Sometimes my brother says something or does something that just stumps me and I’m speechless. Today was one of those days. When we left him yesterday, we had just picked up his prescription for an antibiotic for the bruise on his arm. He had 20 pills and was to take 2 a day with meals, one at breakfast and one at dinner. Pretty straightforward, right? No questions, right?
Today I called to ask how he was feeling and how his arm was doing. He told me that he could feel that he had done something to his arm and - he was taking 3 pills a day (one at breakfast, one at lunch and one at dinner) since he had some left over. ‘Left over?’ I asked. ‘How did you ever have any left over?’ Well, he had gotten some antibiotics for a tooth problem a while back and, when he felt well, he stopped taking them and now had some ‘left over.’ And - I was speechless. Luckily, I quickly gained my voice back and explained how antibiotics work: that their primary purpose is not to make you feel well, but to kill germs. You might feel super but the germs might still be inside you. Not only that, but all antibiotics are different and they age. What he had been prescribed before might not be for this type of problem and might be so old that they might not be potent.
So I’ve told him to toss the ‘left over’ antibiotics and to take these as the doctor prescribed. I asked him if he had seen the commercial on TV that asks: would you like your doctor to do your job? Then why are you doing his? Now, what are the odds that he’s following my advice? I’d guess as well as he follows the doctor’s orders.
On an entirely different subject: one day last week we were walking in the mall and happened upon this scene: the Hy-Vee cake decorating contest. Hy-Vee, a midwest grocery chain has local and then regional and finally a corporate cake decorating contests for their cake decorators. There are about 500 cake decorators in the entire company and these 18 women are the best vieing to be the best of the best. These women have won at the local level, the regional level and now, here they are, in the big city of Des Moines, where the corporate headquarters is, at the local mall with all the suits milling around, judges eyeing each confection with their scorecard and hundreds of mall shoppers circling and taking pictures.
What beautiful jobs they have done. But, they don’t just decorate a cake, they have a theme and have to decorate several cakes, one tiered, one flat and one other, 10 cookies, and, well, here is the full enchilada, the whole entry for one woman.
Here’s one part of the entry from the winner. The hot dog bun is made out of cake, the hot dog is frosting and the pickle relish is green-dyed crushed pineapple. At the local contest, back in December, she used green maraschino cherries for the relish but, when time for this contest came around, she couldn’t find any, was told they were seasonal items and had to find a substitute. Green-dyed crushed pineapple was her choice.
Now, we’ve got to go home to our lunch of yogurt and fruit. Nothing wrong with that but these cakes look much better.
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