Diary of a SubUrban Housewife

PePe

OK, that amused me, but maybe I'm just easily amused. (OK, you see the title of the previous entry was MeMe, so I went with PePe. Get it???????????)

Yeah, I had a date with a specimen cup today. It's been four weeks minus one day (I think, but then I have no short term memory) since I last smoked pot.

As previously reported, my little "at home" test came up clean, but being me, I still stressed about it. Substantially less, but the reality is, something could go horribly wrong and I'll find myself really unemployed on Monday.

These last two weeks, while I have been without employment, have not really been "unemployment". They've been "between employment" weeks.

Anyway, I drove for at least an hour to get to bumfuck Whittier today to pee in a cup. We can start with Whittier, but why? After having gone to Whittier today I cannot for the life of me figure out why anyone would want to actually make it a destination, much less live there. But that's just me. I'm sure lots of people say that about Sherman Oaks. And Paris.

For the last 30 or so minutes of the drive I really had to pee. This is excellent considering I'm driving an hour to pee in a cup.

I arrived at the pee clinic. It turns out it was basically inside the emergency room of a hospital. The authorization form that I brought with me did provide a vague-ish map showing me where to go, but it did not actually tell me it was inside the ER, but after asking around, I found my way.

I was greeted by a most unpleasant clerk at the desk of the pee clinic. She gave me about 25 forms to fill out, giving me instructions in heavily accented English. Now pee clerk is used to getting pee from the masses and has seen these forms 5 million times, and obviously understands what she's saying. I, however, had never seen the forms before and didn't so much understand what she was saying. And I really had to pee.

I managed with the forms and turned them in and informed pee clerk that I really had to go. She told me, quite unpleasantly, to have a seat and someone would be with me shortly.

Shortly after my arrival two (obviously) sales people walked in. The woman had a briefcase. The man had a box with a pie in it. They were immediately shown to the back area.

I sat and waited.

More people filed in. Some of them had pee request forms and were given their pile of pee forms to fill in with the same piss poor instructions I received. The others were told to sit and wait. Several of those others (the non-pee-ers) were shown to rooms in the back. I (now with my legs firmly crossed) had to continue to wait.

About 45 minutes into my waiting I approached pee clerk to ask her if it would be much longer as I REALLY had to pee by now. Pee clerk tried to ignore me, but I was having none of that. She told me that it would just be a few more minutes.

An hour into my wait....now rightly fed the fuck up with being made to sit and wait an hour to pee, I find out that the two salespeople were in the back giving the staff some kind of demonstration and serving them pie. (As if anyone who handles pee all day would actually want to eat at their workplace?????? or maybe that's just me being fussy.)

After I threw a bit of a fit and told pee clerk I had to pee NOW, I was shown to the pee area.

I saw the pee nurse who had me fill out a few more forms (because obviously I couldn't do that in the hour I sat in the waiting room). I had to show pee nurse my ID to prove that it was me, and shown to a cabinet to lock my purse up. I could take the key to the cabinet into the special pee restroom with me, but nothing else. (I was vaguely surprised that I didn't get frisked).

Pee nurse squirted some blue stuff into the toilet, handed me a specimen cup, and told me to pee to the line of the cup and not flush when I was done.

I closed the door to the pee restroom (which was not lockable by the way) and peed. I only peed to the line, but I could have probably filled the cup I'd needed to go so badly for so long.

There was a sink in the restroom, but the water was turned off and there was a sign that said I could wash my hands at the sink outside. The sanitary napkin disposal box was taped shut with a note that said something about that being a requirement of a pee restroom.

Whatever. I was just so happy I could finally go. Then I was afraid I'd lose my mind and flush, but thankfully, I kept my wits about me.

I came out and handed pee nurse my specimen and proceeded to wash my hands. She poured some of my specimen into a test tube, which I then had to initial, and then poured the balance of my sample into the toilet and examined the water before flushing.

But it's all over now. Aren't you glad I shared with you?

Now I must go. I have to pee.

Posted by beth at April 14, 2005 10:09 PM