Categories: Break RoomScrubs

What’s the difference between a new nurse and a newbie nurse?

Scenario: Large objects start falling from the sky unexpectedly and a local emergency is declared
The new nurse reports to her supervisor and is immediately assigned the job of helping to transport less-critical patients to another wing of the hospital, clearing her unit for those who’ve been hit by the falling pianos and walruses. She wears her hard hat as she’s been trained to do and has an extra set of scrubs in her locker, just in case she gets splashed with some walrus.

The newbie nurse reports to her supervisor and is given the task of moving patients away from the windows and closing curtains and blinds. While doing so, she notices that some of the walruses and pianos aren’t falling as fast as others, and wonders if there might be a reason. Going outside, without her hard hat, she strikes up a conversation with the leader of a group that has predicted piano-and-walrus showers as part of the end of the world. After a few minutes, she remembers that she’s supposed to be closing windows in the hospital. Because the entrance is blocked with broken pianos, she scales the wall and crawls through a heating duct, arriving back on her unit just as the crisis ends.

One of these scenarios actually happened to me in the last year. I’ll let you decide which one it is. I’ll say frankly that I was a newbie that day!

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Agatha Lellis

Agatha Lellis is a nurse whose coffee is brought to her every morning by a chipmunk. Bluebirds help her to dress, and small woodland creatures sing her to sleep each night. She writes a monthly advice column, "Ask Aunt Agatha," here on Scrubs; you can send her questions to be answered at askauntieaggie@gmail.com.

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