Fairly eventful weekend here at the hospital. We had our focus on the
Englsih country all day with the soccer match that occurred late on the 12th
of June for me but it started earlier in the day. Saturday started with
basic sleeping in a little. I have somewhat regained my teenager ability to
do that at times but we had a good excuse to sleep some in the am of
Saturday. The heat is playing havoc with our generators and causing them to
overheat and stop working. That happened in the middle of the night. What
drives you nuts is that you can tell it is coming. The ac pretty much runs
all the time and as the generator starts to fail it starts to groan and fade
out and then come back in. Its not its normal whirl and hum that you hear.
It started early Saturday and then finally quit at about 3 am. Then the
emergency light comes on in the room. I could handle that b/c by this time
I have slept through a lot of challenges. Then the sun comes up at 430 and the heat builds. It still is 90 at night around here so I started to lose
the cool air and then got hit when the sun came up. Might as well go sit in
the hospital and cool off. Sorry to crab but this place stresses you in every aspect of your day. Comfort and communication are the two big ones.
It got to 128 on Sunday and we still are not into July. So I was crabby this weekend to start with. I know everybody at work and home said thank God
he is there and not here.

The day got more interesting b/c there was a rollover accident off post by a
British company working with the oil companies. One of the workers
dislocated his left shoulder and actually sustained what we call a greater
tuberosity fracture. I got Dean going and we took him into the operating
room and reduced his shoulder. This was in the afternoon and what was funny
about that is I had the patient and his two British friends helping take
care of him there. All they cared about was getting his shoulder back in
place and him woke up so they could go back to there dorm area and watch the
England vs. USA soccer game. Well we succeeded to do so.

The day did not stop there as far as activity with the hospital. We
admitted a sore ankle that was swollen. Placed the guy on antibiotics and
watched him for a possible infection. In general a farly busy day for

We did have some fun though. That night Gary and I went over to the British
Consulate on an invite to watch the soccer game with them. They have a new
medical director guy. His name was Hinny. Yes, that is his name. This guy
was really funny when you could understand him.

The first picture is of the gate in which we came in.



You can see the English flags adorned over the main gate into the compound.
What you couldn't see is that we walk up to this little hole in the gate and
knock and somebody opens up the door slide to peak out at you. The pass
word was America sucks. No, not really. We looked non-terrorist like so
they let us in.

Our first order of business was to eat supper with Hinny and the Brits.
They were serving the classic British meal called Fish and Chips.



As you can see I do not have my uniform on. That is b/c Hinny wanted us to
be incognito somewhat. If there are Army people in charge reading this I am
deeply sorry that I left my room for 3 hours without my uniform on. It did
feel good to be a normal human for a bit. What is fish and chips. The fish
was like a huge slab of fish that you get from Long John Silvers restaurant
when you get the fish order. I mean this piece was 5 times as big and
fairly tasty. I am not sure you can appreciate that from the picture. The
chips part of it are actually french fries. You may already know all of
that but I guess I had never truely experienced until now the British fish
and chips menu.

I thought all this was pretty cool b/c I know how big soccer is in Europe in
general and especially in Britian where they have probably the wealthiest
team in the whole world called Manchester United. This is there super
bowl. I asked Hinny about the upcoming Olympics and everything going on
with that. He said that meant nothing to the English compared to this world
cup. I think you now get my point on the importance of this match. I
approached this situation like most things with the ability to have a great
experience with some new people that are passionate about something. I have
been to a lot of great games lately that have been amazing. I was at the
1st game of the World Series at Yankee stadium. I am a huge Yankee fan and
to be there was unbelievable. I was with my oldest son at the Final Four
this year and got to watch Butler play two amazing games. The championship
game was 70+ thousand people with at least 90% of them yelling for Butler.
You will never see more people in an arena at a game routing for one team
playing basketball. Well this experience isn't to those degrees but it is
cool to be technically on British grounds in one of the biggest games in
their history. Especially when it comes to beating the USA.

The next two pictures shows the basic atmosphere of where I was at




This was kind of like an outdoor patio and they had their flags hanging
everywhere. Even balloons, and as you can see a projector set up to put the
game out in front of everyone as big as they could get it.

Lets talk about soccer. I really like soccer now. I didn't growing up b/c I
thought it was pretty boring. I gained some appreciation of it when my kids
started playing it and still do at the Y. I realized how great of shape you
needed to be in to play and really the technical skills that you need to be
great. I am a big fan of Steve Nash who plays for the Phoenix Suns and he
attributes a lot of his success to his soccer background. Nash is an
undersized gaurd for the NBA and I know by watching him and how quick his
feet our that if it wasn't from all that soccer training that he wouldn't be
as successful as he is. I also appreciate but did not remember to look that
Hastings High actually did very well in the state soccer championships this
year. With all that said it really is kind of hard to watch. I did
appreciate it the most during the last world cup. Lots of intensity was
present and unbelievable skill.

The game started about 930 our time and it started poorly with the Brits
putting one in at the 3 min mark. They made us look like fools. Everyody
was exstatic and initially crazy. Really neat atmosphere. It then died
down and got pretty quiet when the goalie basically let one limp into the
goal to tie the game. The game then seemed to drag on. USA about went
ahead and I thought the place was going to explode. Some good rushes by
them but the goalie for the US was superb. It ended with a thud as a tie.
This was disappointment for them b/c they wanted to kick our butt. You
could tell. Really disappointed. Just like every game that I went to watch
Nebraska play while Callahan was coaching. That kind of emptiness and
depression. It was cool to be there and I will always remember that
experience.

My sunday was busy b/c the guy with ankle got worse and I had to improvise a
washout of his ankle joint. What that means is I don't have the instruments
like home to wash it our. I therefore rigged up to large needles and
removed the infectious fluid and then lavaged it through those needles to
clean it up some. The rest of the day was getting all the paperwork
together to send him to Germany. I may have solved his problem and with
antibiotics cured it but if not he needed to be at the next station up the
line to proceed with a more invasive surgery. He also needed a central line
for about a months worth of antibiotics.

We had some fun and did some work. We got challenged by our environment but
what else is new. I hope all of you enjoyed the weekend and basically
almost a month from leaving.

Play Hard
Play Smart
Play Together