Tue
22Still Alive
Well internets, I figured I should probably pop in and let you all know that I am still alive, and haven’t succumbed to the sweet whispering death of carbon monoxide inhalation. They installed the new furnace earlier today, and when I woke up from my nap feeling like I was on fire, I knew it was working perfectly.
The past few days have been a fucking nightmare, between constant errands for my mother who happens to be incapable of doing, say, ANYTHING, coming out of winter depression, and scrambling to find a job. Today in particular was even more ridiculous than usual.
My dad, like many, is a handyman. He’s always building something, and he’s the one you go to when you buy some outrageous piece of furniture with an instruction manual that might as well be written in Swahili for all you know. So earlier today when he asked me to drive him to the emergency room, I knew it had to be due to one of his various project mishaps. Apparently he was adding more shelving to a closet in the basement (?!) and leaned in too far, slipped, and broke one of his ribs. He thought he might have internal bleeding, so I drove him right away to have it checked out. My dad is the type of guy that could shoot his thumb off with a nailgun, wrap it up and be done with it, so I knew it had to be pretty serious.
Four hours later, and yes internets, you read that correctly: FOUR FUCKING HOURS of reading 3 Newsweeks, an old edition of the Economist, pondering who they paid to slather the walls in that ghastly pastel wallpaper, and walking outside every 10 minutes to hide behind cars and chain-smoke, and he was finally discharged with a clean bill of health. His CT scan was normal, and x-rays showed a tiny hairline fracture in his left 4th rib. It will heal/fuse itself back together.
I’d really like to know just what the fuck takes so long in emergency rooms. I could totally understand if say, a bus overturned and the pit was filled with bleeding, limbless patients. But on a slow monday when we were the only people there, what the fuck takes so long? I just sat there, watching nurses and residents flounce around jotting cute little love notes in charts while they CLEARLY could have been discharging us. An x-ray takes all of what, five minutes? In short, I hate the United States healthcare system.
I need a break from this whole having a life thing, dudes.