[Uh-oh ~ unintended segueway to long story...] BTW, I meant to say my father appears to be OK ~ he had part or most of his prostate exorcised and the munchkin (?) was benign.
I don't know if I can or should tell this, it's probably not in the best literary taste, but you know I will anyway... I had a few beers for courage and tried to sneak into the hospital after talking to him on the phone up to eleven p.m., to just hang out and see him. I'm always sneaking around doing stuff I'm not supposed to, even tho I get caught because I've never been in politics or the military. I got there about half past midnight and all the exits were closed up tight and the entrances too, and only the better-be-on-a-gurney emergency entrance was open. I walked in and they were very surprised to see me, two guys and a girl and they weren't going to let me go anywhere, I could tell, but I started talking to the woman and even tho I could see the guys were disgusted with my tack they could see she was going to cave in (looked like a case of clearly no-no) and she wound up explaining the long convoluted route thru there and under there over there to the hall down the ramp to the elevators to the other wing. I couldn't believe it. I burped large, but quietly, with my head pointed up-hall, and gathered up muh overcoat and casualed down the way; turned the corner, and a nurse at the end of that long hall jumps up immediately and isn't going to let me thru. I stare her down, with a "no-info" look, waiting til the last moment when speech pressure forces her to open her mouth, and then draw my hand from my left pocket (in steady walk) and gesture to the left corridor ~ "Wing C...?" I continue to stare as I pass... "Thru the doors at the end, then right and left."
Whew! Hehheh. Hehheh. All a-tingly now; but realizing I'm far enough in the entrails that only lack of a security badge can stop me now. Hee hee...I love this stuff, I giggle to myself as I zoom down the ramp. I just stand tall and make eye-contact and nod, and pretend I'm a famous neurosturgeon. The saltnpepper beard I think it is gets em.
I realize I'm probably just leaving the sectors with all the stealable drugs, so I take my hands out of my pockets. The security at the base of the elevators is around the corner facing the doors, and zhoop! up to the fourth floor and it's pretty dark and toned down as expected with little room sets and late night nurses at their desk talk. Which always sounds like late night nurses at their desk talk. You could hear it on a plane and know where you are. I slink past their door and the conversation stops but I don't hear any getting-up chair squeaks, and I zoom forward to Dad's room so that if anybody is heading to the door to peek out I'll be already gone, and I snippit into his doorway.
It's all dark except technology lights and tubular metal bed reflections and Pops is over along the nice long window. Some hall light comes in and I stand at the foot of his bed to get my eyes adjusted and pick a spot. He always woke up when I snuck into their room as a kid, but he's snoring now. I decide the best place is going to be between the bed and the row of windows, maybe leaning up against the wall sitting on the floor. I don't want to wake him up, I just want to sit there, so I maneuver over around the end of the bed quietly, carefully placing my feet, with balance.
All of a sudden the floor gets all squishy and soft, I'm losing my balance and it feels like I stepped on a squid. I reach behind me to use the windowsill for balance but the vertical louver shades are drawn and my hand crashes thru them and overturns the flowering tillandsia plant that is on the sill because it needs plenty of light and the louvers were drawn up to it on either side. It's plastic pot hits the floor, and some of the dirt squirts out, and I shift my weight to the right squishy foot, more; but it's way squishy and Dad starts snorting so I go into "preservation" and a controlled knee drop, in-space, to the floor. My butt hits the hard floor; with the tillandsia to my left, thank goodness.
I sit for a minute...hmmm...
OK, there's been some decay in performance at this point. But it's important to move forward, to assess the situation objectively. As my eyes are adjusting to the light from the doorway coming across the floor, I can see a really large round area at the edge of my foot ~ What, the hell, is that. What is that. What's it doing on the floor. They don't leave stuff on the floor. It's like a big, sorta black, sorta shiny...jellyfish, laying on the floor. Like a big slug; a giant round hospital wall slug, laying on the floor. Like a soft big barnacle. A hospital floor barnacle.
God! It's gonna get my foot!! Or scoot over here and get me by the butt! It's going to attach! It's a hospital recruiter! Something they've been working on! They lay em out here at night to catch people!
This only takes me a second. I'm a quick thinker. There's a moment of recoil, and my left hand goes down into the tillandsia dirt, like I'm getting up and out of there. The front of my right foot comes up as I lean back, and the top of the para-sigantea rolls away gently, wafts away gently.
Wait a minute. Wait. Wait! Paul! Paul! Think about it, a second. Do they really have these things? Twelve inch hospital parasites? Well, yah, probably they do. Well, but yah, what are the chances you're going to run into one? Probably pretty good...
Well, you're right there...
Well, ok, I admit, there's been some decay of performance at this point, but my heart has slowed considerably in the complete attempt to regain thinking capacity. Matter of fact, I've pretty much forgotten where I am and what I'm doing, listening to all those people in there, thinking and explaining to each other what can happen in these situations.
Upf!, Here, here comes reality, soaking back in there from the edges.
OK. Whad we got...
Touch it. What? Poke it. What? You've learned everything you can, stupid, you're going to have to touch it or poke it now. You're not going to sniff it or taste it, you're going to have to poke it. Wait a minute, I'll, examine it, visually, more. More. It's...flat on the bottom, round on the top, and I just poked it ~ it's plastic. And it's got a tail, coming out that side, and going up there, woah right past my knee...and up into the bed.
Nuh-oh. |
