Justin of the GOGOGO

The thought of a razor blade or laser slicing corneal tissue on my eye, lifting a flap of it up, and then getting another laser blasting tissue away was a squirmy atrocious thought, and still gives me the heebiejeebies. But then I found out that my health insurance at work decided to cover it this past year, so why not?

I never quite thought glasses worked on my face, and the dry and irritated flareups that happen when I wear contact lenses with an abnormal sleep schedule is rough. Also, if conservative America did decide to revolt against the current administration and the world reverted to post-apocalyptic hunter-gatherer societies, it would be good to know that I wouldn't die in the first ten seconds from a tiger that I thought was a rock because everything more than three inches from my face is a complete blur.

I pursued two eye institutes but neither gave me good vibes, and one was really hostile when it came to payments and insurance. I decided to go with the Filutowski Cataract and Lasik Institute in Orlando because I heard they automatically took care of all the insurance stuff, did very good work, and had a very friendly staff made of 100% hot women. After a 3 hour consultation where it was determined I had microns of corneal tissue to spare, my lasering was scheduled for 10/16/09.

My friend Erin was kind enough to take the day off work to drive me since you can't see well enough to drive yourself afterward. After registering, they give you a vallium to calm your nerves, but it takes about an hour to kick in. The offices were going through major remodeling, and the hour or so wait was accented with deafening banging and drilling on the uncarpeted floor, which undid whatever serenity the vallium would have probably brought.

The waiting room was full of people, and there were about 20 or so signed in above my name that arrived as early as 7 am. Every five minutes, someone was coming out saying how wonderful it was they could see again. It was really nice to see someone's life changed drastically every few moments, and at 6k per person, this office was pulling in a hundred grand before lunch. I guess the yellow Ferrari parked in the first spot that I noticed as we walked in belonged to Filutowski.

They finally called my name and this Scottish lady with a delightful accent led me into a large medical room with two reclined chairs and two sitting chairs. I sat in one of the sitting chairs and she rubbed something all around my eye, and below my eyebrow and said to keep my eyes closed. I think it was some kind of numbing agent, and it gradually began to feel very hot. There were three other people also in the room - no one said anything to each other but you could feel some sort of kinship that everyone was blindly going through the same unknown scary procedure.

After sitting for a few minutes, the Scottish lady comes back and brings me into a room with a huge machine in it and a reclined chair. I sat in the reclined chair and they put some drops in my eyes. The other lasik doctor was named Dr. Dempsey was a very sweet person with a wonderfully soft voice. Her presence was very calming as she came in and put her hands on my shoulders and assured me that everything was going to be fine during the procedure. She said she would tell me everything as it is happening, but I requested that she doesn't actually tell me what is happening, but an indication of where the procedure is at would be nice. She said she would spare the gory details. She said I would feel pressure as the machine pushes on my eye, but there would be no pain.

After a few more drops, she put a strip of opaque tape over my left eye presumably to block my vision so I would only see out of one eye, and then rotated me under the machine. It was very claustrophobic, and looking up at the machine, all I could see are these beautiful concentric circles of blue and white light. A few last drops and then it felt like a plastic ring was put around my eye to possibly keep it in place, and then I was instructed to look forward as the machine came closer and closer. It came all the way in contact with the ring, and even further pushed onto my face.

Dr. Dempsey said that the procedure was starting, and I felt this sudden tremor across my vision. I was trying to place what step of the procedure I thought each action was doing, and I thought that was the flap being cut. I was definitely feeling very nervous and was wondering if I was starting to feel panicky, but I kept concentrating on the rings of light, which eventually just faded to black over the next 30 seconds. Then the machine lifted off, and Dr. Dempsey said that my right eye was done. They did the same thing to my left eye twice, but didn't ever explain what the second time was for.

But that was it, each eye took less than a minute. No pain, just pressure and claustrophobia. More drops were put in and I was told to keep my eyes closed for the next 10 minutes as I waited back in the first room. The Scottish lady led me back there, slowly pulling on my hands to direct my walking. I could tell there were others in the room as well, and we all could hear this loud zapping sound coming from outside the hall. After about 10 minutes, I was told to lie in the reclining chair while more drops were put in, and the few seconds that my eyes were open for the drops, it seemed like I could see better than before.

After another five minutes or so, in which time I almost felt like I could fall asleep in the reclining chair, the Scottish lady came to me and said that the laser machine was ready for me. This was quite a surprise because I thought I was done after that first machine, which was entirely just a flap cutting machine.

I could open my eyes now, but everything was hazy and cloudy. I was led into the adjacent room to a reclining chair, and Dr. Filutowski sitting to the side of it. I am really out of it at this point, and I was barely acknowledging my surroundings. He shook my hand and introduced himself in an eastern European accent, but I barely responded because I wasn't even sure what I was doing or where I was going.

I sat in the reclining chair and above me was another machine like the first, but this one didn't have any claustrophobia - there were two yellow lights and a red laser that flooded my vision with a ton of light, blocking everything else out, Dr. Filutowski put two pieces into the top and bottom of my eye to hold it open, and told me to look right at the red laser. Lasers are interesting to look at, and if you ever see one from a pointer on the wall, you might have noticed that it doesn't stay static like normal light does - it looks all dynamic and has these dots in it that sort of dance all around. Staring at this huge laser light in my face is interesting in the same way - its light moves all around like a flames from a campfire. There was a green light almost behind the laser, and if i shifted my vision around a bit, I could see the green light and not the laser.

More drops came in, and I could feel the doctor nudging something on my eye over and over again, which I am guessing was him trying to lift up my flap. After a few nudges, he said we were going to begin, and to always look at the laser. I read that the laser tracks your tiny eye movements, even the ones you aren't aware of, so there isn't any way to really screw it up if you had to shift your eye for some reason. I felt the urge to blink more than with the flap cutting machine, and my eyes were slightly constricting around the pieces that were holding my eye open. The doctor said there would be no pain but that I would smell the burning tissue.

The procedure started, and the laser started moving towards my face very slowly, and the same loud, staticy pulses that I was hearing earlier started coming from the machine. The laser was bathing my eye in light, and I could smell my burning corneal tissue, which smelled like burning hair or paper. The laser started moving around slightly and I just looked where it was moving. When the laser got really close a few seconds later, it suddenly went back to its starting position and that eye was done. More drops, nudging which I presume was putting the flap back in place, and then the two pieces holding it open were taken out, and that eye was done. Total time was about a minute.

He did the same thing to my left eye, but while looking at the laser, I lost sight of it and only saw the green light. I said that I couldn't see it anymore, but then it came back into view.

After both eyes were done, I closed them, and the doctor said that it went well and I should have a great result. He sat me up, moved my legs from the chair to the floor, and told me to smile for the camera. I was like, Huh? Camera? I opened my eyes and looked to the right, and there was the Scottish lady with a point and shoot. Filutowski said to give a thumbs up, so I did:




The scottish lady led me back to the waiting room. My vision was immediately better - I could resolve details at a distance even though it was foggy and hazy. Imagine taking greasy fingers and smudging up glasses lenses. A few seconds later they came with a bag full of stuff for me, including the photo, sunglasses to wear home since I was light-sensitive, and sleeping medicine for later. My eyes were starting to get irritated towards the end of the two hour ride home, and I took the sleeping medicine at about 2 pm. When I woke up once at about 9 pm, everything was very clear. I could see the alarm clock and the window and all the details I was never able to resolve around my room, which was an extraordinary feeling. I fumbled around for my glasses instinctively for a few seconds, not yet realizing that I didn't need them anymore. I put in more drops, then slept until about 4 am, put in more drops, and then slept until 5:30 am. I had to get up to drive myself to my next day appointment at the same office.

The next day checkup revealed that I am healing nicely. They hope for a 70% improvement in vision after the first day, and I was way beyond that. I went from a -8.0 prescription to about a -1.0, which is going from completely non-functional near blindness to near perfect vision. Things at a distance are not 100% clear and my astigmatism, which I hoped to totally eradicate, is still with me. But it is a phenomenal difference and I am very, very happy with the result. It must be really special for the staff to give these kinds of sacred gifts to people every day.

There are some common side effects of lasik that go away over time - starbursting and halos. Bright, single points of light have much more of a glow to them than usual, and a square grid of tiny rainbows appears around it.

Where you would see this:





I see this:





It is really striking, and it made for a pretty drive to the eye institute that morning. When I come out of work late at night, I always have to stop and admire the pretty colors of the rainbow that the parking lot lights create. I wish you could see it, it makes everything in the world just a tiny bit prettier.


Looking back, it was really all a great experience. It is life-changing to be able to see again without the use of aids, and while the unknown procedure was scary to go through, now that I know what to expect, I could do it again easily. It wasn't more than four minutes of procedures per eye in total, and absolutely no pain. The price varies depending on how much tissue is blasted away, and mine being the worst you can get, cost about $6,000, of which I'll be paying $1,000 of after deductibles and percentages and such.

But the eye bruising from the procedures lasts about a month, and isn't very pretty.

( Two days later )


( Nine days later )

I have 11 hours left of terrible eyesight and then I shall be going under the laser. It feels strange to lose something that has been there all my life, even if it is a nuisance. Bad vision bewilderingly becomes a part of you. Unlike other kinds of vanity surgery that changes the way others perceive me, this will radically shift how I perceive the world, and I seem scared by this.

I almost want to bask in the blurriness and savor the haze, and implant in my memory the way a sharp stop sign with glasses becomes a tremendous red blob without. Or how a flick of an eyelash can make an astigmatic brother of this monitor screen converge on its maker. It is somehow bittersweet, and I shall miss the quadruple traffic lights that I see every intersection at night when there is only supposed to be one. Studying the faces of my loves was always done at a one-inch length with cloud-colored eyes, a whimsical closeness that the farsighted miss.

But I take solace knowing that if a post-apocalyptic future is ahead of us, I won't die five minutes later in a jungle from the tiger that was three feet in front of me but I thought was just a huge growling rock.

Also, with lasers in my eyes, I have now assimilated into my second X-man.

To solidify OkCupid's computer science nerdiness and utter domination as the best dating site alive, they released an application that creates a graph based on the dating questions I have answered. It has a starting point and paths through all the very important questions I answered and ends up with a solid "Let's bang" or "Sorry, I need to wash my hair tonight."

I would guess that most people's graphs can fit on one or two pages. Mine is 8 feet tall by 6.5 feet wide. I think I will print it out and hang it up, my house could use some new wallpaper.

Check it out: Best graph ever

Edit of last post:

Second date, as terrible as I thought it went, didn't deter her a bit. But after today, it is back to being a third date curse.

Last night, I had my first date in 15 months, and it was fantastic. Tonight was my first second date in 15 months, and I think I shall rename it to the second date curse. Pure epic failure. I seriously doubt my ability to relate to anyone when trying to explore a relationship possibility.

I think my hair line is receding. Genetics are lame.

For the past year or so, I thought and have been telling people that I was 28 years old. My tax software just informed me that I am indeed only 27.

Thank you, TaxCut Free Edition®. You have made my day by making me feel less old.

Not 24 hours after my last rant about Batman Begins, I get this in my email:

On my main dating site, I keep getting asked why I hate Batman Begins. I have to reconstruct my argument from memory every single time, so I figured that I would archive my reasoning here for quick reference should this topic come up again. Plus, I think it is pretty funny.

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Batman Begins was TERRRRRIBLE. I've only met like two other people who didn't think this movie was amazing, but we all hated it for the same reasons completely independently.

It was cheesy. Oh god, was it cheesy. Here's just one example: remember when Bruce Wayne had these two skanks in a hotel lobby or something and they were causing an uproar, and some bell boy comes over to Bruce Wayne and tells him to settle his guests. Then this jerk pulls a check out of his pocket, hands it to the bell boy, and is like, "MUHAHAHAHA I JUST BOUGHT YOUR HOTEL, BELL BOY! I CAN DO WHATEVER I WANT!!!!" He doesn't even know if the hotel is up for sale. Maybe it is owned by a hard working American who loves running a hotel and whose dream is to own a hotel so he can pass it on to his kids one day. And here comes some arrogant millionaire who thinks he can just buy anyone's labor of love. If I walked into a restaurant and handed the bus boy a check and said that I owned his shit now, he'd probably tell me to fuck off and call the cops. It is all terribly unrealistic and made me sink in my movie theater chair because it was so cheesy and embarrassing. I guess I don't really like Batman as a character in his human or costume form. He's elitist and a jerk as a man, and sounds dumb and edited too fast (more on this later) as a bat. At least Michael Keaton's Bruce Wayne was admirable and humble as a man, and didn't do any kind of stupid voice as a bat.

The dialogue was nonsensical. People's conversation was totally unrealistic, stunted, and unnatural. I haven't seen it since, so my memory kind of lapses with specific examples, but I am reminded of when Bruce Wayne was riding in a car with Katie Holmes and getting all emo about how Gotham was a bad place, so she turns a sharp corner down some poverty-stricken street and starts to spout some sentences that are supposed to be inspiring but just end up sounding terrible. Again, I can't remember the exact words, but I assure you they were BAD. Everything Liam Neeson said was terrible and it sounded so cliche as well.

The fight scenes were nonsensical. I have great respect for Christopher Nolan for directing Memento, my 4th favorite movie of all time. In that movie, the dialogue was real and meaningful, the story was great, the editing was expertly crafted, and it was all around sensational. But in Batman Begins, it looks like anytime there was the tiniest bit of action, the camera is two inches from someone's face or unidentified body part. The editing is the worst kind of MTV-quick-cutting dreck, with no shot lasting more than a quarter of a second. It was all just a blur to me, and I got very frustrated not even being able to see if that was a punch that just landed. Was it a fist? A kick? A gun? You don't know because you can't see!

The story was nonsensical. So this group of like 10 ninjas in Asia somewhere singly decides that this one city somewhere they've never been before is sooooo sinful that they must just take it over and kill everyone and everything. I could understand if they were like terrorists that hated the country as a whole, but this was just a single city. What foreign policy grievance could the mayor of Gotham City possibly have done to some unknown ninja compound in rural China that they would actually care about? LAME. Also, there is a lot of focus in the story of how Bruce Wayne becomes Batman and develops all the gadgets and all that jazz. We see everything he does and how he learns from his mistakes and develops bigger and better things when something doesn't work. So there's this one part when he gets set on fire and thrown off the roof of a building. I didn't recall anything about the development of the bat suit that said it was fireproof, and his face if exposed somewhat, so how did he not get burned? And he's in a total tail spin, but you never see how he survives the fall. This shows an inconsistent attention to detail - finely tuned in some places and gaping holes in others. Pair it with all the other inconsistencies in the movie and it just is a mess.

The villains were nonsensical. We have Scarecrow who has the most stunted, pretentious dialogue ever in his human form, and in his monster form, you catch like two glimpses of him, then Katie Holmes shoots him in the face with a tazer and he's dead with almost no fanfare or confrontation. Like I mentioned, everything Liam Neeson says or does just feels cliche and dumb, so I didn't care for him at all either.

The Batman Voice®. FFS.

There's way more, but I've blocked it from my memory because the trauma was too great. All of these things added up to an incredible disappointment for me because I was hoping this would be the redemption of the franchise after two incredibly lame sequels. Christopher Nolan? Awesome! Christian Bale? Incredible. Michael Caine and Morgan Freeman? All the better! An hour into the movie, I was cursing Christopher Nolan under my breath. "Oh god Chris, what the F did you do? This had such potential."

The two other people that I knew that hated this movie for the same reasons, but they went and saw The Dark Knight, and said that it is way better. They said there is still some of the same problems, but overall it is much more enjoyable and less annoying.

I still have my doubts, though. I saw a clip of Bruce Wayne in a restaurant talking with Aaron Eckhart and Maggie Gyllenhaal. There doesn't seem to be enough room at the table, so Aaron, like a gentleman, is like, "hey should we get them to push some tables together so we all could sit down?" And smug, arrogant asshole Bruce Wayne is like, "well they better, I OWN THIS RESTAURANT MUHAHHAHAHAHAA I'M SO RICH AND YOU AREN'T!" My hopes aren't very high after seeing that.

With the way people nitpick most movies for bad elements, I'd have thought that all of these problems would be incredibly obvious. It completely baffles me how this movie seemingly has universal appeal.

So in short, this movie sucked. I want to nail Christopher Nolan to the cross for his sin. The end.

Today was my third Intercenter Run, a healthful running race on the KSC landing strip that all KSC employees are invited to attend.

I was absolute last place in the 2 mile run last year. And not by a short time - like almost two minutes. I ended up with 28:45. Of course, I had to defend my title this year and get dead last again.

This year, I finished at about 26:25, and am pretty sure there were people behind me still running the 2 mile (unless they were finishing up the 5 mile). I guess I am just too good - I both meet AND exceed my goals.