Surprised With An Appointment

Guess who forgot she had a fasting lab this morning at 8:30. That's right. You must be psychic! It was indeed Mrs. Hillbilly Mom. It dawned on me this morning around 6:15, one hour after taking one medicine that requires "a full glass of water." Anyhoo...I didn't eat or drink anything else or brush my teeth, packed up my remaining medicine for later consumption, hauled the #1 son to summer school, and hot-footed it over to the doctor's office in time.

The Pony was pleased to partake of the free trolley ride from the parking lot to the door. I had told him I was going to walk, and the loyal little Pony declared that he, too, would walk. That he would walk with me. I insisted that he take the trolley, since he enjoys it so much. He demurred. We got out of T-Hoe, and that overly-cheerful retiree who drives the trolley made a beeline for the back of our parking spot. The Pony looked at me. "I think I'll ride the trolley today," I said. The Pony lit up with a grin from ear to ear. It doesn't take much to make him happy.

Inside the lobby of the hospital, there was a dude with several full trash bags holding open the elevator door. "Are you going up? Because there's only one elevator today, so I thought I'd wait for you." A prince among men, he was. The Pony also enjoys the elevator. He stands in the back corner. I don't know why. He's The Pony.

I was glad I had hauled in my 20-year-old purse, what with the receptionist asking for both my insurance cards and a picture ID. Then she looked up the date of my new appointment that was made six months ago and changed five months ago. The lab girl called me in at the stroke of 8:30. I left The Pony holding my purse. We had been sitting side by side in a section of four chairs. The Pony was on the end, then me, then an empty chair with a magazine, then an old lady who came in after us.

The lab girl called me 'Sweetie' about 100 times in five minutes, but it was not in an Obama-like way, so I did not object. She chose the right arm instead of the left, which the lab girls hardly ever do. She kept apologizing, for the low chair, for tying off my brachial artery with a section of rubber hose, for sticking it to me, for sucking up the blood into two tubes, for strapping a swatch of gauze to my inner elbow. But she DID say she didn't see anything wrong with my drinking water with a pill at 5:15 a.m. She said they don't like it because it dilutes the blood, but she likes it because Hey! More blood!

When I came out, The Pony had a new companion. A new old lady was sitting right next to him. He made fish-eyes at me. That's a look he gives. Some of my students who used to ride the bus with The Pony named it Fish Eyes. I don't know how he could possible object to an old lady, but he's The Pony.

We watched an elevator repair guy work on the broken elevator right next to the one we were waiting on. There are stairs, but they only go from the fourth floor to the second floor, and from there, we would have had to jump over the balcony. I told The Pony he could go first, and then catch me, but he was having none of it. The trolley guy was gone, so we hoofed it to T-Hoe. The whole experience was much pleasanter than waiting an hour for a not-haircut, our next stop. The Pony finished the book he had brought with him, and was a bit annoyed.

After that near miss with the appointment, I called the boys' dentist when we got home, and found out that they are both due for a tooth cleaning two weeks from today. Actually, The Pony was due in May, but we missed that one. His teeth didn't fall out, so I'm OK with it.

Sorry the details of this medical excursion can not match those of my blog buddy, Deadpan Ann. I'm sure she will have quite a tale of her intestinal excapades in the near future.