Straight out of National Lampoon, episode #232

Some are destined for greatness, others for parody. My life seems to fall consistently into the latter category.

I just got back from another field trip. S's class visited the hospital after school today and I agreed to be a chaperone under the condition that I could bring B along with me. The teacher wasn't happy with the plan, but she needed all the help she could get, so she agreed, as long as B was discreet about it. Those of you who know B are probably already chuckling-- discreet is just not in his vocabulary.

So we get to the hospital and get a tour of the lab there. The technician whipped out a vial of urine and demonstrated how she tested sugar levels with a dipstick. Then all the children got their very own dipstick to take home to test themselves. As a joke I suggested to the teacher that she might be able to include that as part of the lesson tomorrow and she stared at me horrified. I keep forgetting that my dry sense of humor doesn't go over all that well with Germans.

B, probably inspired by the multiple vials of urine, suddenly had to produce some of his own. As we were leaving the lab we spotted a bathroom. I sent him in hoping that he could go really fast and that we could catch up with the group before they turned the corner at the end of the hall. I was hoping he'd be discreet.

Suddenly I hear B's screams echoing throughout the hallway. I raced in to find him at the sink, rubbing his eyes and howling. He'd tried to squirt disinfectant on his hands and somehow it had splashed up into his eyes. I stuck his head in the sink and washed his eyes out with water. It sloshed all over his hair, shirt and pants. A nurse brought us a towel and gave B a wet washcloth to hold on his eyes during the rest of our tour.

Then we wandered around in the pediatric ward for a while trying to find the class. B got a lot of attention for his wet washcloth, which spurred him on to new thespian heights.

Next stop: the emergency ward, where all the kids got to have a cast put on their finger. The teacher told B that he couldn't participate since he's not part of the class and he burst into tears. The kindly hospital staff, who had already offered to have his eyes checked out by the paramedics, felt sorry for him and intervened. So now he could get a cast too, as long as I accompanied him.

When we got back out one of the girls came up to me, held the arguably very phallic cast up to her pants and said: "Look Betsy, I'm peeing!" Of course then the rest of the children followed her suit. S turned to me very proudly and said: "I taught her that. Thought it up all by myself!"

I would not be surprised if the teacher is at home right this very minute sticking pins into a voodoo doll with my name written on it...