G's-Spot

Happy 50th Lynn!

Wow. I cannot believe it's been over 20 years since we met!  More like 23 years. I've been feeling nostalgic all weekend, so clearly remembering your Mom's house full of all of us friends for your 30th birthday, and now look. We've grown oldish together but we'll never grow up! Here's to 23 more years!

Wishing you the Happiest of Birthday Years to come!

Old, sure, but "Socially Expired"? According to one reader, Yes!

Just got the GREATEST snotty comment on the blog post I did titled "Kathy Griffin Does Paris Hilton."  It was about the episode of Life on the D-List where Kathy sets up a shopping trip with Paris Hilton to connect with the younger generation.  It is one of the funniest episodes, in my opinion, that Kathy did.  Paris seems completely lost anytime Kathy makes a joke, reference, or uses a sentence that doesn't contain the word "hot". 

Well...apparently one reader took issue with my observations and told me so in no uncertain terms:

You obviously don't know anything about PR and marketing yourself. Paris Hilton created a brand out of herself. She's famous for being famous for nothing basically and she plays up the dumb blonde card and makes a shit ton of money doing it. People like you are just jealous because you'll never be pretty and rich and live a luxurious life. Oh and p.s. its kind of pathetic when 40+yr olds who are socially expired try to keep up with tabloid gossip. And the only reason i'm on your site is i have to write a paper on the evolving role of pop culture in society and social norms so i typed in   --Amelia

Wow.  I do agree with her that Paris Hilton is "famous for being famous for basically nothing" and that "makes a shit ton of money doing it" but I have to disagree with the "plays up the dumb blonde" part. I don't think Paris is playing. She takes herself pretty seriously so I'm pretty certain she's seriously dumb.

And I do admit that I am very jealous of Paris' opportunities.  She could have gone to any college she wanted, done anything good with her life, and yet, her choice is to shop and booze it up 24 hours a day.  Okay, maybe I am a little jealous of that too.  Although on my off hours of boozing and shopping, if I were Paris and had her opportunities, I'd like to think I'd try to find something, anything, to do to contribute to society so I wouldn't be such a boil on society's butt.  But hey, that's just me, a pathetic, 40+, socially expired woman who barely keeps up with the tabloid gossip.  You know, when I'm not at the hospital savin' lives.

Amelia, genuinely: thank you. That was the best belly laugh I've had today.  Good luck with your paper!

Quote of the Day

"Your life can be as wonderful or as horrible as you allow it to be. It all depends upon the thoughts that you practice. And therein lies the basis of anyone's success: 'How much do I practice thoughts that bring me joy, and how much do I practice thoughts that bring me pain?'" --- Abraham Lincoln

There Are Patients I'd Like to Put Out of All of Our Misery

Had a couple of men in their 40's with pneumonia admitted into the same room Sunday night I was about to hurt.  They were both such babies that every time I went in to do a treatment on one the other one whined until he got one too. Then they both wanted to know what meds the other one got and which med was “better”. Then they whined because they both thought I was giving too much attention to the other one.  (I’m not kidding.) 

Amazingly though, that distress only seemed to creep up when someone entered the room. I stood out in the hall, which is my test for a lot of questionable respiratory distress, and listened to them passing Halloween candy back and forth, eating anything they could get the PCA to bring them from the pantry, and carry on non-stop conversation. All seemed fine until I walked into the room at which point one sat up to huff and puff and the other one lolled back in his bed in misery.

Geez, what whiners. I overheard them talking about their ex-wives and how misunderstood they'd been during their marriages.  According to them, women are heartless self-centered witches.  Hmmmm...I was thinking that they were a match made in heaven and should hook up.  Think of all the attention they could give each other.

I finally put both of them on the same meds on the same schedule so we could do both of them at the same time each time we went into the room.  At the 3am tx, the man whose treatment I didn't give first whined that he was in such distress he didn't see why he had to wait to be the second tx.  I just looked at him. I was so angry I was afraid to open my mouth.  No telling what would have come out.  

What I was thinking was that I'd love to grab both of them by the ears and drag them down to Peds to show them what a sick five year old with a chest tube-- and more emotional fortitude and physical courage than either of them had-- looked like.

After I finished both treatments that last round,  I told them I was going to be their mom tonight so I turned off their TV and all their lights, told them their bodies needed rest, that they had better go to sleep, and that if I heard they were calling the nursing staff even once more for food or sodas or anything else they’d have to answer to me.  They both laughed but I could tell  they weren't sure if I was serious or not. They did lay off the call button and go to sleep the nurse said later when she thanked me. They were driving her nuts too. 

I should have thought of it earlier.

 

Ahhhh...Team Leading in MICU

The night where hell was having to live through 0200 TWICE and getting sleepy by 0700, which should have been 0800, brought memorable lines such as:

J:  Do I need to set up flowby on this pt who's on a home vent but I don't think the doctor realized that...blah blah blah...vent-dependent...blah blah blah...can't tolerate pressures less than 8/8...blah blah blah--

Me interrupting:  Dude, you had me at "home vent". No flowby.

Me handing supplies to "M" in isolation room:  Please don't touch me with those germy little gloved hands.

M:  Well, I am a dirty girl.

Me: Too much information.

Me to my crew:  Hey, look at these perfect gases I'm pulling.  You know the secret, right?  Labeling the control samples with my patients' stickers.  (Kidding, Lana)

Me to myself, alone in a pt's room:  Wow, wish someone had seen me make that perfect stick.  Oh crap, why didn't I see that arterial line before I did this?

My team to me: Wow, Glenna, you're much more fun to work with than Jones is! Can you team lead every night?

(That compliment was worth every cent of the cash it cost me.)

Thanks for the great night, y'all! Sleep fast and see ya tonight!~

Happy Halloween!