So I’ve come to learn in the past year that there’s two things I can count on in life:
1. When I get sick, I can expect my car to get sick also.
2. When my car gets sick, I can expect to get sick also.
About two weeks ago, Aaron came home carting the most recent Carma’s Crud. It was bad. For Aaron to call out of work, it’s bad. So we were all sickly together for a couple of days, and then it got better…kinda. There was still some bastardly congestion that wouldn’t break up, and a hacking cough that just wouldn’t quit, and just when I was feeling this sexy and chipper, my car wouldn’t start. There was some craziness with trying to start it unsuccessfully (obviously), and then calling AAA and waiting for them for an hour-and-a-half, and then the tow truck laughing at me and saying that there was no way he’d make it down our driveway because it’s in such bad shape. It was awesome. So he jimmy-jacked my car to get it to at least start, and it belched out a bunch of smoke but we got it to the shop in Glen Burnie. Basically it needed a major tune-up, so it could have been a lot worse (like last time when a rodent had eaten through the entire wire casing).
So the car is ::knockonwood:: better, but I have been feeling progressively worse. After being sealed up in a van with my increasingly-sick boss all of Thursday, the second landfall kicked me in the teeth Friday night. Ohhhh the thrill of a fever and chills and the all-over aching twice in 8 days was just indescribable! Saturday morning I tried to go to the UrgentCare, but was about a half-hour too late in my plans/ability to raise my head off the pillow. So waited until this morning, we did.
Let’s preface this by saying this turned into a three-hour trip to the doctor’s office.
There was a sign on the door on the way in.
The sign sayeth: “If you are experiencing flu-like symptoms, please inform our staff at the front desk immediately, so that we may provide you with the appropriate care as soon as possible.” Being the good little citizen my daddy raised me to be, I dutifully (and somewhat sheepishly) told the ladies at the front desk that I was a walk-in patient, and experiencing flu-like symptoms. The receptionist cheerfully told me to wait one second; she returned with a paper surgeon-style mask and some Purelle, which I was obligated to use. *I usually don’t use Purelle because it makes my eczema go crazy.
Needless to say, the other patients in the waiting room shot me many a furtive glance over the next half-hour’s wait.
Those bastards also hacked, sneezed, broke out in cold sweats, and CLEARLY exhibited flu-like symptoms, but since none of them used the magical phrase upon walking in, I was the only idiot in the room wearing a mask.
Dishonest, fraudulent jerks.
Finally, a masked, gloved attendant whisked me off to the Fabulous Flu Room!
“I’m sorry,” she explained, “this room is kept a few degrees colder than the rest of the building.”
“Oh, that’s okay,” I replied amiably, “I’m dressed in five layers for just such an occasion. That, and the chance that the chills might come creeping back.”
We proceeded to the usual check ‘o’ the vitals, and then! A DOUBLE throat-culture, in which two swabs, held side-by-side, were introduced to my esophagus.
I suppose that here I should interject that when I was six, it took five RN’s, my mother, and a doctor to restrain me and obtain a throat sample. That’s how much I love this process.
Luckily, today my medical technician, Samantha, was awesome and let me take my own sample. Unfortunately the little buggers still had to go two-by-two. Then it was the flu test! This one she had to do herself, and we had the mutual joy of a swab jabbed repeatedly in one nostril, and the same swab jabbed thusly in the other nostril. It pretty much ruled. Then I waited alone (but for my throbbing sinus headache) for a good long while for some kind of result. I don’t think I have to tell you that every time someone knocked and talked to me through the door, and reminded me to be sure I was keeping my mask on, my anxiety went up about 3 more points. Finally, after about 20 minutes, my inner-self was saying, “Shit! I have the swine and I have obviously infected children at all three of the last schools I worked at. Shit!”
The doctor came in, sans test results, and did some of the usual flu check-up stuff, including banging on my face to see if my sinuses hurt. Yup. They hurt. Can I go home now?
No! We need to X-Ray your chest to make sure you don’t have pneumonia.
I appreciate that. Because you know who doesn’t want to die of walking pneumonia this year? Little old me.
Honestly, up until this point I was in pretty good spirits. I appreciated the effort being put into my diagnosis, and I respected the fact that these overworked and pretty obviously somewhat-terrified people were doing their jobs as quickly and efficiently as possible.
It was then, my friends, that I met the X-Ray technician.
The X-Ray room is about a quarter-mile from the Flu Room. Since this woman and I had about a five-minute walk together, I decided to make pleasant small-talk.
“It’s really great that you’re able to do X-Rays on site. I pretty much figured I was doomed to go to the ER after this.”
“Yeah, well, we only became an urgent care a few months ago. Before that we’ve always been job-related accidents and injuries, so we had to have the X-Rays.”
“Oh, I see.” ::shuffle shuffle. awkward silence:: Upon coming to the X-Ray room, she looks at me, as though for the first time and says,
“Dammit, didn’t they tell you to change out of your clothes?”
Bear in mind I just spent 5 MINUTES shuffling down the hallway with this lady. NOW YOU NOTICE THAT I AM WEARING CLOTHES.
“No ma’am, I just trusted that you’d have a gown here when you told me to follow you.”
“Well. I can’t let you change in another room, since you’re a flu patient. We have to take you back to the flu room so you can remove your bra.”
“Oh, it’s okay, I’m not wearing a bra. I have a camisole with no underwire.” (I had sort of anticipated they might want to check for pneumonia.)
Now, she gets really pissed, pretty much out of nowhere. She wheels around, and into my mask she says,
“You need to just do exactly what I say! I am taking you back to the flu room!”
She was old and mean for the rest of our time together. What a pleasant encounter.
Final diagnosis:
No swine.
No influenza.
No pneumonia.
Sinus infection, with some other sort of virus attached to it. No work for the next 5 days.
In other news, some tree-trimmers accidentally dropped a tree on my mom and dad’s brand-new front porch. Luckily, the guy’s brother is a carpenter, so by the time my parents got home (the tree trimmers came unexpectedly – don’t ask), the porch was already halfway repaired. And as my dad went to move his car out of said carpenter’s way, his car chug-a-lugged and died!
Apparently we collectively can’t catch a break.
But whatevs, I got to spend the majority of the afternoon playing Donkey Kong Country and Bubsy: Claws Encounters of the Furred Kind! So I can’t complain.
