WFMW: What NOT to Soak Your Contacts In!

This week's Works For me Wednesday theme is "What DIDN'T Work For Me." Enjoy!

Once when I was visiting my friend Wendy, I had to stay overnight at her house unexpectedly because I had a horrible headache and was unable to make the hour and fifteen minute drive home. I didn't have anything with me for soaking my contact lenses, which were not the kind that could be slept in. (Nowadays, I use the kind you can wear for a solid month - I LOVE them!!!) No one at my friend's house wore contacts, and being a poor college student, I didn't go out to buy anything.

My friend gave me a couple of drinking glasses to hold my contacts and suggested that I simply soak them in water.

"Oh, no, no, no," I said. "That wouldn't be sterile."

Enter mysterious, foreboding music.

"Hmmmm . . . eye drops are sterile. Got anything like that?" I asked. They provided a bottle of Murine. I happily squirted a bit into each glass, plopped in my contacts, and went to bed.

The next morning - after a restless night thanks to a hyperactive hamster and his squeaky exercise wheel - I put my contacts back in. My eyes stung a little, but that had happened before when I had to put a contact back in without rinsing or cleaning, so I didn't think much of it.

Fifteen minutes later, in the middle of the morning rush hour on a busy interstate, my eyes were on fire. One was unable to open due to the pain. The other was half shut and tears were pouring out of it, making everything a blur. I couldn't go back to my friend's house, as everyone had already left for the day, and I didn't know anyone else in this city. Of course, this was also in the Dark Ages before cell phones.

It was the longest drive of my life. I kept thinking, When I can just get these things out of my eyes, I'll be fine! I made it back to my dorm, ran to my room, and swiftly plucked out my contacts. I closed my eyes, expecting blessed relief.

S-C-R-A-A-A-A-P-E!

Imagine that an evil plastic surgeon removed your eyelids and replaced them with 80 grit sandpaper, with the rough side facing your eyeballs. This almost approximates what my eyes felt like every time I blinked.

I ended having my friend Junior take me to Urgent Care, where they said that I had irritated my corneas or something. They numbed my eyes (with drops, thank goodness!) and rubbed some kind of ointment on my eyeballs.

That was an experience, watching a gloved finger with a glob of goo come straight for my eye. It was like something out of The Twilight Zone. They bandaged my eyes, gave me a prescription for something with Codeine in it, then brought Junior from the waiting room to lead me out.

"Bwaaaaaaaaah-ha-ha-ha-ha!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! You look like a bug!!!!!"

Junior has never been known for subtlety. Or tact.

By the time he got me back to my dorm room, Wendy was there with Suzanne, my roommate. The Codeine had kicked in, and I was feelin' mighty fine! I became their entertainment for the afternoon.

First, they took me to the park with them and had a ball leading me down the twirly slide. I'm sure it was a sight! Here I was, looking like an albino fly, laughing hysterically as I slid down over and over. (I'm sure the playground was cleared of children moments after my arrival.)

I tried playing Frisbee with them by randomly slapping my outstreched arms together "alligator style."

I didn't catch anything.

Next, they drove me to each of my professors' houses, parading me around while I giggled, "I'm on Codeine!"

The next day, my eyes were just fine, although I can't say much for my dignity. I have to say, I never left home without saline solution again!

Speaking of what doesn't work for me, as you can see from this post Blogger has a mind of its own and is always changing my font size! When I try to edit and fix this, it looks fine in the editing box but when I click "Publish Post" it goes back to the wrong size again! Anyone know how to fix this?

Here are my previous WFMW posts:

Broken Glass Cleanup
Cheap Rolling Cart for Conventions
Chocolate Recipes
Tooth-Tugging Tip for Terrified Tots
Handy Earache Relief
Uses for Leftover Bread
Leaky Diaper/Pull-up Fix
Snack Mix Recipe (at the end of the post)
Awesome Stain Recipe (at the end of the post)
"Fun"damentals of Family Life
Removing Wite-Out from Everything
When NOT to Save Money
Public Service Announcement

For more WFMW tips, stop by Shannon's blog.

My Secret Life as a Bunny (Part 2)

Yesterday I told you about my foray into the bunny business. In answer to your questions, I stuck (or shall I say, "stunk"?) it out for the whole school year.

My favorite part of being Cecil was the children. As school mascots go, bunnies are cuter than, say, vikings or gladiators, which gave me instant celebrity status among the kids at the games. One child whom I'll never forget hugged on me at every game. It was obvious that she was mentally challenged in some way and I always made a point of approaching her. She gave me a plastic stretchy heart bracelet that I still have to this day.

To further my career, I played the Easter Bunny at a local mall for one season in college. (I'm quite sure that I was the only applicant with previous experience.) The mall provided several CLEAN costumes. They were nearly identical to the Cecil costume, minus the teenage boy sweat.

There were several of us playing the famed furry creature. Besides me, there were a couple of other college girls and a really cute, popular high school boy who just happened to be my height. (This detail will be important later in this post.)

We had a lengthy job description, which included things like "no talking" and "no hopping" (it looked "awkward"). That took a lot of the fun out of it. Oh, well. No one said anything about skipping, so skip I did!

For the most part, it wasn't that exciting. (I always worked the slow nights. If you want to avoid the lines, your best bet is a Tuesday.)

I was always so excited for a child to come. The one good thing about it being so slow is that I was able to spend as much time as I wanted with each one. They often sat on my lap for a long time, pouring out their little hearts. I remember one little boy shared how his team had just lost their soccer game. I nodded soberly and patted his shoulder, and he seemed to feel better.

Sometimes, I would get up and dance with the children to the mall Musak, and they just cracked up. I had as much fun as they did!

The most depressing moment was when someone brought the tiniest baby I ever saw for me to hold. I heard the mother say that they had come straight from the hospital. I was so angry and wanted to yell, "Lady, do you know how many kids have sneezed, picked their noses and butts, and rubbed their grubby hands all over my fur????" The young mother obviously didn't know any better. I'll never forget her standing there with her greasy, stringy hair and decaying teeth, smiling at her tiny baby and saying over and over, "She's so little." Meanwhile, I was trying as hard as I could to hold the baby securely while letting the least bit of fur touch her as possible. I remember praying the whole time, "Dear Lord, please don't let this precious baby get sick."

Another memorable moment was a large, gussied up, hoity toity family that came to have their portrait made with the Easter Bunny. I wish I could remember all the children's names. They sounded like surnames, and they all ended in -ton. The ones I do remember were Carrington, Wellington, Washington, and Remington (some were girls!) They weren't little kids, either. Most of them were teenagers. I think the thing that struck me the most was how seriously they took themselves, as if this were an expensive portrait studio. I remember thinking, c'mon, people. This is the MALL! You're getting a POLAROID!

My most interesting visitors were also teenagers. Remember the high school hottie I told you about earlier who also played the Easter Bunny? And remember that the Easter Bunny is not allowed to talk?

This is where it gets fun.

A group of giggling teenyboppers came bouncing over to see me. Well, not me. But apparently they didn't know that.

These girls were poured into their jeans and wore heavy makeup. Imagine Bratz dolls coming to life. ~shudder~

They were rather, um, flirtatious.

I don't want to go into the way that they sat on (read: straddled) my knees.

~Throwing up. Violently.~

True to my job description, I didn't talk. I just sat there, doing my bunny duty while silently begging them to leave.

If only I could have been a fly on the wall at their school the next day! I could just imagine their conversation:

Giggling Girls: Batting eyes. Hiiiiiiiii, Jooooooooooooooooshhhhhhhhh!!!!
We enjoyed seeing you last night!!!!!

Josh: What are you talking about?

And now you know . . . the rest of the story!