Back again

Well that was quite the experience. Checked into the ASU (ambulatory surgery unit) on time, was duly processed, stripped of my belongings and coaxed into a stained gown before then being ushered into a laz-e-boy chair from which I could see the world and the world in turn could see my genitals.

Overhead light was of the bright and flourescent variety so headache soon ensued. Esquire was unusally thin (genius edition turned up far fewer geniuses than they'd anticipated it seemed) and with cell phones banned and the opportunity to harass friends reduced boredom soon set in.

And boredom had time to set in. The guy in surgery before me was certainly getting his money's worth - his 4 hr surgery taking close to 10 hrs. I amused myself by staring at the light, guaging the increase in wattage of my headache as a result of staring at the light (headaches are measured in Watts as the people on the overly bright 3rd floor at work very well know) and by watching the people arrived, get wheeled into surgery, back from recovery and stumble home - all as I waited.

Some of the more colorful vistors beyond the tan curtain told stories of their arrest for 'kicking that bitch's car' and their subsequent visits with the law. Most though merely said things like - 'you're being sick, you're being sick, that's good... right?'

It was a mixture of Richard Prior and Mel Brookes basically. And it kept me going.

Cocktail party syndrome is weird. I heard my name long before anyone popped around tan curtain (accurately dated by its symettrical patterning to 1986) and told me that after 5 hrs of waiting I'd probably be cancelled.

The labs were closed and everyone was knackered - it was Friday night after all. I shruged the shrug of the helpless and they took pity on me. Labs stayed open, a med student was dispatched to keep me company and the O.R was scrubbed ready for me.

Med student turned out not to be much company so I flashed the genitals and gave her something to look up in Grey's Anatomy when she got home.

The plan? Take a suspect node from my neck - test it in the O.R, if it was cancerous do a back flip... bring me around and send me home. If not then cut into my chest and take something from the mass there. That would mean a hospital stay. As the surgeon told me - 'when you wake up look down, more than one scar means more than one day here'

Turns out they took from my chest... I woke up a couple of times during the night (first as they shoved morphine into me and yelled 'take a deep breath, more morphine, oxygen....') the second when the woman in the next bed took to yelling "I'm confused" whenever she had the breath to do so. To her credit the nurse told her "The hell you are. You're not confused. You're annoying" and I internally cheered.

8am and I was given water, apple juice (the hospital has a deal with an orchard I swear - it's ALL fucking apple products) and ginger beer. Yum.

10am and I'm taken upstairs and told Nil By Mouth. :-(

No doctor.

No word on what's happened.

Jude arrives with my mom. I croak on as they sit bored.

No doctor.

Clueless intern arrives - no notes, no case history, no idea.

He calls my surgeon. An hour later I'm fed (apple jelly!) and on the curb waiting for a cab.

Make it up the stairs home and start coughing.

Am still coughing.

Less often and less blood.

But the scars look cool, Jude's great and my mom gets to fly home knowing that I'm nae deed yet.

Hopefully more news tomorrow - until then FISH 'N' CHIPS (again!)