The other night it rained something fierce. We had a huge storm and some parts of the LA area even got hail and a bit of snow. I think hell might have finally frozen over.

Yesterday I made a run over to Good Sam to pick Rob up from work and see a dermatologist about my fish tattoo. I made the mistake of seeing a Good Sam doctor because there's no deductible to pay under Rob's insurance plan. You really do get what you pay for. *sigh*

Back on the 4th of July I got a little blue fish tattoo on my left inner ankle. It seemed to heal up well and then the dark blue ink started puffing up. The light blue ink was normal. I've tried various creams and nothing seemed to help so I decided to see a doctor about it. Instead of going to a real doctor, I saw one of the incompitent fuck ups from Good Sam (hey, I'm out of work and free is about the only doctor I can afford right now).

The doctor was retarded and an asshole. After waiting around for awhile (which is the norm for any doctor's office) he came in and asked me what my problem was. I pulled up my pants leg to show him and told him the problem. He glanced at the tattoo from across the room and told me it was "cobolt granuloma" (for those of you D&D geeks out there, no, Kobolds did not eat my fishay). He didn't look at it up close and he didn't touch it at all. He glanced from about 15-20 feet away. I told him I had other tattoos and he didn't ask if anything weird ever happened to them or if any of them had any blue in in them. He just told me it was "cobolt granuloma" and said he would make an appointment with me for laser removal for next week. What? Hold on now there. I don't want my fishay removed and I told him so. I asked if it would get worse (it's just a little puffy and doesn't really bother me at all) and he said no. I asked if there were ANY treatments I could try and he said no. I told him that unless it was necessary I wasn't getting the fish removed. He told me that when I mature and grew up enough to want it removed to call him and walked out of the room. He sent me home with a xerox about cobolt allergies (it had nothing to do with tattooing - it was about how bricklayers and metal workers might be sensitive to the metal cobolt).

Is it just me, or is this one of the worst derms out there? Something didn't sit right with me so when I got home I looked some things up on the internet. That's when I found out that this guy was an asshole who didn't know what the hell he was taking about. I did find out some interesting things, however.
1. I saw pictures of granulomas in tattoos, and it looks nothing like what is happening to my fishay.
2. I read up about cobolt dermatitis and it said that if you react with a cobolt allergy to blue ink, that you will have reactions to black ink and sometimes red inks as well. I have other tattoos in black and in red and have never had any problems with them.
3. I read a posting from a girl who had the same symptoms that I do with blue ink and she found out that for some odd reason her body took 3-4 times longer to heal blue ink than any other color. The puffing went away for her after awhile.
4. There ARE treatments for ink allergies and for cobolt granuloma. There are creams to try and even pills. And only if those all fail should removal be considered (unless the patient wants removal in the first place).

This guy insisted that my only option was removal. I asked him if I could try some other treatment and he told me no. He didn't look at the tattoo and made his diagnosis from across the room. This really isn't right. So, when I have the money, I will see a real derm. I need to see my allergist and regular internist when I have the money for a visit and I'll ask them about it and see if they can recommend a derm to me.

The moral of this story is that no matter what, no one out there should go to a doctor from Good Sam. This is the second time I've had problems with them (the first being when someone saw something bad on a CAT scan and I had to get an MRI to see if I had an anurysm or a brain tumor - nothing showed up on the MRI and the original guy seemed to have read the CAT scan wrong). Nice to put me through the freaking out of thinking that I have something in my head waiting to pop.

This has also made me realize that I should only listen to myself when it comes to something like a tattoo. I had originally wanted to get my fishay done in a rainbow design, but after Rob, Carrie, and Shannon teased me that it would be a "gay fishay" I went with blue. If I would have gone with my gut and gotten the cute rainbow colors instead of blue I wouldn't be having this problem.

So, right now I think I should get a second opinion and not trust this doc. I really don't think he's a good doctor at all. Any opinions on this situation from you out there? If anyone knows anything about problems with tattoos drop me a line and let me know.

After the derm appointment I drove Rob home and he and I spent the night in and watched TV. The rest of the night was thankfully uneventful. Tonight we're playing D&D which should be fun. I always have fun with it and I think Rob could use it - he's having a very bad day at work today.

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You Are Submissive!

Pain may or may not be your thing, but chances are at least a little spanking turns you on.
Submissive doesn't mean your a masochist (though you could be!)
It means you like your lover to take charge ... and take care of you
In return, you like to worship your partner - in whatever way (s)he wants!

Are You Dominant or Submissive?
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