Well what can I say? If you remember Garfield the Cat and how he hates Monday’s you can probably understand this post. Maybe you have lived this yourself. Maybe not, but there is always tomorrow.
I really expected to have a nice day recovering and resting from my very draining trip to California to help out with my dad. It started that way but didn’t end that way. When I got home I found out that my license plates had been stolen off of my car. Thus I knew that today I would need to go to the DMV to report them stolen and get them replaced. I figured that this couldn’t be too bad, I called my boss yesterday afternoon and he graciously gave me the time to do so. Of course I could not gotten through the front gate without them, but still it is good to have an understanding boss.
Late in the evening I started to get my things together for work. After having watched the movie Fletch with Judy I was tired and expecting to go to bed. Judy had told me earlier in the evening that she had a sore throat and had taken some throat stuff to make it feel better. The throat stuff usually takes care of the problem. This time it didn’t. She started complaining of sharp pain of like 9 on the scale of 10 in her throat and that she was having a hard time swallowing. This to me was odd. Judy has a super high threshold for pain, that fact that she has been married to me for nearly 26 years testifies to this. Once in Germany she had a cavity filled with no anesthetic when the Army dentist who had the shrine to Dr Mengele in his office refused to give a topical before sticking her with a needle. She let a broken ankle go for a year before having something done about it. Sorry I don’t like to suffer like that. But she has a super high threshold for pain. So at 0002 in this morning (for those not German or military both of Mickey’s hands are pointing straight up to the 12) yes Monday dark and early, we set out for Sentara Bayside ER. I was not a happy camper. I picked up one of my Andrew Greeley Bishop Blackie Ryan mystery novels and took Judy through the rain to the ER.
Now to me a real ER is where guts are hanging out, people a being coded in multiple rooms. In a real ER there are gunshot wounds, stab wounds, burns, strokes, heart attacks, people mangled in car or industrial accidents. Likewise there are always Police with knuckleheads who have been arrested, drug overdoses, suicide attempts and real live psychotic people who think that they are Jesus. Death, crisis, mayhem that dear readers is my kind of ER. Eating a cheeseburger with a trauma surgeon while looking at the track of a bullet in an open chest after some gang banger got whacked and we could save him. That is an ER to me. I did my residency at Parkland Memorial Hospital in Dallas as the Trauma Department Chaplain and worked as an ER Department Chaplain in a Trauma Center in West Virginia. I’m used to full waiting rooms, upset people and various forms of craziness. I now work in a teaching hospital and have the adult and pediatric ICUs. To put it mildly this was not what I experienced this morning. We got there and there was no one in the waiting area, which unlike places I have worked before was nicely decorated and relatively comfortable. They even had Lifetime set as the channel on the cable TV. Judy went through triage quickly and was taken back. After a while I was called back. Judy was getting an IV placed and a full panel of labs and a CT Scan of her obviously swollen neck were ordered. This was a bit scary for her, and a little unsettling for me as first she is my wife and I don’t want to lose her, but also because I know that if untreated whatever was going on could threaten her airway. This is never a good thing.
The nursing staff and the ER physician were very nice. I have no complaints. For a while it looked like that Judy might be admitted until she responded to the three different IV meds and drips that she was on. Now whatever was going on was potentially serious but seemed to have been nipped in the bud. I did try to comfort Judy by telling her that it couldn’t be that bad because she wasn’t intubated, didn’t have a Foley catheter or NG tube, but she didn’t find that terribly comforting. I young man how had cut his arm pretty bad after giving a dumpster an elbow was across the way and had a pretty cool cut, but still pretty mild by what I am used to. Compared to the places that I have worked it was far too sedate. It was really kind of boring. I guess that is okay, I didn’t want Judy to be the one who got sporty and provide the entertainment for the evening.
We got out of the ER about 0330 and hit 24 hour Walgreens to pick up her medicine. She even got good stuff for pain, Vicodin. All I ever get is Motrin, no let me take that back, my Nurse Practitioner here put me on Ultram for my chronic pain in my shoulders. But this isn’t like Vicodin. The people in the pharmacy were all friendly, giving us a cheery “Good morning” every time that we turned around. We finally got home well after 0400. Checking in with the boss I got permission to come in late.
This afternoon I still had to go to DMV to get the license plates. I didn’t get much sleep and what I had was not very good. Groggy and grouchy like a bear waking up from hibernation I put myself together. I did not want to go to the DMV, but it had to be done. Now the DMV sends chills up my spine. I grew up in California, so my first experience of the DMV was in that fair state. The DMV in California is like the major league of the DMV. I’m sure that I stood in line behind Jimmy Hoffa one day well after he went missing never to be seen again. He’s probably still in line. The last time I went to the DMV here it was a long wait. Today I expected the worst. It started out where I thought that would be the case when the rent-a-cop at the door sent me outside and told me that I couldn’t have my Norfolk Tides travel mug filled with Dunkin Donuts French Vanilla coffee, Splenda and Coffee Mate Nonfat French Vanilla creamer in the building. I thought, “well isn’t this just great….I’m tired as hell and have to wait in DMV for what could be forever without more coffee.” I was even less happy than when I got there. Thankfully the rest of the DMV time was not too bad. The lady at the desk was friendly and had lived in California and even knew something about Mudville. I left with my temporary tags and stopped by the Advance Auto Parts store on Princess Anne Blvd in Virgina Beach to pick up a new license plate frame and mounting devices. Now Advanced usually gives military members a 10% discount on the purchase. Showing my ID card I expected this. However the young man refused to give it to me because “I had not specifically asked him for it.” I thought this was kind of shitty as all the other guys there have went out of their way to honor this. I decided to say the hell with arguing with him and just write a nasty comment on my blog with tags for Advance Auto Parts on Princess Anne Blvd in Virginia Beach. Following this I got Judy some soft food to eat and went in to check in with the boss, drag all the stuff I would need for the week into work and to go through my hundred or so e-mails so I wouldn’t have to do that tomorrow.
In a few minutes I head over to the Church of Baseball, Harbor Park Parish for a double header between the Tides and the Louisville Bats. Tonight, though tired I need this.
Thank you all for your prayers, encouragement and kindness this past week.
Peace, Steve+
Post Script: The double header against Louisville was great. The Tides swept the twin bill winning 6-2 in the first game and 2-0 in the night cap. Justin Christian homered and Matt Wieters a triple with Chris Tillman picking up his 5th win with no losses. David Pauley getting the win, his third and Jim Miller his 10th save striking out the side to close the game. The Tides are now 25 and 12 and up by 2.5 games over the Bulls in the IL South. I really needed tonight, the weather was a tad bit cold but it was good to be back with my Church of Baseball Friends. Barry my partner down in section 102 B had his daughter down and it was fun to be with both of them. My section usher Elliott was back as was Chip up in section 202. Had my usual King Twist pretzel from Kenny up on the concourse.
The Inglorius Padre Steve's World 