Makes me feel all… paramedical, and stuff.

Conversation with the patient after I lit him up like a Christmas tree:

Patient: "So I was pretty sick, huh?"

AD: "Still are pretty sick."

Patient: "I didn't want my wife to call y'all, but I'm kinda glad she did anyway. If she hadn't called 911, I'd have…"

AD: "… stubborned yourself to death? Yes, you would have. I hope to hell you got her a nice Mother's Day gift today."

He's already had his coronary arteries stented, new ones grafted, and the grafts stented, so I guess now he'll get an AICD as his latest souvenir for thumbing his nose at The Reaper.

Whenever I play Cee Lo Green's "F*ck You," or Pink's "F*ckin' Perfect," she will gasp in horror, blush like a tomato, and clap her hands over her ears until the song is over, whereupon she admonishes me for listening to such trash.

Ooooohh boy, am I gonna have fun reminding her of that in a few years…

*Warning: Contains explicit language. Children, don't let your parents listen to these songs, or surely they will experiment with drugs and post-marital sex, turn to a life of crime and spiral into a vortex of despair. PTA meetings will devolve into drunken, drug-fueled orgies, and the little old ladies who greet you at Wal Mart will have their hair dyed in one blue stripe down the middle, instead of all over. It'll be anarchy, ANARCHY I tell you!

It's a good class. We fill up all three sessions every year, and get great reviews. We've gotta add some stuff to it this year, because apparently some people re-take it every year, and the information is starting to get a little stale for a select few.

Still, all the positive reviews we get don't hold a candle to this email:

Just wanted to let you know that the Pedi Workshop you held at the TX EMS Conference just came in very handy. We had a 3 y/o "respiratory" that was actually a post-ROSC ( as in right before we arrived) on a vent with a trach. The trach was dislodged by the home care nurse and the child went into respiratory arrest for so long that she also went into cardiac arrest. The nurse got her back but the trach she placed was both in the wrong place and it was the wrong size. So, we got to do some problem solving and ended up inserting a new Shiley. Thanks to your workshop, I looked like a pro. Many, many thanks to you and the other instructors for a high quality educational session!

Yep, I'll take feedback like that all day long.

All the enhanced 911 systems, medical alarm monitoring services and 24-hour sitters in the world will do you no good if the paramedics cannot find your house among the dozens of other cookie-cutter homes on your block.

Do yourself a favor and invest another $30 in your safety and peace of mind, by going down to Home Depot and buying some 3-inch reflective numbers for your house AND your curb, and installing one of these:

That's a GE 3-position emergency light switch. Installs just like a regular light switch, takes about five minutes, if you're really slow walking to the breaker box. Up is on, down is off, and middle blinks the light on and off repeatedly, drawing the medics to your door like resuscitating moths to a cardiac arrest flame.

Well, it does if you install it on your porch light. If you install it on an interior light, there's just no helping you.

And my partner last week may well have been the smoothest driver I've ever had. You could barely feel the road when he drove.

Of course, it's easy to be smooth when you drive at the approximate speed of tectonic shift. Dude didn't need a speedometer, he needed a calendar. I finally told him to just keep the lights and siren off, because when you're driving substantially below the speed limit and angry old folks are passing you on their Rascal scooters, flipping you off as they whiz past you in the breakdown lane, what's the point?

It wasn't just the driving, either. Dude moves at the blistering pace of a geriatric sloth with a Xanax habit. On one call, a wreck, I told him to follow behind me with the spine board and stretcher. I had assessed the patient, listened to her tell me she wasn't injured and didn't want an ambulance, written down her demographic information, had the refusal form signed and witnessed and was on my way back to the rig before he got the stretcher unloaded. He even looked disappointed slowly; it didn't so much flash across his face as it did a slow melt. I was back in the rig and massaging my temples before he got his frown fixed into place.

I never thought I could find something more mentally stressing than having a speed demon as a partner, but this came close. Halfway through the first shift, I had to quit stomping the imaginary accelerator on my side of the rig, lest he squeeze the steering wheel in half, he was that white-knuckled. I finally just wound up driving to all the calls myself. Seemed a more productive use of my time than expelling exaggerated sighs and pointedly looking at the speedomoeter, anyway.

I mean, I like to watch the seasons change, but not from the back of my ambulance between scene and Emergency Department.

Jeez…

So when you’re arguing, you know that there are certain buttons you just don’t push, certain subjects that you just don’t broach.

You Just Don’t Go There.

And when you cross those boundaries, you know there will be consequences, ranging from getting the cold shoulder for the next few days, to unwilling celibacy for the foreseeable future, to having her/him toss you out on your ass.

And when your argument spills over into physical violence, expect that one or both of you will go to jail when the cops get involved.

Likewise, there are some things you Just Don’t Get To Say.

If your spouse/lover/life partner/ babydaddy chose to get the police involved, or if a third party overheard your argument and called 911…

… well, suffice it to say we don’t grant Mulligans. You don’t get to take it back.

And chief among those things You Just Don’t Get To Say in an argument is, “I’m just going to kill myself.”

Almost as bad, but without the implied threat, is, “I wish I was dead.”

Make the threat more specific, like say, threatening a specific way to do harm to yourself, just adds the element of a defined plan to your suicide threat, and makes it all the more credible.

Say those things, and I can guarantee you one outcome: You. Will. Go. To. The. Hospital.

Your only choices are whether you go restrained or unrestrained. You don’t get to say no any more.

And yes, I am perfectly willing to believe that you said it in the heat of anger and didn’t really mean it.

I also believe that someone who seriously intends to kill him/herself would be willing to tell any lie necessary to get the cops and paramedics to leave so they can get on with mixing their hemlock smoothie.

You don’t get to be that person.

And no, I don’t really give a rat’s ass if you get a mental health record or if you have class/work/social engagements in the morning that you just can’t miss.

Neither am I going to lose sleep over the fact that a 48-hour stint in the psych ward ruins your chance at that law enforcement career you’ve been so zealously pursuing, or takes you out if the running for Man Of The Year at the local Rotary Club.

Pleading with me for lenience is only going to fall on deaf ears. The only leniency you get is the ability to choose the pleasantness of the ride.

You made the threat. I don’t get to decide whether it is credible, nor do I want that responsibility. Plead your case to the ED doc and the mental health tech if you want. Sometimes, if they believe your story, they’ll cut you loose.

But it’s my job to get you there for that conversation, and get you there I will.

Fighting with me is pointless. I will win that fight, every single time, and all your struggle only guarantees that you will spend the next 48-72 hours walking around in shoes without laces and talking to psychiatrists about things you’d rather not discuss with strangers.

So, consequences.

Don’t like ‘em, then don’t say those things. Don’t cross that line in the sand.

Hugs and Kisses,
Your friendly neighborhood Ambulance Driver

Last year's campain raised roughly $11,000, or will as soon as Caleb gets through shooting the Bianchi Cup in a couple of weeks.  For every X Caleb shoots in both classes at Bianchi cup, he's donating $1 to LiveStrong, and Todd at Pistol-Training.Com has agreed to match it. I'm rooting for The World's Most Dangerous Hobbit to shoot like Doc Holliday and Dave Sevigny combined, and hopefully we can add a few hundred more dollars to our 2011 total.

I'm also praying for embarassing video footage of wardrobe malfunctions, because I'm just evil that way. Besides, wearing a kilt while competing at arguably the nation's most prestigious action pistol match? That's just made of win, y'all.

To raise as much as we did in such a short time, with so little lead time to plan, qualifies as a major accomplishment no matter which way you slice it. But for me, the biggest accomplishment was this email I got from a reader:

Kelly,  I owe you a bit of thanks.  I read your blogs all the time and for being 58 I'm in really good health.  However after listening to your push for Prostate Cancer awareness I went in and got checked out.  Much to my surprise they found a nodule  Gleason 7 Type 3.  Never had any prostate symptoms.  Detected Dec 20 removed Feb 6th. With no complication!  So thank you, God only knows when/if it would have been detected without your preaching.

And yet, last month also saw the father of a good friend lose his long battle with prostate cancer. We can't even begin to pat ourselves on the back, not yet.
 

So this year, we're aiming higher. We want a Kilted representative in every state, and we want to raise $50,000 by the end of September. Go over to the Kilted To Kick Cancer website, and click on the Team KTKC map to sign up as a rep for your state.

We want that entire map blanketed in teal well before September, so sign up now!

Same as last year, I'll be hosting the fundraising challenge here on my blog. I'm still rounding up prize sponsors, but there promises to be some schweet guns and gear for the top three fundraisers. There are, however, a few changes to the rules from last year:
 

• There are no 1st, 2nd and 3rd place prize packages. All prizes packages will be roughly equal in value, with some slightly different guns and gear. 1st place winner gets his/her choice of prize package, 2nd place winner gets to choose from the remaining two packages, and 3rd place winner gets the remaining package.
• I'm declaring myself ineligible for prizes this year. I'm still going to participate, and my goal is to put you all to shame in the fundraising department, but someone else is going to win the prize this year.
• If you can't/won't go kilted, post a KTKC badage on your blog.

And, just as a teaser of some of the stuff the top fundraisers are going to receive, take a gander!

Representative sample. Not the actual pistol.

A talented group of student gunsmiths from one of the country's finest gunsmithing schools are going to strap on their kilts and build, from scratch, a matched pair of Queen Anne dueling pistols, in custom hardwood display box, for one of our prize packages. These are some talented guys, and I'm impressed by the quality of their work.

The above pic is a trapper pistol built by one of the 'smiths who will be building the KTKC pistols. The photo doesn't do the pistol justice. That gold filigree was made by engraving the metal, and then pounding gold wire into the engraving, and it looks and feels like it was painted on there, it's that smooth.

I'll post new pics and links as I get more prize sponsors, so y'all get to signing up!

AND GO GET YOURSELVES CHECKED!

*Hear that, Motorcop? That's the sound of a gauntlet being thrown. If Caleb can run and gun through the equivalent of two pistol matches wearing a kilt, the least you could do is show up kilted to your next firearms qualification. And post range pics.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eR7-AUmiNcA

Brought to you by KatyBeth, who is, like, the biggest Sarah Bareilles fan evar.

Nonetheless, one does not work on the highway at night without reflective gear unless one is suicidal, even if the garment in question makes you look like eight pounds of shit in a five-pound sack.

Besides, I could see the comedic potential a mile away. So, I squeeze into the vest, all the while singing, "Fat guy in a little coat, fat guy in a liiiitle coooaaattt…"

All I got from my partner was a blank stare.

"Come on man, you never saw Tommy Boy?" I ask incredulously. "Chris Farley? Matt Foley, motivational speaker?"

This time the blank stare is accompanied by a shrug. "No, who are they?"

Then I got to thinking, Tommy Boy came out in 1995. My partner was five years old at the time. He was only seven when Farley died.

Shit, I feel old.

One of my first bad calls, and there is a Language Alert in effect, folks.

Enjoy.