Quirks and Invaders

Having worked the last 7 out of 8 days (or, should I say, nights?), I left the hospital singing the tune of "Freedom" while thinking of the Blues Brothers. As I sit on the couch and unwind, I can't help but think about how mankind, in his fallen state, strives to make himself (themselves?) stand out and save the day. This means that certain people--some more than others--feel that they need to control as much of every situation as they possibly can.

Take, for example, a certain physician who decided last night that his patient needed and "emergency" c-section. Now, the doctor didn't go running out the door to the O.R. to change into his scrubs to prep for emergency surgery. Instead, he decided to "help" get the patient on a gurney. Normally, the nurses do this, but wanting to present himself as the ever-present hero doctor who always saves the day at every turn, (which is why ALL of his patients are dubbed "emergent,") he got the poor woman all tangled in her sheets and stuck between the bed and the gurney before the nurses could assist her with where she needed to be. While the nurses untangled the monitors, catheter, and sheets, he decided it would be nice to move the baby warmer out of the way.  Now, this was already done, since in a true emergent situation, we would not have wasted such time. (And there were five of us there.) In the process of moving the warmer further into the room, he pulled the oxygen cord right out of the wall. Imagine a highly-pressurized, noisy hiss of air suddenly bursting upon your eardrums! Again, perhaps the man should not have tried to do something outside of his particular scope of practice. (Honestly, he's a good surgeon, but shouldn't tamper with neonatal equipment since that is not his job.) 

He then, as any hero would do, tried to wrestle the cord back into the hookup. Now, if you can imagine, this was pretty funny. There was so much pressurized air that the end of the cord was whipping around in a rather reptilian fashion. I tried to take it from him (since some of us HAVE been  trained to work with this particular equipment), but since he was the hero, in his mind it just wouldn't do to NOT be the hero, especially since he created this situation in the first place. 

Finally, one of my favorite old-school nurses lumbered over and said, "Gimme that!" and snatched it from him. Between the she and I, with one ear pressed pressed to each of our respective shoulders in an attempt to protect at least one of our eardrums, we were able to reconnect it.

Why is it that certain people are always seeking to make themselves look so good, and in the end, they look ridiculous? 

Speaking of ridiculous, I still can't find malathion. My sweet hubby made yet another trip out last night to console his poor wife with her garden woes. This morning, I attempted yet another attack on behalf of my plants. With the first spray, the end of the nozzle shot off into the foliage somewhere. So, instead of "fine mist" setting, I now have "douse your plants for all they're worth" setting. Oh well. I guess we'll see if my leaves turn into crispy critters or not. At least now I know that basil is hearty enough to bounce back!

Speaking of "bounce," I have (or just HAD) a spider on my wall. Huge.Much like the picture of the wolf spider shown here. I tried to kill him with a paper towel, but alas: he fell from the ceiling and ricocheted (is that how you spell that?) off of some furniture. I can't help but feel he might try to exact some sort of revenge upon my poor leg or foot as I recline....But, I'm taking extra measures to keep my feet off the floor. Too bad I didn't have a blast of highly-pressurized 02 to keep him glued to the ceiling while I smashed him. Oh well. Perhaps spiders don't have as many quirks as humans for revenge or to make themselves look good. And, unless they ravenously consume lots of garden larvae, they certainly don't save the day.