I am an idiot. A shivering idiot. I went out in the cold rain in a long-sleeved t-shirt and a thin water-resistant jacket. I should have worn a sweater. I'm home and dry but still cold.

I was back at Mass General today, this time for an ultrasound to find out what's up with my neck. It looks strange. The right side is sort of convex, like my lymph nodes are swollen. The ultrasound didn't find anything abnormal, so I wiped the gel off and let them take more blood and had an uneasy conversation with a nurse about the possibility of someone sticking a needle in my neck for a biopsy. I keep thinking of taking core samples from trees in my freshman forestry class. I don't want someone taking a core sample of my neck. To quote Carrie Fisher, fuck that shit.

When I left the hospital, there were no taxis at the cab stand, of course. It was cold and rainy and I was second in a line of six or eight people and there were no cabs anywhere. When one finally showed up, he insisted that he was there to pick up a particular individual and wouldn't let anyone else get in. The chances of him finding this specific woman were somewhere between slim and none. I was so cold by that point that I was ready to off him and steal his cab, but instead I placed a cranky call to a local taxi company and suggested that they get some cabs to the hospital before violence erupted.

I finally got myself (and my neck) into a cab with a sullen Persian behind the wheel who turned up the radio in the back as soon as I pulled out my phone. I checked my messages anyway and found a voicemail from my real estate agent saying the application was through and the apartment was mine. Yeah baby! She said that she was going out of town, but I should call her Tuesday to start figuring out a move-in date. (Monday is the Boston Marathon. I live near the finish line. They're expecting about 500,000 people this year.)

The cabbie gave me twelve dollars in change in ones, which I transferred to Pier at the video store for returning Bring It On a few days late. I rented Almost Famous and, as the next in my tour d' Crowe series, Romper Stomper. Pier said it's better than Virtuosity so I should see it first. I trust him. He's my videoboi. He's seen every movie ever made and we share some favorites, so I'll overlook his inexplicable dislike for Peter Weir.

I asked him if I'd be really sorry I watched Romper Stomper though. I recently saw American History X (this is what you do when you're stuck in a Florida hotel room: watch cable) and while it was an extremely good movie, it was a little upsetting. C'mon, don't tell me you'll ever forget the curb scene.

So why should I rent an Australian movie about neo-Nazi skinheads? Because Russell Crowe is in it. "'I'd rather get beat up by Ed Norton than Russell Crowe," Pier said thoughtfully. "Russell Crowe would fuck your shit up."

Pier gave me the movie poster for The Watcher, which someone doctored to make it look like Keanu Reeves was strangling Hillary Clinton (excuse me, Senator Clinton). I love it. I'll hang it in the new apartment.

I just read over this entry and realized how much profanity I used in it. I usually avoid profanity because I think it's a mark of a lousy writer; profanity is an easy substitute for more powerful language. But I'm still shivering a little and I just don't give enough of a shit to correct it all. Deal with it.

"Nice talk, sugar mouth." (Grosse Pointe Blank)