[Stargate: Drabble] "Unbecoming Conduct" [SG-22, G]

[ami_ven]

Title: Unbecoming Conduct
Prompt: writerverse challenge 14 weekly quick fic 5, prompt ‘tripping’
Word Count: 150
Rating: G
Original/Fandom: Stargate SG-1, SG-22, original characters
Summary: Gunnery Sergeant Vicks falls down on the job.
Note(s): originally posted to the writerverse wv_library

Comments

[bobdeloyd]

Interesting, I was writing chapter 16 tonight and for the first time ever used the word "infirmary" in any of my writings. I come here to read your stories and there it is!

[ami_ven]

There's a word for that! When you learn something new or are working on something and suddenly it's everywhere - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_cognitive_biases#Frequency_illusion

[bobdeloyd]

I took sociology in college and know that if you buy a green VW Bug you will start seeing Green VW Bugs everywhere.
When was the last time you used the word infirmary and what was the reason you used the word in your story?
I was looking up something other and more archaic than hospital to set the atmosphere... Here:
"I awoke in a bed inside an infirmary of some sort. I say infirmary because it wasn’t a modern hospital and all the beds and chairs looked to be out of the 1950s. Yellow paint flaking off the walls and the bottom corners looked water damaged and moldy. My good arm was handcuffed at the wrist to the bed’s railing." (unedited)
This is the only time I ever used infirmary and I don't recall reading it except maybe years ago until I read your story... I just thought it's strange.
:)

[ami_ven]

Yes, exactly. Sometimes, I'll look something up for a story I didn't know much about, and suddenly I find all kinds of references to it in stuff I'm reading.

And I think 'infirmary' vs. 'hospital' is about context. As far as I use the words, a hospital is a stand-alone building for treating people - an infirmary is inside a larger building/complex, like a military base (as in Stargate) or something like a boarding school - and if your military thing is a ship, it has a 'sickbay' (say, in Star Trek, the Enterprise has a sickbay, but a space station like DS9 has an infirmary). If you write mostly about civilians, you probably don't use 'infirmary' much, but if you write militaristic Sci-Fi like me, you might use it pretty often.