All Night In The Emergency Room

No.
It had nothing to do with Raptor Red.
It went something like this.

• Sunday afternoon, Mrs. FC leaves for a 3 day nurse conference in Sarasota.
• Sunday afternoon, I take Raptor Red for a long ride north, continuing to break her in.
• Sunday evening, I arrive home after dark and check my phone. There is a message from Mrs. FC that says Junior is having lower right quadrant abdominal pains.
• During the next hour or so, there is much texting and calling back and forth as we monitored his situation (He is 40 miles away in his apartment).
• At 11:30, I decide to err on the side of caution and take him to the emergency room in Gainesville.
• I load Bear up with food and water, pat him on his massive head and take off.
• Around midnight, Junior and I walk in to the North Florida Hospital emergency room.
• We wait.
• Triage happens.
• Then we wait some more.
• We chat, and sit ... waiting.
• At 1:00 am, still waiting, a former student of mine hobbles out of the back and greets me as he exits the ER.
• Small world.
• Finally we are taken back to a room, where we wait.
• A nurse practitioner comes in and checks Junior out.
• She leaves.
• A great perky nurse comes in after awhile with wisecracks and a great bedside manner. She plugs an IV into him and administers a dose of morphine.
• It's 3:00 am by now and my fuzzy mind questions morphine, when he has only rated the pain at a 4 on a scale of 1-10 with ten being terrible pain.
• Junior says his head is heavy, then recovers and is positively "chatty Cathy" for the next hour.
• The nurse leaves a quart of Crystal Light with a marker in it for the CAT scan to come.
• We talk, we text updates.
• Twice he is rolled out for Scans.
• I call and leave lesson plans for my Monday classes.
• I doze in the hard chair, my head against the hard wall.
• Total doze time that night, about 1 hour.
• Around 8 am, the nurse practitioner returns with a diagnosis that doesn't rule out early appendicitis, but doesn't confirm it either.
• Paperwork is signed, copayment is made, and the IV is removed.
• I take Junior to his apartment at around 9:00 am, Monday.
• I drive the 40 miles home, walk a desperate Bear, eat breakfast and crash in the bed until 3:00 pm.
• After I awaken, I call his Pediatrician, Dr. Rosi, aka "THE GREATEST DOCTOR EVER!" to schedule a follow up.
• She quizzes me and tells me it sounds like a muscular injury, but don't tell Junior as she wants a blank slate when she examines him Tuesday.
• Tuesday, Junior and I go to see Dr. Rosi.
• She is a work of art as she puts him through paces, studies him, pokes, prods, and watches.
• I love this woman. She has doctored my kids since the eldest was an infant.
• Diagnosis: a deep abdominal (he's got great abs) injury on the right side. College is okay, but no working out and no busing tables at the Texas Roadhouse this week.
• We hit Publix and I buy him some groceries on the way to his apartment.
• At 3 pm I am pulling in to the school where my academic team is waiting to board the bus for an out of town match.
• We tie one and lose one at the match.
• The kids want to hit Burger King since there is no fast food in their little hometown.
• It's a treat, don't you know.
• I capitulate.
• The two girls behind the Burger King counter are former students of mine.
• One asks me if I want the "Senior" coffee.
• She was funny in class too.
• I sip a cup of coffee (mistake!) while my team stuffs greasy food down their mouths.
• As I am sitting wishing the kids to chew faster, the store manager comes walking over.
• He too is a former student of mine, from a long time ago and we chat for awhile.
• Finally, we are on the bus again heading back to school.
• It is now 6:00 pm.
• At the school, everyone has ride ... almost. So I stand around with my last kid until the parent shows up around 7:00 pm.
• Then it's twenty miles to the house and Bear needs walking.
• After the walk, I stir fry a solo portion of kung pao and talk to Bear while I eat it.
• With supper over and that stupid coffee in my veins, I do a little virtual school grading on line until the nods finally come.
• Mrs. FC calls from Sarasota and I update her.
• One last walk with Bear before bed.
• Crawl into bed and read until the sleep finally comes. (stupid, stupid late day coffee!)

That's how it went.

Just wanted y'all to know I wasn't slacking on ya'.