I'm still having unexplainable symptoms of something, and it's driving me just a touch bat-shit-crazy.

Just a touch.

There is a very rational part of my brain that says things like "Melissa, you are not that sick. You need to eat better, get plenty of rest, and this will all go away. You do not have anything life threatening."

The problem is that the rational part of my brain, let's call her "Doris" because I think that's funny, is sort of a boring, matronly gal. The completely irrational part of my brain, we'll call her "Rita" because I also think that's funny, is a hypochondriac in a short skirt.

Doris and Rita are locked in eternal battle. Doris tells me that I need to get over myself and stop Googling my symptoms. Rita would have me believe I've got several forms of cancer. 

And since I've been going to see the doctor, and neither she or the emergency room staff can as of yet tell me what's wrong with me, I'm way past being freaked out. In other words: Rita is having a field day, imagining that I've got something very tragic and hard to detect.

Especially since I thought I was getting better, and today I am clearly not.

This what seems to be true:

 Sometimes I have a lot of pain, but with a few rare exceptions, it's at most like a six on the scale of 1 to "I want my mommy."

The pain feels like it moves to various places in my abdomen. First it felt like kidney and back pain, then, stomach, then it felt like my intestines were burning up, and now, it's just a sort of vagueish-middleish sore spot.

I haven't had a fever, although I may have one now.

I have a strong suspicion that this is connected to what I'm eating, but I haven't yet found a pattern.

The CT scan showed nothing, except a "pulmonary nodule." Don't Google that, you'll have lung cancer. True story.

Anyhow, I have an appointment to see a specialist on Thursday and I'm going to try to not psych myself out in the two days in between.

Here's a not-so-shocking, not-so-secret secret: I am a horrible driver. I blame a complete and total lack of natural instinct for the task, plus, I learned to drive and have done most of my driving in Massachusetts. Which, if you're reading this from far-off wherever, please understand this just amplifies the problem. It is totally normal for me that other drivers wouldn't dream of letting me cut into a line of traffic or will cut me off all together, thereby forcing me to swerve into oncoming cars or a guardrail, or whatever. Par for the course.

That said, I took a jaunt up to the not-so-cold because summer decided to show up in March, not-so-great-white-North. Specifically, a friend borrowed a cabin in New Hampshire and I, being in need of vacation, drove up. At first I was ridiculously worried that I'd agreed to venture into the middle of nowhere, because that's where the GPS took me. Up and down a dark, foggy mountain, even though it turns out I could have just stayed on one road to get where I needed to be. Usual story: it was dark, there were no other cars on this road, I hate nature, etc.

So it was a relief to drive into the town I was staying and find not only civilization but outlet shopping! Yeah, lights, shoppers, discounted merchandise! I can handle anything if I can shop, even the country. So in my way I was then prepared for a weekend in a place not resembling anything like a city. But then it got very weird.

The other drivers on the road got out of my way. They let me out of parking spaces into long lines of traffic. They didn't ride my bumper going up the windy mountain roads. They gave the polite, friendly little wave after acts of driving kindness.

It was very strange. Nice, but strange. Needless to say I was totally out of my element, and I'm not totally convinced it wasn't just the Mass plates on my car that made the other cars keep their distance, although that's not my point. The point is that polite drivers plus shopping means New Hampshire has officially earned my Melanie Griffith in Working Girl seal of approval.