The sexy treadmill capitalist, heaven forbid...

What a day. About two weeks ago, after a physical that included an EKG, the doctor said he noticed what could be an abnormality in my heart. He didn't think it was anything but he was sending me for a stress test anyway, just to make sure. A nuclear stress test. Sounds fun, doesn't it?

So, after not having any caffeine (no Pepsi since Saturday night....oh, the torture), and no food before the test, which was at 10:00 in the morning. That part wasn't that hard, cause I didn't even get up until 9:00.

I got ready, went to let the dog out (mom was in Atlantic City, hopefully increasing my inheritance), and then I drove over to the medical center. Naturally, I had forgotten the paperwork given to me, so I had no idea which suite to go to. So, I went to my doctor's office, and asked the receptionist. She got my file and told me it was suite 100. I was at 130, so off I went, to the opposite end of the building. But when I got to 100, it was podiatrists office, definitely not where I wanted to be. Yeah, I KNEW this was gonna be a good day.

So I returned to my doctor's office, and asked the receptionist again. She rechecked my file and saw the suite 100 on the paperwork. But she checked a directory of the place, and saw that they were located in suite 223. *SIGH*

So once I finally reached 223, luckily I was still early. The receptionist there gave my four pieces of paperwork to fill out, oh joy that we all know that is. Then I waited. Luckily, I had taken a book along.

After a bit, a cute little nurse came out to get me. She put an IV in the back of my hand, and it then occured to me, that's the first time I had ever had an IV! And she did it so well it didn't hurt at all. Then she put some saline in and then in a seperate port, put the radiation stuff in. Nice. Then I had to wait in a small waiting room with CNN on the TV reporting about every ten minutes about Tropical Storm Fay. I had to wait a half hour while the radiation...did it's thing. Ew. And so I read.

Eventually, we went into the room with the photograph machine. I had to lay down on a board, put my hands above my head and not move for 17 minutes while this claustraphobia inducing machine got right over my chest, about two inches from my chest, and took photos. And I couldn't move my arms or legs. Oh how this sucked. I never knew 17 minutes could be so long. And naturally, my nose itched. And then my arms started to fall asleep. And my legs were getting sore being in the same position. And I could do nothing. Finally, it was over, thankfully. Then back to the waiting room, again.

Then I was taken into the room with the treadmill. I got my chest shaved, 12 of those things stuck onto my skin, and then hooked up to wires. I had a blood pressure cuff on. The only upside was Bruce, the cute, young, black nurse who did all this to me. Oh, and he had a slight accent...Jamaican maybe. Don't know, but it was hot. Then, of course, it was time for the treadmill. I don't know how long I was on it, but they increased the speed and incline three times. And by the third time, my calves were really hurting. I had to say something about it, and she lowered the incline, thankfully.

Then i was returned to the waiting room to...you guessed it, wait. And this wait was over and hour. I got so bored, even with the book I was reading, that I asked them if I could go out and walk the building. So did a lap of both the upper and the lower floor. Don't know how long it took me, but it was refreshing to get out of that waiting room.

Finally, I was taken back to the imaging machine and had to lie in the same position, but this time only for 15 minutes. Whoopee. This time, I drifted off into a light sleep a few times, one of which, I woke myself with one of those jerking motions. Kinda screwed up the whole "don't move while it's imaging" instructions. But what could I do.

Then, back to the waiting room. This time, though, I was only there for about ten minutes before the doctor came to get me. This time, it was Dr. Ali Khan, or something. A very attractive Middle Eastern fellow. Taller than me, lean, short cropped hair, very cute face, and when we shook hands, long fingered smooth hands. Nice.

He showed me 3D images of my heart pumping and 'slices' of my heart to see the blood pumping. Both of those were pretty cool. He said my heart was pumping at 52%, which is "low normal". Normal is supposed to be 55-75%, so he didn't seem concerned about that. And he showed me one place where there appeared to be less blood flow than there should be, but he said he wasn't concerned about that either. He said if he saw those things in conjuction with other warning signs, he'd be more concerned, but absent anything else, he's not worried, saying it was nothing. But now they have this so they have something to compare it to in the future, which is, I think, the reason the doctor did it in the first place.

I got there this morning about 9:50. I left at 1:55. I spent 4 hours, mainly waiting, for basically nothing. Ugh.

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"You read too much." "I'm an English major!" - Sebastian, Shakespeare's Sonnets