Summertime
“Summertime, time, time,
Child, the living’s easy.
Fish are jumping out
And the cotton, Lord,
Cotton’s high, Lord, so high.”- Janice Joplin, “Summertime”
I shouldn’t be blogging right now. Actually, I shouldn’t be home at all right now. I was on call today at the hospital. It means I am supposed to work from at least 7:00 a.m. to 8:30 p.m. In reality, that usually ends up meaning working until after midnight or even later. But I got lucky today. We only admitted 5 patients and there were no code blues (pulse-less patients).
Last night I only slept for a few hours because I was awake vomiting out the entire contents of my GI tract. I went in to the hospital in my pathetic state because, well, that’s my job. But my resident had pity on me and let me go after I finished all of my work and we reached the time where we weren’t allowed to admit any more patients.
It got up to 95 F today. Not that I would know because I never left the hospital during the day. But it was still almost 90 degrees when I walked home just now. This means one sweaty intern in scrubs.
I took the above photo on my way home. There’s something comforting about finishing up a long day at the hospital and walking home through Brooklyn and seeing kids playing in the sweet streams from fire hydrants. Reminds me of summertime in the city.
So many interesting stories from the day.
One thing to keep in mind. If your patient doesn’t speak English and has never had a foley catheter in, you really need to get a translator to explain what it is. Otherwise, you end up with a very confused and distraught patient. I’m happy to be the one to make this realization and put my patient at ease.
Time to eat and sleep. And sleep.