocolate chip cookies. Double chocolate chip cookies. Chocolate cream pie. Brownies. Milanos. Riesens. Chocolate sauce. Reese's Peanut Butter Cups. Chocolate Cake. Chocolate-dipped strawberries. Tootsie Roll Pops. Mocha. Raisinets. Chocolate fondue.

Hot chocolate.

Thin Mints.

Peanut Butter M&Ms.

Chocolate chip ice cream.

Coca-Cola.

I'm very, very, very depressed about this. I'm going home, I'm going to make myself some vanilla ice cream and butterscotch and I'm going to weep copiously for my loss. Then maybe I'll pull myself together, make myself some hot apple cider, and throw everything that has chocolate in my apartment off the balcony. And then maybe I'll cry again. I don't think I need to feel ashamed of this. Today, I lost something very important. It's well within my rights to mourn its passing.

R.I.P. Chocolate. Someday, in another life, I hope we meet again. And then our joy will only be strengthened by our long separation.

Though before then Halloween is coming, and I am gonna be pissed at you.

Time to switch out those TVs, people!

Well, the Smart Growth Conference has ended, and it seems to have gone pretty well. There were a number of little idiosyncrasies, though: for example, you know how I said I had just discovered I was hosting a tour of our facilities? Well, unfortunately, that tour ended up getting printed a couple of different times in the program in spots where it wasn't supposed to, so I ended up having to do a number of different tours in spots where I'd been counting on crashing for an hour or two. By the time the first day finished up late last night, I was running camera for a one-man interpretation of "Blue Like Jazz" (it was pretty good, by the way. Much better than you'd ever think), and I was falling asleep at the camera. I don't mean like "oh, I'm not on screen right now, I can snooze for a bit." I mean, "doing a slow zoom in on the lead actor and blacking out for a split second midway" sort of falling asleep. I was that tired.

Anyway, the post today highlights my friend Taylor Vinson, who graduated from Asbury in May, and after only two and a half months working in the shadows as a production assistant at a news station, has gotten on a piece on the six o'clock news - as on-air talent. For those of you who don't know how the hierarchy in news stations work and what it takes to get on air: that's a big deal.

Here's a link to the story. And here's to Taylor!

Smart Growth!

The entire Communications Department stayed up all night to create 300 Smart Growth binders that had to be pushed off till the last minute because a good deal of the staff at the church apparently can't be bothered to check their emails. Or their voicemail. Or talk to their assistants. For up to two weeks. So the whole project ended up having to come together at the last minute at an all-night Collating Party at Kinko's. I'm really tired and I discovered I have to lead my session twice today because my listing was accidentally printed twice in the schedule, which I know because it was in those binders we stuffed all night.

This counts as posting. That is all.

Picture Posting

I don't have time to post because we have our Smart Growth Conference coming up tomorrow - I'll say no more about it in order to keep my job, but I'll put it this way: Yesterday morning, I thought I was doing almost nothing for the conference. Yesterday afternoon, I discovered I was speaking at two seminars, in charge of producing the video recording of all of the major sessions, and hosting a tour of the media department. Ha ha! Also, I'm stuffing 300 binders tonight.

Since I can't do anything more interesting, and I spent a good part of the afternoon yesterday writing my last post, all you get today is a picture or two. Let me find one...

Ah! Here we go! This was my day on Monday - after returning from the laundromat, I had to park my car on higher ground in a nearby parking lot and wade through thigh-deep waters on the road to get back home. I couldn't bring my clothes out of the car until the next morning. This is the parking lot I had to drive through in order to park my car on higher ground. The really deep water was on the road behind the cars.


It was awesome. Every store and restaurant worker were just standing outside of their stores, watching. Chris and I kept going out on the balcony, watching the rain all day.