It's been 1743 days since I joined xanga. That's a long time. I feel like rambling. It's 12:25 am and I am filled up with codine and I feel kinda goofy so I apologize ahead of time if my filter farts and I let slip something offensive. Drunk on cough syrup. Oh the joys of illness. I went to the doctor today. You see I've had this nasty cough for a long long time now...like we're talking months. And well recently it's gotten worse and I just got fed up and went into the doctor at a ripe old hour of 8:30 am. I walked up to the receptionist and said, "My name's Naomi Vogt and I've got a cough!" The receptionist looked up at me and asked, "Did you call ahead?" I said no. She told me to sit down. So I sat. And I waited. And they called my name and I thought "Hallelujah the wait is over!" And I followed the pregnant nurse-like lady to a little cubical off to the side. "What seems to be the problem?" she asked me. "I've got a cough. A really bad cough. I've had it for a long time. I want it to go away," I said. The nurse sighed and stuck a clampy thing on my finger. She looked at the little box it was connected to. "You're normal," she said. I snorted. Normal HA! I didn't say that out loud though. It's a very serious place that walk in care. "Go sit out in the waiting room!" she said and pointed dramatically towards the waiting area. So I did. I sat and pretended to read my book as I observed the people around me. There was this couple sitting across from me holding hands. The woman looked like someone I wouldn't like very much. The man looked nice. And not a nice as in I'm-checking-out-this-most-likely-married-strange-man, but a nice as in I-think-you-might-be-entertaining-when-you're-healthy kind of way. But who judges on appearance anyway? This mom and her pre-teen son came in drinking coffee. I wondered about the pre-teen drinking coffee. When I was a pre-teen I never thought about drinking coffee. Then I remembered that school's in and I thought how lucky that boy was to get to skip school and drink coffee. Then I remembered I was sitting in a clinic waiting room. He seemed a little less lucky to me. They called my name again. Sweet victory! I hopped out of my chair and followed the nurse back to the exam room. She took my blood pressure and temperature and seemed pleasantly detatched from life. The she said, "Wait a few moments and the doctor will be in shortly." Goodness me more waiting. So I waited. The doctor came in. I can't remember her name. I do remember she was very serious looking. She had an air of severity around her that made me wonder what she would have done had she caught me playing with the little lighty look down your throat thingy. She sat at the computer and typed some stuff. Then asked me a bunch of questions. Then took some notes muttering "hmm" after every answer I gave her. Finally she told me to hop up onto the exam table. It was too high to hop so I climbed instead. I didn't think it would be a good idea to point this out to her though. I didn't want to contradict a doctor. She picked up the lighty look down your throat thingy and lighted it up and looked down my throat. Then she looked in my ears and up my nose. Then I saw her just put the thing back. She didn't even remove the thingy she had just used to look up my nose. I wondered if she had used that one to look up other people's noses too or if she was planning on throwing that one away later. She then handed me a paper and sent me back out to wait. This time the wait was shorter. They called me back to blow my nose into a piece of Saran Wrap and then place the "specimen" through the door. But I needed to get more than a few drops onto the Saran Wrap. I had to get a real good amount. No problem there I'm sick. Then I waited a bit more and then had to go back to the x-ray room. They had me take my top off and put on a paper gown. It was itchy. And it was awkward changing when I knew that guy was just around the corner and anyone could walk in at any moment. He x-rayed my chest and then sent me back out to the waiting room. The wait this time was really long. I observed a new family enter. There was a cute blonde lady who I found out was 9 months pregnant but she showed very little, her husband who was of an ethnic origin I couldn't decipher, and their two children, one was asian and about a year old, the other was mexican and about a year old. They were adopted. I found this out when the pregnant lady was talking to the nurse after her asian daughter fell off the chair and cried. When this extra long wait was finally over the nurse came and stuck me back in that same exam room and told me to sit and wait for the doctor. So I did. Doctor angry face came in and told me my C count (or something like that) was up meaning I had allergies. So she just decided that my cough was a result of that and prescribed me Allegra, awesome cough medicine, and an antibiotic...which if all I have is allergies why do I need antibiotics???? I don't know I don't know. Then she started asking me about Uganda. "You had a bunch of vaccinations done I see." "Yeah." "You going out of the country?" "Yeah." "To Uganda?" "Yeah." "Are you going there for school?" "Yeah." "Oh that's exciting." "Yeah." "What will you be doing?" "An internship working with kids at a boarding school." "Oh wow." "Yeah." Then I took my little drug paper and speed walked out of that little clinic. I thought to myself, "self, we need to get these drugs. Where is a pharmacy in this lame backwoods town?" And myself said, "Walmart silly." I laughed at myself. "Of course." I said. And then I drove to Walmart. I walked up to the window with the sign above it that said, "DROP OFF" and I stuck the paper in the person's face. "I need these filled please." I said. "The lady grabbed the paper, looked at me, looked at the paper, and then sniffed. I don't know why. Then she took my insurance card and told me it'd be a 20 minute wait. More waiting hooray. At least this time I was in the wonderful World of Wally and so there were shiny objects to look at. I first sat and sifted through the 2 for $10 movie bin. There were some interesting movies in there but none that overwhelmingly inspired me to buy. I then wandered over to the plant section and contemplated buying a bamboo plant but then changed my mind because obviously I can't take a plant on the plane with me. It would have gotten squished when I tried to check it. Then I wandered back by the electronics department to look at more movies. I. Want. Nightmare. Before. Christmas. Can we say amazing? 2-Disc special edition set! WOOT! I love that movie. Anyway I looked at my watch and saw that it was 11:25. I had handed my prescription thing in at 10:56 so I figured it'd be done. I went back to the pharmacy and it was like crazy mad house over there. I waited in line and finally got up to the window and the girl just sat and looked at me. "I'd like to pick up a prescription for Naomi Vogt please." I said. "How do you spell the last name?" She asked. "V--" "B?" "No Veeeee-o-g-t." "That's not how you spell vote." The lady said. "Yeah and you're ugly. Are my drugs ready yet?" I asked. I don't think I said the first part out loud though. That would have been mean. "Looks like it's going to be just a few more minutes." She said. I sighed. "Fine." And I decided to pick up some motion sickness bracelets while I had nothing better to do. It took me 10 minutes to find them on the bottom shelf of that obscure part of the pharmacy section where that middle aged woman was bent over stocking the shelves. Then I moseyed back to the electronics section and fiddled with the cameras for awhile. I like Canons. I should have got a Canon. Not a stupid Kodak. Maybe I would still have my Canon right now had I got a Canon and not a stupid Kodak. But that's another story. Another 20 minutes later I walked back to the pharmacy, waited in line again amidst the chaos, listened to some lady whine about how her prescriptions were promised 5 minutes ago she didn't have them yet. I finally got up to the window and I was told, again, that it would be a few more minutes. "I'm actually working on filling it right now." The lady said. Yeah right. So this time I went and sat on those uncomfortable benches they have right there. An old creepy looking guy was sitting on the one behind me making weird nasaly noises. I was grossed out but I wasn't going to say anything to him. Then FINALLY the lady called my name and I got my drugs that cost me $30 and I don't think they will help much because I don't think that my problem is allergies. Seriously, anyone here ever heard of someone hacking up a lung because of some dust in the air?? Maybe sneezing or getting puffy eyes and runny noses...but not coughing. I could have a respiratory illness or something. You know like one of those commercials that has people hacking and coughing and they say, "Do you sound like this? Well get to a doctor cause you're probably dying!" I do sound like that. But no I have allergies. I leave in a week. I'm still so not ready for it. I need much monies before I go. Credit card debt here I come.... | 
