I wrote the following a long time ago in an email to my friends. A lot of my friends really liked it and both of them said I should send it in to Readers Digest or something like that. I didn’t send it in, but I saved it. Now that I’ve found it again, I’m posting it here so my friends can read it again.
As some of you know I have developed an un-hip hip. An operation is scheduled for next week.
This afternoon I was at the hospital for pre-admission waiting room sitting. My sitting and waiting practice was interrupted for brief intervals of meetings with hospital administrators and technicians. First I met with a woman who asked a lot of questions and wanted lots of copies of my autograph. Then I got to practice waiting again.
Then I was taken to a little room where I had to get out of my street clothes and put on a paper gown. Then I got to practice sitting and waiting on an examination table for about twenty minutes. The paper gown ripped open as soon as I sat down.
I got to practice shivering for a while.
When the next lady came in she asked me the same questions all over again. I figured I must have got the answers wrong the first time, so I tried some different answers. Then she left. I still don’t know why I had to be wearing a ripped paper gown for her visit. Perhaps her job is really boring and she needs a little chuckle now and then.
After that I was allowed to sit and wait and shiver for a little while more.
Then the medical technician came in and stuck me in the arm a few times to make sure I could bleed. Once he was satisfied that I could bleed he went on to take some other measurements. Luckily, my paper gown was torn in all the right places to set the EKG probes. Even so, he took longer setting up the probes than it took to do the EKG. He measured all the other stuff too, like BP, pulse, height, weight, temperature and how much my hair had grown while I was practicing waiting.
When he left, I got to sit and wait again. My hair grew some. Then a nurse came in. I guess her job isn’t so boring because she told me right away to get dressed. Then she asked me all the questions again. I must have got the answers right this time because she said I could go when we were done. And she gave me a nice cup with my name on it. But what she meant was I could GO, now, and I had to leave the cup in the bathroom.
