Inessentials: The Blog

Since some of you have asked, here’s a Dickensian (in length, anyways) rundown of my event-filled three days.

Monday, 3:00am

I wake up with sharp stomach pain, an achy back, and indigestion. This is the fifth or sixth time this has happened in the last couple weeks. It usually takes me hours to go back to sleep. Sometimes the pain is in my stomach, sometimes in my ribcage on the right side. Usually there’s indigestion as well. I promised Nicole that the next time this happens, I’ll go to the urgent care. Well, this is the next time. It’s not as bad an attack as previously, but still pretty significant. I drive to the urgent care, which because my wonderful university wants to pinch its pennies, is a security guard who lets me into the nearly deserted University Health Services building. I go the second floor, where a nurse takes my vitals. Then a second nurse comes in. She asks some questions and decides to go wake the doctor. Yes, there is a doctor sleeping in the back room, and yes I definitely woke him up in the middle of the night. He’s pretty sure I’ve got acid reflux and not happy that he’s been woken up for it, so he gives me some pink stuff to swallow that is both for acid reflux and numbs the esophagus. In return, I don’t make fun of his bedhead. After the required five minutes, I tell him that while the indigestion is better, the pain is still there, sharp in the front and dull in the back. He tells me that, while it’s probably just acid reflux, it could be my gall bladder or pancreas, so it’s not a bad idea to get an ultrasound. Since UHS is a ghost town, I can come back in the morning for the ultrasound or go to the emergency room, where hopefully it isn’t too busy. “Really, it’s a judgment call.” I wait a couple moments for him to make the judgment call. Then I realize he wants me to make the judgment call. This is a real pet peeve of mine: he’s the freaking doctor, with all the requisite degrees and I’m a guy with a pain in my stomach; my only qualification is not having died yet; why doesn’t he just make the judgment call? Partly out of spite and partly out of wanting to get this diagnosed while I’m having symptoms, I decide to go to the ER for x-rays.

Monday, 4:00am

The ER on a Sunday night is apparently a good night for “moonlighting,” I overhear as the various nurses, interns, residents, and other classifications I vaguely remember from television medical dramas discuss what a quiet night it’s been. I also hear a guy in green scrubs describe the places where he still has shrapnel in his body from his two tours in Iraq; the real bummer, I find out, is that one piece touches the ulner nerve in his elbow and makes motorcycle driving difficult. I am at a teaching hospital, which means in addition to the ER doctor who is talking to me and the nurse who is drawing my blood, other folks are walking in and out taking bets on what the tests will find. Consensus is pancreas. That’s harder to diagnose (requires “labs,” which I think means blood tests but could also mean well trained labrador retrievers will be reading my charts).

However, Dr. Judgment Call is closest to correct, since he sent me to have an ultrasound of my gall bladder. The ultrasound (which took about 20 minutes because Mr. Med Student was trying to figure out how to properly use the ultrasound machine) reveals very many, very large gall stones in my gall bladder as well as “sludge.” Fortunately, the gall bladder is not inflamed and the common bowel duct is also okay. Those two would require immediate action. Instead, (SPOILER ALERT) I will have weeks of uncomfortableness to look forward to, while I figure out that coffee is too acidic! and Thanksgiving is less fun when you can’t overindulge! and I can test the limits of Nicole’s sympathy! After my ER ultrasound, I go to radiology for an ultrasound. That means I am wheeled on a gurney. I considered thrashing around like I was in One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, but that’s only because I haven’t practiced my Brad Pitt in 12 Monkeys impression recently. Instead, I just blandly watch the sadder folk I pass by. My second ultrasound is much more pleasant (they warmed the goo!) and this ultrasound tech is much better than Mr. Almost a Doctor: she has me turn on my side to get a better picture. She brings in Dr. Short Germanic Lady who reads my ultrasounds, then decides to do some of her own. You know, just cuz. Finally, I go back to the ER, await the labs, and eventually drive home at about 7:30am.

Monday, 10:30am

After two hours sleep, I throw my suitcase, Christmas presents, the dog, and other random items into the Prius to begin the 17-hour drive to Wisconsin for Thanksgiving. Nicole will be flying separately after she finishes work on Wednesday. We’ll drive back together on Sunday. As I pull out, I notice the gas gauge is at one bar (out of roughly ten). I’ve gone 389 miles, and a tank will usually last at least 400-450. There is definitely no Low Fuel warning. Of course, within a quarter mile I’ve forgotten I need gas, so I get in the lane to get on the freeway instead of going to the cheap gas station on the corner. No big deal, I’ll fill up after I run a couple errands, which include picking up my Percoset prescription. I pull onto the Q Bridge, the stretch of I-95 in New Haven that crosses the Quinnipiac River before it intersects I-91, and the car flips out half way across the bridge. Lots of ominous warning lights (none of which say Low Fuel), but the car is clearly not acting right. I coast off the freeway and pull into a neighborhood I don’t know very well. I pull out the owner’s manual, which isn’t very helpful. I eventually decide that this particular collection of warning lights means the car must be out of fuel, even though I never got the Add Fuel light and the gas gauge still reads that I have about 1/8 of a tank. Using only the electric motor in the hybrid, I try to drive to a gas station, but only make it halfway. I remember reports from other friends who own Priuses complaining about the gas bladder in the Prius (instead of a gas tank) sometimes gives faulty measurements about how much gas is left because sometimes the bladder doesn’t fully inflate. The redesigned 2010 Prius no longer has a bladder tank.

Now I’m stuck, it’s cold out, and the dog is in the car, not quite sure why we’re stopped but happy to be doing something. An abandoned gas station taunts me from across the street. I remember a Firestone station that is a little closer than the gas station I was headed to. Maybe they have a gas can. I go there first. No luck, and the serviceman convinces me that a gas station in Long Wharf is much closer than the one in East Rock that I was headed to. (A later Google Map search reveals that the Firestone is equidistant between the two gas stations, but my car is definitely closer to my original gas station choice.) After my 2.5 mile round-trip hike to the gas station in Long Wharf, where I pay $13 for a one gallon gas can, plus $3 gas, carrying it back in 30 degree temperatures to the dog waiting in the car, I add the gas only to find the car still won’t start. All the same errors. Since I have a lovely Prius, there are complicated computer systems that control the hybrid system and don’t allow something as basic as adding fuel to solve a complex problem like not having fuel. I call the dealer, talk to the service rep, and try finding a fuse to remove to reset the computer system – basically, a hard reboot. The fuse he wants me to remove apparently doesn’t exist, so I can’t do this myself. I’m gonna need a tow.

Monday, 1:30pm

Since I’m partly blocking traffic, I try to put the Prius in neutral and push it onto a side street. I can’t both push the car and steer it, so nice, older, Italian gentlemen in this historically Italian neighborhood give me a push. I now have a predicament. I need to get a tow to the dealership on the other side of town (about 30 minutes away). I have a car full of luggage, including an expensive camera and computer. And I have my now very confused Shih Tzu sitting in an awfully cold car for three hours. I know I don’t want to take her to the dealership with me, even if the tow company allows it. So I call up a dog-loving friend who works in downtown New Haven, who picks up Panther and takes her back to my condo with my house key. (FORESHADOWING) One problem solved. Tow truck arrives (it has to be a flatbed because, you know, Prius) and takes me cross town to the dealership. When I arrive, I can’t pay him because they forgot to tell me on the phone that he needs to be paid in cash. Again I go to a gas station, this time to get enough cash to pay the nicely mustachioed tow-truck driver. I talk to the service department, and they tell me they probably won’t get to my car today because it’s now late afternoon, and everyone stops working around 4:30pm, but would I like a free rental car? Sure. I take the brand-new 2010 Prius home with me, where my wife now is. Do I need any keys off my key chain? Nah. I already gave over my house key, which is the only one I might need. (MORE FORESHADOWING)

Tuesday, 9:00am

I try to be ready for when the dealer calls to say my car is fixed (they told me it would likely be done by 10:00am), so I grab the key to the rental Prius, go out the door to move the car to a place where I can better load it with the luggage that I will transfer to my car when I pick it up, shut the door behind my and lock it because I won’t be coming back in that door, and, hey, I’ve got my keys with me. I move the Prius, park it out front, turn it off, and stop dead in my tracks. (FORESHADOWING PAYS OFF) Uh-oh. I don’t have my house key. I don’t have my garage door opener (which is built into my Prius and isn’t removable). All the doors are locked. My dog is inside and hasn’t peed since the night before. What do I do?

Option A: Drive an hour to Nicole’s work, get her house key, drive an hour home.

Option B: Get a hold of the friend with my house key, but do so without a phone or a computer or knowing where exactly she works.

Option C: Go to the dealer, wait for the car to get fixed, and come home and use my car’s garage door opener. Problem: I don’t have my cell phone to see if the car is ready, and I don’t have my wallet to pay for the car if it is ready.

I decide that Option C has the potential to be the quickest IF I can get $100 cash to pay the $90 estimate for the car. My plan: Drive toward Nicole’s work. Stop at my bank along the way. If they give me $100, I’ll go the dealer; otherwise, I go Nicole’s work. Amazingly, I convince my bank to give me $100 cash even though I have absolutely no identification. (Admittedly, judging by the flash of terror in the teller’s eyes, I shouldn’t have begun by saying, “I have an unusual request…”) I give them every piece of personal info I can think of, including Social Security number and recent account activity, and they give me $100. So I drive to the dealer. And wait. And wait. And wait. (The Price Is Right is still awesome, by the way.) The guy at the service desk is worried that I only have $97 (I can’t remember what I bought), because in addition to the $90 estimate, I’ll have to pay for the 5 gallons of gas they put in the tank. I panic momentarily (I can’t exactly hold up another bank), but then remember the toll money jar in my car, which I think will have just enough nickels to cover the bill.

Tuesday, 12:30pm

At this point, I haven’t eaten anything today, the dog still hasn’t peed (outside the house, at least), and the service guy tells me the car probably won’t be done today, but he promises it will be done by 9:0oam Wednesday. It is now no longer looking like a great plan to drive to Wisconsin early in the week, since leaving on Wednesday will give me approximately 26 hours to make it to Wisconsin before Thanksgiving turkey is served. Oh yeah, and a snow storm is moving into the Midwest on Wednesday night. Instead, I have a rental 2010 Prius with me and a confused dog at home and a wife at work and hour and a half away. I try Option B as Plan B. I drive to downtown New Haven, where I get on a school computer to contact the friend with the house key. She doesn’t seem to be online, and in the nine minutes that I am in the library on the computer, my rental car gets ticketed for not putting money in the meter. Nine minutes. $20. No closer to letting the dog out or leaving New Haven. For those keeping track, 27 hours after I left on my 17-hour trip, I have travelled 27 miles by car and tow-truck and walked 3 miles without leaving New Haven. It is now time for Option A.

I drive to Nicole’s work, but I’m so distracted I miss the exit and drive nearly into Rhode Island before turning around. Then I get to the small town where Nicole works and realize I have no idea where my wife works. I know where she used to work, and I find that building right away, but I’ve only been to her new school once before, and I just don’t know how to get there. That doesn’t stop me from driving in circles (yes, literal circles) for another hour before getting directions at a gas station. By the time I arrive at her school, all the kids have left, and the people in the office are laughing at my arrival. They already know the story because Nicole has lovingly forwarded to a few of her colleagues my brief e-mail description (sent before I knew that I had gotten a parking ticket and before I got lost for an extra hour and half) of my terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day. By this point, Nicole is ready to leave so we caravan (at her suggestion, so I don’t get lost) back home and let the dog out, 17 hours after she has last gone out to pee.

Wednesday, 9:45am

I officially begin (for the third time) my drive to Wisconsin from the dealership’s front door, which I admirably perform in one 16 hour and 45 minute shot to Wisconsin. Rain along the way, lots of phone calls, a quickly aborted book on tape, and a concluding nasty stretch in southern Wisconsin when the rain turns to snow, the conditions become hazardous, and I play The Killers very loudly to keep myself awake. I arrive at my parents’ house before Nicole, who is stuck at the airport waiting for the in-laws, who themselves are delayed by work, snow, and frequent stops.

The next day will be Thanksgiving Day, which will conclude with our family Christmas gift exchange. Nicole and I will leave Saturday night, driving to South Bend, Indiana to break up the long drive back on the heaviest travel weekend of the year. I wasn’t able to eat much all weekend, and I’ve now lost 6 pounds since going on my don’t-give-myself-severe-abdominal-pain diet (no fatty, fried, or spicy food). That’s one whole belt loop. And as Nicole likes to remind me I’ll be losing another two pounds when they remove my gall bladder. (Well, probably more like 8 ounces). As she also likes to say, I will no longer be “complete.” But finally, this post is.