Much A Do About Nothing

I did nothing remarkable this weekend, and yet feel like the wind has been knocked out of me all the same.

I drove to Alexandria Friday after work to purchase charcoal brick, hickory chips, a new fire starter, basting brushes, meat, the ingredients for pasta salad, slaw, baked beans, etc. with the plan being that I'd hold a barbecue on Sunday evening for all of my friends. My list was 2 steno notebook pages long and took me about 4 hours to completely finish. So, I got home at 10pm and found myself laying in bed with a book by 10:15pm. Exciting stuff.

Saturday, I cleaned. Scrubbed, dusted, folded, bleached, polished the stainless still on the grill with this fab Goo Be Gone grill cleaner, hung, vacuumed, and then took the longest most relaxing shower ever. I'm a wild child these days.

At 6:30pm, Brando and I drove down to Dixie Bones in Woodbridge for some delicious barbecue. We even waiting the whole 15 minutes over the 30 minutes they promised for a table. My pulled chicken sandwich and potato salad and pecan pie put me into a little daze, so I was glad we skipped mini golfing and watched movies afterwards instead.

It rained Sunday. I was off to get lunch with Brando and then buy a tent so I could barbecue when the rain made my back wooden steps super slippery. Brando slid down them and popped his shoulder out of place and bumped his head. He walked in only to fall on the ground and lose consciousness briefly. I thought he was having a seizure and gonna choke on his tongue, so I pulled him back up and had him go sit on the couch where he almost lost consciousness again. I brought him some water and went to lift his arm up to stretch it only to dislocate his shoulder. Apparently this was the worst pain he's ever felt in all of his life.

Thank goodness for the shoulder pain, because I don't think I would have convinced him to go to the ER (even with my father and my primary care physician insisting he go) otherwise.

The ER took forever. All day. The Pea was nice enough to send out a message to my barbecue guests saying that the cookout was off, though, she later admitted it was weird to write without saying the truth about why it was off. I suppose it did look a bit strange to have my friend write a message on behalf of me saying the barbecue was off due to weather. Especially considering I'm totally always with my laptop.

The not-so-nice male admitting nurse (then again, would I want to be this guy ever) informed us at 2pm that we'd soon have a room in the ER, but to clear our schedules all day as GW is a teaching hospital and can take hours. I texted my mom: "Remind me not to have a heart attack or be shot in DC. I'll die before they see me."

Two bottles of real soda (I needed the sugar. Apologies to my teeth.), two personal pan pizzas from the cafeteria (which were remarkably good even though I could only get down one slice of mine. And, wow, that hospital has a Starbucks inside. So cool.), one cat scan, one entire showing of The Fugitive and Mission Impossible, one modified game of Go Fish using Creative Children's cards I bought in the gift store (Brando: "I can't believe you just modified the rules to Go Fish."), several walks to the farthest door of the ER to use my cell phone, and many grimaces at the 3 hours of hysterics by the woman on the other side of the curtain in Brando's room (she slipped and fell and sprained her ankle. I remarked later, "your fall was so much worse. Wait, is it wrong that I'm being competitive about this?") and it was 9pm.

Brando got a referral to an orthopedic surgeon, foam and Velcro sling (much more advance slings today) which he did not want me to sign (no fun), Percocet and super strong 800mg Ibuprofen, and an explanation for why he lost consciousness. I guess what happened is that he literally was knocked out (like in the movies or a boxing match). I'd never seen that before, so I thought it was a seizure. I suppose being a doctor's kid makes me think everything is more extreme than it is... oh well. Better safe than sorry.

I was so hungry I wanted Wendy's. Brando was too, thank heavens. I don't think a junior bacon cheeseburger has ever tasted so much like a Peter Luger steak before. It was the greatest thing I've ever eaten in my entire life. I got home and passed out immediately like the doctor had given me the Percocet.

So yeah, it was a much a do about nothing weekend.