How fun is it to drive around a city in an ambulance on icy roads rescuing people from their own stupidity? Well, the rescuing stupid people can be fun at times depending on the situation, but the icy roads part is not fun. At all. I had to do this for 24 hours yesterday. I live in TEXAS for crying out loud. It's not supposed to get that cold here, at least not in D/FW, maybe the panhandle. Isn't that why people live in Texas? Sure snow is great. It's a fun treat for the 3 hours it sticks around every 3 years we get it. But ice is crap. And Texans DO NOT know how to drive on it. There were so many accidents on the roads of FW yesterday that were caused by stupid people driving too fast. We were transporting (very slowly I might add) a legitimate patient from far north FW to downtown. The roads were an ice block, and we drove 10-20 mph in order to keep from sliding off the road. When we got into downtown, this guy flew down the freeway past us, then immediately proceeded to slide across three lanes (um, sideways), hit the wall and then was hit by another car. Hello?...stupid. We reported the accident but couldn't stop as we were already engaged with another patient. It was another 10 minutes before we got to the hospital- because we were driving reponsibly- and we still hadn't heard an ambulance dispatched to this accident - there just weren't enough ambulances to cover all the calls we were getting on stupid people like this. Ok, so I'm cynical. People, use your brains. That's the reason G-d gave them to you. Be responsible for yourself, and don't do things that are unreasonably dangerous and could get you killed. I'm sure this guy was fine-I've seen enough accidents like this and people are rarely seriously injured. But something bad could've happened.

I got hardly any sleep last night because I kept getting dispatched on accidents on icy roads in our vicinity. I was tired because I had stayed up until 2am working an overtime shift the day before my 24 hour shift. Every time I would try to take a nap or go to bed, I would get comfortable and then they [dispatchers] would dispatch me on a call. I love my job. Being a paramedic is fun when you don't let the cynicism take hold and choke the life out of you. I think I've mastered control over my cynicism. But it just amazes me how stupidly people behave. When there's ice on the roads, drive slowly. It's that simple.

And I want to kiss the person who invented those charcoal hand warmers. They are really a finger-tip saver. It's hard starting IVs with frozen fingers.