So, I took my wife to the ER today. She woke up feeling like the Wrath of God, and went downhill from there. The cough she had been practicing for the past two weeks had finally decided to play for bigger stakes. Anyhow, by 11:30 we were off to the ER to see just what was going on. About 12:30 I called into the store to inform them that I would not be there for the start of my shift, and possibly would not be there at all (Turned out to be the latter: it counts as a sick day, though, since I spent it at the sick people place...) Going to the ER was the right thing to do. They found pneumonia in her right lung and decided to keep her there at least overnight.

Well, it's now Monday and they finally found her a room last night. It took a while. I have to say the Somerset Medical Center is a nice hospital. The people are at once very professional and yet very warm, sympathetic and friendly. They know that, on the whole, you'd "rather be in Philadelphia" than in their fine facility, so they try to make things as comfortable and unintrusive as possible. I spent the day trying to be a quiet as possible by not coughing too much. What sort of worried me was that most of her symptoms, both the ones she had and a few of the ones she didn't, also applied to me at various times over the past two weeks. I don't know, every now and then I think of Jim Henson and understand how he could have put off going to the hospital until it was too late. I will bend heaven and earth to avoid trips to doctors, dentists and most especially hospitals.

Nope...no hospitals for me until/unless I am so sick I can barely move. And now I have to wander over to SMC to see when they are going to spring herself. I'm pretty sure we're going to have to cancel Thanksgiving at this house. We could be moving the feast up to my Mom's, but only if she gets some help in the kitchen. Cooking and cleaning up at her place is not the easiest. Face it, she's been living in that house for forty years as of next spring, and the kitchen is unchanged except for a new oven and a newish dishwasher. Pretty much everything about her kitchen, while it was once the absolute cutting edge, is now...old. And badly lit. However, even from her sick-bed, mi esposa has made it clear that we will be cooking the Turkey here. She wants to make the stuffing and control the cooking process. (she has not a great deal of trust in my Mom's ability to deal with a 26 pound bird. I have to say that I agree with her on this.)