You Need to Inject that Where?

Well I did get a call back on Thursday night, two actually. One was from Sears and the other was from Enbridge Gas. So, no call back for the play, which I have to admit is disappointing, but as my Granny used to say, "What's for you won't go by you, good or bad."

Still, I hate waiting for the phone to ring, and I walked into work on Friday feeling glum and gutted. I'd had a long week of 7:30 a.m. starts, and was into my fourth week of feeling like I was dragging it. It starts to get on your nerves after a while.

Fortunately, we now have summer hours which means that on Fridays, we can leave at noon, assuming the hatches are battened down of course. I'd gotten two major hurdles out of my way last week, which left me a morning to devote to the third. This task had been hanging over my head, feeling almost impossible, yet Friday morning I banged through it and sent it out by 11:30 feeling like a major weight had been lifted.

I headed out about 1 pm, treating myself to a vendor hot dog enroute to the car. There's nothing quite like eating a hot dog in warm weather while the radio's playing. It's such a quintessentially summer thing to do. Despite how much I enjoyed the hot dog, what I enjoyed even more was the freedom to have an afternoon to myself.

I headed over to my vet's to pick up cat food, and it was while I was on my way home, that it occurred to me that I could go get my iron injection that day instead of waiting until Saturday. I'd called the pharmacy and only had to pay the dispensing fee, so I had enough cash for the injection fee at the clinic [I pay a criminally low 7 dollars as I'm a patient of my naturopath's]. So sure enough, they were able to take me. I had just enough time to pick up the iron vials and get there for my appointment.

I filled out the obligatory forms while seated next to another fellow who was hooked up to some sort of machine. I dunno what he was getting, but it seemed intense. There was also some other woman nattering on to no one in particular about how they [the technicians] could be sure her veins hadn't been damaged.

"What do you mean damaged?"

"Damaged! How will you know? You could tear my vein walls!"

"Oh, I think that's quite impossible but if that happens, we will certainly know."

There's always one.

And please keep in mind while all this is going on, I'm being treated to a David Attenborough DVD about the animals of the jungle. We were at the part about insect eating plants.

At last my turn comes, but my assigned nurse asks me to come with her, which made me curious because I figured I would just stay in one of the chairs and get an I.V.

But oh no Dear Reader.

We went into a small room and she closed the door, turned to me and said "Take off your pants."

"Excuse me?"

"For the injection."

"You need to inject this in my butt?"

"Oh yes." She said in a tone that indicated "what other possible way is there for me to do this?"

So of course, I had that internal thing every human being has had when you're asked to do something you can't quite believe you really have to do, the internal "noooooooooooooooooo waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay" as I like to call it.

So I obliged the nurse while she swabbed my left buttock with a fierce smelling alcohol. Me being me, I just had to say "Excuse the view."

She laughed and replied "Oh trust me. I've seen worse."

I'm sure she has, and this woman was certainly on top of her game. The needle felt much like a pinch, nothing more, and then it was all done. Suitably cotton balled and bandaged, I pulled up my pants.

"Remember what side I did so I do the other one next time."

Oh trust me honey. NO DANGER.