ER, But, Alas, Not On TV

The emergency rooms here in San Diego are smaller than I expected. I have now been to two and found their size to be surprising considering that San Diego is one of the larger cities in America. 

In any case, I have now become intimately familiar with the UCSD Emergency Department in Hillcrest. I spent several hours there on Sunday morning amidst an odd assortment of characters; a spindly-legged fellow who claimed to have fallen down a flight of stairs and blacked out; a duo of middle-aged blond women eating fast food; a wizened Mexican gentleman and his portly cohort and, last but not least, a guy in a CSI hat with an obvious mental disorder who kept asking the registrars about syphilis and smelled overwhelmingly of fermenting yeast.

In any case, writhing in lower abdominal pain, I was admitted not once but twice to UCSD Hillcrest and, a CAT scan, IV and much poking and prodding later, was diagnosed with an obstructing kidney stone. Yes, those horrid little things your grandfather gets, along with flatulence and excess ear hair. I would feel more like an old man if what I wasn’t already feeling much of the time was intense, pulsating pain (which is currently being remedied by the wonder-drug Vicodin) and a general sense of uselessness, as I have not left a two mile radius in four days.

But, like most things, kidney stones do, well, pass.