Help! I've married a 31 year-old Boy Scout!

Happy New Year to all. How do you celebrate the new year? Any resolutions? Well, we didn't have any specific resolutions or celebratory habits, but we did decide that NOW would be the best time of year to take up a new hobby. Which hobby? Well, camping of course! We do live in the South and are slowly but surely acclimating to southern life, so naturally our next step was to expand our outdoor sport repertoire.

Off to Dick's Sporting Goods we went. They seem to have a large selection of tents, good prices and...oh, who am I kidding, Anthropologie was in the same plaza and I had a gift card...Anyway, we shop around and find a great 4 person tent by Field and Stream. (It doesn't get much more southern than Field and Stream) There was only one left and the box was slightly beat up, so of course I finagled 10% off. This made Kevin extremely happy and opened his eyes to incredible power of asking cashiers for money off. It seems everywhere we went that day, he asked for 10% off...and got it most of the time :)

Fast forward to later that day, where Kevin just HAD to set up this tent. Quick quiz: If you wanted to set up a recently purchased LARGE tent, where would you do it? Now, take your time when answering this, it's tricky. Answer: Outside.......unless your name is Kevin, then it must be set up in the front foyer/living room of your home.

mmmmm, what a splendid addition to any home entrance...

The pups seemed very interested in our new purchase..

Nala thought this tent was like a giant crate for the whole family and therefore loved it equally.

Hail Mary, Full of Cars

Ok. Here is a relatively simple question with a not so simple answer. Ready? Where would one park their car if they needed to go to the emergency room? Hmmmm. Let me think? At the hospital? At the actual emergency room entrance? Nearby? On the same street? If you said yes to any of these questions, you, my friend, are WRONG. If you need to go to the emergency room at St. Mary's hospital, you must park at least a quarter mile away. I believe this is a relatively new policy instituted to encourage patients (and patients' chauffeurs) to get much needed exercise. Or maybe the economy is to blame. Perhaps St. Mary's figures that 10% of all patients will either give up, get better, or get lost on the way to the ER and so staffing can be cut. Whatever the reason, I found out the hard way today. I took a friend to the ER and let me tell you, it's a damn good thing she didn't have a broken leg...or else we would have been in the 10% (we would've had to give up- I'm not trying to be a superhero and strap her to my back.) So, a quarter mile, we trekked.

Upon arrival, we were greeted with the ever pleasant sounds and smells of a variety of ailments....there were flues, colds, a twisted knee (probably from walking to her car), some fallen elderly, and a depressed woman. Heather was triaged quickly and taken back behind the double doors where the "real" wait began. I accompanied her and attempted to entertain her and keep her spirits up. You see, poor Heather has being experiencing a plethora of symptoms worthy enough of TLC's Mystery Diagnosis. It ranges from acute headaches to joint stiffness, to some type of peripheral neuropathy where she can't feel her hands or feet. She's been getting the brush off from her family doctor (don't get me started on those) and when she woke up today not being able to open her right eye fully due to muscle weakness, I said "TO THE E.R.!!!!" So off we went, straight from work, which is slightly humorous because when anyone leaves our workplace to go anywhere, everybody seems to weigh in on where they went, how long they were gone, etc. etc. etc...and rumors are born.

I will now bypass the entire escapade within the Catholic hospital (whose motto is "thanks for doing business with us"...excuse me??) and instead move to the hysterical portion of the day involving the return to work.

We returned 5 hours later and were instantly separated and questioned about Heather's current state of health. I didn't want to divulge poor Heather's HIPPA protected information, but needed to address a few "concerns." And by concerns, I mean diagnoses that were assigned to Heather by our co-workers after we left.....below is a compilation list and the accompanying code name of the individual

"A virus that won't go away"- Macadamia nut

"A lack of sleep"- Peanut

"Multiple Sclerosis"-Peanut again

"The long term effects of having a child....15 months ago."- Macadamia AND peanut

"GYN problems"- Meow

"Some muscle disease that will take forever to diagnose"- Cashew

"Autoimmune something"- Mr. Burns

I'll say that Mr. Burns is closest to having an actual real thought, but I'm pretty sure it's because Heather and I said something about possible Lupus. His first incling was to take her blood pressure. (which was slightly elevated- typical of the workplace to induce stress.)

Now for the best part. Here are the suggestions of our dear co-workers as to what Heather should do to combat her symptoms of impending doom...

"Get some rest"

"See my 85-year-old mother's neurologist...he's the best"

"Stop worrying"

"Get some more tests"

and my personal favorite....

"get pregnant...because pregnancy is like a "switch" that can turn on and off crazy symptoms and allergies."

Hmmmmmmmm. wow. That's all I can say. wow.

Get better Heather and if you need reminding of our fun-filled adventure of St. Mary's and the loud man with prostatitis....here are a few pics.

Woo Hoo! Looks like fun? Perhaps not fun, but still better than being at work!

Check out those vitals!!!!!! This silly thing would go off every 5 seconds.

The world's coolest vending machine. Just use a magic wireless button and you can get anything you want...trachs, gauze, ambu bags...you name it!

This is me looking sad that Heather is in the ER. The curtain behind me was shrouding the loud man with prostatitis.

This is a picture of the security camera taking a picture of me taking a picture of their supply cabinet. Bizzare but funny.