And now for my next trick....

I am definitely developing insomnia. This is a real problem, as I need to be extraordinarily productive in the coming weeks and I'm finding I have less and less energy. Fortunately many of the tasks I need to complete involve shopping, which is a strong motivator. The less fun things on my list (room cleaning, laundry, scheduling doctor's appointments, pharmacy runs, learning to cook, etc.) are not getting done. On top of that, I'm finding spending time with my friends a chore, which is a horrible thing to have happen. I'm just so damn tired all the time. I have got to find a way to fall asleep before 6 am. Or at least a way to make the time I spend awake productive.

Well I officially have six days left of work. My last day is Thursday and we still haven't told the girls. Speaking of the girls...Today I took two clients to their doctor's appointments. One client (LY) was just going for her initial physical. The other (JG, a challenging client as she is severely cognitively limited unlike any of our other clients) went because she had been complaining of pain in her ear for the past few days. The two clients and myself are in with the doctor when the doctor looks in JG's ear. The doctor says "what is that in there?" and asks me to come look. Its white, so I ask JG if she'd been using Qtips to clean her ears. JG said yes, and everyone in the room agreed the foreign object stuck in her ear was probably a piece of cotton. The doctor attempted to get the cotton out with a pair of tweezers, but was unsuccessful as it was too far into JG's ear canal. At this point, Doc had no choice but to flush out her ear. I've had this done before and warned JG that this is an uncomfortable experience, but the process will relieve the discomfort she'd been feeling. The nurse came in and began the process. Sixteen year old JG began to scream and cry and knock things over in much the same manner as the 8 year old boy reacted to a shot. We'd previously concluded that the little boy was too old to be reacting so violently. The process ended, fortunately without major injury. The object was still lodged in JG's ear, but was pushed out far enough for the doctor to grab with the tweezers. The object is removed, and the following is unveiled:

Sadly in my wild fit of laughter, I was unable to hold the phone steady enough to take a clear picture. But that, my friends is a gum wrapper. With a tiny piece of green (probably spearmint) gum inside. How the gum wrapper got inside JG's ear? The world may never know.