So on Thursday I have to head down to Melbourne for my annual checkup on the ol' ticker. I have been doing these trips for nearly 23 years, and the younger I was, the more frequent the trip. The earliest I can remember is doing two trips a year with mum and dad. Now it's once a year, and the journey I undertake by myself. This blog will tell the tale of last year's trip, which was quite draining.
So my appointment schedule was pretty much standard, 9:15am for an echo, followed by a 10am meeting with my doctor. I think that was it, so when you see that it doesn't seem much of a big deal, well.....
I have experienced Melbourne during peak-hour, and the last thing I wanted was to be late for appointment, face possible cancellation and a waste of petrol, so I left fairly early. How early you ask? Well I awoke at 3:30am to start the trip, and travelling from home it takes 3.5-4hrs, going into the city. So I left around 4:30, getting some nice brekky and a wake-me-up-shower into me.
For some strange reason I don't mind waking up early and travelling. There is something about being on the freeway in darkness, by yourself except when passing the odd truck, then slowly without really even noticing dark becomes light, night turns into day, moon replaced by sun. I did my typical stop halfwayish for a serving of Macca's brekky, as I was craving sausage and egg McMuffin, and stocked up on Redbull.
What's a bit ironic is I love Redbull, I mean I can drink that stuff all day! The irony is that I go to Melbourne to have my heart checked out, and apparently people have made up rumours Redbull is bad for your heart. From memory, I think I bought two 436mL or whatever cans, the big ones, but only drank one on the trip down.
So I arrived around 8-8:30, and did not mind being early. So I just grab a few Women's Weekly and just chilled in the waiting room until it was my turn. Everything was standard, I nearly fell asleep during the echo which isn't uncommon for me, and afterwards talked to my doc.
During that time period I recently moved from Melbourne to home again, and it was about 2-3 months since I saw my friends from Melbourne. So I ended up catching up with one and we went to a DFO, walked around and all that jazz. We then eventually met up with two other friends at the train station, in which one was greeted with a bear hug and the other a casual 'wassup' man hug.
Oh almost forgot, because this gets very important later on. I had the worst cough I have ever had, and it made me feel crook as. I don't know what exactly I was sick with, but it was strong. And we're back in...
Not sure what we did in the afternoon, I think we just went to an arcade and walked around, but then we went to a restaurant (I think it was this trip) where I ordered the biggest parmy in my life, in anyone's life! The meals there was so big, there was four of us, we only ordered 2 meals.
So we spent some time there trying to munch through our meals, and then at like 9:30ish there was craving for pancakes. I was thrown in the backseat to conserve energy while I was coughing my guts up, and we went to that pancake franchise, can't think of the name, in Doncaster.
We were there for a while, until it got late and my friends remembered I had a 4hr trip home. Before I was allowed to leave we had to get some supplies at my old Safeway. I bought some cough lollies, two bags I think, water, some orange juice, Redbull and butter menthol's. This was to last me on the trip back.
After saying byes to everyone, I made my journey back home, leaving Melbourne around 11:30pm. About 30minutes into the trip I noticed I already consumed my orange juice and butter menthol's, and well into the lollies. Knowing these are meant to last me a little longer than 1hr, I started to ration them.
Half-way down the freeway I noticed I was yawning, nodding my head and kind of veering on the road, so I thought it would be best to park the car for a nap. Found a little truck stop, set my alarm to allow a half-hour nap, and I fell asleep in a heartbeat.
Upon waking up I took a wee-wee outside, and consumed some Redbull and lollies and I was on my way again. On the road between Mulwala and Oaklands at about 3:30am (24 hours since I've been awake, if you don't count that nap of course) I may have spaced out and nearly crashed. Well, kangaroos hopped out on the road and I suffered some delayed response. Needless to say, I was safe, and so were the roos, so relax people.
I think I got home around quarter to 4 in the morning, and I crashed onto my bed, not even worrying about changing.
I slept for half-an-hour in a 24 hour period, and it was one of my longest days. To that date, it was the longest I have ever been awake, but that record was shattered later (But that's a whole new blog). What makes that feat impressive was I had peaks of Redbull energy followed by crashes, I most likely overdosed on cough lollies and I received death-threats of my friends if they were to get sick. Quickly with the Redbull consumption, I would have easily consumed over 1.2L of Redbull, so that wasn't exactly healthy of me.
What made the experience worst was I had an assessment due on the day of the trip, but got it extended to the next day, and me being me I may have left it 'til that day. I awoke around 9am to travel into TAFE to work on the assessment and hand it in, and when I returned home that evening, I had more than enough.
At the moment the trip on Thursday may follow similar characteristics of the trip of last year. I will need to awake quite early to avoid peak hour and make my early appointment, however I may not get the chance to really spend time with my friends due to their work commitments, so I don't think I will be leaving around 11 at night. Another positive about the upcoming trip is that I'm not crook as a dog, and not coughing my guts up every 3 minutes. Hang on, going to knock on some wood.......
From The One They Anthony, This Is The Life & Times
No comments:
Post a Comment