More "fun" times at the doctor's office

Yesterday we did a minor procedure on a 17 year old boy named Luis. He was our last patient of the day, so when we were done with him, he came and sat in the lobby to wait for his mom to pick him up. Dr H went to his office, and I sat at my reception desk working on some things. Everyone else had gone home for the day, so it was just Luis and me up front.

After a while he came over to my counter and ask if I had any suggestions on what he should take for the pain. I told him that Motrin or Tylenol should work just fine and that we normally don't have to prescribe anything. He kind of nodded slowly, but then said that his feet were already starting to bother him. Since there's really no way the local anesthesia could wear off that fast, I started to get suspicious that maybe he was just after drugs or something (unfortunately, when you work at a doctor's office you deal with a lot of druggies). So I told him again that we don't prescribe anything for it and that as soon as he got home he could take some Motrin to ease the pain. He nodded kind of slowly and started to lean heavily on the counter.

And then he collapsed.

I heard a sickening "thud" as he fell out of my view and hit the floor. He was pretty big for a 17yo so there was a lot of weight to go down! It was one of those moments you see in a movie - I sat there stunned for half a second while I processed what had happened, then I jumped up and leaned over my tall reception counter to peer down at him. Then I ran around the desk and was like, "hey! are you okay??" His eyes were open but kind of glazed and he didn't respond, and even though I was obviously flustered, somehow I managed to think clearly enough to drag a chair over to him from the lobby and prop his feet up on it. Then I ran to Dr H's office and even though he was on the phone, I just said "Um. . .I need your help - Luis just like totally passed out on me." I felt like I must have looked kind of crazy, because the words came out in a half panicked/half nervous laughter kind of way. He immediately hung up and and started hurrying toward the lobby and said something like "we need to get his feet up" which, thankfully, I was able to say I had already done. By the time we got to the lobby, the kid was coming around so Dr H just squatted down to tell him that it was a normal reaction and that we just needed to get some blood back to his head. Twenty minutes later the kid was fine and stood up and went home, but geez. I had a headache for hours just from that "thud" echoing through my skull.

I've said it before, and I'll say it again. Things are never boring when you work for a doctor.

Some words of wisdom

I went driving with my 16 year old sister for the first time last night. Far less terrifying than I had expected, especially since I let her drive my new sports car.

I voted on Tuesday. Yes I did.

My heart aches for my friend. Luv you, L.

And finally, some parting words of wisdom:

Before you criticize someone, you should walk a mile in their shoes. That way, when you criticize them, you'll be a mile away and they'll be shoeless. (tehe!)

Highlights from my week thus far

1. I got paid and found out how much my raise was, and it was more than I expected!
2. Neal brought home cool presents from Morocco!
3. Farm Country was so much fun, and the pictures turned out pretty good!
4. I finally got Maddy to say "moo" after 4 months of coaxing!
5. I am having THE BEST MORNING EVER!
6. I get to go to a party and get prizes tonight!
7. My 5th post this month!

All in all, this is shaping up to be a pretty good week!

And Then There Were None

Okay, I HIGHLY recommend this book to you. I just finished reading "And Then There Were None" by Agatha Christie, and it was AMAZING! I actually consider it one of the best books I've read in a long time, and I've read some pretty good books recently! It's no wonder it's so well-known.

Just as a short synopsis for anyone who doesn't know, "And Then There Were None" is a mystery book about 10 people who wind up on an island together and slowly get killed one by one. Thankfully, it is not at all gruesome, gritty, or scary (one of the reasons I rarely read mysteries is because I get nightmares easily). But it definitely is a mystery, and the ending completely blew me away because I could not figure out who the murderer was!

I read this book because my youngest sister Roshini recently wrote a script called "And Then There Was a Nun" which loosely parallels Agatha Christie's book. It took maybe an hour for her to tell me the whole story of her play, which was very detailed and impressive, so it made me go read the real book so that I would understand better the subtle similarities.

Great stuff. Really, go read it. (I sound like Reading Rainbow)

"Cursed"

A very spooky Friday the 13th to everyone!

Big News!

I JUST GOT A RAISE!!!!

Blogger's Block

Well, can I just say that I have a major case of blogger's block. Despite my attempts to think of something clever to post to appease Miri's plea for "more blog" I have failed. Apparantly I blogged 5 times in May, which is actually more than I thought I had. Once a week is not terrible, I guess, except that I'm pretty sure that the first 3 times I blogged all fell within like the first week. Oh well.

Random tidbitties:

1. My first primary activity is coming up! I am pretty dang excited about this, because I think we are going to go to Farm Country at Thanksgiving Point. I am excited to see all the animals, and feed them, and go on a wagon ride (because I'm pretty sure I'm too old for the pony ride), and pet the animals. . . Oh, and I'm sure the kiddies will like it too, of course. . . .

2. I am very excited for the little-er one to be born. I am very interested to see how my "goddaughter" (laugh) M will take to the new one. I plan on showering them both with lavish gifts (unfortunately not, since they won't really be able to take anything with them in the move, but I wish I could).

3. My allergy medicine does NOT WORK FAST ENOUGH. True, I have been taking it every other day instead of every day like I am supposed to, so that's probably the reason why. But it costs like $1 per pill so I'm trying to stretch them out. But I haven't been able to smell anything since April and it hurts to put makeup on because my eyes are so sore from all the rubbing. I splurged and got some soothing eye stuff from Mary Kay so hopefully that will help.

4. The doctor finally fired my assistant. Hooray! My stress levels have been just through the roof because of her ineptness and my workload feels like it's tripled. We've been doing interviews this week and they're going to let me have the final say on who we hire since I'll be the one working with her.

5. My abs rock. I am very pleased that my daily pilates/kickboxing classes are starting to do their thing.

Also I am pretty loopy today and I'm not completely sure why, so please forgive the craziness in the post. I'll likely delete it later.

Lastly, a comic that is funny from lefthandedtoons.com:

An Unpleasant Morning Surprise

This book is actually fascinating. I highly recommend it.

So I'm at the office, minding my own business, and a delivery truck pulls in. The guy brings in 2 large boxes and has me sign for them. After he left, I sat down on one of the boxes and started reading through the order sheet to figure out what they are. Finally, in one small corner, I find the words: "Goods Description: Exempt Human Specimens." At which point I promptly jumped up from the box crying, "ew ew ew!"

Working for a doctor is so startling sometimes.

Kavita

This is my beautiful sister Kavita!

I went to her vocal performance last night at the Northampton House. I haven't heard her sing solo in a few years, so it was really fun. I knew she had a good voice, but I had forgotten how good it actually is. As I sat there fiddling with my camera angle, all of a sudden I heard this deep, melodic, honey-covered voice resonating through the air, and realized it was my sister!

I'm so proud. :)

Free Health Screenings!

American Fork Hospital will be having a health fair June 7th and will be doing a lot of free health care screenings. Here's the link for anyone who's interested:

http://intermountainhealthcare.org/xp/public/americanfork/aboutus/news/article28.xml

"Hate" is not a strong enough word

I loathe birthdays.

Exercise

Starting Monday I am going to be taking a couple exercise classes at BYU. If anyone would like to come along please let me know! I am not so good at the working out by myself thing, as far as consistency goes.

The classes I am going to be taking are:
Kickboxing T/Th 8-9pm
Pilates M 5:30-6:30pm and W 7:30-8:30pm

Classes are $38, or $65 for two, and they run for 3 months. Like I said, if anyone's interested, let me know.

Haunted

I chose this title because I feel it accurately describes the way I've been feeling lately. Not by ghosts, but by my own dreams!! In the last year or so I feel like I've had WAY too many troubling dreams, the kind where you wake up feeling panicked, and then can't shake the feeling for days.

Lately there are 2 recurring dreams I've been having. The first is about needles. For instance, a couple nights ago I had a dream (or would my dreams more accurately be called nightmares?) where I was running around trying to find my sister Ayisha, who is also a medical assistant, because I needed an insulin shot and couldn't bring myself to do it. So I was searching everywhere for her, and finally found her, and then I couldn't find a needle to fit the syringe. And I was panicking because I knew that if I didn't give myself the shot on time I'd get sick.

The second dream I've been having usually involves this one set of my close guy friends I had in high school and college. (I don't dream about my female friends as much because I get to see them much more often) Last night I dreamed that it was high school graduation again, and they called me to meet me somewhere, so I just kept running all over the city trying to find them, and I was crying because I couldn't find them anywhere. All my dreams run along this line - either I'm trying to find them and can't, or I'm having so much fun with them that when I wake up and realize it was just a dream then I'm really sad.

It's so weird that I dream so much now, because during junior high and high school I hardly dreamed (or rather, remembered my dreams) at all. I remember one point my senior year where I realized that the last time I remembered dreaming was in like 7th grade. I think my dreams got kick-started again because when I sent my missionary off I started dreaming about him or my other friends that had left several times a week. And now I'm just a regular dreamer!

Speaking off: There are only 2 dreams that I had as a child (under the age of 10) that I can remember, and they both involve my sisters. In the first one, a lion escaped from the zoo and came to my house and so we all ran into the house to hide. But my sister Kavita didn't make it in time, so she jumped into the sandbox to hide and the lion jumped in and ate her. In the other dream, my sister Ayisha was hit and killed by a car in the street. Both gruesome, no? I must have been learning about death for the first time at that age or something.

Sorry for the random post. Though I suppose they're ALL random. . .

Embarrassing

Oh, boy.

Yesterday I wore a white skirt to work. I was feeling all confident, and cute, and composed. . .

AND THEN.

I went to a medical luncheon at AF Hospital. On my way back out to the car it was my horror to have pointed out to me that I had something on the back of my skirt. For half a moment I thought it was something else, but upon closer inspection, I decided it was chocolate. Since we had been served chocolate chip cookies for dessert at the luncheon, I concluded that there must have been a chocolate chip on my chair. The chair I had just vacated, which means only one person had seen it.

Feeling much better, I then realized something else: I had patients coming into the office in 20 minutes, and the drive from AF Hospital to my office takes 10 minutes.

SO. Quick as a whistle (what does that even mean?) I decided my best option was to buy a new skirt in the next 10 minutes. So I zoomed into the Lindon Walmart, picked up the first skirt I saw that matched my shirt, paid, and left. I got to my office just in time, and the skirt looked great. Saved!

. . .and then this morning when I got in my car to come to work, I brushed some dirt off my driver's seat, and remembered how my windows had been open a couple days ago when we had that dust storm.

Dang. Maybe I DID have the stain on my skirt all morning.

Pie

Remember:

The difference between hostility and hospitality is pi(e).