Post Operative Bloopers - Black Comedy in Real Life - Part the Second

I found another piece I wrote while in Mt Sinai Hospital, recovering from my last surgery.  Even in the midst of the most painful circumstances, humour may be found.  

Part I

Mt Sinai Hospital, Toronto, Ontario.

February 28, 2011, 12:26pm

What follows is a true-to-life, nearly word-for-word and action-for-action account of a patient's latest recovery episode at Mt. Sinai hospital.  Again, what is written below is not meant to disparage any person or any organization, it is simply written to illustrate, from a patient’s perspective, the numerous and crazy difficulties one can endure while in hospital.  Any likeness to real-life individuals is probably true, and most likely not fictional.

[Insert Law and Order "buh buh" sound].

Pain Scenario Part 1:

Nurse: "Good morning Mr. Wilson, we are going to remove drainage tuning from your stomach."

Paul(concerned): "I am feeling a lot of pain in that area; the pain meds you gave me are not going to be enough."

Nurse: "No, they are enough."

Paul: "No, they are not. I am in pain right now so if you were to yank it out now I will be screaming."

Nurse: "I am sorry but the pain pills we gave you are enough."
Paul: "Look, if you yank this thing out and see my fist flying in the direction of your face, you will know I needed more pain pills. PLEASE give me more as I am still in pain!"

Nurse: "No, you wouldn't do that; i'll just start to remove sutures so we can yank it out."
(starts snipping sutures)

Paul: " Well no, I am not that kind of guy but I am trying to tell you that I need more pain meds to deal with-- (nurse slightly presses on site)

OUCH!!!!!!"

Paul (exasperated): "I am TELLING you I am in pain, and if you are going to remove this, I need more meds!"

Nurse (starting to slowly pull on tube): "No I am sorry but what I have given you is enough and--"

Paul: "OOOOOOUUUUUUCCCCCHHHHHHHH, AAAHHHHH! Look, can you see that I am hurting here??? My apologies for yelling but need more pain meds before you do this!!!"

Nurse (Male nurse, in case you are wondering about my fist flying comment): (Reluctantly, shocked): "Well I'll have a chat with the Doctors to see if we can up your pain meds for this one time. I'll give you your regular meds at 1:30, shot at 2:00, and we'll remove the tube at 2:30."

Paul: (inaudibly sighs) "OK, thank you."

Part II

Mt Sinai Hospital, Toronto, Ontario.

February 28, 2011, 2:15pm

[Insert Law and Order "buh buh" sound].

Nurse: "Unfortunately we cannot give you a higher dosage than what you currently have."

Paul: "That is... Unfortunate."

Nurse: "Ok let's pull this thing out shall we.....? (concern etched in voice) You aren't really going to hit me, are you?"

Paul: "No, no... (sigh). I don't do that kind of stuff. Although I may pound the snot out of the hospital bed rail (reader's note: male nurse's lower half conveniently located two inches away from rail).

Nurse (relief):  "Oh, I see... Well let's pull this out (grabs hold of tube). So tell me, how long have you been working?"

Paul (slightly tense, but calm):  “Well I have been at my current job for four years and-- (nurse begins pulling on tube)

AAAAWWWWWWAAAAHHHHHH!!!!"

Nurse: "No-no, keep talking I am trying to distract you!"

Paul (inwardly thinking, "it is kinda obvious you are trying to distract me, but it it is not working!"):  "Aaaahhhhh... (body tensed, hands gripping bed sheets hard, in a pained, strained voice) Well I worked in another place 3.5 years prior to—(nurse yanks out tube from stomach; attached is an eight inch drainage filter, two centimetres wide).

YYYYEEEEEAAAAGRRRAAAAA AAAAS! GAAAAA!!!!"

Nurse: "There there, it is all over, you are OK!"

Paul (gritting teeth in much pain): "Yeah you may have pulled it out but the pain hasn't stopped!!!"

Nurse (with certainty in voice): "Well there is no blood, so you are OK." (Places gauze and applys pressure on site)

Paul: "That may be, but it still hurts like heck!!!! Grrrrrr!!!!" (gritting teeth)

Nurse (showing Paul the tube like it is some kind of prize):  "Wanna see the tube?"

Paul (a twinge of fascination):  "THAT was inside my stomach???  Wow."

(Nurse applies tape to gauze, walks out of room. Paul accesses Facebook to write what has just occurred)

Fin.

Deep Thoughts by Luape Noswila (cousin of Jack Handy--500 times removed)

Whenever I hear the sound of rain,
it makes me think of the word "pejorative".
And that in turn makes me wonder about geese.
You know, when a flock of geese fly over a group of people, I often say with wildlife wisdom,
"Isn't that flock of geese absolutely pejorative?"


Someone in the group always responds, "Hey, you hippy, the definition of pejorative is,
'a word or phrase that has negative connotations or that is intended to disparage or belittle.' 
And you didn't even use the word properly, definition notwithstanding!"


And you know what?  Being a snarky guy, I respond, "Who died and made you King of China?"

That Attic Thing

OK so I am not going to write much on what I wrote about before.  All I will say is that I am amazed that houses these days can still stand up and function, what with the lack of care given to house construction, and overall house maintenance.

I had a good chat with a knowledgeable person on the decline of human housing over the past 2000 years.... the average life span of a house has gone from 1000+ years, to 100 years, if that.  And the drastic decline has all occurred in the past 75 years.

My main beef with my nice new (read, old) house is that the original builders 50 years ago installed no insulation virtually anywhere.  The previous owners of this house, who had lived here  for the past 15 years, did nothing to build upon this lack of insulation.  And I wondered why the guest-bedroom wall was freezing cold to the touch on late winter nights...

Oh wait.  Correction.  The previous owners did re-insulate the attic, but in the words of my aforementioned wise friend, the overall effect was that it looked like they tossed a bunch of insulation up in the attic, then lobbed in a grenade, and let the chaos theory do the rest.  It appears (nay, it is a fact) that I have some spots where the insulation is packed high, and other spots where there is no insulation whatsoever.  And again, I wondered why I was freezing my bum off last winter, even withe the thermostat at 71 degrees....

In any case, I will be hiring someone--a reputable someone--to blow insulation into my attic.  Properly.  No way am I doing this one myself I tells you... I want this one done right, no room for error (i.e. I don't want me falling through my ceiling as I try to lay insulation).


In other news, although I am still off work, still feeling good, still waiting for last incision to fully heal, I am beginning to feel the pinch of having only 60% of my salary to pay for mortgage, taxes, utilities, bills, food, gas, insurance... upkeep... and it is beginning to hurt.  Nevertheless, on mornings like today, where I get up early, pour myself two cups of java, sit on my porch (leaning back in my chair, as is my custom), reading, and listening/watching birds in the bright not-yet-stifling early morning sun... I come to the realization that little moments such as these can be a beautiful, restful, relaxing, heartening time.  God's creation is a mighty and wonderful thing/

I do however desire to get back to work--not just for financial reasons.  I miss my colleagues, friends, challenges... and heck, it keeps me busy and out of trouble.  Why just today I tried to get onto my roof to clean my eaves, as they were full of leaves... but that is another story.  Suffice to say that my ladder is a tad bit short, and I left it at that.

Happy Sunny Tuesday.

Attic + Horrible Insulation Job = HorribleAtticInsulationJob

Not saying much here... Will say more tomorrow... But by golly, how is it that people--well some people--can do such a half-hearted, lacklusterly uninspired job with such an important thing as attic/roof/house insulation?

And that is all I an going to say as I am losing interest in typing with my middle finger only in the iPhone. I need a real keyboard to rant properly.

Good evening to you.

The Wonders of Radio and the Eeeevils of Raccoons

Alright.  So the most unexciting interesting happenstance occurred yesterday:  I was able to speak on the Ontario Today show on CBC Radio 1.... while driving in my car.  Before you report me to the police, however, I was using a hands-free Bluetooth device.  I even pulled over to the side of the road--not because I was an overly cautious outstanding citizen (although I like to think I am some times), but rather because the CBC Radio Person advised me to pull over, so they could hear me better.

Anyway... it is a slight ordeal to get on the air for this show.  My last attempt took 10 minutes and 27 busy calls before I dejectedly gave up.  This time it took me 5 minutes and 17 busy calls before I squeezed myself into the lineup.  Out of the seven callers (or thereabouts), I am the second-last one, I believe.  So if you follow the link, or have the CBC app on your iPhone, I am about three-quarters of the way through the show lineup (you can click on the title of this particular blog to access the show).

http://www.cbc.ca/ontariotoday/2011/06/01/man-versus-raccoon/

I sent a quick panic text off to a few people (while the car was stopped, yes), and then within a few minutes, I was hearing my voice over the Bluetooth speakers, talking with the host of the show.  A small note, you cannot have the radio turned on at this point as there is a half-second delay from phone speaker to radio speakers... and it is just too darn confusing to listen to your voice out of your mouth, on the phone speakers, and then out of car speakers.

That is basically it.  Nothing more interesting than that.  I was able to say my fill on how I have dealt with raccoons in my neck of the woods... and then it was off to another caller.  Yup.  That is it.  My 1:05 minutes of fame on the radio.


What I WILL say, on a related topic (and here is where my rant is ramping up) is how much I despise raccoons.  To the uninitiated, raccoons may seem cute, furry, and inventive, but don't let first impressions fool you (although they truly are furry).  Raccoons wear a mask around their eyes for a reason:  they are conniving break-and-enter artists, nature's fat and bold vigilantes, well deserving to be shipped somewhere in the northern part of our country, away from urban temptations.

Yes, I give them props for being inventive (as animals go) but I certainly do not give them props for their poops.

 Thusly, here is a story for you:  One day I was looking out my bedroom window, and I spy with my little eye something green growing on the top of my shed roof, on top of a healthy layering of two-inch thick decomposing vegetation and dirt (or so I thought).  Now that I think about it, I am not sure how I reasoned that two inches of dirt could end up on my shed roof...

Annnnyyyyway, I pull up a ladder, climb on to the adjoining fence separating my shed from my next-door neighbour, get a leg on my shed roof, and begin clearing up the green plant growth and brown gunk.  3/4s of the way through, grunting and groaning as I try to reach the hard-to-reach places, I hear a voice off in the not-too-far distance, "Are you OK?"

I respond that "Yes I am, I am just cleaning off all this plant growth/dirt."  My newly met neighbour, bearing the same name as Yours Truly, walks up to the fence along our bordering back yards, points up to his shed roof, and says in a pitying, shake-of-the-head learned voice, "You do know that racoons have pooped all over my shed roof....?"  He leaves his sentence in an open-ended question.  I look over onto his shed roof, and I see well-formed gifts of raccoon poopy.

Now, it doesn't take a genius, and it certainly doesn't take me but a few seconds before I put "poo and poo" together, and realize that the brown gunk I have been determinedly cleaning off my roof is just a smoothed out, pasted, green-growing fertilizer of the raccoon variety.  And there was a lot of it.  <shudder>.

And the reason I shudder, if you wonder, is not just because I was handling the disgusting discards of Nature's Answer to Man's Dominating Crapulence*, but more to the point, it was because of all the awful things that could be contained in this aforementioned gunk.  Granted I garnered this from the "interweb" (is that what kids call it these days...?), but still, having this knowledge--fake or real--does not help my memory of the occasion.

Now before you get too spooked and refuse to shake my proffered hand next we meet, I was wearing heavy-duty working gloves.  Notwithstanding I finished the job (who else was going to do it), and the gloves now lie quarantined over my laundry tub, waiting for a hot wash.

And here we circle back to the original issue:  I despise raccoons.  And I despise them even further for the Achilles tendon our animal-rights laws have burdened us with:  that we can do nothing about these vermin.  Nothing.  We cannot call a company to trap these natural wrecking machines unless they enter our house first.  But then, the damage is already done.

The Reason (heard on the radio):  Because they are territorial.  Com'on!  Really????  Let's put this into perspective.  To use an extreme uncouth comparison, what if I suspected some individuals of terrorism?  I call the police, RCMP, whoever, and they say that, "I'm sorry, we cannot arrest/detain these individuals until they have blown up a building, not before."  I try to explain, "I see a van, I see people with guns, I see it parked suspiciously outside a building... but nothing can be done????"

"Nope.  Sorry.   Terrorists are territorial.  We have to wait for them to blow something up before we can arrest."

Buh.....?!!?!?

Of course, by the time the above happens, people have been hurt or worse, the damage has been done, and it will cost everyone a lot more than if the evil individuals could have been stopped beforehand. 

To continue, let's pretend that the terrorists do strike, the RCMP does get their man, take them into custody... using the the Rules of Raccoon Release and Capture, the RCMP would then be obliged to not put the terrorists in jail or prosecute them, but they would have to release them two or three blocks away into another urban neighbourhood.  Why, oh why?  Well, again it is because, "They are territorial.  They have become so used to living (terrorizing) in human urban centers, they would not survive in jail."

Drawing this example back to raccoons, if and when a critter company receives the call to catch the raccoons, because the dirty poop machines have become too used to living around humans, they cannot be released into the wild.  They would not "survive."  So they are packed up, and released to terrorize another neighbourhood a few blocks away.**  This is the only instance where NIMBY (Not In My Back Yard) appropriately applies.


A harsh, over-the-top example, huh?  But hopefully you get my point:  If a group of raccoons are hanging around your yard, you have done what you could to humanely deter them, and nothing can be done until they tear off your roof shingles, enter your attic, poop and tear up your insulation... there is definitely something wrong with the system.  Who is more important:  a human, or a raccoon?


Of course, I do not for one second condone torturing, or beating raccoons with any device (although I can certainly understand the frustration that the now ill-famous Toronto man experienced when he took things a bit too far).  Cruelty to animals is just plain wrong.

I do, however, support the notion that we humans have to protect our homes from the likes of these critters, and need better assistance from the city to do so.  Look:  aside from marriage, a home is probably the biggest investment one can make in life.  I don't want to sit idly aside while raccoons poo and tear up said investment.


Now circle back to me speaking on the CBC:  On the show I said what I have done to protect my house, my God-given investment, from animals (doesn't the Bible give an example in the Old Testament of Israel needing to to subdue the wild creatures in their promised land....?).  I have spent a ton of money, and I have watched my neighbour nail 6 in spikes (spiky side down) into our fence to deter raccoons from nearing our house.

If, however, in the dead of night you hear a particular"EEEEEEEEeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeekkkkkk!" sailing over your house trailing off into the distant depths of the night, it is because I have used up all currently legal means in dealing with these creatures, and have resorted to the use of my own raccoon-propelled-catapult, which humanely launches any masked trespasser off into the far depths of the wild, where they truly, truly belong.




Asterisk Notes:
*Not an intentional play on words:  the word "crapulence" taken from the "Who Shot Mr. Burns" Simpsons episode.  "Smithers had thwarted my earlier attempt to take candy from a baby. But with him out of the picture, I was free to wallow in my own crapulence".

**Take what I say at face-value.  My facts may be wrong.... but this is what I recall on the Management of Racoons.

I actually created a blog...?

Oh right.  I did.  Almost a year ago.  Well a good friend encouraged me to start a blog a few weeks ago.  Unbeknownst to both of us, I created one last August, but never did anything with it.  So here we go, I am now going to start using this thing somewhat regularly, whenever I feel moved to write.


So what do I say for this one?  Well, I am still on the recovery tail end of my latest, greatest, and last surgery.  I'll delve more into that fun in a later blog.  I am however feeling fantastic, just waiting for one final thing to heal up.

And now on to the gravy of this post:  last night, out of the blue, my brother phones me up saying he has some good Jays tickets--right near the field.  So I dutifully accepted as any non-baseball fan would.... and boy it ended up being a very fun night.

Now to digress one second... I may be, what some consider, transit incompetent.  Really and truly.  The last time I took transit (subway) I took the wrong transfer, ended up far far away from where I parked my car, and had to take a cab to where I parked my car.

That being said, there was no way I was going to drive my car to TO last night so... I took the dreaded step towards the GO Station.  On a scale of 1 to 10 (10 of course being the highest), everything was at a 10, until I stepped on the platform.  Purchasing a ticket was a breeze.   On my ticket was the number "2", so I thought (illogically, now it seems) that this meant my train would be arriving on Platform 2. 

While waiting, I decided (against my male pride) to ask another fellow GO traveler if this was the train to Union Station.  She told me (kindly) that no, I wanted Platform 1.  This one was going East, not West.  Now, far be it from me to criticize GO, but why the heck don't you put platform #s on the ticket?  Yes, there are only three to choose from... but still.

Anyway, it appears that I didn't see the perhaps large posters hanging on the wall denoting which Platform went to which station.  Fine.... I walked to the other Platform, eagerly awaiting the 4:30 express train.

20 minutes later, my 4:30 train did not appear.  An express train DID appear on Platform 3... which was probably the one I wanted.  Sigh.  Anyway long story short, I took the 4:44 train to Union Station, somehow got off at the VIA exit instead of the GO exit (much to my brother's nonplussed chagrin), met my brother for a smorgasbord feast of steak and ribs at Baton Rouge, went to the game, enjoyed the close field location (even in the light of the fact the Jays blew it)... and then left after the 7th inning.  By that point my post-recovery condition was pushed past its endurance, and really, it was just time to go.


The highlight of the whole night, however, was hearing the following ice cream advertisement from a passing vendor:

"Ice Cream here, get your ice cream.... it comes on a stick....!"

OK it may not be so funny now, but at the moment it was pretty hilarious.  My brother and I burst into fits of laughter, as did the people beside us.  Who says creative advertising is passe???


Oh, and no, in case you were wondering, there were no further transit incompetence occurrences.