What Makes a Man?

I've been toying with the idea of "slow-betting" this contest by not letting you guys know how I'm doing. The plan has been to take advantage of my monumentally late start so that I could hopefully slip under the radar and be the Cinderella Story that takes home the gold. Alas, I am not strong enough to do this. Win or lose, I need some validation right now, and you seem the only group of people with whom I can share the epic achievements I've been making these last couple days. Without a doubt, this is far worse than the previous contest. I can't emphasize enough how accurate TK's "pack of cigarettes" analogy was. This is F-ing miserable.

For a change of pace, here is a light-hearted story recounting an experience I had today. If you're pressed for time, by all means stop reading now.

I had to get some bloodwork done today (the good Lord chose to bless me with a faulty liver). Between previous bouts with this ordeal, donating blood and the like, I really have no fear of needles and such this days. It's been years since blood drawing has left me even remotely nervous, but I still generally heed the advice of turning my head away. I've made the occasional glance, nothing big, and often times they cover it up anyway. Today I decided that there'd be no problem watching the entire procedure. The bitch rolled up my sleeve, tied the doohickey around my bicep, and immediately commented, "nice veins," to which I of course replied, "that's what they tell me." She pulled out her needle and stuck one of the two nice veins that even Helen Keller would have found. My first response was that maybe looking was a bad idea because, for some reason, it already hurt more than usual. Whatever, I'm tough, I played ball. She attached the first tube and hit the valve which should have resulted in the container filling up pretty quickly. The actual result... was intense pain... no blood flow. After waiting for a moment (as if my blood were simply playing a game with her stupid ass) my forearm took it upon itself to shoot the needle out, and spitefully include a geyser of blood. Thanks forearm. She recollected herself and then prepared another needle for the other superhighway of a vein, explaining "It popped out." I tried to act interested as if she had just taught me something, then applied more pressure to the gauze pad because my fingers were getting wet. So, to be sure she got the next one right (instead of lodging a hollow metal spike into my ulna) she went SLOW. Ten careful minutes later, she had a cum shot worth of blood. Congratulations. She said I was done and to go to the check-out. When I stood up I thought to myself, "Man, stood up too fast, a little light headed." As I walked toward the desk across the hall, I realized I was stumbling a startling amount. I threw all my weight onto the table in front of the secretary so as not to fall on the lobby floor. As I leaned there for awhile, I couldn't help but notice that my vision was blurring a good deal. Only when she said to me, "Sir, if you're ready, I'll take that slip now," did I realize that she'd been holding her hand out for quite some time. I can't think of a sincere enough way to express that I couldn't see all that happening, so I thrust my papers into the direction of the voice. A minute went by and she told me I was all set. Another minute or two went by and she said, "Sir, you can leave now." Little did she know that I was insisting on leaning against that table until I could figure out, at the very least, what color her skin was. I'm not racist, I just figured that if I couldn't decipher her skin color, I probably had no business walking around the place. The search for the car and the journey home were also eventful, but this has gone long enough, and I feel the story has already peaked. In closing, I'd like to add that, as far as this contest goes, it's a good thing I'm a switch-hitter.