No, she’s not a new fangled nurse. Just a pseudo waitress that I took a picture of in Stockholm.

But there doesn’t seem to be all that much difference between waitresses and nurses, in the eyes of many. Hospital administrators and many patients act like nurses are there to “serve” and then disgruntled when the service isn’t instant or to their liking.

Meals? Well, if the soup is cold the nurse is blamed. Take ti back, they bark, as if they’re in a restaurant. “I want something else. Where’s the menu?”

Some patients, who are quite capable of getting up and out of bed, and who would benefit from the mobility, keep their damn finger on the call button. “Can you bring me a cup of tea? With lemon and sugar?”

“I want a new pillow case. I don’t like the color.”

“Can you refill my pitcher? The ice is starting to melt. Well, I know I just asked you to refill it five minutes ago, but you didn’t put in enough ice.”

Both waitresses and nurses get paid hourly, and from what I can tell, many hospitals require nurses to punch a time clock! How demeaning does it get? A nurse is supposed to be a professional, but having a time clock shows that these esteemed professionals cannot be trusted to be honest about time worked.

And at least, a waitress gets tips.

I’m not sure why I chose to write about this today, except that its the Christmas season, and a lot of nurses would have loved to have been off, but instead, had to come in and punch the time clock. And got no appreciation from patients or administrators (the administrators were at home stuffing their faces and getting drunk) for working on a holiday. One friend of mine, who does per diem work at a nursing home, says that they have managed to find a way around giving holiday time to workers such as herself. Lovely.