Hurry Up and Wait, Miami Style

Hospitalization in Miami has been somewhat of a new experience for me. First of all, there was the interminable wait in the emergency room of North Shore Medical Center in Miami Shores, where I had been taken on Sunday evening because of atrial fibrillation and an unbelievably high blood pressure reading. Being admitted to the ER at 8 PM, there I sat until 4:30 AM on Monday morning. Part of the problem was that the on-call cardiologist who was contacted for orders on me hung up on the nurse who was taking the orders and refused to call back. After having the ER doc let the on-call know that I was a retired insurance claims manager and could cause a world of problems for him if that's what he wanted. The guy called back shortly thereafter. I was finally wheeled up to my room, a full 8½ hours after being admitted.

After spending two days at North Shore, I had to be transferred to Mercy Hospital in Cocoanut Grove in order for a cardiac catheterization to be done. I was told I would be transported at 7AM on Wednesday morning. The appointed time came and I was up and ready to go. I waited; and I waited; and I waited. I was told there was some problem with the paperwork. Finally, at noon, I left North Shore for the trip down to Mercy, arriving around 12:30. Again, I waited; and I waited; and I waited. After a couple of hours I was told that the cardiologist, who had been ready for me that morning, had to leave for his office appointments and he would not be back until about 5:30 that evening. So, all I could do was wait and wait once again. In the meantime, I sent Pam home with Linda, rather than them having to wait around all afternoon long. I couldn’t go anywhere, because all I had on was the usual hospital gown. Finally, around 5:30 I was wheeled into the cath lab where I was prepped and waited again for the cardiologist. He finally showed and the procedure was done (damnit, I had to have another stent placed, making a total of four stents now). I was wheeled up to my room and was able to get a turkey sandwich and cranberry juice, the first anything I had eaten in the previous 25 hours.

On Friday, Dec 10^th, I was to have a cardioversion, a procedure to correct the atrial fibrillation, wherein they place electrodes on the breast and back and give me a shock to get the heart back into a regular sinus rhythm. I was hoping to have it done in the morning, get back to my room, and then discharged. Again, it was a game of hurry up and wait. All morning long I waited and waited, checking with the nurse a couple of times, but he had no information. Finally, about 2:00 I was taken to another building. Once there, I found out what the problem was—the doctor with whom they had scheduled me was on vacation and I had to be seen by the one covering for him. This doc had been in surgery at another hospital. Unfortunately, he could not do the procedure because, beforehand, they passed some kind of instrument down my throat to get a closer look at the heart, via ultrasound, and found there were some clots n the heart. Not wanting to risk dislodging the clots, the procedure was cancelled until they are completely dissolved thru the use of medications, so I will try again in about 6 to 8 weeks.

The final straw occurred on Saturday when I was cleared by the cardiologist to go home. As I was literally walking through the door to the hallway, the nurse came running up, saying the discharge had been rescinded. I was to be followed up at our friend, Linda’s, by a home health nurse to check the Coumadin level and give me any necessary injection of additional blood thinner. Unfortunately, as the insurance company is not open on Saturdays, he couldn’t get the pre-approval he needed, so it was back to square three for the duration. As I was dressed and no longer being on a monitor, I took the opportunity to take a shower—the first one I had had since last Sunday morning. Fortunately, my Coumadin level was within acceptable range today and I was finally discharged. Now it’s just a case of cooling my jets, decompressing from last week, and heading back home to Bradenton sometime mid-week.

Miami Emergency Room Nightmare

Pam and I drove down to Miami on Thursday, December 2^nd to celebrate our best friend, Linda’s, birthday on Friday. We had a great dinner at our favorite local restaurant, The Village Café, and spent the day Saturday at Aventura Mall. Saturday evening we ate at a local Japanese restaurant on Biscayne Boulevard where I had a delicious terriaki steak. I ate about 2/3 of it and took the rest back to Linda’s to finish up later. Next day I worshiped at the Miami Quaker Meeting, came back to Linda’s where I finished the steak off, and took it easy after a short trip to the local T.J. Maxx’s. When we got back to her place, I started feeling a bit bloated and uncomfortable. We ordered out a pizza and I went out to pick it up, feeling a bit worse. When I returned I decided I didn’t feel like eating, so I went to lie down. My chest was quite uncomfortable when I breathed and I felt like I had just smoked a couple packs of cigarettes. I decided to check my blood pressure and was shocked to find it a whopping 179/107. We decided to call 911 and that’s when the fun began.

The EMTs did an EKG and asked me how long I had had atrial fibrillation. Of course, I never knew I had such a condition. They suggested I go to the hospital, to which I reluctantly agreed—mostly to assuage any concerns Pam had. I was taken to North Shore Medical Center, a community hospital a couple of miles from Linda’s house, arriving at the ER around 8 PM. Of course, I was hooked up to all sorts of machines and another EKG was done. Then I sat (or should I say “laid”) around for what seemed like forever. In the meantime, a lady suffering from dementia was admitted to the next bay to me and every once in a while she’d get of the gurney and start walking around. I had to call the nurses in to get her to lie back down, but it got worse and worse. At one point, after I had been there for a few hours I could hear the nurses say that the doctor who was giving them orders hung up on them and they couldn’t believe it. In the meantime, a cardiac arrest came in and the woman in the next bay was up and wandering all over the place. I was calling for the nurse “stat” but they were too involved with the new case and they couldn’t come. I’m still hanging around, waiting to be moved upstairs. Around 2 AM or so I asked the nurse if she knew when I might be moved upstairs and she told me that the on-call doctor had hung up on them. I was a bit pissed, to say the least, but I just bided my time. Finally, at 2:30 I told the ER doc (a great one, I might add) that he should contact the guy who hung up on them and tell him that I am a retired insurance claims manager and if he wishes, I can make his life as miserable as he wants me to. The guy called back within a half hour.

I finally got out of the ER at 4:30 AM, some 8½ hours after I was admitted. The ER doc told me that they cannot release me to the hospital, proper, until a staff physician accepts me as a patient. So, after 3½ hours of sleep Monday morning, it began a day of lying around, cat napping and waiting to hear something. I now find I will be transferred to Mercy Hospital, which has a large cardiac care program and, if my stents are clear I can be discharged. One can only hope.

Back Home Once Again

It was a long day today and I am sure glad to be back home. I left the Rocky Mount Holiday Inn at precisely 8:30 this morning and drove to Raleigh for my flight south. I got to the airport in plenty of time and hung out for a couple of hours before my flight to Fort Lauderdale. Surprisingly, there were many more people there than I expected on a Sunday morning. I got a good seat toward the front for the flight south, which was uneventful. I have driven past the Fort Lauderdale airport on many occasions in the past when driving to Miami, but it was kinda neat to see it from the inside. Geez! Was that airport ever crowded!

Fortunately, my connecting flight to Tampa left from the same gate I arrived thru when I got there. After waiting another couple of hours, it was off to Tampa for a short 45 minute flight. That was kinda neat because, rather than flying west and coming up the Gulf coast, the flight went pretty much directly northwest toward the Tampa area. In taking that route, I was able to look below and see the route we generally take between Bradenton and Miami--U.S. 27, flying over South Bay, on the south side of Lake Okeechobee, Clewiston, where I had a great Cuban lunch last month, and Moore Haven, where we usually stop for lunch about halfway to Miami. One thing I can say as that those towns look a hell of a lot closer from the air than they are on the ground.

Got to Tampa on time and had just an hour's drive from the airport back home. Great homemade soup with multi-grain Ciabatta roll for dinner. So glad to be back home after an exhilarating weekend. Now that I am back, I am relaxing and feeling a bit tired. So happy that the Rays evened up their playoff series with the Rangers, but not so happy that the Packers lost to the Redskins. I was feeling pretty confident when I watched them jump out to a 10-0 lead while waiting for my plane in Lauderdale. Story of my life--last year the first of only three games the Buccaneers won was against the Pack. Oh well, onward and upward.

The Last Day at Wesleyan

Well, here it is, Saturday evening, and things are drawing to a close. The day started out with breakfast at the Hardee's Patio on campus. Saw some more old friends, most notably Charlie Saunders and Art "Fergie" Ferguson. I took a tour of campus with two of the student ambassadors and it was amazing to see a lot of the changes which have taken place over the past 40+ years. Probably the best thing is the library with its state of the art computer lab and the programs of tutoring and student assistance. It's sure a far cry from the large room on the second floor of the Administration Building that served as a library. The two young men who conducted about 15 of us on the tour seemed intrigued at the tales we were telling them of the early days. In fact, at one point one of them mentioned something he had heard but didn't know if it was truth or a myth. We verified it for him as having actually happened. It involved moving one of the guy's (whose name escapes me) room furnishings and clothes out to the fountain at the entrance of the campus.

We had a lot of fun talking about pranks that were pulled, such as detouring traffic off U.S. 301 through the campus when there was some road construction going on. A few moved and strategically placed detour signs did the trick. I don't think I ever laughed harder in my life. One thing that occurred before I came, thanks to its retelling by Royall Brown was that someone had let loose a pig in one of the classroom buildings one night. I guess it caused a lot of excitement when the first person showed up in the morning to open up.

After the tour, I drove over to the Northern Nash High School stadium for a tailgating party and Homecoming Game. Wesleyan soundly trounced Greensboro College 48-12. The first half was all Wesleyan with them leading 38-0 until four seconds were left in the half. Then then gave up a touchdown to end the half. In the second half, it was pretty much Wesleyan's second and third stringers playing and continued the shellacking started in the first half, albeit not as bad.

This evening was the Alumni Awards and Hall of Fame dinner at the Dunn Center. Dinner was turkey, dressing, veggies and cheesecake. At the end of the evening, we Pioneers were recognized and acknowledged. I am now back at the hotel, where we just had one last get together down in the lounge. Surprisingly, while I was schmoozing with my old classmates, some of the members of Nu Gamma Phi fraternity were there. When I returned to Wesleyan in the Fall of 1970 I roomed amongst the fraternity on the third floor of South Hall. One of the brothers recognized me from my photo name tag. As it turned out there were four of the guys there, including Ed Taylor, who roomed across the hall from Jeff Shee and me. I had forgotten, but one time that Fall, Jeff and got into Ed's room, swiped all his clothes and put price tags on them and were having a (mock) liquidation sale of his clothes. So, besides renewing acquaintances with the "Pioneers", it was great to see others from my second go-round at Wesleyan.

I'm headed back home tomorrow. I have really missed Pam and the animals and it will be great to be back with them. I so wish that Pam could have been here, but such is not her bag and I am so very grateful to her for her understanding and allowing me to have a great weekend among my oldest friends. Can't wait to see them all again in another 50 years.

Day Two at NCWC

Had another nice day back in Carolina. After taking my time to get going and grabbing breakfast I decided to do some exploring.

Driving into Rocky Mount, the first thing I noted was that the nearest bar where the drinkers hung out, The Retreat, is now apparently a strip club, Baby Doll's Cabaret (and, no, I haven't gone nor do I plan to). Continuing on into town, I found that the old airport, where LBJ landed to launch his War on Poverty, is now a HUGE sports complex with soccer fields, a football field, baseball diamond, softball and Little League diamonds. Once I got downtown, the only buildings I recognized were the train station and the Methodist Church. The original Hardee's has been torn down and replaced with some sort of commercial building. I kinda missed the place because, when I went to college here, once in a while my buddies and I would make a late evening run down to Hardee's. If they had cooked too many burgers and would have to discard them, they's let us have the leftovers. Sure beat having to pay for them! One really sad sign of the times, though, was the massive number of vacant storefronts. Downtown Rocky Mount is a unique one--about five blocks long with the mainline of the old Atlantic Coast Line (now CSX) Railroad and the county line running down the middle of the main street. It was like a ghost town. Very few cars and people could be seen. Obviously, all the business had moved out to the U.S. 301 By-pass.

Afterwards, I went out to Wesleyan and strolled all over the campus, taking in both what was here when I was, as well as that that came in the last 40 years. For some reason or other, the hallways in the admin and classroom buildings seem to have narrowed since I was last here. I took a load of pictures. This evening there was an alumni dinner here at the Holiday Inn and even more old friends showed up who weren't here last night. Again, it was great catching up with them. While I hate to say it, the guys are more recognizable than are most of the women. One good old friend who was there tonight was Max FitzGerald, one of the friendliest upperclassmen I ever met. He is (of all things) a retired sex therapist who lives in Wilson, NC with his wife, a classmate of mine, Della Reeves. They were both endeared to me, as they now have an animal rescue consisting of 170 dogs (including 3 they got today) on 80 acres they own. We really hit it off, because rescues are my wife, Pam's and my passion. I shared with them that we have 3 rescue dogs, ourselves (but we have nowhere near 80 acres).

This evening was a family-oriented event at the Dunn Center, a comedic juggler named Mark Nizer, who put on a very entertaining show, some of it in 3-D. While it was not The Beatles, he was entertaining in his own right.

Tomorrow, it's playing in an alumni baseball game, tailgating, and the Homecoming Game. It will be my last day here, as I head back home on Sunday, so I am hoping to make the best of it.

NC Wesleyan College 40 Years Later

I am back at my alma mater almost 40 years after I finished my degree and geez how things have changed. But a little background first. North Carolina Wesleyan College (NCWC) was founded in Rocky Mount, NC in 1956 and opened in 1960. This year marks the 50th anniversary of its opening and so a special "Pioneer Weekend" was planned for those of us who were in the first four classes at Wesleyan. I started at NCWC as a freshman in 1963--the first year there were four classes attending Wesleyan. I was here for three years before Uncle Sam came calling after my junior year. Rather than getting drafted, I went into the Air Force for four years, picking up a semester's worth of credits before returning to NCWC in Fall, 1970 to finish up my degree.

Leaving home this morning, I drove to Tampa where I caught a flight to Raleigh, NC and rented a car for the trip to Rocky Mount. Naturally, I made a wrong turn coming out of the airport and realized I was headed the wrong way. I got off at some exit, don't know the hell where, but it was somewhere between Raleigh and Durham. I found some workmen who told me to just continue on the road I was on for a couple of miles and I'd find I-40. I finally got back to where I was supposed to be in the first place and headed east toward Rocky Mount. That was not without adventure though. I was passing a semi which was to my right. All of a sudden, a Lexus SUV comes up alongside me to pass on my left. The woman was yakking on the phone and starts to drift over into my lane--me in a PT Cruiser and a semi to my right. All I could do was hit the brakes and lean on the horn. She finally woke up and got back to where she was supposed to be. Anyway, I made it safely to Rocky Mount.

This evening there was a reception for us "Pioneers" and it was great to see some of my old friends. In fact the first one I saw was my old baseball teammate, Ron Brockenbrough. We talked for a while as others arrived--Gil Wylie, Dave Brady, Ray O'Kelly, Ray Robinson, Royall Brown, and others as well as basketball coach, Don Scalf. We had a great time reminiscing about the early years. One thing that cannot go unmentioned is that, for the first time, I was able to legally consume alcohol on campus. Not only was I able to have a drink, NCWC supplied the drinks (wine in my case). You see, founded as a teetotaling Methodist college, there was absolutely NO drinking on campus, which is not to say I didn't have my own stash. It was so ironic, because the first president of NCWC was named Tom Collins. After that get together there was a show at the Dunn Center, an addition to NCWC since I was last here. It was a great show with a Beatles band, "1964 The Tribute". They put on one heck of a show, singing many of the pre-Sgt Pepper songs. The got the audience involved and everyone seemed to enjoy the show. While I was a bit disappointed that they did not do the greatest rock and roll song of all time, "Hey Jude", I really enjoyed the show.

Now, its back at the hotel, decompressing from a long day's activities and looking forward to tomorrow and other friends who haven't arrived yet.

Peace, Salaam, Shalom

Today, September 11, 2010 is the ninth anniversary of the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, as well as the crash of United Airlines Flight 93 near Shanksville, PA. It is a day of remembrance of lives lost, both then and as a result of two subsequent wars. As a result of 9/11, there has been much hatred directed toward Muslim--hatred borne of ignorance and prejudice. Unfortunately, a pastor in Gainesville, FL (who shall remain nameless, having garnered his fifteen minutes of fame) was to have a Qur'an burning today. Fortunately, he rethought his actions and decided not to hold his book burning.

I was fortunate and honored to take part in the Interfaith Service of Understanding and Peace, held this evening at the First Presbyterian Church of Sarasota. It was a moving and overflow service drawing on Islam, Judaism, and Christianity. Readings from the Qur'an, the Old Testament, and the New Testament were part of the service. In fact, the most dynamic speaker of the evening was Imam Tarik Al Bouri of the Islamic Center of Sarasota and Bradenton. He was most entertaining in his talk and, in giving some information about the Qur'an, told the gathering that in the Qur'an Jesus is mentioned 25 times (favorably, I might add), while Mohammad is mentioned only 5 times. My small part in the service was reading a part of a larger responsive reading which included people from all three religious traditions.

Hopefully, this and other such services held around the country will lead to a greater understanding and appreciation of all mankind and the various religions that make up this small blue ball we live on. If we can all live in peace and mutual respect, it would be such a wonderful world.