The Mole

D and I were attending a party a few weeks ago and had the chance to meet some new people. When the discussion of what we do arises D LOVES to talk about his job. He works for an insurance company in property claims and spent some time down south and has tales of what he saw while there, or other stories about the destruction of property. I on the other hand, dread telling people what I do. Often times the first reaction people have upon hearing that I'm an Epidemiologist is that they want to show me a mole. Seriously. In the past 5 years of working for the state health department I have seen more than my fare share of moles. After saying my profession I know that the cycle will proceed like this: Their face will brighten and say "Oh really? Would you look at this? What do you think this mole is?" as they lift their shirt or roll up their sleeve. I then watch their faces fall as I tell them that I'm not a dermatologist, and the while epidemiology starts a lot like epidermis it has nothing to do with skin, and I have no idea what is going on with that mole of theirs and could they please put it away. The next question is what do I do as an epidemiologist, I then say that I'm an infectious disease epidemiologist and I track the prevalence of reportable infectious diseases in the state. This usually leads to a discussion of restaurants for some reason and where there have been outbreaks of disease. So, at this party I decided that I would circumvent this whole like of discussion and the first mole I saw I told him I was pretty sure it was cancer.

As an aside the other downside to this profession is the inability to hang up on a telephone survey. D has no problem telling them that he is not interested in their survey, I on the other hand think of the surveys I might need done in the future and do not want to rock the survey Karma boat therefore putting me on every call list for any survey being done. I answer questions about kitchen faucets, disposable diapers, toothpaste, you name it, I'll answer your survey on it. When we were kids my grandparents used to send us surveys in the mail with different types of Little Debbies. It was so much fun doing a taste test and then filling out the survey, I wish I'd get a survey about a Little Debbie every now and then!