Our family doctor has his practice in the basement of an old folks' home. I expect he is the "house doctor" for the facility and also sees outside patients.
It had been many years since we had last seen him. Since our last visit, special keypads had been placed at every door between the parking lot and the doctor's office. I guess they've had concerns about senile patients wandering off, so they've taken precautions. There are three such doors. Each of these doors has a slightly different two-digit or three-digit code. On the way into the office, the access code is written on a label pasted near the door.
Leaving is another matter.
To get through the first door, we had to backtrack to the doctor's office and read a posted sign. The second door had a small label. The third door, in the outer vestibule, had a label indicating, "To exit, press." And the code had been removed. Someone had magic-markered a number that looked like either 09 or 04. Someone else had penned in 11.
Eventually, we started doing sequential combinations 01, 02, 03, 04, 05 ... We were plugging away when someone who worked in the building stepped into the vestibule and, with no preamble, said, "It's 12."
"How on earth were we supposed to know that?!" I exclaimed with thinly veiled exasperation.
"Ask someone?"
The only people we could've asked were two locked doors away. Did they think all the patients just KNEW the release code? Guess so.
It probably *does* keep the senile from wandering off!
ReplyDeleteBOYN
I don't know who BOYN is...but I laughed hysterically...I wouldn't have made it into the office, let alone get back out.
ReplyDeletePat :)
BOYN is Stephen. The acronym stands for Bone of Your Nose, and Steve has used it for decades. A reference to some mythical primitive tribe that inserts a bone through the woman's nose to convey that she is married. I'm not quite sure why he himself would be the bone ... but it was romantic at the time, and it has stuck. We also use MOAYC and FOAYC (Mother or Father of all Your Children) whenever we exchange notes or e-mails about the kids.
ReplyDeleteSome day you should do a post on your acronyms.
ReplyDeleteThose ones are so sweet!
Pat
Actually 'Bone of My Nose' comes from Rudyard Kipling's Just So Story, 'The Butterfly that Stamped," and it is one of the pet names that Sulieman bin Daoud (King Solomon) has for his first and best beloved wife. Remember that Solomon had 1000 wives!
ReplyDelete