Balls and Walnuts
more than you ever wanted to know
The trick with call . . .
is to steel yourself for a stress-filled sleepless night.
As you’re eating dinner, you know you’ll be interrupted and you’ll have to fress cold noodles later. After you’ve bolted all your food, undisturbed by your pager, you’re pleasantly surprised.
As you’re checking into your hotel*, you know you’ll just barely get your bag into the room before the ER calls with a lip laceration or a peritonsillar abscess or some deep neck pus. But that’s okay, at least you’ve checked in. But they don’t call. You check your pager, and all the bars are full on the battery indicator.
You begin to wonder if no one loves you, but then you remember that (A) you’re only two hours into call, and (B) you really don’t want to be called, do you? Not before your shower.
The shower is never as nice as you expect it to be, even with all that nice hot water and strong water pressure, because you’re asking yourself: would I hear my pager over the water?
Okay, so now you’re blogging and you figure, I’ll just barely have time to finish this before the pager goes off.
You realize in horror that Motel 6’s cable package includes neither MSNBC nor Comedy Central.
You know you’ll be up all night . . . and as you drop off to sleep, you’re wondering when the fun will begin**.
D.
*Motel. Motel 6, to be exact. I have a heater, a comfy bed, a hot shower with good water pressure, a TV, and internet access. What do I need with Marriott?
** I haven’t had a night call since early August of ’08. Does it show?
Deep neck pus? Sounds unpleasant.
Nice reading while eating breakfast…
It sounds like the anticipation is the worst part of being on call.
Did you get any sleep?
lmao @lyvvie
My first call was just before midnight. It was the typical, “We can’t reach a dentist so you’re the next best thing.” Thanks a bunch. I gave them what advice I could and they never called back.
My second call was a little after midnight. The story was weird enough that I had no choice but to go in to see the patient. Pediatric patient, so I have a low threshold to check, anyway. I got back to my hotel and was in bed by 2:40 AM, and slept until 7.
Not a perfect night, but I’ve had much worse nights.
Why is this filed under Thirteen Candles?
This is why I gave up being on call for networks — 911 in particular. The stress of waiting for the shoe to drop drove me crazy.
Jacob: that’s what happens when you blog tired. And I see you wrote 7 words today. 93 to go!
Nara: some folks learn to disconnect. They can fall asleep at a moment’s notice. I never developed that ability.