Ever have "one of those days?" Where stupidity reigns supreme, inefficiency is the norm, and the only thing that can possibly quell your growing level of insanity is texting someone who you just know will laugh at your predicament?

That's right, boys and girls! It's time for a segment (that I've just made up) called "Text Me From Work," where we can all vent our ridiculous/frustrating/absolutely mind-boggling encounters with all whom we meet in the course of our job.

Nursing home giving you the run-around?

Text me from work, man!

Yet another million dollars of apparatus running up and down the street because Joe Moron turned on his dirty furnace for the winter and smelled a little bit of gas?

Ugh, I feel ya… text me from work.

Crazy, hammer-weilding PCP patient had you backed into a corner?

Cool story, bro—text me from work.

I suppose I was inspired in two parts by my love of "textsfromlastnight," a user-submitted content aggregation of funny (sometimes NSFW) stories told via 160 characters or less, and an absolutely ridiculous, ass-kicking day I spent on a medic unit two tours ago. The last few times I was detailed to this particular EMS unit, I had a relatively easy day. However, it appears that the gods were against me as I was repeatedly hammered with call after call. Them's the breaks, I guess.

Either way, I found myself notifying other like-minded souls who, while they couldn't stop the onslaught of inane situations, would completely understand my "FML" moment (UrbanDictionary, for the uninitiated—and no, it's not "fix my lighthouse").

I present to you the following verbatim texts that I sent while on a twenty-four hour medic unit detail. I hope you enjoy, and perhaps find a kindred spirit in the insane version of me.

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Dear [nursing home]: a photocopied piece of paper with "DNR*" written on it in Sharpie does not count as an actual legal document. Just FYI, thought you should know.

*stands for "Do Not Resuscitate," a legal directive stating that the patient is not to be treated with certain resuscitative efforts, and is instead allowed to die without invasive measures.

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Given recent events, maybe [Howard University Hospital] shouldn't have this displayed quite so prominently.

Plus, there's that whole Rosenbaum thing:

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Holy shit, you hear all this VA Tech shooting stuff?

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It might be one of those "grass is always greener" scenarios, but at least I know over here that all the grass is fucking dead.

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Jesus, that's our second weird call of the day. Dude works for [government agency]. Says he went to visit the Czech Repub. two years ago, banged out some chick and ahd shows up on his doorstep two days ago, in full crazy mode off her meds. Now she's faking seizures and stuff in his current/real gf's apartment for attention. Seriously, I can't make this up.

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(at 4:30pm:) I chugged coffee, drove home super quick when I was relieved, and woke up ten minutes ago. Yeah, it was one of *those* nights.

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What do you think? Should I register "textmefromwork.com" so we can all share our most ridiculous venting moments with each other? I'd love to hear some of the SMS messages you guys have sent, I'm sure there's some comedy gold out there. Gotta love the profession…

I haven't put up any photos in a while, so I figured it's about time for one of these. However, I'm doing two of them—this first one will be a collection of stuff I've seen/done recently, just the usual funny and offbeat items.

The second will be an end-of-the-year collection, in which I will select my favorites from all photos I've taken this year. Enjoy these below, and look forward to the big collection!

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One of our more recent calls involved an occupied vehicle in an enclosed parking structure. The front was tensioned with a come-along, and Res-Q-Jacks stabilized the rear to allow patient extrication.

Talk about old-school! Found hanging from an unknown locker above one of the older firehouses in the city.

Speaking of coats, they finally fixed mine (after three years!)

Building walkthroughs—very important. Lots of new residential structures are springing up in Southeast, and we're trying to stay on top of it.

"A truss is a truss is a truss, and it has no redundancy."

I was paging through a book about September 11th memorials when lo and behold, who did I come across? Yep, that's Andy Fredericks, whose legacy lives on not only in photos and trinkets but in the annual Andy Fredericks Training Days.

"Instead of anything resembling a proper eyewash station, let's just stick a bottle of tap water on the wall. Yeah, that should do it." Thanks, hospital administrators.

This is some top-dollar stuff right here. Need to input patient information for that last medical call? So, we're fresh out of that. How about a Blue Screen of Death instead?rry

Apparently, our computers aren't the only things that crash (damn Metro buses). If you look closely, you'll see that cloth medical tape really *can* fix everything! Nicely done, guys.

Yes, that's a car door embedded in the front of the wagon.

Work crews came into all the firehouses and mounted pictures of the mayor and the firechief (one of the more intelligent things they've done was choose to have it mounted behind impact-resistant plastic).

And lastly, here's some good ol' firehouse ingenuity for ya (it's probably stronger than a wooden truss, haha).