Mother know best and lesson learned in the ER

My mother always told me that it was important to always wear clean underwear and shave your legs. Boy am I glad I listened to that advice yesterday!
Wednesday afternoon my stomach began to hurt very badly. I toughed it out through the remainder of my shift at work and then I rushed home and lied down. The pain began to shift to my lower right side and subsided. I thought I'd eaten something bad and that the pain would be gone the next day. Wrong! I woke up the pain was still there. My all-knowing mother told me to go see my doctor. Begrudgingly, I went. My doctor told me that I either had ovarian cysts (which is what she thought it probably was) or I was having an appendicitis attack. To rule it out, she sent me to the ER.

ER lesson #1 - Everyone is in a hurry and in no mood to joke around. My nurse...very serious and boring.
ER lesson #2 - Plan on getting naked. Yep I had to strip and put on one of those gown thingies that never cover you up in the spots that matter! This is when I was really glad I'd taken the time that morning to shower and shave!
ER lesson #3 - Bring a book. I sat, mostly naked, on a gurney for 5 hours! I was bored, cold, and hungry.
ER lesson #4 - When the nurse tells you that your contrast dye tastes like lemonade, he's lying. I had 1 hour to drink horrible tasting contrast dye before they would take me to my CT scan. YUCK!
ER lesson #5 - Iodine injected into your IV make you feel like your peeing your pants (if you had any on.) :/
ER lesson #6 - All news is bad news in the ER. My doctor came with my CT results and with a look like he was telling me that I was dying, he grabbed my hand and said "its appendicitis. You're going into surgery immediately."
ER lesson #7 - "Immediately" in ER time is another hour in real time.
ER lesson #8 - Your best friend in any hospital is the anesthesiologist and the Micheal Jackson drug (aka - propofol). Nighty night!
ER lesson #9 - Apparently when the surgeon asks you if you've had any surgeries c-sections don't count. Really?!?
ER lesson #10 - When they tell you that you can go home or stay in the hospital, GO HOME!
So here I sit in my own bed. My appendix is gone (good riddance) and all I have to show for it are three holes in my stomach, one of which is in my bell button and it ITCHES! Yes I have pictures and no you can't see them! This is not what I had planned for my weekend, but its not all that bad. I've got a really hot nurse waiting on me hand and foot. People keep bringing me all types of nummy food and I'm in bed reading all weekend long! Not the kind of vacation I had planned but heck I'll take it!
My favorite memory from all of this will be Bob yelling down the hospital hall as the wheeled me off to surgery, "I LOVE YOU!"