Tom Tomorrow, �Hell in a Handbasket�
Remember how in that last entry I was talking about my eye bothering me? On Wednesday morning, when I opened up the bar, it was bothersome; itchy, red, and burning. Like a hemorrhoid, only on your eye. I went home and took them out for cleaning, stumbling around the house like a blind man, because, well, if I take my contacts out, I essentially am a blind man. Somewhere between Wednesday night and Thursday morning, my eye started to lactate and I had to physically pull the eyelids apart when I woke up in the morning.
I had to go to a meeting for the paper at 10:30, so cleared away the gunk, put the contacts back in, and had the right side of my face look like it had just witnessed the Nazi holocaust as I drove, tears streaming down my face.
Well, I say tears, but really, it was pus. When I tried to wipe away the liquid, my finger would stick just a little bit, and the result was something like a boogr that really, really wants to stick around on your finger for as long as possible, though this was more gray than green.
We had our meeting, and whenever I was called on for my opinion, I made sure to note that I had no idea who was actually speaking to me, or what proximity of the room they were in. When the meeting was finished, I recruited one of the other writers to bring me to the hospital.
�We need to get those contacts out of you right now,� said the doctor when he finished his examination. �But as we�ve finished with your eye exam, I know you won�t be able to find your way out of the hospital if you�re not wearing them. What I�m saying is; you need to go get glasses right now.�
�OK, I said, I�ve got Kaiser,� I said,� and Kaiser has an optometry department. I�ll go down there and get some glasses.�
�Kaiser wouldn�t have your glasses ready for about a week, and you can�t wait that long. You need to go somewhere where they�ll give you glasses in an hour.�
He paused for a few seconds. �Or less,� he said.
The contacts went back in, and the tears/pus again started flowing freely. I made my way to the mall.
Slowly.
At Lenscrafters, I picked out a frame. This is probably bad. I�ve seen the glasses I�ve picked out previously in retrospect, and I should not be left to my own fashion devices. I asked the unfashionable gay man behind the counter for his opinion. He liked first at the price tag, which was $250, before lenses, before he said that he liked them.
The order was placed, though it took a half-hour before he told me that since my prescription was so high, they didn�t have any of the cheaper lenses with my vision requirement. The only thing they had were the lenses that reacted to daylight, darkening as the UV rays got higher. Since this is Hawaii, and seeing how I wouldn�t have to buy sunglasses, that meant adding another $180 onto my bill.
By this time, even with copious wiping, the pus had reached my cheekbone, making me the world�s worst bukkake model. I agreed and signed the contract
$500 dollars, three beers from the mall bar and two hours later, I had glasses. I then had to lock myself in my room with the curtains (well, this is Hawaii, meaning I had to lower the beachmat over the window) for the next three days, staying in the dark and not leaving. The few times I did try to leave the room, I did my best re-enactment of Gremlins, shrieking, �bright light! Bright light!,� scurrying off to the corner to look terrified and cute. And hairy.
Funny thing is, with all the work I�ve been doing over the past couple of months, on more than one occasion I�ve declared that I was going to pick a fight with the biggest guy in the bar. My reasoning was that when I got beat up (and let�s be honest, that�s what would happen), I�d be able to spend my time in the hospital recovering, thus giving me a few well-needed days off.
And for this, I didn�t even need to eat hospital food.
Hell. Handbasket. Check and check.
