Climbing my personal Everest

The last time I was scheduled to go for some blood work (as part of my doctor's desire to not don latex gloves), there was a snow storm which resulted in a power cut. The power cut affected the lab where I was at, so all poor souls having made the journey to said lab had to return whence they came without the pleasure of Dynacare's geriatric maids searching for a vein with a needle the size of your jugular. They need a needle this big as it has the necessary contrast for their coke-bottle glasses to detect. Anything smaller flies under the radar and ends up being inserted in knees, adjacent chairs or the wrong person.

Having rescheduled for a week later, there was also a snowstorm. The snowstorm was much worse, in fact, and the roads were impassible. So I had to lug my arthritic joints up and down side streets, avoiding errant teams of huskies and polar bears, all the time not knowing whether the antique generator at Dynacare had been set up to take care of a renewed attack on electricity service by the brutal mongol hordes of, erm, snowflakes. It hadn't.

Fortunately, however, it wasn't needed: the Ottawa Hydro power utility had managed to maintain service in the face of such unexpected meteorological events as snow in the city in January, and everything was running as it should be. Even more fortunately, I was one of the few with enough faith to schlep my weary legs to the lab, so when I went in the traditional hour-long wait was reduced to several minutes. This, naturally, pleased me. 

Even better, the coke-bottle glasses worn by the Dynacaremagd were doing their job: she found the requisite vein in a matter of minutes, withdrew the required vials of blood; handed me a urine bottle to fill; and told me to meet her in a room at the end of the corridor once the container had been filled.

As I made my way to the room, holding my still-warm container, wrapped carefully in a blanket of paper towels, I wondered what I had done to deserve such special attention for my urine sample. 

"Is this where you have to go to take the piss now?" I asked, making to hand over the sample.
"What?" she answered, a little more aggressively than I thought the joke warranted.
"Don't you want the sample?" I asked.
"Of course I don't. Haven't you done one before? Yes you have - I recognize you. You made the same joke last time you were in. I didn't laugh then. There is a container on the cabinet outside the toilet with a sign on it clearly indicating that it is where you are to place the urine sample. Do you seriously think we want people wandering the corridors of the lab with a sample of urine in their hands?"
"Right," I said, somewhat sheepishly, stomping off in the direction of the yellow container, "so why did you want me to come here, then?"
"For an ECG. Don't you read your requisition form?"

I have to admit that I don't. I took it from the hands of the doctor, waited six weeks until I had recovered from the colonoscopy and found the courage to confront the Dynacare monsters, then turned up. I returned to the room somewhat contritely. Frau Colaflaschenbrille had not discovered contrition. Instead, she was ripping paper off a leather bed (no arm restraints, I was glad to see) and whipping a machine into order.

"Take off your shirt and trousers, and lie down," she ordered, exiting the room. I did as I was told.

When she returned, she covered me with some sort of gel (unwarmed, I noticed) and slapped on a dozen sensors on my chest and arms and legs. 

"Don't move," she said. As if I would dare to.

Then she stared at the machine and left the room, returning a minute later with another technician, who was wearing a similar pair of coke-bottle glasses. They both stood at the monitor looking at the screen (which I, in my inclined position, was unable to see) and making tutting noises.

"Try it again," said the new arrival. "Sometimes the sensors are not connected properly." So off came the sensors, one by one. The gel was wiped off and then reapplied. Then the sensors were put back on. Apparently there was no improvement in the result because my initial technician slapped the side of monitor quite forcefully.

"Are you sure it is plugged in?" I asked, helpfully. 
"Of course it is plugged in," said the first technician. 
"Well, what is that wire hanging down by the side?" I asked.
"That's not important," she said, plugging it in.

Of course, it was. And as the lights suddenly came on and the machine started making all manner of beeping noises, the other technician left and Frau Colaflaschenbrille studiously avoided all eye contact. Fifteen seconds later she left, telling me the test was complete and I could get dressed and go home.  She wasn't at the front desk as I wandered by on my way out.

Sometimes...