My Weekly Rant !!

August 25th '97
Well thankyou for checking back here, I appreciate it. And just for being so loyal and kind today you get inflicted, erm I mean treated to not one but TWO rants. !! Yes that is correct, no mistakes I just cannot choose which to write about so I'm going to put them both in !! The first one is about my weekend that I just spent in Washington DC and the second is about my trip to the hospital ( nothing too serious, don't worry !! ) Anyway onto those rants !! The second one is Here !!

So anyway, the week end of the 17th I finally made it to Washington DC, the nation's capital and I had a pretty good time. We got there and decided to rollerblade, that was mistake number one. I don't know if you know much about DC but it has a reputation for being HOT !! Well we managed to rollerblade to the Washinton Monument and then along the Reflection Pool ( the pool that Jenny runs through in the movie " Forrst Gump " I believe ) and made it to the Lincoln Memorial, hot, sweaty and about to drop dead. Yes we drank so much water that day it was unbelieveable, now we managed to crawl back to our cheap affordable accomodation and die peacefully. We decided to walk, it really did take us that long yo make that decision, it turns out that it was 105 degrees that day, and about 111 degrees taking the humidity into account !! There was a hot weather warning and we were rollerblading, hmm make your own decisions about that !! ;0)
So then we went sightseeing. There are lots of things to see in DC so we just chose what we really wanted to see. We wanted to see Dorothy's Ruby Slippers from the " Wizard of Oz " movie but they were on tour ( dang !! ) Then we wanted to go up the observation tower at the old Postoffice, but it was closed for repair and re-opened Wednesday ( dang 2 !! )By this time we're starting to wonder if anything would go quite according to plan !! We went to the White house ( which we must admit to, we rollerbladed past it the first time, I didn't know it would be so small !! ) We couldn't take a tour as we missed the last tour ( dang 3 !! ) and they don't do them on Sundays, and the FBI building was closed too ( dang 4 !! ) as it seems that FBI agents don't need to hunt down drug barons and gun runners at the weekend as the bad people rest for the long week ahead ! SO we saw pretty much all the rest, and there was lots to see so we weren't too disappointed but then Sunday afternoon arrived and we had to head off to the airport, by which time it had been raining for an hour !! ( Can you feel the impending doom yet ??? ) We got there and checked in. Now I am not a very good flyer as it is and the sheer thought of flying in the rain, well to be honest, I was TERRIFIED !! Then it started, quietly at first and not very obvious, but it moved closer, getting gradually brighter and loader, yep we found ourselves in the middle of a full blown thunderstorm and surrounded by unhappy people whose flights had been cancelled ! Our flight was scheduled for a 9pm take off, well they were a little unsure about it, but they didn't cancell it. It got delayed, then the storm seemed to be clearing so we got hopeful again, but suddenly, BOOM, the storm was back and our airplane was circuling overhead full of at least a few petrified passengers I'm sure !!
So after a 2 hour wait, and it was delayed for an hour, the plane got diverted to Boltimore and it was cancelled ( dang 5,6,7 and 8 !! )!! This is when uproar begins. Suddenly there are at least 200 people stranded at an airport with no place to go !! Now the airline doesn't pay for a hotel as it wasn't their fault but they Do get you a discount and we were able to stay in a $209 dollar a night room for $50, so you can't argue with that can you ? The worst thing is though, as 200 angry, cranky people stand outside waiting for the airport shuttles, the rain and storm stopped. It became such a nice night, as if it was laughing at you !! So we managed to get a flight Monday morning but of course, I was late for work because of this unfortuate happening and had caused a lot of bother ( oops )!! Anyway, there is no moral to this story, just watch the weather !! ;0)

So my other rant is a bit shorter I believe !! I was having problems with my ears, well when I say problems I mean that both ears felt like they had the equivalent to 100 gallons of water in each one and I could hardly hear anything, it hurt and buzzed and rang and ....... !! Well anyway I got completely fed up so off I dragged myself to the Emergency Room to get it sorted out ! I got there, everything was going fine, but I had to wait AGES ! I was waiting for about an nhour, now I know that that doesn't sound too ong, but when all the entertainment offered by the hospital is a tv that is not very load, it's not much fun not being able to hear !! Finally I go in and the Doctor gets round to seeing me !! It seems that the problem is not an infection or anything fun or gory that can be discussed in graphic detail, no I have been usin Q-Tips and pushed wax into my ear !! Now I don't know about you, but getting talked to sternly is bad enough, but when it's a Doctor it just makes you feel REALLY small ! Anyway I was told I had to have my ears " irrigated " which didn't sound too much fun, and told to wait longer, half an hour later a female nurse pours some brown stuff into my ears and walks away, leaving me sat in a room with big cotton wool bals protruding from my ears ! Following this, I get told to sit in curtain area 2, where even MORE people get to see me looking like I've got ne big Q-Tip lodged in my head with the ends sticking out of each ear !!
So finally I get irrigated by a bit, bearded, pony-tailed nurse called Peter. Some of you may know what occurs during the process of Ear irrigation, but for those of you that don't it involves filling up a large syringe of water and something else and shooting it straight into your ear in order to dislodge the wax. It is a VERY strange feeling, it made my eyes water !! The feeling though when the water clears and your ears are empty is so uplifting that you don't care and you just want to keep the pea-sixed balls of wax that have just been pressure-washed from your ears ! So following my ear-enema I get inspected by the Doctor again whose prognosis is simple and tells me that the only follow up action I need to do is never to put Q-Tips in my ears again !! So a whole 2 hours and 45 minutes later I emerge from the hospital, amazed at how load every little thing was and all the sounds that I had been missing !! I almost ( but not quite ! ) skipped !! ;0)