Having recovered from a fourth round of chemotherapy and another bout of pneumonia, I'm starting to taste a bit of normal life. But there are always the funny little things that remind me I'm still leading the hospital lifestyle.

Take my recent conversation with my nurse, for example:

Nurse: "Hi! How are you doing?"
Me: "Good. How are you?"
Nurse "Great!"
Me [remembering seeing my nurse many times over the past week]: "How many days a week do you work?"
Nurse: "We don't do days per week - we do days per month" [The conversation continues... Skip forward,,,]
Me: "How far from work do you live?"
Nurse: "Not too far. Downtown."
Me: "So how long does it take you to get to work?"
Nurse: "About twenty to forty minutes. So have you moved your bowels today?"

Yep, that's part of the everyday chitchat here in the hospital. Imagine asking that question in the office...