Spinning
the Wheel of Vaccine Side Effects
–
There I
was, safe in the assumption that science has got my back. When my
number was called (age group), I marched to the vaccination site in a
parking lot next to a cemetery in Prague. I should have known that
this was a sign. I should have known that even though I had chosen
the LEAST likely brand of vaccine to cause nasty side effects
(Pfizer), that things could always go tits up.
Maybe I
shouldn't have made the remark about hideous side effects
like infected bumps in the junkal region. Am I CRAZY? Am I a PROPHET?
Am I just tempting fate?
Oh,
yeah. Side effects followed. Like hell raining from above instead of
below, I got smitten in the biblical sense of the word. The fifth
seal of the viral apocalypse was opened, and infectious bumps rained
down upon me, dangerously close to my junkal region.
Science
decided to smite me. Or maybe it was the god of the rednecks, smiting
me for being an unapologetic atheist. What a god! If the fecker
exists, why would anyone follow a monster like that?
Angry
Boils
Have you
seen the classic cult movie How
to Get Ahead in Advertising?
Oh, it's a doozy. It's a classic formula flick: Man gets boil on
neck, man screams at boil as it grows in size and anger, boil
literally comes to a head, and replaces the man's head and takes over
everything.
A few
days after my intramuscular injection of untested hard drugs (aka
corona vaccine), I started getting weird pimples in weird places.
Left buttock, right buttock, chest, left thigh. One after the other,
they appeared, angry enough to cause me to pop them rather than give
them a second thought.
I've had
plenty of experience dealing with pimples as an adolescent, and now
that I'm in my second adolescence (middle age), I know EXACTLY how to
deal with the feckers. At first I attributed the sudden appearance of
these nostalgic reminders of pubescence as a side effect of working
at home and ordering KFC bucket deliveries.
But then
something strange happened: the angry boil on top of my left thigh
grew in prominence. Pissed off that I would try to squeeze the life
out of the fecker, the oozing chancre decided to try to take over my
life. And for the last 5 days, it did.
Nemocnice
Bulovka
Every
city has a medical institution that is so subpar that it gets a bad
reputation. And nicknames follow. Way back when I was a feckless yoot
with a low-paying post-high-school job, I drove Ford Escorts carrying
packages of nuclear medicine to hospitals up and down the California
valley. I loved the rock music blaring on the speakers, windows down,
wind in my hair, 70 mph on CA highways, carrying unknown isotopes in
needles waiting to be injected into unknown people.
One of
the hospitals on my route was the UCD Med Center, a teaching branch
of the University of California, Davis Medical degree program. Part
of the program was an outreach for indigent locals, meaning, poor
people without insurance.
The
waiting rooms were full of them as I rushed past with my radioactive
payload waiting to be delivered. They coughed, sweated, stank, and
pissed themselves as an introduction. We soon began calling the place
the UCD Wretch Center. The name stuck. Oh, the humanity.
Cut to:
Act 2 in Big Sir's life, middle age, living in Prague. After a week
of cursing my growing carbuncle, it got REALLY painful. Like
making-me-limp-all-day painful. It grew to the size of a golf ball,
so I went to the nearest emergency room.
Sadly,
when you are Libeň
La Vida Loca in an industrial Prague suburb, that emergency room
is at the infamous Nemocnice Bulovka. Bulovka Hospital is not just a dilapidated, confusing sprawl of crumbling buildings with the
accessibility of a hostile foreign country, they built the fucker on
several hills. Because they wanted the shuffling, moaning,
staggering, limping fucks to WORK for their treatment.
Cabs
can't park inside, buses don't take you anywhere near the building
you need to go. And you need to go to several. Just for one problem.
But on a Friday night, it's the only place you can go if you fear
that the oozing, infected, black-and-crimson-red, golf-ball-sized
blight on your thigh just might possibly be slowly killing you.
The Evil
Eye
I waited
outside the night emergency room entrance at Nemocnice Bulovka. It
seemed like the back entrance to a library rather than a building of
medical treatment. I asked a young couple in front of me just in
case. “Yeah, this is the emergency room entrance,” they said.
“Are
you in the line?” I asked. They answered 'yes' and I joined them,
standing. No seats for the wicked.
Soon
they went inside and I was next at the outside entrance. Then a
carload of loud yoots listening to mindless disco music pulled up and
dumped its payload of babyshit onto the sidewalk. I call them
babyshit because they were so green that they had no idea of the
rules of ordinary, well-formed, solid shirtbird adults like me.
So they
cut in front of me, barged through the door, and took their place
right behind the kindly couple who had previously advised me. Then I
heard them laughing and speaking Russian. Da. Da-hahaha.
So I
looked through the window and gave them the Evil Eye. The same type
of Evil Eye that was burning inside the angry boil dangerously close
to my junkal region. It was an eye raised during the Cold War,
watching the Russians and Americans scoff, threaten, cajole, and
abuse each other nonstop. Fortunately for mankind, the Russians ran
out of credit first. End of Cold War.
But Fuck
the Russians anyway. They STILL wanna take over the world. That's how
I was raised, and these sons-of-Stalin whores just Pushkined past me
like a piece of American trailer trash (how did they know?).I began
the hairy eyeball routine with the weakest of the group. As they
tittered and whispered, an older one would look out the window at me
to check the threat. They found the burning Evil Eye watching them.
Yes, I am old, fat, and hobbled from a leg infection that burns like
a white hot knife wound. But I am ANGRIER than my boil. And in the
immortal words of Ivan Drago: I
must BREAK you.
They
must have seen me channeling Dolph Lundgren, because the oldest one
soon came out with younguns in tow, and said 'we go after you.' Or
maybe they saw my tiny role as a Russian General in the casino
commercial. Mad respect. You don't fuck with that dude.
That's
right, bitches. Age and treachery before youth and ambition.
Another
Ring of Hell
After my
referral from the emergency room physician, I hobbled uphill to the
next ring of hell. It was the surgery center, and I was in for a fine
Friday night indeed. At first I was pleasantly surprised. The long,
dimly-lit hallway only held a half dozen people waiting for
treatment. So I checked in with the medical receptionist, who told me
to take a seat at the end of the hall.
I
plunked down on one of the rows of cold steel chairs lining the
hall of the basement in the Bulovka surgery center. It was exactly
like sitting at a bus stop in a ghetto. Why did they make the seats
out of steel? Easier to clean? Durable? Or just another ring of hell
the poor wretches must work through to receive their treatment.
After
three hours I wondered why I had not brought a book. My phone battery
had died, there was no reception in the basement anyway, and I had
been to CZ hospitals several times before. You always wait at least 2
hours, even when you have an appointment for a specific time. It's
the commie way. You must wait long enough to earn the right to be
called a patient.
Finally,
the door swung open and they called my name. I limped in, and they
told me to take off my pants. They must have read my file from the
previous doctor. Rarely do I have that effect on people otherwise.
On a
side note, I remember reading a sales pitch for a private medical
clinic disparaging ordinary public Czech health insurance. “They
are cold, impersonal, and will command you to unceremoniously undress
in front of a room full of people.” Hmm. Maybe the expats expect
them to play Pomp and Circumstance first? I'm sure the finer halls of
medicine have disco music and stripper poles for the money-grubbing
whores. #dieyuppiescum!
Those of
us who live in the real world (aka American refugees,
non-yuppie-scum, etc) take the public health insurance offered by the
employer. So far, it has probably saved my life a few times. So when
I bitch and moan about Czech medicine, it's only the natural reaction
of a sick person with a finger suddenly thrust up the buttockal
region. Yes, it is abrupt, invasive, sudden, and stern. But it is
fair.
Nonspecific
Abscess
After my
unceremonious disrobing without music, I proceeded to receive the
diagnosis: nonspecific abscess. After some brief interrogation (are
you gonna kill me cuz I'm American?), the doctor told me that I had a
nonspecific abscess possibly due to my COVID vaccination. What?
B-B-but. I got the PFIZER. Ain't that the good jab?
She
smiled the knowing smile of someone in the medical profession who
pretends to know everything. But just practicing.
So she
wielded the metal tools of her trade dangerously close to my junkal
region, looked down her nose at me and said nothing. She didn't speak
English. And my Czech is bad on a good day, when there's no evil boil
burning on me like hellfire.
First
came a small sting. She then said 'lokal.' I got it. Local
anesthetic. Cool. Pop away, doc. Then came a scalpel. Ooh. This is
getting good. I expect a right proper gorefest to follow. My hand
slowly covered my junkal region, just in case. I never know if the
night doctors have exceeded their 5 cocktail maximum.
I kept
looking over my belly at the progress of the wide-awake mini surgery.
There was blood. There was pus. There were weird colors of both.
Suddenly, the attending nurse pointed to the doctor's name tag. She
stopped cutting and swabbing blood and pus to look.
Aw
Jeez. Did I spurt some on ya, doc? My bad. I'm embarrassed. It was an
awfully angry boil on an awfully angry dude. So sorry.
But then
she laughed, and the nurse tittered. They pointed to each other's
name tags and compared them. I understood from bits and chunks of
Czech convo that the doctor's name tag photo was new, and that the
nurse was jealous. Hers was old and outdated, just like her and the
hospital. This exchange went on for a minute.In case you may be questioning the nastiness of my particular ailment, right when the two ladies were comparing badge photos, an elder nurse walked by and glanced at my open wound. The grimace on her face said everything. In her 60 years of service, there was still something that could twist her face like a pretzel. Not a comforting thing when you are on the surgical table.
Um,
hey? Sucking leg wound down here? Ladies, will you please mop up
the gore, give me some pain meds, and shove my ass out the outpatient
door? Compare badge photos later, if you please.
The
Aftermath
I
finally got home after midnight. I slammed down some wine and
antibiotics, limped to bed, and got up the next day to repeat the
process. I had to go back to the Bulovka Hellspital. Four days in a
row. Each time a 3-4 hour wait followed.
But I
remembered to bring a book. And water. And a snack just in case. I
was always told to sit at the far end of the hall at the third door.
It's what they call triage. The most serious cases go first. And as
angry as my boil and I may be, others have it worse. But everyone in
the hallway in Bulovka looks like they're in the same degree of
suffering. But I had to wait 6 hours on Friday night, 4 hours on
Saturday, and only 2 hours each visit on Sunday and Monday.
It
wasn't about the time of day I arrived, it was about the random
spinning wheel of fate. It's a bit more obvious in the U.S. Gunshot
and stab wounds go first, followed by heart attacks, overdoses, and
trouble breathing. But in CZ, you can't tell. A surprising lack of
violence here. And zero crack or meth. Just a bunch of people
suffering in silence together in a dimly-lit basement hallway of a
decrepit old hospital on the side of a suburban Prague hill.
But
sometimes a gurney full of fresh pain would come rolling in with
ambulance personnel pushing. And I would get pushed to the back of
the pain bus again. Such is the nature of probability. Open book,
shift buttocks on steel seat, soldier on. Be patient, my patient.
On
Monday I got the good news: my wound was healing (they had slashed,
sliced, drained, and re-bandaged it 4 times by then). Better yet,
this doctor spoke English. He said that I didn't have to keep coming
back to Bulovka after this. I could choose the closest clinic to my
address.
Now I
have a day off from the hospital for the first time in 4 days. I had
previously taken Friday and Monday off from work just to relax,
pre-boil. But like the man said, man makes plans, God laughs. Fecker.
The last
doctor I visited at Bulovka was so friendly that I almost expected
him to ask 'Can I do anything else for you?'
I should
have replied: Yeah. After 14 hours of sitting on your hospital's
cold steel benches, I have a new side effect. Can you kindly treat
the angry 'roids which are now festering and burgeoning and brimming
with anger inside my angry ass?
Yes,
gentle readers. I went into the Bulovka hospital for a four-day
treatment of an angry boil and left with a burning ring of fire.
The
Takeaway
I don't
want this to discourage anyone from getting the vaccine. It's how we
beat this thing. But if somehow, somewhere, somebody crawls out of
the primordial ooze (alt-right fux) and says: See! Vaccines don't
work! They give you the same angry boils I got when I went to that
Tijuana Donkey Show!
I can't
tell those type of people anything. It's like talking to a wall, a
rock, or a religious person. Same stony stare. They might believe
that Bill Gates is inserting microbots into the vaccine to take over
their minds. And that aliens took their cows and themselves up for a
brief whirl around the planet with a side excursion of bonus anal
probe.
Weird
how rednecks don't believe in science, but they do seem to believe in
science fiction.
I'm
vexed my damn self. I'll still continue to believe in science, even
though the pharmacy business has so tainted the process that profits
supersede results.
In the
meantime, take some time to read up on the various flavors of
vaccines out there, including the long list of side effects. Keep in
mind that the side effects are usually much milder than the short and
long term effects of the actual coronavirus. That shit could kill
you, regardless of age.
Me, I've
just got angry boils and a case of the old bum grapes. Like Gloria
Gaynor and my Sactown homeboys Cake said, I
Will Survive.
