Category: Rants

Come on, come on, come on, Jordan. I am so sorry everything fell apart today, honest-to-God, I am. But I guarantee that when you get here tomorrow, Dr. Gerson will, in fact, be in the super-deluxe birthing suite so that you can go ahead and have that story-book, drug-addled, Pitocin-induced pregnancy that you’ve always dreamed of ever since you were a little girl. But, in the meantime, you’ve gotta cut me a little slack. I mean, come on, it’s not like I see the real father running around here, busting his hump.

I need you to extubate the young fellow in 304 and start an insulin drip on Mrs. Adler for the third time this month — God bless diabetics who continue to drink — oh, and Lassie! In response to the bestiality rumors circulating about you, I’ve decided to forgo calling you by the usual girl’s name and instead I’m gonna be referring to you by whatever famous dog I can think of. I’ve gone with Lassie” because, of course, that satisfies the criteria of being both a girl and a dog’s name, thus helping you ease into the transition.”

Hey, Carla, would you be good enough to take this young gentleman back to his room in Pediatrics? Apparently as a form of social protest, he chewed on and subsequently swallowed part of a Rolling Stones CD. I’ll tell you what, there, Ralphie: They sold out for good once they started doing Ford commercials, you know what I’m saying?

Work! I hate you! You suck!

Fine. Fine. Fine, fine, fine, fine. You wanna know the real skinny? If you want to be good doctors and nurses, you damn-sure better get ready to get in trouble – a lot. Because patients are stupid, and they are really scared. And some of them need you to hold their hands, and you should. Others need you to kick their asses, and you absolutely should do that, too. But, it really all just comes down to whether or not you got the guts to say just exactly what you know in your heart of hearts you really should say.

Look, Gwyneth, you’re old enough now to hear this from me: Every time I go out of my way to help you children, I get nothing but trouble. Now this is the first five-minute window I’ve had in the last week to be with my son. And I’m just not gonna have you pirouetting around in here while my heart is breaking inside.

No. Well…yes, but I am honestly trying to tell you that I don’t think I was being clear with you before. In fact, I think I was being a pretty lousy teacher. Look, I think putting one in the win” column every now and then is what gives us the juice to keep plugging along in games that we know deep down we’re not gonna win. And that’s why I locked in so intensely to that patient. Because opportunities, they…God, they come along so rarely in this place. And when they do, you just can’t let them slip through your fingers. You cannot. You know?”

Newbie! Let me – let me tell you a little story. It starts every day at 5 in the morning — which is just about the time that you’re setting your hair for work – when I am awakened by a sound: Is that a cat being gutted by a fishing knife? Nooo! That’s my son. He’s hungry and he’s got a load in his pants so big that I’m actually considering hiring a stable boy. But, I go ahead and dig in; because I do love the lad and, well gosh, you know me, I’m a giver. And I’m off to the hospital, where my cup runneth over with both quality colleagues, such as yourself, and a proverbial clown-car full of sick people. But, what the hey, my pay is about the same as guys who break rocks with other rocks and I only have to work three or four hundred hours a week, so, so far I’m a pretty happy camper! And then I head back home where I’m greeted by the faint musk of baby vomit in a house that used to smell like, well…nothing! Nothing! Nothing! I-i-in fact it used to smell like nothing at all. And all I want to do before I restart this whole glorious cycle is, you know, maybe lay on the couch and have a beer and watch some SportsCenter and, if I’m not too sweaty from the day’s labors, stick my hand right down my pants, buuut apparently that’s not in Jordan’s definition of pulling your weight”.

Ohhhhh, my little newbie-doobie-doo! Say, that whole telling Jordan how I feel” thing just went terrific, thank you for that. Now I need a place to crash. Where’s Naomi’s bedroom? Good night, roomies.”

About a year ago, Jordan said she wanted to crash for a while.” Now my office is a nursery, my closet is my office, my clothes are in the entertainment center, and my TV is in the john, which I guess is kind of nice…I don’t even know anymore.”