Sunday, January 22, 2006

The bad, the ugly, and the good.

I had an awful incident at work yesterday. In light of all the wonderful rules of HIPAA and confidentiality I probably shouldn't even talk about it here, for fear someone stumbling across my blog will report me for divulging patient information. What I will say is that I hope to never ever be in that situation again.

I work as a clinical pharmacist in a major teaching hospital in Boston, and here we are part of the code call response team. (That's like when they call a "code blue" on those medical dramas and all the people come running.) Yesterday I had the worst call of my career; the patient was a young woman, who just delivered a baby. It was gruesome, and stressful, and she died despite how hard we worked to try and save her.

It's so crazy to think that in today's day and age a woman can die in childbirth, but yes it happens. There are still risks. But God, this poor family. I am so sad for them.

To offset such a terrible story, I am going to tell an embarrassing and funny one about me. To preface it, I have to tell you that my ATM/debit card was cracked. I guess I use it too much. :p So I called the bank to have them send me a new one, which came just in the nick of time. I also received a separate slip that said, "This is your new pin number, and had this long sequence of digits." I was like, WTF? Why did they change my pin number? Then I open the card, and read all this nifty stuff about how they upgraded me to a platinum card, (everyone now, ooooooh aaaaaah.) and I have price protection, and "my pin number has not changed."

Ok, so which was right? I wondered. So the first time I go to use it, at Toys R Us, I test my old pin, and it works. Coolness. Then I used it at the grocery store, no problem.

However, the next time I tried to use it at a different grocery store, it didn't work. I was confuddled. I wondered if it was due to this mysterious "pin" issue. I made a mental note to call the bank. Of course I forgot, until the next time I tried to use it at the doctor's office for my co-pay. Didn't work. Weirdness! What was going on?

When I left my appointment, I tried the ATM machine in the lobby. It wanted to charge me a fee???? But it was my bank! Then it didn't recognize my pin. So I pulled that other letter out with the numbers on it and tried that. It was at this point I realized that the sequence of numbers actually was my pin, and I am just used to knowing it as the word it spells. LMAO. I am such a goober.

You'd think that alone would have made me more suspicious of my non-functioning card, but I got in my car and drove home, pondering this mystery. Was it using it as a debit vs. a credit issue? Did they change something on my account that I didn't ask for? I started to think about where I used it, and where it worked and didn't.

It was then I remembered using it to get cash out at work the Thursday before.

Then I remembered the card ended up in the pocket of my leather jacket instead of my wallet.

Realization dawned that it must not be my debit card that I have been trying to use as my debit card for the last 5 days, as I never got the card out of my pocket. I had been using one of my other credit cards, which is also a lovely shade of platinum.

I called the hubby to tell him so he could laugh. It still took me another day to fetch the card out of my jacket, and I had to call my answering machine to remind myself. Having children fries your brain.

4 comments:

Bored Housewife said...

Oh dear lord! Yes, yes it most certainly does...

Last year I went to the ATM and removed my cash and receipt and as I was putting them in my purse, rolling up my window, and driving away, I wondered annoyedly to myself, "Why is that damn thing still beeping? Do they always do that?"




Yup. I left my card there. Mr. husband still makes fun of me for that...
And sometime I'll tell you about the day I wore two different shoes to work. (I might even pretend it happened after I had kids.)

Leesa said...

How funny. I park in the same place every day, even if there are parking places closer to work because I have forgot where I have left my car. Really.

Gina said...

And sometime I'll tell you about the day I wore two different shoes to work.

Ha! Now *this* the husband did. Guess who had to put three kids in a car and drive half way to Boston to meet him with the correct shoe since he was meeting a cliet that day? LOL

Gina said...

Oh, and Leesa I do the same thing, I wander around the garage irritated beyond words.