Oddities of the Universe Unite!

It always amazes me how just being a nurse attracts the weirdest situations. Sometimes you are standing in line at McDonald's wearing your scrubs (wondering how on earth that little, tiny french fry on the floor became such a mass of squished goo), when the lady in line behind you starts telling you about her copious vaginal bleeding and how many clots she's expelling, while all the other customers are trying not to vomit and silently throwing their ketchup away.

I've even experienced many of these interesting scenarios just driving down the road. You never know what will be on the other side of that corner. If Mel is with you, you can be assured that something crazy or completely hysterical will happen. She attracts the oddities of the universe like flies on the sticky strip of life. I really think she should start working in the Emergency Department. She'd fit right in with the rest of us who are one taco short of a combo plate.

Last year at about this time, Mel and I decided to take a drive to Boise to escape the duldrums of a deep, depressing winter. Can I just take a moment here to say I hate snow? I seriously hate snow. It starts off white and sparkling and amazing. In 4 hours it is crap - and when it starts melting off at the 7th month, it turns into liquid shit. By the 3rd day of snow, I'm ready to pull my ass up to the top of the local skyscraper (all 2 stories of it) and start screaming obscenities nonstop. Kind of like the gentlemen we admitted to the psych hold room last week.

Mel picked me up in the boonies where I live. When we hit the end of the road at the highway, Ms. Eagle Eye Mel looked to the left and spotted an upside down truck in the snow about 1/4 of a mile up the road. A white truck - in white snow. I was oblivious to the situation since I was seizure dancing in the front of her van, rocking out to Third Day, swinging my hair and screaming "Turn it up bab-eeeee!" I think she might have even punched me to get me to pay attention the fifth time she asked me, "Is that a wreck over there?" I finally stopped my seizure dancing and followed the line of sight from the tip of her finger to the corner.

My control freak personality emerged. "Get over there!" I yelled.

Jumping out of the car, we ran to the truck. The cab was pretty much intact, but the bed had been ripped away from the frame. A local cowboy was bent down at the passenger window with his cute little wrangler butt sticking up in the air, trying to help the passenger crawl out of the vehicle. They were having a little difficulty getting her seatbelt undone (but I was enjoying the view), so I started ordering Mel around (bossy little wench that I am), "Go get coats, blankets, whatever you can find". By this time, a few more vehicles had stopped and Mel "borrowed" the needed items.

I turned my attention back to the passenger. I knelt down beside the cowboy and stuck my head in the window. I ran through the whole "Does your neck hurt? Did you lose consciousness? Any pain in your back? Yada, yada, yada," conversation. She kept denying everything. "I'm fine. I'm fine," she kept saying. Mr. Cowboy Man finally got her seatbelt undone and starts pulling her out the window.

"Wait!" she yells. "I can't feel my left leg"

"Ah Crap, Immobilize! Immobilize!" I think. Until the lady so very calmly says to us........................................................




"Actually, I don't have a left leg."


She was an amputee. After the shock wore off, I couldn't help but giggle. I looked at Mel and thought, "This is all your fault."

Mel's Journey

Please watch the progress of my friend Mel as she does a medical mission in Cambodia. She is an amazing nurse who will be going to Cambodia for 2 weeks at the end of April.

You can find her blog here