My Sunday night ER escapade

When I have my way I am typically a pretty private person. I don’t spend a lot of time letting everyone know everything about me, and I try not to be the squeaky wheel type. I much more prefer to work in the background and go quietly about my business and let others work out front. At least, that’s how I perceive myself, I am sure others have different opinions.

But Sunday night I found out just how wide open our lives are now that we have all this social media stuff hanging around our necks. Albatross that it may be, here’s how Facebook opened up my personal life Sunday night at the John Randolph Hospital Emergency Room. But first, let me say that I believe I received top-notch care from the staff in the Emergency Room. In fact, they probably needed medical attention after I left at 3:30 Monday morning.

The Facebook string started out innocently enough when my wife, Jackie, posted this message:

“Not how I planned on spending the rest of my weekend- at the ER with David- making sure he is ok.”

To bring you up to speed, I had been ill since Friday and was trying to suffer through the weekend fighting a moderate fever, intense headaches, and a lack of appetite. The last of those, for me, is rare. I think that’s how Jackie knew something was serious. We tried to divine what might be the matter. Jackie guessed bladder infection and I, in accord with WebMD, came to prostate problem. Either way, it was Saturday afternoon before I finally contacted my primary care physician (PCP), who put my on Cipro-whateveritis to fight the infection. He also said to look out for a number of things that might necessitate a trip to the hospital, one of which was a spike in my temperature.

That happened late Sunday night when my temperature tripped the meter at 103.8. I called my PCP and he suggested that “I pick a hospital any hospital.” Being familiar with JRH, I choose to go there. In no time at all, I was whisked into a triage room and that led to an ongoing Facebook “conversation” that included no fewer than 90 entries. The majority of the entries were of the kindness variety, such as: “Hope everything is okay.” But several others were pretty comical, especially when auto-correct stuck its nose into the conversation. Here’s one of those entries, by me:

“Manure said there was a car crash.”

Which of course I originally wrote as “My nurse said….” How autocorrect could make such an exchange is beyond me. I almost never have use for the term manure.

As we sat through the night for six hours several things occurred. First, one RN came in to draw blood. He got seven vials. Another nurse hooked up an IV bag. A third nurse came in and got to blood cultures. But that wasn’t going to be enough, they also need a urine sample, two X-rays (no pneumonia), and a CT scan.

In the meantime while I am being probed, prodded, prepped, propped up, and tubed, this huge Facebook conversation is going on about me no less. Which prompted another friend, Susan, to comment: “LOL - this is better than TV!” Which isn’t saying much about the quality of our current TV programming.

The conversation started at 9:34 Sunday evening. Six hours later they finally had the results of all of the testing. And I was pretty much loaded from the meds they gave me to get rid of my headache. Ultimately, the result was: “Why does this man have a fever.” Apparently all the tests came back negative.

While I pride myself in always having been a good test taker, this is one time I wish I would have failed a test. So here I am Tuesday morning feeling not horrible, but not great either. I don’t have much of the headache and the original problem that drove my sickness has abated somewhat. But the problem is no one seems to have any idea what might have caused the infection in the first place.

So again, I would like to thank the staff at JRH for their excellent care. I would also like to thank the many friends who took the time to keep Jackie occupied while she waited patiently for me to run my medical testing gauntlet. Fortunately, I made it through with no problems. Unfortunately, we still don’t know what caused my fever.

Ha-ha I almost said “what’s wrong with me,” but that would leave me open to way too much ridicule as I am sure all my enemies and most of my friends out there would have a comment about that.

Power corrupts, absolute power makes you be tidy

Now the Colonial Heights City Council has things going in a positive direction. Not content with people using their trash and recycle bins, the city decided it needed to regulate where the cans are kept. Apparently side yards or backyards are the only places suitable for storing the cans between use, sort of like the law they have for campers, camper trailers, and boats on trailers.

It kind of makes you wonder what exactly is next on the agenda. Can we regulate other nuisances, like failing to put the milk away after you use it or brushing after meals—and don’t forget to floss twice a day?

At what point does a political body overstep its bounds from governing to mothering? In Civil Disobedience, a political treatise on government and governing bodies, Henry David Thoreau states “That government is best which governs least.” Put simply, the government ought to keep its nose in things that are the concerns of government.

Trash can policy is not a concern of the government; if they really want to dig into trash can policy they ought to see the debris and detritus left on the street after the trash collectors go whipping by in haste to finish their work day.

The city already has the authority to issue written or verbal warnings, according to City Attorney Hugh “Chip” P. Fisher, III. The director of public works has the authority to do so. Why not just enforce the existing laws? Why is it necessary to impose some ridiculous cattle prod in the shape of a $50, $100, or $150 fine?

When I was in high school my Science teacher demanded that we students have a spiral bound notebook for his class. I didn’t really think about it much, but when I came into class with a loose leaf notebook it set him in a rage. At the time, I didn’t bring the wrong kind of notebook as a form of civil disobedience. I didn’t even know who Thoreau was back then, and my experiences with Gandhi and Martin Luther King were tenuous at best.

Frankly, I had the loose leaf notebook because it was the only notebook I had. I figured some notebook was better than no notebook. That indiscretion earned me a whack on the seat of my pants. While I contend a notebook is a notebook, some people in power just have to have their own way.

How is this kind of rule any different?

Councilmen Kenny Frenier and Dianne Yates both said that trash and recycling bins serving as yard art in people’s front lawns were a concern. Mayor C. Scott Davis and Milton Freeland also supported the rule change and imposition of a fine for failure to comply. Davis said this change is another way to improve the aesthetics of the city. Really? Really? So I guess that makes this a city beautification ordinance.

Still, it’s hard for me to believe that so many citizens in our community take that issue to heart. Certainly leaving trash bins out by the street detracts a bit from the otherwise pristine quality of the city; however, we already have a means to press the constituency into “doing the right thing.”

It’s hard for me to believe that while these representatives were canvassing the city looking for votes and lecturing the citizens with their “vote for me” spiel any citizen would pop-off and say, “Oh, by the way, can you do something about all these trash and recycle bins left out in people’s front lawns?” How does a conversation move in that direction anyway?

To me, it reeks of obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD), or in layman’s terms micromanaging. Whether or not a few citizens complained, it seems ludicrous to try to regulate something as mundane as bringing in the trash and recycling bins. I know times are tough right now, but as a revenue source this isn’t like setting up radar on the Interstate and nailing unsuspecting speeders.

And why on earth is this such a big deal that it seems necessary to ride around the city checking everyone’s yards to make sure they move their receptacles to a respectable place? There are a hundred more important things for City Council to be doing other than cruising the neighborhoods looking for such miscreants.

The next step, I suppose, is an ordinance to ensure the citizens use proper personal hygiene. Who exactly would enforce such an ordinance is beyond me. It has been said “the job’s not complete until the paperwork is done.” This is probably no exception.

A farewell to Dames

If there was any more stunning news Monday than the death of Margaret Thatcher it could only have been the death of Annette Funicello. And could there be any two people who represented human culture in more disparate ways?

While Maggie and Annette represented different parts of the human experience, they both held sway over the public like nobody’s business. The Iron Lady, as Ms. Thatcher was known all over the world, set a rigid standard for British Prime Ministers that hadn’t been seen since Winston Churchill’s days. Dogged and demanding, she was the kind of political figure who instantly cut the wheat from the chaff. And the chaff railed against her as she continued to ply a course through the political turmoil of the 80s.

She was a steady right hand and solid influence and support to our country’s own revered Ronald Reagan, who both parties today cite as a dominating figure in post Iron Curtain politics. There is no question that Ms. Thatcher’s leadership brought England out of a series of doldrums that reached back to the early 60s. In much the same way, Reagan pulled the American spirit up by its boot straps, dislodging the hideous recollection of Vietnam and setting a course that put America back on top in terms of political prowess.

Thatcher took over as Prime Minister in 1979, won a second term in 1983, and a third term in 1987. She became England’s longest serving prime minister of the century on Jan. 3, 1988 and resigned the position in November of 1990 after a party revolt.

A great number of quotes have been attributed to her, among them the following:

·        If you want something said, ask a man; if you want something done, ask a woman.

·        If you just set out to be liked, you would be prepared to compromise on anything at any time, and you would achieve nothing.

·         Being powerful is like being a lady. If you have to tell people you are, you aren't.

·         I love argument, I love debate. I don't expect anyone just to sit there and agree with me, that's not their job.

·         I seem to smell the stench of appeasement in the air.

In the other extreme we have the passing of every boy’s first love in those days, well okay, mine anyway, Annette Funicello. If you were a youngster in the 1950s how could you not have fallen in love with Annette? I mean, after all, Disney brought her into your home every week. And, at 13, she was a plumb knock out.

Even after her years with the original Mickey Mouse Club, she continued to grace the big screen in that series of beach party films that were fun, frolicsome and just a little bit hokey. But it was still Annette up there, big and beautiful and coaxing us out of our youth.

Annette passed at 70 from complications due to multiple sclerosis.

Disney Chairman and CEO Bob Iger said that Annette will always be synonymous with the word Mouseketeer and I would have to agree. I don’t remember any of the other members of the troupe, but I will never forget Annette.

And so it is that on the very same day the world loses two of its most prominent women—one a political firebrand worthy of the title the Iron Lady, and the other the fair damsel of children’s television. All I can say is goodbye sweet ladies; I know the world will miss both of you in equal measure.

CH Cops--Too Many or Just Enough?

A waitress at Buffalo Wild Wings in Prince William County was a bit put out when eight plainclothes police officers were seated at her table. It seems the plainclothes boys were armed and their weapons were very visible. According to the report, the waitress refused to serve them because she was afraid of the weapons and they eventually left the restaurant hungry.

When the restaurant’s management found out later they were of course apologetic. I mean, after all, if they were to treat all of the police officers who came to the restaurant the same way, the officers might take umbrage. In fact, they might even resort to sniping the establishment’s regular customers by lying in wait in the medians of the local highways and pulling any cars that were suspicious for anything from a broken headlight to weaving.

On the other hand, do we really want our restaurants full of armed people whose weapons are readily in view by the wait staff and presumably other patrons?

What to do, what to do?

Well refusing to serve them is one answer, and while it may not be the right or best answer, at least the waitress made her point. There are way too many problems with people with guns so why should we treat the police differently? It would be one thing if they were there responding to an emergency call about a robbery or something. But this group of officers was there merely to eat. So why not leave your main weapon locked in the car?

It’s not like the hot sauce is going on a rampage. And, I am sure, the officers would frown on a patron being inside and packing a .38, even if they had a conceal-carry permit. I can’t blame the food server for her actions.

On the other hand getting back to paragraph 2, don’t you think that the police sit in the medians waiting for their DUI prey to come out of any of the local establishments, like B-Dubs, Applebee’s, or Ruby Tuesday’s? Several years ago, the Colonial Heights Police Department wrote a record 450 DUIs in one year. By contrast, the City of Richmond only wrote about 500. And that’s not to mention all of the other citations that went out when there wasn’t enough probable cause to administer a field sobriety test or when the driver passed the test.

While I appreciate the local police cleaning up the drunk drivers, I wonder how ethical it is for them to pull someone over for a bad headlight and turn that into a DUI. In some ways, it seems like a bait-and-switch sale at a local store. They are illegal, and it seems to me that stopping someone for a minor infraction in hopes (yes in hopes) of nabbing a drunk driver is borderline entrapment.

For the record, if you go out for a night on the town in Colonial Heights and either can’t control how much you drink or don’t have a designated driver, then you get what you deserve. I figured that one out a long time ago, and while I don’t drink very much—maybe an occasional beer or glass of wine—I usually only do so when I am home or in some place where I know I will not be driving. Nothing, and I mean nothing in the world, is worth risking getting a DUI.

And then, when I get to thinking that having five police officers roaming the streets 24-7 is a bit over the top for a city as small as CH, something crops up to make me alter my perspective. For instance, Saturday night when my wife and I were leaving a farewell party for one of our friends, I noticed a patrol car go whizzing by on Ellerslie Ave. As usual, I watched the car in my rearview mirror and noticed that the blue lights were put out at the top of the bridge over I-95.

As I sat at the light at Conduit and Ellerslie, I noticed another patrol car go flying through the intersection heading in the same direction with lights blazing. Come to find out later that the CHPD were Johnny-on-the-Spot to track down a shoplifter who had absconded from the Food Lion with his pockets full of stolen merchandise. It seems every time I start to wonder about being over-policed, something like this crops up and makes me think that having so much of a police presence may not really be that bad.