Saturday’s Review (written on Sunday morning)

EB writing here.  I’ve been rolling the words around in my head from the past 20 hours or so looking for just the right words to describe one  bit…no many bits (pun intended) of yesterday.

We jumped in a taxi and headed to Victoria’s Peak (VP) first thing yesterday morning.  I’ll leave all the detail describing of the trek to LJ.  What I want is to provide the “emotionally intelligent” part of the day.  Anyway, the trip to VP involved a long and winding road up a mountain in the back seat of the cab.  I didn’t notice anything unusual whatsoever – well maybe just two little things registered in my brain.  I thought it was amusing that the road was so curvy that my ass wouldn’t stay put in the back seat of the taxi even with a seat belt.  I was sliding around with each bend of the curve like the seat has been “lip glossed” just before we got in.  I also looked at LJ one time and noticed a bit of a fixed stare on his face.  He said “whew this is making me sick?”  Being the nurturing care-giver that I am, I quipped “breath through your mouth and quit turning your head from side to side so much…you’ll be fine.”

We reached Victoria’s Peak – blah blah blah from LJ later on – and had a little “look-see.”  Then we crawled in another taxi to head down the mountain.  I think it was the other side of the mountain.  The taxi driver went down the mountain fast – really fast.  And he kept jabbing the gas pedal so our heads were whiplashing back and forth all the while we’re still attempting to keep our asses in one place on the seat.  It kinda reminded me of how eggs must feel in the frying pan when they are being scrambled.  Anyway, the trek down to some blah blah blah bay (again…LJ later with details) was long and winding and fast.  At about the 15 minute mark, I happened to catch a glimpse of LJ out the corner of my eye.  He didn’t say anything at all.  He just stared straight ahead.  I didn’t think much of it.  Ohhhhh….so not a smart move on my part.  I remember again thinking “how much longer in this nut job’s cab?  He’s driving like a bat outta hell.” 

That was the last thought that I had for a bit.  Things got exciting really fast.  I mean really fast.  I happened to look over at just the time that LJ’s belly and chest rolled up like a wave hitting a sinking ship.  I’ve seen lots of people puke in my days as a bedside nurse.  This one folks overtakes any puke you have ever seen before.  Maybe it was that I was in the back of a small taxi with the windows up going down a mountain at about 150 mph.  I dunno. . . but it was bad.  

Right after the stomach muscles starting contracting in order to begin the hurl of all hurls his eyes started bulging and his cheeks puffed out.  I don't think I've ever seen anyone's eyes bulge out that far.  That’s when I knew.  I yelled “roll down the f’ing window.”  I don’t know how well that translated in Cantonese.  But it must have made an impression.  I reached across LJ to roll with window down myself.  I got it about a third of the way down before we experienced what I’ll call “the chunky monkey.”  

Yes my dear friends LJ hurled chunks the size of Oklahoma out his mouth somewhere toward the window.  I remember literally shoving the hell outta his head to try and get him close enough to the window.  Now that I re-think it I believe the window may have been down approx. 3/4ths of the way.  Anyway, I digress.  The widow was down far enough that he could get his mouth up to it and get some of the puke outside of the car.  But most of it rolled down the inside of the glass, like water on a shower door.  Ahhhh….I then saw breakfast again.  This time it looked vastly different than it did going down though.

The taxi driver must have known this could happen because he threw two small plastic bags toward me.  I caught one of them just in time to shove it up to LJ’s mouth as he let the next hurl go.  Now things were getting serious.  The bag was like one of the small one’s that you get if you’re buying a really cheap something in the Dollar Tree – you know a tiny little paper thing.  OMG he filled the bag up completely with puke.  

At about this point I remember “smell” registering in my brain.  Yes smell.  The taxi was filled with that unique smell of vomit -- the kind of smell that I remember as a first or second grader when someone would hurl on the floor at school – usually in the hallway thank god – and the janitor would bring that oatmeal-like substance and spread it around to sop up the mess.  With this second wave LJ had done some Olympic moves…the ones where you gyrate and contort your body into a tangled mess.  In doing so he had “chunked-up” the entire left side of his jacket, inside the sleeve as well. 

I had the 2^nd plastic bag in my hand to give to LJ.  I held the full bag in my left hand close to the floor.  It was then that I noticed there is no place to pull-off on this mountain road.  The taxi had slowed some but we continued on a fairly brisk pace toward the ocean at the bottom of the mountain. 

At this point there was nothing more to hurl.  So the clean-up began.  We had some wipes to use from our bag.  I used my free hand to try and dig things outta the bag to help clean up.   My eyes kept rolling back over to that window though – the one with remnants of breakfast rolling down the side. 

We reached our destination in a few more minutes.  Or at least we reached a point where the driver stopped the car and got out to survey the damage.  At this point I negotiated a triple payment to the cab driver.  He never “cussed” – at least in a language I could understand.  LJ, in his weakened state, rolled outta the taxi and over toward a bathroom at the place we had stopped – incidentally a high end shopping complex.  I walked around a bit outside of the taxi (Or was it pacing?  I don’t quite recall.)

It took a few hours…no I mean seconds…to realize that I was still carrying around the open puke bag in my left hand.  I made my way over to the trash can with it.  Then I walked back to the taxi and paid the nice gentleman and we were on our way for a full and fun first day in Hong Kong.

P.S.  The only other time I've seen LJ have an episode like this was when we had the kids at Sea World and we got on a corkscrew roller coaster with them.  When the ride stopped he was literally green.  Incidentally, he didn't hurl on that ride.  I guess with age comes less grace.