PSA

because i'm REALLY WHITE, i don't tan.  i mean, obviously.  i guess i didn't realize that until relatively recently, because i did get some bad burns when i was younger because i was attempting to tan.  or being lazy with the sunscreen.

and now i've had two pre-melanomas removed!  awesome!

they are called displastic nevuses (nevi?), and apparently dermatologists are split - some think that displastic nevuses turn into melanomas if you don't do anything; others think that melanomas start out as melanomas and displastic nevuses are nothing to worry about.

i've had my two removed - one in may of last year and one in august - one of which was in the "moderate" stage instead of the "mild" stage, and required a two inch incision to get it all out and seven stitches and a pretty beastly scar.  if people ask about it sometimes i tell them i was knifed in a bar fight.  because it looks like that.  when i was in europe, british people were especially susceptible to believing this story.  in my mind, this is because there is so little violence in the uk and they imagine that the united states is crazy-violent and something like this could just HAPPEN.*

so now i'm going to the dermatologist's office every six months to check my moles instead of once a year.  and yesterday they did biopsies on two more "weird" moles.  i am just accumulating scars like it's my job.

here's hoping that they come back as nothing other than funny looking.

are all of you getting your moles checked once a year?  BECAUSE YOU NEED TO.

that is your public service announcement for today.


*i'm finally watching bowling for columbine, in which michael moore cites this statistic - in 2001, 68 people were killed in the uk by a gun.  in the united states?  11,127.  now, i realize that the population of the us is five times that of the uk, but still.  oh. my. god.