Dream a Little Dream

In case you were wondering what you get when you consume blackberry hot sake, white fish sushi, 3 glasses of pinot grigio and birthday cake with buttercream icing all in one evening, I'm about to tell you (and p.s. it is not a Wii-Fit that exclaims your weight gain because Neal and I have been working out like crazy people). First, a little background:

1) Furosemide is a drug used in the treatment of edema and congestive heart failure. It comes in pill form, but when I worked in the hospital pharmacy, we stocked it in tiny little vials for the nurses who could not get a pill down a patient. The vials are about the size of your last pinkie knuckle, out to your nail (depending on how long your nail is. If your pinkie nail is long enough to make the DEA look at you twice, then we're not talking about your nail.)

2) In the catholic church at home, it is not uncommon to see parents feeding the kids breakfast. I have seen everything from Cheerio's out of a baggie to just short of bringing a camping stove to scramble up some eggs. And yes, this all occurs during mass.

3) If you are not familiar with the catholic mass, there are 3 readings followed by Responsorial Psalms. Really, you just need to know that the deacon reads a scripture and then we, lead by the choir, sing a little song about it.

4) My aunt is a teacher. That means she is...um...not quiet and demure. If she has an opinion, she will speak it. Granted, it is not to the extreme of my dream, but perhaps this is what I fear someday?

Setting: A catholic church in Lexington. It is not the one I usually attend but one much bigger...like Christ the King Cathedral. And it is not a morning mass but maybe one in the evening - like the Saturday 5:30 pm service. My aunt and her husband, her son and his wife (who is also catholic) and their 2 sons, and Neal and I are all there...sitting about the 2nd row from the front. All is well until there is some commotion about 2 rows back.

Suddenly, during one of the Responsorial Psalms, my aunt began singing about the noise behind us. (Oh and the Responsorial Psalms generally only have about a 5-note range through the whole song so keep that in mind when you're envisioning this scene).

Auntie: This boy is back here.. (imagine the last syllable of each line drawn out for like 5 seconds)
And he is stacking his medicine...
And those vials should not be stacked like that...
Furosemide is very reactive...
Plus, children should not be eating in church...
(at this point, a couple of families get up to leave)
What are these parents thinking?...
This is not the breakfast table but a church. Can't you do something...
(and this is where everyone has stopped trying to sing over her and just shut up to let her speak..or..er...sing...sort of. And of course, more families are leaving. She continues this way until every family has left - including the one about which she was singing - and it is only we who remain).

Having no one left to hear mass, the priest turned and walked straight out the side doors, to his chambers, followed by the deacon and alter boys. Auntie then turned to look at me and said "what? I didn't do anything wrong." Having never been to that church before, I then spent the better part of the next 30 minutes trying to figure out exactly where the priest's chambers were so I could apologize...while the family waited in the car. When I finally found him, he was in bed (a Murphy bed that unfolded from a utility closet) with the Swine Flu. And then I woke up.

So, remember boys and girls...sake+pinot+sushi+buttercream = a dream where you give the priest of a major and popular cathedral the Swine Flu. And can you really sleep with that on your conscious??