Spending the night in the emergency room is a truly unpleasant experience. I have done it a couple of times. The first time I went to the emergency room that I remember was in 1994 when I was in Boston for the weekend with R___ and I thought I was having a heart attack...We were in a hotel in Wellesley, T__ was with us and I made him take me to the hospital (it was like 1am)...he did and it turns out I was having an anxiety attack. The next time I remember going to the emergency room was in 1999...It was the night of G___'s Thanksgiving party and I was fine at the party. Then we went back to A___'s place and I could not breathe...I wasn't exactly wheezing but I was definitely short of breath...so A____ (reluctantly) took me to the ER at CPMC and it turns out I was having mild asthma...The next time I went to the ER was when I was dogsitting for C_____. It was January 2001 and I woke up in the middle of the night with some kind of eye infection. My eye was totally puffy and sore and I could not figure out what was wrong...It hurt and I didn't know what to do. I was housesitting for C____ by myself (A____ and I were pretty much broken up (for the time being)) and it was like two in the morning and I didn't know who I could call at that hour. So I had to take myself to the hospital. I put the dog in the car and off we drive to CPMC Davies Campus. Turns out I just had an eye irritation. The doctor gave me a wet towel to put on my eye, to soak it. And sent me on my way. For that I was charged something like $250!

My most recent trip to the ER happened yesterday, Friday, April 11. I woke up in the morning and noticed that I had a lot of gas that was causing me to burp. And the burps were, well, disgusting. They basically smelled like sulfur. Disgusting. But, I figured it was because I swam the night before - first time doing butterfly so I swallowed a lot of water - and then got home and ate late...so I thought maybe something was stuck or something and I was just going to burp it out. No big deal. Buzzie and I drove up to Sonoma to meet Mer...and I started to feel kind of crappy. My stomach started cramping a little and I felt like I had to go to the bathroom. We sat through the short film series and then went to the Girl and the Fig for lunch. I was so excited because they have this famous salad that I was excited to try. We got to the restaurant and all of a sudden I had to go to the bathroom...so I did. And from that moment on, I went to the bathroom, excessively, every ten or fifteen minutes for the rest of the day. Finally, at 11pm, I was at Buzzie and R___'s and I was heading home and decided to go to the ER...the burping had returned, the bathroom business hadn't abated...so I went. R____, a gem of a human being, came with me (and stayed all night, until 430am, when they finally let me leave!).

Here is the thing. I recently took my car in for an oil change...Like most people, I do it every 3000 miles or every three months. And that keeps my car in good working order. They check all the fluids, they top them off if they are low...and at critical mile markers, they take a more intense look at the car and do some preventive measures so that the car keeps running smoothly.

So my question is, why do we treat our cars this well and yet not our own bodies? I mean, sure, I go to the gynecologist for my annual checkup, well, annually. But that's it. That's all I do. I suppose I could go for a general physical every year, too, but I don't. It's not like the oil change - it doesn't take 15 minutes, it doesn't cost $30, you can't just drive in and have someone help you right away. But I wish there was the equivalent...maybe Jiffy-Gyn. Where you go every few months, no appointment necessary, general check-in with the doctor, take some blood, run the usual tests and that's that. $39.99. Wouldn't that be great?

So I spent the entire night in the ER and it pretty much sucked. But I will say this - I can't think of a better companion in the ER than R____. He kept me laughing all night long...I swear, he is like the brother I never had. I really love him like family. And he was like the best big brother in the hospital last night (even though he is younger than me and not actually blood related!).

I walked into the ER and R____ went to park the car. It was pretty crowded and I could tell I would be there for a while before I even saw a doctor. As I was waiting to check in with the nursing station, I felt this wave of disappointment that it wasn't more like the ER on "e.r." I mean, duh...that's a tv show. But still, it seemed like a mellow ER for a Friday night. Mellow but crowded. But as the night wore on the ER became more and more like the one we know on television. There was the supposedly ex-heroin addict who scratchd a pimple on his ass and it turned into an abcess the size of a grapefruit (thanks for sharing). There was the older Asian woman who kept shoving tissues up her nose. We think it was bleeding. There was the "bum" - this guy was straight out of central casting - who wouldn't give his name to the doctors or the paramedics ("ask the FBI," he told them). There was the woman whose husband rushed her in from the car - she seemed to be having a heart attack and none of the doctors seemed to be paying attention. There was the baby that kept wheezing, then coughing then vomiting. There was the homeless woman who was shaking in the fetal position on the gurney, probably from withdrawal from SOMETHING. All that, from midnight to 430am. And though I was exceedingly uncomfortable and frustrated, R____ and I laughed our asses off all night long.

While waiting to be called to see a doctor in the ER, I was watching CNN Headline News in the waiting room and I saw the most disturbing thing...First of all, at the bottom of the screen they always run those headlines. It was so bizarre to read headlines like, "Marines begin approach to Saddam's home town of Kirkuk" and then the next headline said something like, "Hong Kong considers SARS implications" and then there's a headline that says something like, "Tiger Woods has rough opening day at the Masters." HUH? Mind you, all along underneath the headlines is a running tally of NBA scores. WHAT? It was so fucked up. News about war, news about a massive health crisis and then news about golf? And basketball? Then another war headline? Are they kidding. The worst thing I saw,though, was when one of the headlines said, "Wassup for the Weekend: How about doing your taxes!" WASSUP FOR THE WEEKEND? Did I really just read that? CNN wrote, "Wassup for the Weekend" for real? It was so disturbing. What is happening to our country? What is happening to our collective intellect? Why don't more people seem to care what is happening to the media in this country? Wassup for the Weekend - I am horrified, and I am scared. I hope Orly and I can collaborate on that newsletter...

Well, I could go on and on about a lot of things...the war, talking about/debating the war (especially with friends), people who are late, Passover, training, my sensitive stomach, my amazing sister, blind dates, online dating, and on and on and on. Alas, it's 1115 pm and I am tired...