A few things I've learned this week

My friend Bryan, who goes on random adventures with me and is frequently mentioned here, has been in the hospital for nine days. He is very, very sick and I am very worried. Several of us have been going to the hospital each day, but none of us every day. I myself have only made it seven out of nine days, but am trying to do better. Given the time of year that it is, though, this basically means that the last week for me has been "Work, Hospital, Sleep" and very little else.

I've managed to learn a few interesting things along the way, though.

1) Hospital food really is disgusting, and that's not just a punchline. The other night the staff made a mistake and brought an apple cobbler that Bryan wasn't allowed to have, and he and the nurse both insisted that I eat it rather than just letting the nurse throw it away.

They really did. This wasn't one of the deals where I stared longingly at it and mentioned how hungry I was.

No, really.

I wasn't even looking at it, and the nurse was like, "Bryan, you're not allowed to have that. I'm gonna throw it away. Wait, do you want it?"

I should have said no. Why?



That's me, holding the apple cobbler perpendicular to the floor, and that's the apple cobbler, not moving. Even more frightening is that it's the second photo. I held it up long enough to take a picture, check the camera while still holding the cobbler up and decide that I didn't like the first one, and then take a second picture.

Not only was it immobile, but it tasted like pure flour. I have no idea how they did it, but I even fished an apple out with my fork and tasted it by itself, and the apple tasted like flour. It was disgusting, but I was hungry, so I ate the whole thing anyway.

2) There's always something worse that could happen:



As tired and cranky as I may be, at least I didn't leave some of my groceries in the cart and then drive away, like some people.

3) The hole in the side of the music building never stops looking absurd, no matter how many times you drive past it:



It looks like the Tasmanian Devil exploded through the side of the wall. They're demolishing the music building right now, so that they can build a bigger, better one, but it looks like they took one swipe at the wall and then called it a day:



4) Spelling is hard.



On the one hand, I'm kind of giggly snickering and "Oh, hey, ICU Waiting Room, dictionaries are also available," but on the other hand I'm kind of wondering if I would entrust my medical care to people who can't spell. You read stories about hospitals amputating the wrong limbs or leaving forceps inside surgical patients and wonder how it happens, but the writing is, literally, on the wall: some people are not only ignorant, but are also willing to post their ignorance where everyone can see it.

I kind of think I'll stick to the other hospital nearby instead. They may have thought that I was a wife beater, but at least they spelled it correctly.

5) These exist:



Am I the only one who didn't know about Coconut M&M's? I saw them at the hospital gift shop and decided that I needed to try them:



They taste like little tiny nuggets of Mounds bars. I don't see any actual coconut in them when I bite them in half, but they are really, really strongly coconut flavored.

That's it for now. Bryan starts a new treatment tomorrow, so if anybody has any spare prayers around that they're not using, please offer them to the diety/dieties of your choice. Or just wish him positive energy and good karma, or whatever else you think might work.

Thanks, in advance.