It occurs to me that some people might not have had, in their life, the occasion to experience both anesthesia and fainting. Although one might hope to avoid both of these states, one might still be curious about the sensations involved. That’s where I come in today.

Anesthesia
(If you are curious about occasions where I required anesthesia, they are two surgeries: first, a curettage for a pregnancy that didn’t come full term, and more recently an appendectomy.)

Anesthesia is a blink.
It’s starting to count backwards and, halfway in, blinking to another room and other sounds. There is no feeling of time lost. No subconscious thoughts lingering of what happened.
Even when sleeping, there is a consciousness that feels the passage of time. Not so with anesthesia. There is just going in, and waking up.

Fainting
(For curious minds, again: this was once, right after the appendectomy, when the nurse insisted I make the trip to the bathroom. I made it there, but kissed the floor on my way back.)

Fainting is zapping.
One moment you’re walking around, and very suddenly you are in a vivid dream about something else entirely. Like your mind forgets it’s supposed to be doing something else. Then, after a couple of moments, there is a fade in.

A fade in.
Exactly, perfectly like the movie transition, where a black screen dissolve to an image.
In my case, it was the image of three nurses’ faces bent over mine (exactly like in comedy movies… I was quite amused by the whole event) and the feeling of cold tiles growing under my neck and back. Gravity comes back gradually. The mind has to transition from vertical to horizontal, because it didn’t register the change.

Both sensations are eerie.
I can’t recommend them (health threats and all), but they surely were interesting to experience.

Feel free to note down variations from your own experiences in the comments; I am not pretending this is the same for all!

I’m brewing thoughts on a couple of things that are different and blending together at the same time, and I’m soliciting opinions.

A couple of catalysts:
- I’m turning 30 this year (in about two weeks, in fact).
- I want to start supporting something. A charity, an organization, a cause… I want to do some right for the world (if that makes sense…). We’re blessed and I want to give back a little.

One or two months ago, I thought a small birthday-fundraiser would start me off well. The way these works, is requesting that people give donations instead of gifts/stuff. Charity:Water has a great goal and looks like it’s doing great things, so I would have gone with them. Their website is setup nicely, too.

A couple of things changed my plans:

First, cynics (that I love and trust…!) brought to my attention that not all charities are well managed. That’s likely. I browsed for reviews/ratings on Charity:Water and didn’t find anything worthwhile, so I’m now looking at various charities, trying to find well-rated charities/organizations that support good causes.

I like environment/sustainable world organizations, but I’m having trouble figuring out tangible actions they are taking (I registered on WWF.ca, but I still don’t know what they are doing, exactly, except marketing and attending summits). I also looked into sponsoring a child; it feels like something I would like to do. I’m not a religious person, so Christian sponsoring (such as World Vision and Compassion) is not a good fit for me, but I found “Plan“, which offers child sponsoring — I didn’t find many reviews of them, but what I saw was good enough. “Water for People“, which has objectives similar to Charity:Water, seems like a good one, too.

If you have opinions and sources on good charities/organizations — and validating websites (ex. charitynavigator.org) — I would love to read them. Thank you.

Now, for the other thing: I’m turning 30 in two weeks, I want to make it special (ie. drown out nostalgia and general grumpiness about piling on a new decade). I’m not really a party animal, although I like to hang out with friends; I enjoy explorations and visits/activities. Ideas?

New decade/year. New design for the blog. New resolutions.

• Reduce (overconsumption?) by about 35%.
  Partly because I’m trying to be more environmentally conscious. Partly because, although I knew the cheap stuff I bought probably meant someone was being under-paid to make it, it didn’t resonate loud enough until I heard Annie Leonard, in The Story of Stuff, say “I’m not paying for the things I buy”. I’m a proud person. I don’t want other people to pay for my things (by being exploited).
  I’m not going for Voluntary Simplicity this year, but I’ll try to develop better buying habits.
• Continue to give blood.
• Go to a festival. Hot-air balloons, western, whatever.
• Become better-informed about environmental issues.
• Eat less meat. (Meat pollutes. Heck, meat kills animals.)
• Start to give small chores to the kids, for them to help out around the house.
  So far, I’ve asked them to put away the cereal boxes after breakfast, sort the silverware from the dishwasher, and take out the place mats for dinner. Any other ideas?
• Find a physical activity that is useful (ie. motivating…).

PS. About the new design: it’s going to look super if you’re using Google Chrome (CSS3, yay!), good if you are using Firefox, and ok if you are using standards-carefree Internet Explorer. (Seriously people: IE is dragging its feet in adopting the standards, do yourself a favor and upgrade to an alternate. You will find the web looks better than you thought.)

I love it when life makes my life easier.

If you recall my super list of resolutions for 2009 — I’m sure it’s engraved in your memory, right? Right…? — there were two items toward the end that read: “Take a class or two” and “Donate blood”.

Well tonight, when I walked out of my gypsy-tango dance class, I was standing 3 steps from a blood drive! It was 8:30pm. With the kids in bed, Frank wouldn’t be needing me right away… I reasoned this was the best opportunity I would get to make good on my promise before the end of the year.

The whole experience was really good, too. I was their last client for the night, and the workers were all chatty and charming. They gave me a blood drop pin with a shiny “1″ on it and told me I can give again in January. I’m psyched!

And hey, apart from the water-saving one (I know! I’m sorry, Environment… I just need to get warm in the morning), I’m doing good enough on all my other resolutions for 2009. Yay!

New year, new look
I found one of my favourite winter pictures from 2006, “purpled” it up and married it to our sepia theme for the blog.

New year, new resolutions

• Diet:
  • Continue good progress on the vegetables
    The more, the better!
  • Reduce portions
    I’m an ogre… I consciously reduced my portions over a weekend before the holidays (and spent three days feeling hungry), but there’s still a way to go for my stomach to shrink to a normal size.
  • Eat more fish
    This should go well, since we’re getting better at cooking it.
• Environment:
  • Stop the water while I soap up.
    Since a steaming shower is my version of morning coffee, I’m having moderate success so far. At least, it doesn’t take much time to soap up compared to rinsing, but these nippy intervals are so chilly!
  • Get eco-friendly cleaning products as my old ones need replacing
    (except for Ivory Snow, the official scent of the kids, and Mr. Clean’s oh-so-magic Eraser)
• Take a class or two, learn something new
  Probably at least an evening of photography
• Donate blood and/or time
• Hire a maid
• Work on a project with Frank

Oups: this was supposed to be posted on my birthday two days ago. Turned 28, for inquiring minds.

Signs you’re getting older

• You were there when the original of a “remade” song came out.
• You like some of the songs from the soft-rock station.
• You remember your spouse’s preferred meal, with condiments and beverage, from all the major take-out places.
• In a hurry, you have broken into a half-run – possibly with kids in tow – at the mall.
• You buy clothes as a necessity.
• You buy shampoo according to price.
• You know what “RRP” stands for.
• There are snacks, small toys, a diaper and baby wipes in your purse.
• Objects entering your home are immediately judged by size/choking potential.
• You can navigate the non-creaking floorboards in your child’s bedroom through the dark.
• Someone names you “mommy”.