Dear Crabby,
I have to go to the hospital to have a procedure done and then stay the night. I am nervous. Do you have any suggestions?
Sincerely, First Time Patient
Dear First Time Patient,
Yes, I am very well acquainted with our local hospital and staff. At my age, I’ve spent more time there than I have at the Hilton, if you know what I mean. There are two things you should know that will save you some time and frustration about hospital visits. First is that their robes are backwards. The opening goes behind you. This is for added humiliation and to make sure you don’t go wandering the halls too much. The second thing to note is that when the nurses tell you to push that little button anytime you need something, they don’t really mean that at all! What they actually mean to say is “only push that button if it’s convenient for me and if it’s a dire emergency for you!” But that being said, there are definitely ways to amuse yourself while at hospital. I remember the last time I was there. This nurse kept asking me for a urine sample every morning at 6 a.m. So one morning when she left the container, I opened my apple juice and poured it in the sample container for her. When she came back she looked puzzled and said, “This doesn’t quite look right.” So I snatched it out of her hands and opened it up and chugged it all down and said, “Let me run it through again for you.” Oh the look on her face was worth it. Sometimes, if I had a particularly difficult nurse, I’d have to take more drastic measures. One time this nurse was really difficult with me so I fixed her good. I called one of them numbers on the television for the acne medication. I started telling them how bad my face was. Then I said I had to switch phones and wondered if they wouldn’t mind calling me back. I gave them the nurse’s name and number and just waited to hear that call come in. It was grand! She answered the phone and started raising her voice with them saying, “What do you mean I have horrible problems with my face?” She went on with them for several minutes, all the while having no idea what I had done. When she came into my room, I said, “You know I knew a gal once who had bad acne too.” She snapped and balked that she didn’t have acne! Oh boy, that was great! She really got worked up. So I did that a few more times with everything from mortgages to having a friend call her to tell her she won a $100,000 sweepstakes, only then to tell her there was a mistake and it was another woman with her same name. Well, the more I thought about it, the more I figured I should apologize to the rest of you folk that might get Nurse Grumpy after me! Anyway, hospitals aren’t that bad. They are actually just trying to keep us all alive. Other than some humiliation and an occasional poke, it’s really just about getting better and getting home. Make the best of it, and try to think of some fun you can have while you are there!
Sincerely, Dear Crabby
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