MaryEsther and Louise in The Hospital

MaryEsther and Louise were each sitting up in a hospital bed in the same room in the county hospital.

"I'm bored. What shall we do?" asked MaryEsther.

"I don’t know. What do you think we should do?" replied Louise.

"There’s not much we can do. That nurse with the mustache said we couldn’t get out of bed. I think she made up that rule. I don’t like her eyes. I had a cat with eyes like that once."

"Well, we’ll just have to think of something to do in bed. Now, let’s see...what do people do in bed?"

"They sleep."

"I know, but there must be more we can do."

"I have a bedpan."

"I don’t need a bedpan right now, thank you."

"No, I mean maybe we could use our bedpans like catcher’s mitts and play catch. Want to try?"

"OK," said Louise.

MaryEsther thought for a second. "We need a ball. Do you have a ball?"

Louise’s face brightened. "I have a baked potato from last night’s dinner tray. I put it in my bedside table. That will work, won’t it?"

"It will do. OK, what are the rules for the game?"

"Do we have to have rules? Can’t we just throw the potato into the bedpan?"

"I guess so, but can we think of another name for the game? ‘Throw the Potato Into The Bedpan’ sounds so clinical...like a medical procedure or something. I don’t like the sound of it. It’s not lady-like."

"OK. We’ll call it, ‘Spud in the Tub.’ How’s that?"

"Much better, thank you."

Louise took the foil-wrapped potato in her right hand and screwed up her face the way she remembered Whitey Ford doing and gave the potato a fling toward MaryEsther’s waiting bedpan.

With the deft response of a Yogi Berra, MaryEsther caught the potato in midair. The game was on.

Back and forth, back and forth the potato was thrown, occasionally losing bits of foil and drops of butter as it flew through the air.

At one point, just as Louise gave the potato a really good fling, the nurse with the mustache and the cat’s eyes walked into the room so quickly and unexpectedly that the flying potato hit her square in the side of the head.

"It’s... bath... time,ladies," she announced in a somewhat strained voice.

"Can we have bubbles?" asked Louise.

"Actually, I always use a little JOY dish soap and some epsom salts in my bath. Do you have any JOY and epsom salts?" asked MaryEsther.

The nurse left the room.

"She’s really very helpful, isn’t she?" asked Louise.

"Yes. I really shouldn’t have mentioned her mustache earlier. Maybe I can tell her about Mama’s mustache remover. I have the recipe in her old Grange Cook Book."

"Yes, she is an angel of mercy and we have to remember that. But she does have very cold hands, doesn’t she?"

"Maybe she needs some of your spring tonic. It always puts fire in my veins."

"Yes, and I’ll make her some honey and sesame seed bars," said Louise.

MaryEsther and Louise smiled, closed their eyes, and took a nap, knowing they were about to brighten someone’s day.