"if my nuts were on your chin, where would my dick be?" - nikki sixx, to a police officer who was attempting to arrest him
that quote has nothing to do with this entry, but since i'm 12, i can't write nuts without making a childish joke.
anyway, i'm a dipshit. you might think you've seen dipshits in your time. you might even be a dipshit. but i'm here to tell you that you don't know from dipshits. as anthony michael hall once said to molly ringwald, "i'm king of the dipshits".
for as those of you who know me already knew, i am allergic to certain types of nuts. until yesterday, i thought that list included only cashews and pistacios. this allergy appeared only just over a year ago. i had eaten many types of mixed nuts my entire life and never had a problem. well, in december of 2003, i ended up in the ER due to my cashew consumption. i lost the ability to see for a while and prayed for the sweet release of death as i was drenched with sweat and my pregnant wife drove 90 mph down a semi-residential street to get me to the hospital.
but barring one minor reaction to pistacios last spring, i've been fine ever since.
until yesterday.
you might think that having been through that sort of experience, one might exercise a bit of caution about what one consumes, as far as nuts go. but you would be wrong if by "one" you meant me. cause i'm a dipshit. do you see?
it was my boss' birthday and my co-worker brought in some cookies, including macadamia nut cookies, which i have had in the past year and been just fine.
i ate one at 4:30 or so. one. just one goddamn little cookie. it all went to shit after that:
4:31 - my throat feels itchy, which i recognize immediately as a potential problem. i ask the co-worker, accusingly, "what was in those cookies?". hearing that it was macadamia nuts, and knowing that they are NOT in the same nut family as cashews and pistacios, i thought the throat thing might be coincidence. i'm like a goddamn nut professor, motherfuckers. i know my nut families. i'll take the anacardiaceae family for $1000, alex. oh, it's a daily double? i'll bet it all, alex. cause my knowlege of nuts is tight bitch. you can't fade me.
4:40 - obviously the nut family doesn't matter, as i can feel my uvula swelling. that totally sounds like a cheesy romance novel line. "as the stable boy emerged from the dusty barn, estrella's bosom began to heave and her uvula swelled to new heights". at this point, i did something i'm not proud of; i auditioned for the bullimia follies. that's right, i gagged myself in an attempt to rid my stomach of the offending foodstuff. once back at my desk, i took an over-the-counter allergy pill.
5:05 - i leave work. my only symptom is still a slightly swollen uvula and a scratchy throat.
5:15 - i arrive at the gym, stubbornly determined to sweat it all out of my system.
5:18 - while changing clothes, my eyes start to itch. i promptly head to the house, where my epi-pen is.
5:30 - arrive home. someone has either punched me repeatedly in the eyes and given me a full body sunburn, or this is shaping up to be a nice little reaction.
5:31 - with increasingly shaky hands, i administer the aforementioned epi-pen, which i later find out is expired. i call my wife to tell her to hurry home.
5:40 - things keep getting worse as my hands, feet, arms, and legs itch like poison ivy. i decide to get to a hospital, which most sane people would have done an hour ago, having gone through this before. but since i know that vision issues are possible, i don't want to drive. i walk over to my neighbor's house, but he is not home. next i call a co-worker who lives nearby. she does not answer. realizing that primacare is about two miles away, i decide to make the drive. i tell my wife to pick up the baby and meet me there.
5:50 - arrive at primacare. the desk clerk looks at me like i'm a freakshow attraction; equal parts curiosity and abject horror. my vitals are fine, with a slightly high blood pressure of 145 over 85. my normal bp is 120 over 80.
5:55 - while filling out some paperwork, i start to get light-headed, which happened the first time right before i lost vision. the nurse takes me immediately to a bed. i then receive a shot of benedryl and a steroid shot, both of which feel like fiery paste being injected into my veins. my upper ass hurts.
6:25 - i sit up to continue filling out the unfinished paperwork, at which point i get lightheaded and sure enough, my vision goes away. i can only see a small circle directly in front of me, into which my wife and child step. i lay down and tell the nurse that i can no longer see and that i feel "fucking terrible all of a sudden". i start to sweat profusely and have trouble drawing breath.
6:29 - i tell the nurse that i can't breathe. he does not respond. i tell him that i need oxygen. he does not respond and instead leaves the area. i tell my wife that i "can't fucking breathe and can someone get me some goddamn oxygen please". she storms out to round these incompetent fuckers up. the nurse eventually comes back and sticks the breathing apparatus up my nose. it doesn't work for about five minutes, which felt like eternity. the doctor sticks his head in and freaks me right the fuck out by having a look on his face like he's never seen anyone in my condition and couldn't tell his ass from hole in the ground. i'm told "we've done all we can here; we've called for an ambulance". as you can imagine, these words are quite relaxing when you already can't breathe or see. i hear my wife calling her dad to come watch the baby so she can go to the hospital with me. she is crying; which relaxes me further. my blood pressure is 80 over 55. when i act alarmed over this, the nurse tells me to "relax man". i thank him for his stellar advice and mentally kick him in the ballbag.
6:35 - another shot of epi.
6:40 - i hear the sirens outside and realize that they are coming for me.
6:41 - my vision comes back, but i'm cold.
6:45 - i leave in the ambulance, enjoying the stares from everyone in the primacare waiting room. they start an IV of saline, which must have glanced off the side of my vein, because it hurts like a bitch.
6:47 - the paramedic asks if i'm a runner. great, so now with my whole body bright red and splotchy, my eyes looking like rocky after fifteen rounds with apollo creed, and only recently having reaquired the ability to see, i'm being propositioned by another man. this day has now moved into my top 10 best days of all time. i nod that yes, i am in fact a runner, and am just about to politely tell him that while he is an attractive man, i just don't play for that team, when he tells me, "yeah, your heart rate is like, 55". being quite glad i didn't reject his nonexistent advance, i tell him that my resting heart rate is usually between 50 and 55.
7:00 - i arrive at the hospital's ER. at no point does anyone look like nurse hathaway or tell anyone to "push" anything "stat". there are no renegade doctors who are willing to break all the rules in order to save anyone. it's actually quite quiet, with the exception of an elderly woman vomiting into a plastic bin. i'm sorely disappointed. my spirits lift a bit when they talk to me about my pulse-ox, but there is no need to run a central line or to tube anyone.
7:05 - i meet a doctor who appears to have shit under control. i immediately want to propose to him, even though the paramedic had better shoulders. any of you doctors or doctors-to-be out there, try at all times to look like you know what you're doing. cause when you don't, the patient can tell and he or she will be 99% sure that they are dying.
7:15 - i get a breathing treatment. my wife and i talk basketball with the respiratory tech.
7:30 - they add benedryl to my IV. i believe at this point, if you had a shot of my blood, your runny nose would clear right up.
8:00 - i finally get to leave.
so the total tally was five shots, who knows how many co-pays, and a severely unfavorable view of the staff at primacare.
i'm at work today, but i'm tired and my upper ass hurts from the shots. my right eye is still puffy, but nothing like yesterday.
the only good thing is that i'm not allergic to peanuts, at least not yet. if that happens, i'll just have to keep an IV bag of epinephrine and steroids handy because i'll never stop eating peanut butter.
up next for me is a trip to see my good friends at cvs to pick up my steroid, benedryl, and epi-pen prescriptions. then i'll have to make an appointment at an allergist to find out once and for all what i can and cannot eat.
happy weekend everybody.