If I have to hear it, you do too

For some reason today I've been infected with an earworm, featuring this classic Monty Python number. So, since I seem to be stuck with it, I'm sharing it with you guys.

Mary, make an appointment for her

It is never a good sign when:

The Monday before Thanksgiving a drug rep who sells Alzheimer's medication drops off a jack-o-lantern bag full of cookies, with a note that says "Happy Halloween!"

Ever.

Sunday morning, 2:18 a.m.

My cell phone wakes me with a message. It's a patient with a relatively urgent question.

I knew the call would take a while, so stopped in the bathroom, then walked to my home office, flipped on my computer, and opened the patient's chart. This took maybe 5 minutes from the original message.

Then I dialed him up.

Dr. Grumpy: "This is Dr. Grumpy, returning a call."

Mr. Etiquette: "Um, huh, oh."

Dr. Grumpy: "You called me?"

Mr. Etiquette: "Man, you just woke me up."

Dr. Grumpy: "Sorry. What can I do for you?"

Mr. Etiquette: "Took you long enough to call back, and I dozed off again. I can't believe you woke me up."

Dr. Grumpy: "Well, in your call you said..."

Mr. Etiquette: "That doesn't matter. I can't believe you woke me up. This is incredibly rude."

(hangs up)

How can I leave this behind?

Okay. There are many ways to give yourself a bigger butt if you so desire (I personally like eating PB M&M's).

But injecting your ass with "Fix-a-Flat" isn't one of them.

Thank you, Rick & EMTGFP!

Medical marijuana

In my career I've caught 5 patients smoking marijuana in the hospital, roughly 2 years apart from each other.

For reasons I don't understand, all 5 times they were in the same telemetry room.

There is nothing special about this room. It's a generic room on the 7th floor, facing the nurses station, but no more or less so than any other room. Different nurses have come and gone. But patients keep smoking weed in there.

Room 7310 is truly one of the great mysteries of the universe.

More fun with Mary

Mary: "Dr. Grumpy's office. This is Mary."

Miss Meyer: "Hi! I'm having terrible back pain and need to get into Dr. Grumpy right away! It's an emergency. I can't even sit for more than a few minutes!"

Mary: "Well, you're in luck. Our 3:00 patient just canceled, so he can see you this afternoon."

Miss Meyer: "Oh, I can't do that. I have tickets for the premier of 'Breaking Dawn.' "

Nuts and bolts

Mary: "Dr. Grumpy's office, this is Mary."

Mr. Lost: "Hi, I can't find your office."

Mary: "Okay, where are you?"

Mr. Lost: "I'm at the hardware store, like you said."

Mary: "I said we were across from the hospital."

Mr. Lost: "Oh. Well, I'm at the hardware store, in paints."

Mary: "Well, your appointment is NOW. Can you come over here?"

Mr. Lost: "It would be a lot easier to find if you guys were in the hardware store. I think more people come here than the hospital."

Today's criminal tip

When going to court, keep in mind:

1. Don't steal a car to get there.

2. Don't park the stolen vehicle in the police department's lot.

Like this lady.

Journal of Grumpy Physics

Theory: Various mathematical models have been used to postulate the motions of planets, galaxies, neutrinos, baseballs, and other objects of varying mass. However, the movements of certain objects are less predictable. An ongoing study into the variable location over time of one of these items has revealed, to date, no clear pattern for its movement.

Methods: In 2000 an unidentified hospital staff member placed a 24 oz plastic flask of Nestle Coffeemate (Hazelnut flavor) into a nursing station refrigerator on the 8th floor of Local Hospital. A regional neurologist has casually noted the movements of the flask of proto-dairy product at intermittent intervals over time while scavenging for Diet Coke. The flask has been consistently identified over time by it's original expiration date (February, 2002) stamped on the rim.

Findings: The Coffeemate bottle has now been in the refrigerator for over 10 years. Careful observation (okay, lifting and shaking it a little from time-to-time) showed that its weight gradually decreased in the first several months of it's presence, then stabilized. While weight can vary depending on local gravity, the Earth's gravitational force has not changed substantially during this time, nor has the hospital been relocated to a planet with lesser gravity. The contents have not been directly inspected by the author during this time.

The bottle has remained on the same shelf (center shelf, refrigerator door) since its original placement. Its specific location on the shelf has varied (sometimes next to the Ranch dressing, at other times between the ketchup and mustard, and once briefly near a bottle of banana-based ketchup that a Filipino traveling nurse brought). Overall its location has been reasonably predictable within the limitations of the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle and Schrodinger's cat.

Results: It's still there.

Discussion: There have been a number of postulates to explain this sort of object persistence. While local changes in Brownian kinetics or gravity are possible, the most likely cause of the flask's roughly unchanged location is attributable to the nature of Homo Sapiens. This local species appears to be disinterested in removing objects that are not the direct property of a given individual. Therefore, it's likely that only the specific animal which originally placed the Coffeemate on the shelf will be inclined to retrieve it, regardless of its current condition.

Its persistence, in spite of clearly being empty for several years, is likely due to one or more of the following possibilities:

1. The original owner no longer works at the hospital, or at least not on that floor.
2. The original owner has forgotten it's theirs, and therefore isn't touching it.
3. People are lazy.

It should be noted that item #3 is actually a unifying theorem for #1 & #2.

In conclusion, the author would like to note that I didn't put it there either, and so I ain't touching the freakin' bottle. The last time I tried to do something nice like that I almost got my hand chewed off by a rabid oncology nurse.

Religious crime in America

People are so strange.

Thank you, Janine!

Rats to rats

Mr. Muroidea: "I used to be a stockbroker, but I couldn't stand the rat race, and quit."

Dr. Grumpy: "What do you do now?"

Mr. Muroidea: "I have a farm. I raise rats for labs."

It's almost plausible

He had me going until the Taylor Swift part.

Thank you, Lee!

Distractions

The following was left on Mary's voicemail yesterday:

"Hi, it's about 2:05 and I have a 2:00 appointment with Dr. Grumpy, and I'm trying to get there. I'm on the freeway and my son is driving me, so we just passed 24th street and WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING! DIDN'T YOU SEE THAT TRUCK? WHY DON'T YOU PAY ATTENTION NEXT TIME! ARE YOU BLIND? I KNEW I SHOULDN'T HAVE LET YOUR FATHER TEACH YOU TO DRIVE!"

She didn't show up for her appointment, either.

Holy Nuts, Batman!

Pareidolia at its finest. Words fail me.

Thank you, Liz!