Hospital, Obamacare, Aaron Hernandez

Ok, you're going to have to bear with me here.  I am typing on my ipad and my wireless keyboard's not working.  Either the batteries are dead or my keyboard, like millions of other apple keyboards apparently, shit the bed and the only fix is to drop a tiny tinfoil ball into the battery compartment because apple products are overpriced pieces of garbage.  In any case, I am tapping away with my index fingers like a kid in computer class, so please excuse any typos and also the wonky formatting.

Tonight is my first night in the hospital.  I called in the afternoon and was told my bed would be ready by 5.  Of course, it wasn't actually ready until closer to 8 but Ill get to that later.  My mom took my girlfriend Heather and I to an early dinner for one last meal before my hospitalization and prolonged recovery.  Thai noodle place.  I had a Thai iced tea, my favorite.

We get to the hospital around 5 and meet up with my sister at Brigham and Women's.  We go to admitting and I check in.  I'm told it will be another hour because they have to clean the room.  Annoying, but not unsurprising.  Waiting is the name of the game here.   I finish signing in and take a seat with everyone.  My mom is talking about having to wait another hour when a middle-aged woman comes up to us.  She appeared to be a manager of some sort.  She immediately assaults us with a rant about how an hour is actually not long at all, before beginning a tirade about how Obamacare is responsible for longer waits because hospitals are forced to slash jobs which affects the rate of room turnover.  My mom tried to ask a question and the woman snaps, "excuse me," and continues to talk about how the snow birds from Florida all come up this time of year to get their medical care in Boston, cancer patients are living longer than they were five years ago, and how people in general are living longer and a man in his 100s had knee surgery. All these things lead to an increased wait at the hospital.  

Thanks for the diatribe you miserable bitch.  It was pretty funny how she seemed to resent people getting medical care...god forbid cancer patients are living longer, if it gives her more paperwork to do. After that display, we decided to walk from B&W to Dana Farber (two separate hospitals connected by a bridge; I am a Dana Farber patient but do all my outpatient stuff like radiation and transplants at B&W).  We sat in the meditative garden at Dana, which is an indoor garden with windows overlooking the street.  Very relaxing place to be, although someone should tell them to lower the volume of the bird chirping.  My dad says when he's in there he is always tempted to pick up a couple of the rocks and put them in his pocket.  We stayed there for the rest of the hour before heading back.

When we returned to the admitting waiting room there was a middle-aged couple walking one of their mothers around the waiting room.  If you could ever use more old people in your life, hang out at a hospital.  I look at them and sometimes I share their hope to get well.  Other times I visualize a tombstone.  This woman looked somewhere in between.  While she's being walked around, my sister asks about Aaron Hernandez, so I give her the basics:

"Well, he killed a couple people a few years ago and he just killed a guy who knew about it."

Then I hear the daughter of the old woman say, "Let's wait until he's convicted," as she starts explaining the case to her mother.  That is a true Patriots fan.

So time is passing, and my mother is getting anxious.  How long are they gonna keep you waiting, this is unbearable, etc.  My sister and I decided that our mother can be a time bomb, where each tick of the clock is a mini explosion itself.  Soon my mom delivered her favorite (possibly only) criticism of my girlfriend: "You need to use Dawn.  That health store stuff doesn't cut grease."

Eventually I am admitted, meet my lovely nurses, and set up shop.  I don't think this will be too bad.  The hospital sucks but this is the first step in it being all over.

Hope you stuck with me during this longer, music-less post.  It is hard to embed videos and shit on the ipad, but I will do my best.  I think my next post will be about Regeneration Records in Boston and some fun memories from time spent going to shows and shopping there.

Goodnight