The Surgicenter

Traci's knee surgery today was more complicated than the doctor expected, and went longer than expected, but she is doing well at home. Twelve hours at Kaiser provided me with a plethora of observations, but I will be selective here.

1. We arrived at the Surgicenter at 6:20am, got checked in and waited. About 10 minutes after we got there, a young couple arrived. They were probably about 20 years old. I started wondering why they were there. Who needed surgery? For what? For the older people in the room, I didn't really care. The young couple was quite flirty with one another. She even took some pictures of them in the waiting room with her phone. They were snuggling and touching each other to such an extent, that his head knocked a phone off of the wall. I got the impression that they were on a date. After they left the waiting room, I told Traci how funny I thought they were. She replied that she thought the girl was nervous/scared about her surgery. Once again, Traci proves to be a better person than I am.

2. The surgery was scheduled to start at 8:00am. At 7:30, the nurse told us that that doctor would be late. He called and said he would arrive at 9:00, but she guessed it would be later. He has a reputation for being quite tardy. I think that I will start doing that when I teach - calling in that I'll be an hour late, and show up even later. When he arrived, he said that he slept in, because he was up late the night before, and he thought we would prefer a well-rested surgeon to a prompt one. (Again, reasoning that I can use as an instructor.) Since he was about to cut on my wife, I simply smiled and nodded, instead of hitting him in the head.

3. The staff member who was calling people back into the Surgicenter was struggling with a name. It sounded like she was saying "soo-pie," or something like that. She sounded unsure of herself and asked another staff member how to pronounce the name. Then she called out, "Sophia."

4. As Traci was waking up from the anesthesia, she was trying to look at something across the room, and she asked, "Who are those memee deddee over there?" I asked her to repeat herself. With a lot of volume, she quite clearly asked, "Who are those smelly people over there?" as she stared at a couple within her view. They looked over, she gave them the peace sign, and she closed her eyes again. I just smiled and nodded.

All is well at home. She is resting comfortably. My job is to keep the pain medicine flowing. So far so good.