Adventures in Health Care For The Last Time (Hopefully)
So there I was, with a stomach full of burritos and an ear full of stitches. I had a giant bandage on my ear, and I was a little worried that half of my ear was cut off under the thing, but when I took the bandage off I was happy to see my ear still in one piece. Say what you will against the free clinic doctor guy, he didn't do a half-bad job.
But, there were stitches to be taken out. I would have simply gone back to the free clinic, but I was going to be out of town the whole next week at the General Meeting (i.e. party). Fortunately, there's more than one way to skin a cat, or in this case get medical care without paying a dime. One of my friends is a fully registered, licensed, and bonded nurse, and she graciously offered to lend her services free of charge. So, one afternoon we all headed to a friend's hotel room and performed the operation. Under the skillful care of the Nurse and the rock-solid support of C-Love (the guy with the lamp), I had nothing to fear.
Though you might be thinking that wasn't the best place for a medical operation, trust me. The free clinic wasn't any better. So after a few minutes of laughs and pains, I came out a new man:
Yeah, you can't tell much difference in the picture, but it was better. I enjoyed the rest of the meeting stitch-free, and figured I was finally done with the strange ear growth.
As it would turn out, though, whatever thing was growing on my ear decided to start growing back a couple of weeks later. My team leader had had enough, so we went together to the real doctor (i.e. the kind that charge money) to get it looked at it.
To make a long story short, it turns out I had an infection in my ear (thanks free neighborhood clinic), but besides that the doctor didn't see anything serious. So she sprayed some liquid nitrogen gas on it and sent me home, telling me it would go away on its own. That was a few weeks ago, and though my ear looks better, there's still something growing. I go back to the doctor next week, and hopefully another blast of liquid nitrogen gas will end this story.
