Tuesday, July 23, 2013

There Are 8 Million Stories in the Waiting Rooms of Backroads

I took The Pony to the dentist today for his six-month cleaning. It's free with the enormous premium paid to Hick's dental insurance. Once again, our little Pony had no cavities. He's one gift horse that can be looked in the mouth.

While waiting for him to be polished, fluorided, and released, a Typhoid Mary walked into the office. Of course I had taken the seat nearest the door, as I am wont to do. Which so happened to be the one nearest the class-enclosed receptionist area. Typhoid Mary wheezed in and pecked on the glass. I am not sure that the receptionist slid her shoebox-sized door open.

Typhoid Mary inquired about the receptionist's son. Because the normal thing for a layman to do in a medical establishment is flaunt her immunity to violations of HIPAA by outing medical info on relatives of the workers. Seems the dude had some kind of sinus infection that Typhoid Mary thought mirrored hers, though his was acquired through a rope swing over the river, and hers through everyday living.

Need I enumerate how displeased I was with Typhoid Mary? I suppose her goal was to drop in and explain why she wasn't keeping her appointment. Which apparently she had already telegraphed through other means. The fact that she whined about not wanting to do anything but go home and crawl into bed made me want to shout, "DON'T LET THE DOOR HIT YOU ON THE RUMPUS ON YOUR WAY OUT!" Because there she was, hacking and bronchially-challengedly breathing her germs in my general vicinity. It was all I could do not to huff disgustedly and stomp off to the other side of the waiting room.

Typhoid Mary was on her way to the doctor, but didn't want to go. Seems she had already been antibioticked and inhalered and cough-medicined. Yet her malady clung to her like stink on a deceased road-possum. She was afraid she would be sent for a chest x-ray. Thus stripping her of her Typhoidness, un-Johnny-Appleseeding her, and rendering her a commoner again if her disease was diagnosed and subsequently cured.

I thought about investing in a mask, but I fear a Bubble Boy suit is more practical.

7 comments:

  1. If you became Bubble Woman, people would go out of their way to visit you...

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  2. Cough...snort...that's just ah choo horrible!

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  3. With any luck, she went off to invade Spain with the other Moops.

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  4. Okay, so when this happens, you stick your face into your shirt like a turtle pulling its head into its shell. What is wrong with people?

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  5. I'm with Tammy. Such people should be considered infectious agents and be sent free of charge to places that deserve biological toxins.

    Not that people haven't done that before. Just ask the civilizations ravaged by explorers bearing small pox and similar germs....I will now re-think my comment.

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  6. I once tried to buy a Bubble Boy suit but they don't come in my size. Darn it!

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  7. Sioux,
    I hope they're in the mood for pie. We sell it along the road, you know. Blackberry, boysenberry, huckleberry, raspberry, strawberry, cranberry. Peach.

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    joeh,
    Don't let the "Publish" button hit your rumpus on the way out.

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    Tammy,
    Hopefully. I wouldn't want her to rip a hole in my Bubble Boy suit.

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    Linda,
    I actually do that at school, when my personal space is invaded. I have only my magnetic personality to blame, I suppose. My well-wishers wish me well, but they don't realize they are contagious.

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    Leenie,
    I sense that you can advocate both sides of an issue. Like a black-and-white cookie in a bakery famous for babka.

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    Stephen,
    That must seriously hinder your Trivial Pursuit win record against downstate tourists.

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