*Yawn*
I need sleep like Matt needs dance lessons.
The two very, very large cups of coffee are joining forced w/the two somewhat large cups of Diet Coke to keep me vertical, but I can feel that artificial sleep substitute reaching its uppermost limit any moment now, at which point my head will come crashing into this fancy USC eMac. I'm hanging out at Megan's work waiting for her to close up shop in a few, so the real beauty behind my "head-trauma" scenario is that she'll be the one who'll have to be "on brain detail" like Jules and Vincent in "Pulp Fiction." The things we do for love...
I've had a couple days off, which has been nice, but I have to work tomorrow, which I swear has to be illegal. Making a young, redblooded male work on Super Sunday totally qualifies as cruel and unusual punishment. I dunno if any of you actually prayed for me like I asked, but it looks like I will be spending the shift in triage where at least there's a television. Victims of past Super Sundays in the ED have assured me that the day is extremely quiet until the final gun sounds, when suddenly the flood gates open and everyone realizes they really, really need to get to the Emergency Room.
RANT
It amazes me what qualifies as an "emergency." Over the past year, I've seen everything from "Baby is sleeping" to "Baby is crying" to "Baby isn't sleeping/crying enough" to "Needs to take a pregancy test" to, my personal favorite, "Just doesn't feel right."
It was bad up in the Circus, where we had a daily flood of the migrant farmworkers who would come in b/c, basically, their newborn baby scared 'em senseless. Sadly, this isn't the most educated portion of our population, and they'll have children when they aren't prepared for such a thing and then freak out and head straight to our department the first time junior starts crying.
SIDE RANT
One time, a frantic nineteen-year-old brought her baby in b/c she swore said baby was having uncontrolable rectal bleeding. Turns out mom had been feeding her young one strawberry yogurt.
Do the math.
END SIDE RANT
We take 'em all, mind you, b/c there are legal ramifications to refusing someone admission to our little magic kingdom. Besides, we bill 'em all, and when you get down it this nonsense does pay our salaries. But seriously, what compels a human being who "just doesn't feel right" to be seen in an E-MER-GEN-CY department???? The freakin' word "emergency" is right there in the freakin' title! And why would someone spend hundreds of dollars on an ED visit when they can purchase a home pregnancy test for several hundred dollars less that'll accomplish the same thing?
One of the charge nurses, Dustin (aka Dust-Bin), said the other night that "business would drop by over 50% if we administered an IQ test before admission."
Sad. but true.
END RANT
Now I'm watching the clock and riding Megan's shift out so we can spend some non-library related time together and watch more Naruto. Imagine my delight when Gaki revealed to me that they introduce a character who trains a member of the teams to become a medical ninja(!)
My life now has a direction, suckahs. God help anything or anyone that stands in my way of becoming a medical ninja.
The two very, very large cups of coffee are joining forced w/the two somewhat large cups of Diet Coke to keep me vertical, but I can feel that artificial sleep substitute reaching its uppermost limit any moment now, at which point my head will come crashing into this fancy USC eMac. I'm hanging out at Megan's work waiting for her to close up shop in a few, so the real beauty behind my "head-trauma" scenario is that she'll be the one who'll have to be "on brain detail" like Jules and Vincent in "Pulp Fiction." The things we do for love...
I've had a couple days off, which has been nice, but I have to work tomorrow, which I swear has to be illegal. Making a young, redblooded male work on Super Sunday totally qualifies as cruel and unusual punishment. I dunno if any of you actually prayed for me like I asked, but it looks like I will be spending the shift in triage where at least there's a television. Victims of past Super Sundays in the ED have assured me that the day is extremely quiet until the final gun sounds, when suddenly the flood gates open and everyone realizes they really, really need to get to the Emergency Room.
RANT
It amazes me what qualifies as an "emergency." Over the past year, I've seen everything from "Baby is sleeping" to "Baby is crying" to "Baby isn't sleeping/crying enough" to "Needs to take a pregancy test" to, my personal favorite, "Just doesn't feel right."
It was bad up in the Circus, where we had a daily flood of the migrant farmworkers who would come in b/c, basically, their newborn baby scared 'em senseless. Sadly, this isn't the most educated portion of our population, and they'll have children when they aren't prepared for such a thing and then freak out and head straight to our department the first time junior starts crying.
SIDE RANT
One time, a frantic nineteen-year-old brought her baby in b/c she swore said baby was having uncontrolable rectal bleeding. Turns out mom had been feeding her young one strawberry yogurt.
Do the math.
END SIDE RANT
We take 'em all, mind you, b/c there are legal ramifications to refusing someone admission to our little magic kingdom. Besides, we bill 'em all, and when you get down it this nonsense does pay our salaries. But seriously, what compels a human being who "just doesn't feel right" to be seen in an E-MER-GEN-CY department???? The freakin' word "emergency" is right there in the freakin' title! And why would someone spend hundreds of dollars on an ED visit when they can purchase a home pregnancy test for several hundred dollars less that'll accomplish the same thing?
One of the charge nurses, Dustin (aka Dust-Bin), said the other night that "business would drop by over 50% if we administered an IQ test before admission."
Sad. but true.
END RANT
Now I'm watching the clock and riding Megan's shift out so we can spend some non-library related time together and watch more Naruto. Imagine my delight when Gaki revealed to me that they introduce a character who trains a member of the teams to become a medical ninja(!)
My life now has a direction, suckahs. God help anything or anyone that stands in my way of becoming a medical ninja.