And Now For Something Completely Different

Hi, everyone. This is Phil, Christy's husband. She's sitting in a hospital bed wrestling our brand new baby girl into those little infant mittens and one of those caps. I'm sure she'll have plenty to share about the whole experience, but for now, I've hijacked her blog to discuss a few of the, um, "quirks" of our favorite little baby factory in Atlanta, Northside Hospital.


I'll lay aside for now the fact that the labor/delivery rooms are more nicely appointed than the Grand Hyatt, replete with hardwood paneling, tile, and lots of extra square footage. Some part of me can't get over the gnawing notion that somehow I (through my own cash and the premiums paid to my insurance company) am paying for all this luxury. But hey, if it makes my in-labor wife more comfortable, I'm willing to give a pass. Instead, I'll point out a few other idiosyncracies that make me laugh to keep from crying.


Exhibit A: Where am I Going?


Now, I visit a lot of buidings in my line of work. I've figured out that it's pretty much universal that there's a logical arrangement of floors from 1-x, with "x" representing the number of the top floor of the building. I can usually figure out "L" for "Lobby" and even sometimes "M" for "Mezzanine," but that's typically the extent of the variation. Imagine my consternation when I come into the Women's Center (don't even get me started on that name for the baby factory) from the 3rd floor garage walkway, step into the elevator, and see this:

Can somebody please tell me what the heck this is supposed to mean? Through trial and error, I have discovered that "1" is actually "3," but not the same "3" as the "3" in the garage - that, obviously, is "G." I still have no idea what "A" is or why it has a star beside it. I do know that it is the location of...


Exhibit B: The Father-unfriendliest Coffee Shop on Earth

Ah, the Lotus Blossom Cafe. What else could offer new dads greater promise than the idea of round-the-clock caffeination available just steps from the room in which your pride and joy will emerge after hours and hours of intense labor, then keep you up by crying every 4.8 minutes for the duration of your stay? Well, that's what I thought until I saw this:


Now, tell me this: at what times of day do people (particularly those who are working through sleep deprivation) MOST need the black liquid happiness that coffee provides? That's right - at exactly the times when the LBC is NOT open for business. From 8:00 am to 3:00 pm on the weekends?? Besides this, the "cafeteria" closes at 7:00 pm. Please. There's a tremendous opportunity to make money that somebody is missing here, money that we poor newbie parents are now forced to spend on...


Exhibit C: Mickey D's!

Yep, that's right. There is a 24-hour McDonald's IN THE HOSPITAL. I have partaken of multiple QPCs in the last 48 hours. I've even enjoyed them, but that's beside the point. The point is that it gets even weirder. On the 4.7 mile walk from the Nursery to McDonald's, I encountered the two signs you see below (I wish I were making this up):

Oh, the irony!

This, I think requires no further comment.

I could go on, but I think you all get the idea. I'm sure you'll all be very happy when Christy returns to blogging in her own space, but I felt the need to vent before I returned to normal (or at least the "new" normal) life in about a day or so and forgot all about this whimsical little place that has been my home since Thursday afternoon. Ciao!