I stumbled into the emergency room at our local hospital; on Saturday looking for a painkiller. As I walked through the swing doors I stopped in surprise. The place has about 20 beds and only one or two were occupied. In the control center in the middle a large crowd of green coated men and women were looking at a computer which featured poker hands on the screen. The dealer was laying down the flop and two of the doctors yelled in delight as they saw their hands improving. One of them looked up and saw me. “Here comes a killjoy to interrupt our online casino session, folks!” I was hustled away to a bed. Something was going on in the nurses’ station as well and as far as I could see from where I was lying, it seemed to be game of roulette on the huge computer screen. A knot of about ten white coated nurses was crowded around this screen and they all seemed to be enjoying themselves. I heard a yell nearby and turned my head in the other direction. It came from behind a closed curtain, one that is used to screen off a patient when he or she is being attended to. I managed to hook the curtain with my foot so I could look inside. Craps! About 6 men are standing around the bed on which rested a laptop. All the men are in various stages of dress and undress – a shirt off here, another in a hospital gown, one with his arm in a sling and another supported on crutches and these guys are deep in a game of craps in an online casino. They are all trying to keep the noise level down and one or two even had their hands over their mouths. A nurse suddenly appeared holding two pills in her hand. “For your pain,” she said. I swallowed the pills. “What’s going on here?” I asked. Posted on: October 27, 2009
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