Ask the Experts

THE EXPERTS By GRID MICHAL

GRINDING GRID’S GEARS SMALL VICTORIES

SOME DAYS YOU HAVE to make your own fun by deviating from work. The last few months have been some of those days. This fun is about oatmeal. To begin with, I might eat one or two bowls of oatmeal a year. Mostly, I have raisin bran bought in hundred pound bags at Costco. At least they feel like a hundred pounds. But this is about oatmeal, not Costco.

Right up until Thanksgiving I was functioning like any robust 75-year-old, even the day after when Hank and I were installing a lower unit in a big Honda. We finished and decided to stop at my house for a sandwich. While he made sandwiches I sought a seat in the living room, missing the seat by just enough to look dumb, and depositing myself on the carpet. Fortunately our small town has a volunteer rescue squad that likes to drive fast, within the legal limit, so it wasn’t long before we were scooting down Route 17 towards the small hospital where I came bustin’ through the emergency doors with a 105-degree temperature a pulse of 107, and blood pressure 200/165. I was pumped full of steroids, which made matters worse for my old tummy. So for the next four weeks I existed on ice chips. Finally it was agreed—after shoving my entire body through a bunch of big round things, and examining beaucoup x-rays, that it might be a small bowel obstruction, that could be accessed with minimal invasion. One thing I know about the word invasive is it is negative, minimally or not, especially if I’m involved. So my daughter, the Richmond Registered Nurse, got me into a big hospital that certainly could get her dad well. Four days later after hours of interrogation and more blood removal, I was put on a liquid diet of jello…and ice chips. Two days later the oatmeal saga began. My lines are in regular type. Hapless hospital employees’ lines are italicized.

Day one: soft diet, breakfast of scrambled eggs, and jello brought at 8:30 a.m.

Hi! Thanks, but where’s my oatmeal? Did you order oatmeal? Mais oui, monsieur. Let me go ask the kitchen. He disappeared.

The next day, here comes breakfast, no oatmeal. Hi! Did you bring my oatmeal? Didn’t they bring it?

Nope, you said you’d get it. Lemme go ask what they did. He disappeared.

The next day he’s a no-show. A doctor enters. How are you doing? I would be great if I had some oatmeal. All I get is eggs. The doc disappeared, returned in 5 minutes with a big bowl of oatmeal. He pulled the lid off the plate. One sausage. I ate the oatmeal and the sausage. The next day the tray comes with a bowl of oatmeal. Almost a yay except there’s no plate. War is declared. I order everything I can think of that’s soft, including prime rib. I learn if they don’t have it, they zero the whole menu, just for you. A pyrrhic victory at the least.

Eventually, I leave the hospital and go to an intensive physical therapy/occupational therapy unit. That unit is run by the hospital and my reputation precedes me. A nice lady stops by to say hi. She’s the CEO. She asks is everything okay. Would be if I could have my oatmeal. As nice as this place is, I had to have my daughter get some oatmeal. My spouse brought brown sugar. I’ll get by, I think.

Next day, and until I left that facility, every morning I had a

huge bowl of oatmeal.

But the thrill of the chase was gone. I couldn’t quit!

The next morning, “I got you a double oatmeal!’’

Great! Salt for my eggs, too?

“What eggs?”

I’m full of oatmeal. I enjoy eggs, sausage, and bacon. And salt.

You don’t have eggs. Eat your oatmeal, now. I’ll decide if you get breakfast tomorrow!

Yes, ma’am.

When the first rehab decided they’d been patient enough, I was transferred to a smaller facility near the first hospital where if you decide to be lazy they hang you in a sling and watch your feet swing inches off the floor. On my first day, I was introduced to the menu, which covered things that contributed to a meal, like a chicken, and those that were permanently involved, like a pig. This menu was immense! Hold on, did I just see oatmeal? I circled it. The next morning I got Cheerios. Cheerios are supposed to make one smile, not scowl. I’d circled oatmeal for the whole week, and but for one day got Cheerios. That one day I got a fruit bowl. My morning now starts with vigorous exercise followed by noting emergency exits that are unattended. At lunch, I noted on the dietary instructions “cut meat.” That seems to have included everything, including sweet potato, peas, and breaking a half-slice of toast into communion-sized pieces. There was the obligatory tiny cup of butter and no knife. I got my yellow pad out and wrote a letter to dietary asking if I could please have a knife. At dinner, they gave me a plastic knife, no fork. But they included syrup, which in volume will hold peas on a knife.

I’ve gone through every column I’ve written for Sea and Boating World for the past 31 years and can’t find a reference to any situation in which I might have reduced a customer to a babbling idiot. If I did, please accept my apologies. I received my just due.

Fortunately, the same reputation that preceded me with the oatmeal carried with it the caveat that I was full of fun, and old fogeys belonged somewhere else. When I get home, I may go on an oatmeal diet, but I know better than to try it that way!

The meals at the second place were good, but you had no idea what you’d get. Just that what you circled for the week’s meals would probably not be on your tray, unless it was coffee. The last two breakfast meals were a victory for me: on the left side of my tray there was a knife and a fork, but no spoon. I had a waffle, no butter, no syrup. I had Cheerios, milk, and sugar. I need to tell you how the meals went so you’ll understand the final lunch. I got out of there on a Thursday, so this is how it went. I can’t imagine that food was re-used, but here it is:

Monday: rock-hard pork chop. But couldn’t eat it because NO KNIFE. Veggies: squash, okra, cucumber slices. I hate those veggies, especially when there’s only one tiny tub of butter. Except for the fruit cup, lunch went uneaten.

Tuesday: rock-hard pork chop cut into pieces. Squash, etc, in butter-water. I got one piece of chop down.

Wednesday: chop residue in smaller pieces with gravy. Veggies are looked aged, but I had two butter containers. The only utensil is a fork.

Thursday: pork chop has been in a blender with the veggies. ML and I stopped at Chick-fil-A for lunch on the way home. A small victory.