Category Archives: Health and Medicine

Hey Doc? Your Education is Lacking

It used to be I was afraid of the future because of the GOP and the Pandora’s Box of hornets/hate they’ve unleashed.  But then I realized that there are, perhaps, other signs that the world has gone to hell in a handbasket.  Read on, and try to tell me I’m wrong.

***

Seven intelligent faces looked at me, blankly, their heads all tilted at a quizzical angle as if on strings.

Eagle3

Just because I’m saying “Who?” doesn’t make me an owl, ya know (Google image, natch)

 

They ranged in age from mid-40s to early and mid-20s.

At least I hoped they were intelligent faces.  Because they belonged to a team of seven doctors treating me during my recent (thankfully brief) hospital stay for Crohn’s.

I always draw a crowd.

But it wasn’t long before I questioned the intelligence of this group of gastroenterologists and medical students holding their noses and getting  through this rotation.  Because they seemed to have missed a major part of their education.

“Michael*” — the leader of the pack, put his stethoscope to my belly and listened.

“Not much noise there, Elyse.”  He let the others have a listen.

“You guys haven’t let me eat in days,” I said.  And then, as a person with a gut so noisy that it has a name (Ralph), I continued.  “I always feel like Humphrey Bogart in The African Queen!  You know, the scene where his stomach is gurgling?”

 

“Humphrey who?” one of them said.  The others nodded their heads in agreement.

“Bogart,” I said, with my eyes getting bigger as I realized that all seven of the people around me were tilting their heads at me in confusion.  None of them had a clue who Bogie was.

“I think I’ve heard of him,” one of the medical students ventured.  She didn’t look terribly certain, though.  “Wasn’t he in all of those musicals?”

Something is very wrong in the world.

 

*And when did doctors start going by their first names??  Did I miss something?

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What?? You Thought I Wouldn’t Post This?

 

Happy April Fool’s Day.

I loved this ad.  But it’s not a product I’d ever buy.  Me, I’m a Charmin Girl.

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I Don’t Usually Brag

But sometimes I just can’t hold it.

The Scoop on Poop

If you want to know if you know as much about shit as a fake medical professional/real expert shitter, here’s the link.

 

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My Choice

Tomorrow morning, I will leave for work not completely accessorized.  Not being much of a fashionista, that’s not normally a problem.  But tomorrow I will stop to make sure I have the perfect accessory:

I voted sticker

It’s Super Tuesday, and Virginia is in with the in crowd of mostly southern states holding their primaries.

Strangely, here in Virginia, it doesn’t feel much like there is an election coming up.  TV ads are not constant, and while we’ve been getting a lot of campaign calls, there aren’t any more annoying calls than usual.

Most unusual is the almost complete lack of political signs.  For the past 8 years, there have been far more political signs than voters around here.  The absence of them, without any sort of ordinance prohibiting them, makes me think that everyone around me is secretly supporting Donald Dfrump.*

Anyway, I’m sure you’re dying to know:  I’m voting for Hillary.

Philosophically, I’m really in Bernie’s camp.  I’d love government-sponsored healthcare.  I’d love to make college free.  I would love to erase income inequality.

But I’m a pragmatist.

Even if Bernie could get elected (and I don’t agree with pundits that claim he can’t), well, I spent 10 years watching the sausage mill that is our government.  And I simply don’t think Bernie can do it.

Hillary Clinton has my vote because I think she will be a good president.  Because she’s smart and capable.  Because she knows the system inside, outside and upside and downside.

Is she perfect?  Is she my dream candidate?  Nope.  I was for Obama in 2008 (actually, I wanted him to be my candidate beginning in 2004).

I am not blind to the problems with her.  I would rather a flawed candidate than one who is promising more than he can deliver.

And I think that Hillary can beat Trump or whichever GOP candidate is vomited out of a brokered convention.

So early tomorrow, I will cast my vote and get my sticker.

Elections Matter.  Make your voice heard.

* If you haven’t seen John Oliver’s show on Donald Trump, get yourself some popcorn:

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Too Much Scoop

There are responsibilities that I take seriously.  And giving all of you the scoop on poop is one of them.

But this week there is just too much.  Too much scoop on poop, even for me.

Still, I can’t hold it all in.  I must let it go.  Besides, as I explained in Trifecta! all good comedy bits come in threes.  So I had to, ummm, unload.

Number One:  The first story is one that will, perhaps, ease your mind about all that  downtime you spend at work in the bathroom.  Because someone has invented a calculator to, well, calculate, how much money you make while on the pot.

Paid to poo

Please don’t anyone tell my boss about this calculator.  This image from the “Paid To Poo Calculator/Plumbworld”.  I did not make that up.

***

Number Two:  This one is toilet-focused as well.  And really as suggested in this article, it could really save all of our asses, worldwide.  I’m not just shitting you!

The article says that a British University (too embarrassed to own up to its research and identify itself) has developed:

A toilet that does not need water, a sewage system or external power but instead uses nanotechnology to treat human waste, produce clean water and keep smells at bay.

You won’t need that Brita Filter for long!

Brita

No need for this!  Wikimedia Image

Seriously, though, a waterless toilet that could be developed and mass produced cheaply, and that would produce potable water, well, that would be truly wonderful for the world.

Science is pretty damn cool sometimes.

***

Number Three:

As a kid, a “Number Three” meant a fart.  Usually an SBD — a “silent but deadly” one.  But this number three? Far less benign.

Now as a person with serious bowel disease, I will confess that I worry that some day I will “go” the way of many famous people.  That I will die literally on the loo.  Those people include Elvis (who did not leave the building),  Judy Garland (who did not make this list), and Catherine the Great of Russia (who may or may not have died on the toilet but her descendants have preferred the version to the one that says she died-while-having-sex-with-a-horse).

Still, if I die by poop, I’d always expected it would come from below the belt.  Not above.  And certainly not far above.

Shit!  Now I have something new to worry about.  Just what I need.  Death via blue ice falling from the sky.

Wanna guess what blue ice is?

Apparently, blue ice is frozen shit falling from the sky.  And pee too.  Raining down from airplanes.  And it is landing on and injuring unsuspecting people.

As the article states:

The Times of India reports that Rajrani Gaud from Madhya Pradesh suffered a severe shoulder injury when she was hit by a football-sized chunk of ice last month.

[…]

The newspaper claims that aviation scientists believe she may well have had the misfortune to become one of an incredibly rare group: people who have been hit by what the airline industry coyly calls “blue ice”.

That’s its euphemism for the frozen human waste that very occasionally forms around the overflow outlets for aeroplane toilets, and then falls to earth. “Blue” because of the chemicals added to the toilets in planes to reduce odour and break down the waste.

Oh shit (from above).  Hurting people.

Judy Garland.  Who was  happy before blue ice hit.

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