The "I fell on it" explanation was my favorite, though after meeting one of my college roommate's parents, I'm not entirely sure that explanation never applies. And NaCl, really? Hahaha!
It was a "Christmas bulb". I don't know if that meant an ornament (and how loose would your ass have to be to not have THAT shatter?
) or a light bulb. And if it was a lightbulb, was it a little one or one of those outdoor big ones that get really hot when it's on? I kinda ASSumed it was one of the bigger lightbulbs. I wasn't the one that took the call myself, but LMAO.
And yes, NaCl. I was like, "Uh... did you say sodium chloride?"
"Yeah."
"That's table salt, sir. I don't think you'd need a prescription for that."
He was insistent, and I was starting to lose the ability to hold in my laughter, so I took the message and paged it out, because if they were that insistent on something, we had to. I hope the doc got a kick out of it.
We also had a few "stuck tampon" calls. One of the doctors called us back like, "Um... that last page. Is that serious?" We said yes. Then he goes, "Well, I don't have my pliers so can you call her back and tell her to go to the ER?"
🤣
I also took some consults called in by a woman who misspelled her own name to us a few times. Lord. I think she was an aide or a clerk. My favorite was this reason for the consult.
"Patient vomiting... vomitiking... you know like when you vomit somethin' up?" Like I needed context clues...
"Okay, patient vomiting. Anything else?"
"Yeah and die... dire... dire *****."
"... Can you spell that for me, please?" Please God don't spell diarrhea to me...
"D-I-A-R-R-H-O-E-A."
"I'm pretty sure that's diarrhea." Sweet leaping Jesus.
I imagine a dire ***** is bigger than a regular ***** and has spines running down its back. It also has better stats and is a more challenging encounter than a regular *****. >.<
Disclaimer: I know I've told most of these stories before somewhere.
for you!
