Too Gross To Giggle? The Right Time for Fart Jokes

Laugh, and the world laughs with you.  Fart, and they stop laughing.

Our focus on Colon Cancer awareness month presents us with a challenge: so much of the humor — the jokes that crack us up! — center around things that we, in polite society (or what passes for polite society) simply don’t talk about.  Farting, bodily fluids, and the sheer joy of having a large camera and a surgical team get up close and personal with your colon aren’t really dinner time conversation.

Unless, of course, you’re a nurse.  In that case, there’s no limit on what you’re willing to talk about, even while wolfing down what the cafeteria assures you is chili con carne.  A true sign that you’ve ‘arrived’ as a nurse is the ability to clear diners from the NEXT table at the restaurant, simply by talking shop…but that’s not what we’re talking about today.

When we’re talking with colleagues, peers, and those loved ones who are well used to our stories about death, dismemberment, and slip-sliding our way through a Code Brown, almost everything is fair game. But what happens when we’re talking with our patients? Is humor appropriate, especially during procedures like colonscopies, where the patient may feel ill at ease and uncomfortable? Read more

Are you a wise *ss? Test Your Bowel IQ!

Take this simple quiz to find if you are truly a wise *ss!

1. The adult human has approximately ____ feet of large intestine.

a)      3 feet

b)      6 feet

c)      9 feet

2. The adult human has approximately ____ feet of small intestine.

a)      11 feet

b)      15 feet

c)      21 feet

3. The blue whale, the largest mammal on earth, has about ____ feet of large intestine and small intestines combined.

a)      200 feet

b)      400 feet

c)      600 feet

4. What percentage of folks at forty have a colon polyp?

a) 20 percent

b) 40 percent

c) 60 percent

5. How many calories do you consume on licking a stamp?

a)      0.1 calorie

b)      1.0 calorie

c)      10 calories

6. How far from the toilet do dentists recommend that you store your toothbrush, to avoid ‘airborne particles’ resulting from the flush?

a)      At least six feet

b)      At least nine feet

c)      Store the toothbrush either covered or in another room.

7. The name of the Roman god or goddess of poop was:

a)      There wasn’t one

b)      Vesuvius

c)      Cloacina.

8. The reason that the platypus is considered a unique mammal is:

a)      It has a feathers and a bill, but is not a bird

b)      It can breathe underwater, but has no gills.

c)      It has combined sex organs and rectum

9. How long would you need to continuously pass wind in order to generate methane gas with the energy of an atomic bomb?

a)      6 years and 9 months

b)      12 years and 3 months

c)      25 years

10. When was the flush toilet invented?

a)      Thomas Crapper, England, mid 1800s

b)      William Flushington, England mid 1600s

c)      Unknown inventor, Crete, 2000 BC

Bonus Point:

11. The 19^th century French performer Petomaine was world famous for:

a)      Belching music, including the French national anthem, while dancing

b)      Eating metal objects (his claim to fame was in eating a bicycle, piece by piece, then passing it and later reassembling it)

c)      Playing a flute inserted in his rectum.

Answers (no peeking!)

Read more

Is It Safe To Laugh: When To Use Humor As A Nursing Intravention

It had not been Jenny T’s best day ever. After discovering that she — along with many of her colleagues — were being downsized out of a job, she’d gone out with some friends. They’d had a few drinks, but Jenny wasn’t behind the wheel when they headed home. That didn’t help her much — she’d spent most of the night in the ER, being ‘reassembled’, after the car she was riding in was involved in an accident. We tried to reach her husband, and when we finally did, it turned out he was at his girlfriend’s house and he wasn’t in a big old hurry to come see her — seeing as the girlfriend still had a job and all, he figured it was as good a time as any to jump ship.

What, she asked Linda, her ER nurse, was she going to do?

Linda, a RN with a great deal of experience, had taken in the whole sad tale. She listened, thought about it, and said, “I think you better write this all down and sell it to a country music singer. You’ll make a million dollars.” Read more

Cross Training! by Bina Simon, RN

It’s an old concept. But in today’s economy, this non-revolutionary idea is really taking off. And in what better profession to do this than nursing? Hospitals can save lots of money, which will save lots of nursing jobs. So it’s really for our own benefit. Isn’t it?

And what’s the big deal anyway. Nurse shmurse, we’re all the same. Right?

For example, I’ll start with my own personal favorite specialty: Med Surg.

Snooty-tootie ICU nurses, who think they are G-d’s gift to humankind (second to neuro and cardiac surgeons) may need therapy to handle such devastating and shocking news, but these two departments are basically same thing.

Med Surg nurses: have 7 pts, 2 tubes apiece

ICU nurses: 2 pts, 7 tubes apiece Read more

Classic JNJ: You Might Be A Gomer If….

If the stand up comedy routine, “You might be a Redneck if…” was adapted to GOMERS (ie, representatives of the Get Out of My Emergency Room class of patients, it might go like this:

You might be a GOMER…

If you reach down to scratch your crotch and come back with a Foley.

If your BP is 40/20 and you’re still completely coherent.

If your answer to every question is one statement and it’s something like “Lubba lubba lubba.” Read more

Laughter And Extreme Adversity by Steve Rizzo

Years ago, I attended the wake and funeral services of a friend who was killed in a car crash. He was loved by everyone who had the pleasure of knowing him. I have been to many wakes, viewings, funeral services and memorials throughout the course of my life, but there was something special about this one in particular. An awareness came over me that caused me to view the losses in my life from a different perspective.

When the funeral service was over, a group of us met at a relative’s house. As you can imagine, people were wiping away tears and consoling one another. Some were understandably having difficulty accepting the unfair twist of fate that life had thrust upon him. We all were.

From across the room, I overheard an acquaintance telling part of a story that I was familiar with about our friend when he was in high school. I noticed that a few people were laughing along with it. Then someone else joined in on the conversation and offered an anecdote about the dearly departed’s affinity for football. Before long, everyone in the room was laughing and reminiscing about the good times they had. In the midst of all the laughter, I had a strange, uplifting feeling come to me. Read more

When You’re Running to the Bathroom

Or at least thinking about it (because we all know nurses have bladders the size of Winnebago water tanks, right?) take a moment to think about your fellow nurses who are in the military. Tammy Swofford is a nurse in the Naval Reserve, and on her blog shares her thoughts about many things pertaining to military service, political policy, and what it’s like to be a nurse in the service.

We know it’s hard to get a bathroom break here — but this is what you’d face if you were in the service:

This photo shows the female head (latrine) within the enclosed building, and the field latrine built by one of the men on the Advance Party of WATC02 (Ghana, W. Africa) I was also Advance Party and was one of the first to use the enclosed female latrine. Did I mention that when I sat on the toilet I heard a “swish” and caught sight of a snake in the bowl and ran in terror with my pants around my ankles?

Basically, the male latrine required digging a pit, popping a pipe down into the pit and filling the pit with gravel, placing a screen over the top of the urinal. In the field there is really no complete privacy, and so it is up to the individual to either allow a measure of dignity in the latrine or…. have a sense of humor and take a few pictures.

Worst field latrine was during an exercise which went far into the night. The “enemy” had cut our generators and we were working in the medical tents in the dark. Feeling nature’s call, a male Naval officer escorted me through the brush and “enemy fire” to the latrine. Read more

Tell About Your Life

“… the problem is that you haven’t realized how much your stories matter. You may not realize every story you tell is important … Nothing is more important than the stories you tell yourself and others about your work and your personal and community life.”

~ Annette Simmons, Whoever Tells the Best Story Wins

This is a quote from a book encouraging us to tell our own stories. Nurses, especially, need to let others know what we do, how we do it, and how it affects us and our patients. The public and our loved ones need to hear and feel the scope and reality of our work. How the unrelenting pain of a post surgical patient tears at our composure and heart, how the desperate fear of the unknown can be felt in a patient’s damp grip, how we soar to heights of joy when we catch a problem before it gets really bad for the patient, how hard it is to get some patients out of our mind at the end of a day.

But, the outside world needs also to know how analytical and cerebral nursing can be. The nurse is responsible for knowing the condition of the patient, the likely complications and how to avoid them, the homeostatic condition of the human animal and how that becomes disrupted in illness or insult. She must recognize the indicators: chemical, physical and behavioral, of impending doom. She must know how to respond to each, and when to call in the cavalry. Read more

Classic JNJ Humor!

From Administration Approved by Board of Directors
RE: New Policy Effective Immediately

DRESS CODE:

You are advised to come to work dressed according to your salary. If we see you wearing Prada shoes and carrying a Gucci bag, we will assume you are doing well financially and therefore do not need a raise. If you dress poorly, you need to learn to manage your money better, so that you may buy nicer clothes, and therefore you do not need a raise. If you dress just right, where you need to be and therefore you do not need a raise.

SICK DAY:

We will no longer accept a doctor’s statement as proof of sickness. If you are able to go to the doctor, you are able to come to work.

PERSONAL DAYS:

Each employee will receive 104 personal days a year. They are called Saturdays & Sundays. Read more

Bedside Manners: Got Vim? Resolve to be a Flo Fo this Year by Patricia L Raymond, MD FACP FACG

So, with this new year, will you do things with verve? With vim? With vigor?

You probably know ‘vigor’, but vim (lively and energetic spirit) and verve (enthusiasm and animation) may be not so familiar to you. And neither was Florence Foster Jenkins, aka Flo Fo, to me.

Driving down the road, listening attentively to NPR’s “Wait, Wait…”, I heard a piece on the woman known as Flo Fo, and fell in love with her spirit, her verve, her vim.

Florence Foster Jenkins, born in 1868, wished to become a singer despite a distinct lack of any talent.  Whatso-ever. After her wealthy parents refused to send her to Europe to study, she eloped (with Jenkins, a physician). Upon her father’s death in 1909, she inherited money which allowed her to launch her successful singing career, despite “her complete lack of rhythm, pitch, tone, and overall singing ability.”

After a taxicab crash in 1943, she found she could sing “a higher F than ever before,” and she sent the driver a box of expensive cigars. She sang happily and erratically throughout her long and ear-damaging career. At the age of 76, Jenkins finally yielded to public demand and performed at a sold out performance at Carnegie Hall on October 25, 1944. Jenkins died a month later. Read more

Next Page »