Now Here's a Story

Again, it has been weeks since I last updated my blog, but I really have had nothing that significant or interesting to write about until now – well, until Monday evening.

I had a great long, long weekend. I suppose I am one of the lucky ones whose office remains closed on Easter Monday. I don’t remember much about Friday day; Friday evening I drove over to North Van and spent the evening with Thalia – it was the usual: grab a sushi dinner and watch a movie – this week it was “Inventing the Abbotts.” Great flick.

Saturday the cleaning bug hit me, so I vacuumed, washed, scrub, polished. But while my apartment is germ free, it isn’t clutter free. I have come to accept that until I complete a full “Spring Clean," going through every last thing in my apartment and making the decision to turf or to keep, I will never be fully satisfied with my abode.

That afternoon I headed over to Chris and Lica’s new place to celebrate their son’s (Ken) first birthday.

It’s starting to happen – the weddings are slowing down – I only have one this year, compared to the five last year – and the babies are coming…

So back to the birthday: I always have a good time at Chris and Lica’s. It’s an opportunity for me to catch up with some of my sorority sisters and some of Colin’s fraternity brothers who we are close with, but don’t often get to see.

Colin and I bought Ken his first Mr. Men books. They were a bigger hit with the adults, as our friends flipped through them, bringing back childhood memories.

On Sunday, Colin and I sat down and began planning our summer vacation. This year, our vacation is being planned around Gavin’s (my brother-in-law) wedding, which is taking place in Huntsville, Ontario.

Since I have never ventured outside of BC (when it comes to Canada), we are looking at this as an opportunity for me to actually see some of Canada; and for me to introduce to Colin to the Eastern US seaboard. I’m not claiming to be an expert on the area, having only visited Norfolk, VA and Philadelphia, PA, but I have always had a fun time in that part of the world, and really enjoy the people.

So here’s the plan, of which nothing is final: Fly to NYC, where we plan to spend our one year wedding anniversary. Then take the bus to Boston and spend some time there. Then take the bus to Montreal and spend time there. And the rent a car and drive it to Huntsville, hopefully making a quick stop in Ottawa, so I can visit my nation’s capital.

We spent the evening of Easter Sunday dining with my in-laws, since my parents are in the middle of a Caribbean cruise. I loved the email Easter greeting I received from my mum: Happy Easter from Barbados – wish you were here!

Monday was a relatively quiet day, I ran few errands… and then it hit: Around 7:00 PM I started having intense stomach pains. I lay on the couch, hoping it would pass. I was somewhat spared until the end of 24, and then my body threw me a one-two punch and I doubled over in pain.

I felt like someone was grabbing my stomach and intestines, and twisting them. The pain subsided a little bit, but every 20 minutes or so my whole digestive system just wreaked havoc on me. I had never felt anything like it before. Colin was ready to take me to the hospital, but I wasn’t ready to make that move, yet.

I am the opposite of a hypochondriac – I would have to be missing a few limbs before agreeing to go to a hospital. But by 2:00 AM, after four hours of excruciating pain, which had now moved to the kidney area, I decided not to take any chances, and left for UBC….

…Only to find out that UBC emergency isn’t open after hours. We were pretty much half between VGH and Richmond General – I opted to go into Richmond.

I think a lot of our belief, faith and anger in the BC Health Care system stems from our personal experiences with it. A couple of years ago, I had to take Colin to emergency during the day, on a Saturday. We went to Richmond General that time as well, and didn’t have to wait very long at all. Such, was my experience on Monday night (or Tuesday morning by this time). I was admitted right away.

I met with a nurse as soon as I arrived at the hospital and she took some info from me. After that she took me to a bed. Right after that another nurse came along and got some more information from me. Then the doctor came to see me. He pushed and prodded my digestive organs. He told me he wanted to do a blood test to rule out the possibility of Appendicitis. If my white blood cell count was normal, it was nothing more than a stomach virus; however, if my white blood cell count was higher than normal then they would have to run some tests and make sure I didn’t have an infection. The only waiting I had to do at all was to wait for the results of my blood test.

It was a very odd experience, laying there in the emergency room. You see, I have never personally been admitted to emergency before, and the last time I was in hospital was 17 years ago, when I had mole removed from the side of my face.

As I lay there listening to the machines, all I could think of was that scene in Monty Python’s the Meaning of Life, where the doctor asks if they have the machines that boop and bing, or something like that. It’s always good to have a sense of humour, especially when lying in emergency and you aren’t quite sure what the hell is going on with you.

My white blood cell count was normal. It turns out I had caught a nasty stomach virus which seems to be making its way through Vancouver.

I returned home from the hospital around 3:30 AM. I still had bad cramping. Even to this very moment I am not a hundred percent, but a hell of a lot better than Monday evening.

So my four day weekend, turned into a six day one. I am feeling much better, other than the fact my digestive system feels like it took a helluva beating.

I will go to work tomorrow – Friday, we shall have to see. Friday is my flex – I may go in and catch up or I may stay home and take nice long weekend and recoup from this nasty, painful ailment.