I knew going into yesterday that it was going to be rough, with both supervisors off and me being the only Visa specialist on hand. Phone, paper, phone, blah blah blah. So Noon lunch time comes, and me and my clique go to Foodtopia, a local buffet, to meet another friend that came over from one of the branches. I make all of the standard moves: ribs, greek salad, some honeydew (for the digestion). Good stuff.

I pay, and wait as another member of the group gets herself situated. I'm watching her at the register and keeping an eye out for the other two, who are still trying to figure out what to get. I open my Sobe Energy (which I told the cashier was my favorite), and take a drink. I think the cashier has a crush on me, because she always manages to have lipstick on by the time I hit the line, and she can never quite look me in the eye- I hope she doesn't think ill of me for being there with three women...

I take another drink, and as I lower the bottle the noise of a body hitting the floor and displacing furniture erupts about five feet away from me. I go over to the scene, where a tall older man of 50-60 lays on the floor in the fetal position. "Are you ok?" I ask, obviously not, but he says that he hurt his leg. "We need some help!" I yell across the restaurant, and one of the grill men comes over to help move tables away from around the man. We make a clearing and roll the man over on his back to straighten him out. I yell for an ambulance, and a bystander tells me that one has been called.

Througout the ordeal, various employees of the buffet are bringing things- folded towels for his head, folded boxes for his legs. He's cold, so one of them brings him a fleece. I ask the man's name- "Lester," he barely says through a mouth only half full of teeth. "I'm Cameron, Lester- we're getting you some help." The grill man asks about the man's sugar, which is high, meaning that he is diabetic. I ask about other meds that he's on, he says that he's bipolar but doesn't know the name of his pills.

The grill man and I are kneeling on either side of him, and it seems that we've done all we can do for now. He looks at me and puts his hands together, thanking me for my help. He offers his hand and says his name is Tei, and I give him a good shake and introduce myself. It was good to have help.

I go outside to check for the ambulance, which cannot even be heard yet. A guy in a Bears cap is outside, and had been watching the ordeal from the beginning. He lights a smoke "I hope I don't have to call them for anything," he says. "No kidding. I see you're a Bears fan- not too many of us out here..." We shake hands.

I go in and out of the buffet a couple of times, keeping watch for the ambo and seeing if anything needed to be done for Lester. Finally the ambulance shows up, but lunchtime traffic on Baltimore Street is terrible. When the light turns green at the next intersection and traffic doesn't clear, I start yelling again. "Ambulance right here!" I'm loud even when I'm not trying to be, so when that's my intention and there are skyscrapers to bounce the sound off of, everyone gets the message.

The EMTs, Tei, and I get Lester into a chair and they start quizzing him on his info and taking his vitals. I share the little info that I got from him earlier. He's basically homeless, and bounces from hospital to hospital because he doesn't like the group home that the state put him in- he can't get up and walk around, he says.

Finally we get him into the ambulance and off they go to Mercy hospital around the corner. Tei thanks me again and refuses payment for the two Diet Cokes that Lester asked for. I go back to my friends, who call me Doogie and the Other Dr. Holley as the employees of the buffet straighten the chairs and tables that were pushed around.

Ten minutes after that, a family of three comes in and the father sits down in the same place that Lester had only thirty minutes before. He of course didn't know, and it was like the whole thing never happened.