Bob Here
So, the other day, the wife and I were in this restaurant, right?
I was on my seventh or eighth drink, I don't remember which (chuckle chuckle).
We had just polished off our appetizer - tortilla chips with extra salt, smothered in keso cheese that had little tiny bacon bits spread throughout.
Of course, all that sodium made me even thirstier, so instead of a scotch on the rocks, I ordered up a couple of beers. Figured I could get more fluid that way. I know, I know, shouldn't have been mixing, but I was feeling a bit of phosphorous deficiency, so I wanted to load it on.
So, the other day, the wife and I were in this restaurant, right?
I was on my seventh or eighth drink, I don't remember which (chuckle chuckle).
We had just polished off our appetizer - tortilla chips with extra salt, smothered in keso cheese that had little tiny bacon bits spread throughout.
Of course, all that sodium made me even thirstier, so instead of a scotch on the rocks, I ordered up a couple of beers. Figured I could get more fluid that way. I know, I know, shouldn't have been mixing, but I was feeling a bit of phosphorous deficiency, so I wanted to load it on.
I was tempted to get another appetizer, maybe some potato skins. Or, should I go with buffalo wings? Used to love those before I started dialysis.
Nah, I didn't want to spoil my dinner.
Hah, did I just think that? Must've lost it for a minute there. "Waiter, bring both the skins AND the wings."
For my main course, I ordered spaghetti with extra tomato sauce. With the sauce, of course, I told the waiter I wanted the saltiest, fattiest sausage they could find. "Oh, and bring me a large bowl of parmesan cheese."
(I kind of wondered why a Mexican place would offer spaghetti, but heck, I was going with it.)
"Waiter. Hey, why are you walking away? Don't forget. A couple more beers too, ha ha."
How could I still be hungry after that meal?
I don't know, but I managed.
And for dessert, I wanted the double fudge brownie, with real whipped cream. "Make sure it's not that Cool Whip crap. Oh, and two more beers."
After we were finished, we had a ton of energy, so we went for a jog.
Okay, now. If you were at all doubtful that I was making all this stuff up, that last part should have really tipped you off. The wife and I go jogging about as often as the sun sets in the east.
And, I haven't had a beer since the Eisenhower Administration.
So, you might be wondering, what's with letting the imagination run a little wild here? Well hey, in a day and age where Manti Te'o has an imaginary girlfriend, Lance Armstrong has seven imaginary Tour De France titles, and Barry Bonds and Roger Clemens have imaginary Hall of Fame careers, why should dialysis patients be left in the lurch?
Now granted, the fantasies of dialysis patients are likely to be a little different than those of the general population.
Fame? Wealth? Popularity? Your own island? Nah, we just want to have a good pee now and again. Is that asking so much?
But it occurs to me that these famous guys weren't just letting their imaginations loose, they were actually living in a fantasy world. They worked hard at conjuring up these la-la land lives and not only believed in them themselves, but managed to drag others along with them. Talk about talent.
But I'm here to tell you that dialysis patients are no slouches when it comes to cooking up alternative existences. A couple of dialysis compadres who sat near me over the years have dreamed up some pretty wild scenarios. Sometimes, we would sort of compete with each other to see who could come up with the best fantasy.
It was our own little version of "Dialysis Patients Gone Wild."
One guy was my "neighbor" when I first started dialysis. He was about my age, but was confined to a wheelchair.
I was still on the evening shift, and I would come in and say something like, "Aaah, tough night last night. Stayed out all night dancing, stopped at an all-night diner, had some chili-cheese nachos with extra salsa, drowned it in Dos Equis, got maybe half-an-hour of shuteye, then went to work. Couple of staff members called in, so had to do their jobs in addition to my own. Went out and played a couple of matches of soccer at lunch, presented to the Board of Directors, saw a burning building on the way here, pulled a couple of people out, then put the fire out, stopped an armed robbery at the corner convenience store, and still got here on time." Then I'd plop down in my chair saying, "Man, I'm bushed."
He'd just sit there nodding, completely straight-faced. Then, he said, "So, what'd you do in your spare time?" And we'd just laugh.
He did a pretty good job coming up with these whacko stories as well.
"So, how was your weekend?" I asked him on a Monday night.
He thought for a minute, then said, "Pretty lousy. Didn't get anything done that I had planned. Wanted to work around the house, but kept interrupting to do my decathlon training. Y'know. Ten events take up a lot of practice time. Then Cindy called and wanted to come over."
"Cindy?"
"Yeah. Crawford. You know. Nice kid, but a little needy. Told her, not now, I was going to hop on down to Rio on impulse."
"Right," I said. Then we'd sit there quietly for a minute.
"Of course," he'd suddenly continue, "If Cheryl Tiegs ever found out about me and Cindy, there'd be hell to pay."
Most of our stories played to the lifestyle gaps that are typical for a dialysis patient - lack of freedom, crazy diet restrictions, feeling lousy all the time. They were surprisingly easy to cook up.
One time, we were laughing about one of our whacked-out stories and a young attendant came over and wanted to know what was so amusing.
"Well, you know that ad that says 'It's time to get serious about what happens in the bathroom'?" I said.
Her eyes opened wide.
"NEVER MIND! I don't want to know any more," she said walking away shaking her head with a smile. My neighbor and I looked at each other.
"I'm hurt that she didn't want to hear my story," I said, and we both laughed again.
More recently, I came in one Monday after accompanying my wife on a tennis weekend. I had my Friday treatment at an out-of-town center.
"Hey, where you been?" he asked, with the same young attendant standing nearby.
"Well, you heard that the Mayan Apocalypse didn't happen, right?" I said. He nodded. I then pointed to myself with my two thumbs.
He laughed, but the attendant walked away shaking her head again.
Another guy sat next to me for quite a while, but at first we hardly spoke beyond, "Hey. How you doing?"
Then one evening I came in after he had already started his treatment. Now you know that usually, a dialysis patient would rather be just about anywhere but on dialysis.
"How's it going?" I asked casually.
Without looking up from his book, he said, "It's a marvelous night for a moondance."
Maybe it was the deadpan delivery, and maybe you had to be there, but it struck me as hysterically funny. After a while, we were both laughing, not something you see in a dialysis center very often.
After that, we would regularly exchange caustic life sayings.
We'd be sitting quietly for a while, then suddenly he would say, "You know, the problem with doing nothing is you never know when you're finished." Then we would crack up. Hey, maybe we patients are just easily amused.
During a particularly long treatment, he suddenly blurted out, "Dialysis sucks like Dracula."
Another time, a doctor was making his rounds. Not our regular nephrologist, but some young guy covering for him. Looked like he was just out of high school. Neither of us really cared for him. After he had finished with us, adding nothing of value, we just looked at each other and shook our heads. After a while, I said, "Scars heal, glory fades, but stupid is forever." Then we were howling again.
I think the staff was really wondering if we had just completely gone around the bend.
But they should have known, being on dialysis is fertile territory for dreaming up something better. And you don't need an imaginary girlfriend or statistics falsified by PED's.
Here are a couple of good ones. How about a cure for kidney disease? Or more readily available transplants for dialysis patients?
Now those are fantasies I can hang my hat on.
Thanks for reading. I hope everybody's dreams are a little closer to reality.
Take care.
Nah, I didn't want to spoil my dinner.
Hah, did I just think that? Must've lost it for a minute there. "Waiter, bring both the skins AND the wings."
For my main course, I ordered spaghetti with extra tomato sauce. With the sauce, of course, I told the waiter I wanted the saltiest, fattiest sausage they could find. "Oh, and bring me a large bowl of parmesan cheese."
(I kind of wondered why a Mexican place would offer spaghetti, but heck, I was going with it.)
"Waiter. Hey, why are you walking away? Don't forget. A couple more beers too, ha ha."
How could I still be hungry after that meal?
I don't know, but I managed.
And for dessert, I wanted the double fudge brownie, with real whipped cream. "Make sure it's not that Cool Whip crap. Oh, and two more beers."
After we were finished, we had a ton of energy, so we went for a jog.
Okay, now. If you were at all doubtful that I was making all this stuff up, that last part should have really tipped you off. The wife and I go jogging about as often as the sun sets in the east.
And, I haven't had a beer since the Eisenhower Administration.
So, you might be wondering, what's with letting the imagination run a little wild here? Well hey, in a day and age where Manti Te'o has an imaginary girlfriend, Lance Armstrong has seven imaginary Tour De France titles, and Barry Bonds and Roger Clemens have imaginary Hall of Fame careers, why should dialysis patients be left in the lurch?
Now granted, the fantasies of dialysis patients are likely to be a little different than those of the general population.
Fame? Wealth? Popularity? Your own island? Nah, we just want to have a good pee now and again. Is that asking so much?
But it occurs to me that these famous guys weren't just letting their imaginations loose, they were actually living in a fantasy world. They worked hard at conjuring up these la-la land lives and not only believed in them themselves, but managed to drag others along with them. Talk about talent.
But I'm here to tell you that dialysis patients are no slouches when it comes to cooking up alternative existences. A couple of dialysis compadres who sat near me over the years have dreamed up some pretty wild scenarios. Sometimes, we would sort of compete with each other to see who could come up with the best fantasy.
It was our own little version of "Dialysis Patients Gone Wild."
One guy was my "neighbor" when I first started dialysis. He was about my age, but was confined to a wheelchair.
I was still on the evening shift, and I would come in and say something like, "Aaah, tough night last night. Stayed out all night dancing, stopped at an all-night diner, had some chili-cheese nachos with extra salsa, drowned it in Dos Equis, got maybe half-an-hour of shuteye, then went to work. Couple of staff members called in, so had to do their jobs in addition to my own. Went out and played a couple of matches of soccer at lunch, presented to the Board of Directors, saw a burning building on the way here, pulled a couple of people out, then put the fire out, stopped an armed robbery at the corner convenience store, and still got here on time." Then I'd plop down in my chair saying, "Man, I'm bushed."
He'd just sit there nodding, completely straight-faced. Then, he said, "So, what'd you do in your spare time?" And we'd just laugh.
He did a pretty good job coming up with these whacko stories as well.
"So, how was your weekend?" I asked him on a Monday night.
He thought for a minute, then said, "Pretty lousy. Didn't get anything done that I had planned. Wanted to work around the house, but kept interrupting to do my decathlon training. Y'know. Ten events take up a lot of practice time. Then Cindy called and wanted to come over."
"Cindy?"
"Yeah. Crawford. You know. Nice kid, but a little needy. Told her, not now, I was going to hop on down to Rio on impulse."
"Right," I said. Then we'd sit there quietly for a minute.
"Of course," he'd suddenly continue, "If Cheryl Tiegs ever found out about me and Cindy, there'd be hell to pay."
Most of our stories played to the lifestyle gaps that are typical for a dialysis patient - lack of freedom, crazy diet restrictions, feeling lousy all the time. They were surprisingly easy to cook up.
One time, we were laughing about one of our whacked-out stories and a young attendant came over and wanted to know what was so amusing.
"Well, you know that ad that says 'It's time to get serious about what happens in the bathroom'?" I said.
Her eyes opened wide.
"NEVER MIND! I don't want to know any more," she said walking away shaking her head with a smile. My neighbor and I looked at each other.
"I'm hurt that she didn't want to hear my story," I said, and we both laughed again.
More recently, I came in one Monday after accompanying my wife on a tennis weekend. I had my Friday treatment at an out-of-town center.
"Hey, where you been?" he asked, with the same young attendant standing nearby.
"Well, you heard that the Mayan Apocalypse didn't happen, right?" I said. He nodded. I then pointed to myself with my two thumbs.
He laughed, but the attendant walked away shaking her head again.
Another guy sat next to me for quite a while, but at first we hardly spoke beyond, "Hey. How you doing?"
Then one evening I came in after he had already started his treatment. Now you know that usually, a dialysis patient would rather be just about anywhere but on dialysis.
"How's it going?" I asked casually.
Without looking up from his book, he said, "It's a marvelous night for a moondance."
Maybe it was the deadpan delivery, and maybe you had to be there, but it struck me as hysterically funny. After a while, we were both laughing, not something you see in a dialysis center very often.
After that, we would regularly exchange caustic life sayings.
We'd be sitting quietly for a while, then suddenly he would say, "You know, the problem with doing nothing is you never know when you're finished." Then we would crack up. Hey, maybe we patients are just easily amused.
During a particularly long treatment, he suddenly blurted out, "Dialysis sucks like Dracula."
Another time, a doctor was making his rounds. Not our regular nephrologist, but some young guy covering for him. Looked like he was just out of high school. Neither of us really cared for him. After he had finished with us, adding nothing of value, we just looked at each other and shook our heads. After a while, I said, "Scars heal, glory fades, but stupid is forever." Then we were howling again.
I think the staff was really wondering if we had just completely gone around the bend.
But they should have known, being on dialysis is fertile territory for dreaming up something better. And you don't need an imaginary girlfriend or statistics falsified by PED's.
Here are a couple of good ones. How about a cure for kidney disease? Or more readily available transplants for dialysis patients?
Now those are fantasies I can hang my hat on.
Thanks for reading. I hope everybody's dreams are a little closer to reality.
Take care.
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