Thursday, February 24, 2011
Everyone’s asking me why I was interested in knowing what “Night Trips” was. How was I to know that “Night Trips” is (according to the establishment): “The best damn strip clubs in Oklahoma PERIOD.”? Hahaha!
So where do I begin with this story? I guess I’ll start at the beginning, on the day my sore throat mutated. It started with a wheeze which was accompanied by labored breathing, that resulted in my having to take a couple swigs out of the Benadryl bottle because I thought I was having an allergic reaction to coming in contact mildew.
All that happened on Sunday evening. Monday crept upon me and my throat started to itch, my body began to ache and I went to bed that night shivering like crazy but sweating profusely. It was an odd experience. . .
On Tuesday morning I woke up having lost my voice, my throat was burning beyond belief and my body throbbed in pain. I was in agony but I didn’t have the heart to call into work sick. I just couldn’t! I had already missed three days of work due to my youngest being diagnosed with Type B Influenza, there was no way I was going to fail my bosses now especially since I had already messaged them saying that I had planned on being at school on Tuesday. Long story short, I went to work….
Wednesday was a miserable day indeed. The virus worsened, my tonsils and the lymph nodes in my neck were swollen, it hurt to swallow, it hurt to talk, it felt like my throat was on fire. When I got off work I decided to call the appointment line to schedule a check-up. The appointment line was closed and I was transferred to the On-Call Nurse Line. *O Joy* This is where my troubles began!
I called at 3:30pm and left my call back information with the phone operator. The operator told me that the wait time to speak with a nurse was only 30-40 minutes. (………3-hrs later phone rings) I pick up the phone where I’m greeted by an Eastern Indian speaking man named, Nurse Pete”. He asked me to describe my symptoms. . .
*a-hem* clears throat… “Burning,-swollen throat, loss of voice, runny nose, upper respiratory ickiness, swollen lymph nodes, and wheezy breathing.”
Nurse Pete interrupts… “What color is your throat? Are your lips and fingertips ashy grey? Are your lymph nodes in your armpits swollen? Are you running a fever? …and what’s the highest temp? (Here’s where the questions got funky…) Have you found lumps in your breasts? How many sexual partners do you have? Are you menstruating? When were you last tested for HIV? Do you have HIV? Assuming you have multiple sleeping partners, when did you last have intercourse with them?
…….WHOA! WHOA! WHOA! STOP THE PRESSES!!!
I ask the nurse, “Nurse Petey, what do those questions have to do with my having a sore throat?
Nurse Pete asks me not to interrupt and to answer the questions because he is coming close to deciding what is wrong with me. He continues… “Where’s the laceration?”, I ask, “What laceration?” Nurse Pete continues, “The laceration that is probably located near or around the swollen lymph nodes. Where is it?”
Me: “OK PETEY, WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU SMOKING? I don’t have any lacerations! If I did don’t you think I’d be half way to the ER and not piddling with you and your 20 sexual questions? “
This conversation lasted until 8:08pm. ‘Ol Petey and I argued over my diagnosis until he finally insisted that I have one of two things wrong with me.
ONE: I am a raging whore who enjoys a good rendezvous with multiple partners and contracted an STD that causes sore throats; or..
TWO: There is a laceration on my neck somewhere that I can’t see but it’s there because Petey said so and that’s gotta be the reason why my throat is swollen!
By now I figured out that Nurse Petey is pretty much an idiot. I was so blown away at his diagnosis I began to laugh, and I laughed…. And I laughed until I couldn’t breathe. My laughing got Nurse Petey very nervous. He got so nervous he even asked me to hold on a minute while he flipped through his Diagnosis For Dummies book to make sure he didn’t miss any other possible ailments that could be causing my very sore throat. He became so worried that I would snap on him after my fit of laughter he asked me to seek immediate medical attention to the closest Emergency Room.
I figured, what the heck, I’ll go to the ER. The ER was packed with sicky people. I was finally seen by a doctor at 11:30pm. The doc and his nurse wondered why I was in the ER, seeing as how I was only suffering discomfort from a sore throat. I humored him with the story of how I was given an authorization to be seen at the ER. The doctor then hollers out to his nurse, “Hey, I need you to order a Pap smear and an STD Test, STAT!” As he walked away laughing he turns back and says “The on-call nurse must have been a perv! Did you get his name?” (“….yea”, I jeered back, “Nurse PEEEETIEEE, HA!”) The doc and nurse at this point can’t control their laughter and release me with a script to medicate my bronchial irritation. In the distance heard them still snickering. Before we were completely out of sight the doc says in between chuckles, “Are you sure you didn’t accidentally dial the wrong number and maybe called, NIGHT TRIPS?”
HA!! What a night!
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
0 comments:
Post a Comment