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Sunday, April 29, 2007

Employment

My baby brother (who is incidentally turning 30 this year and probably no longer qualifies as being called "baby") has been dealing with a pretty bad case of tonsillitis the past week. His tonsils were bad enough that he required steroids for treatment, and our method of communication over the past week has relied soley on the flurry of text messages.

He finally has regained the use of his voice today, and although a bit scratchy and hoarse, it was nice to carry on a conversation for a change instead of jabbing madly at my phone keypad. Our conversation started off about his tonsils, but then degenerated into other things.

My Brother: So are you working today?

Me: I'm just on call. But I did have to go in to operate.

My Brother: On what?

Me: This guy I've been watching the past several days. I ended up taking his spleen out today.

My Brother: What? What do you mean?

Me: He had some fluid around his spleen and I've been waiting and hoping it'll get better on it's own. But he wasn't looking so good this morning. So I got a CT scan and his spleen looked funny, so I took him to the OR to have a look.

My Brother: And?

Me: Well, just like I saw on the CT scan, it didn't look right, so I took it out.

My Brother: What do you mean it didn't look right? Don't you need a spleen to live?

Me: You don't need a spleen.

My Brother: You just took it out? How long did that take?

Me: About an hour and a half.

[silence]

Me: It was an interesting way to spend a Sunday morning.

My Brother: Man, you got a weird job.