Typical day, typical stuff?

Confluence of stuff, belying the thought of a “typical day”.

Started my day, yesterday, doing a bit of volunteer doctoring (I still do a bit). Into the office to get a bit of stuff done for some upcoming meetings this week and other “usual stuff” stuff. I paused in those endeavors and examined a sub-galeal hematoma and skull fracture as one of my deputies retrieved a “bullet” from a death by suicide, as requested by the police agency involved in the case. Then I walked across the street to watch a press conference being held by a local state senator regarding proposed legislation to make it a felony for parents to knowing allow underage drinking to occur if a serious consequence of that drinking occurs. I was asked, rather spur-of-the-moment, to speak of my thoughts on the issue and it’s utility in preventing teen deaths (my comments ended up in the local newspapers and on WGN). I then went out to participate in the “scene” investigation of a death (man severely in a burned out pickup truck, investigation still in progress). When I got back to the office, I did get a couple of “usual stuff” tasks done, not to mention taking at least half-a-dozen media calls. My meeting last evening went off without problem.

Today I began with a meeting of the Lake County Underage Drinking Prevention Committee. While there I was notified of a homicide that one of my deputies had responded to. When I got back to the office, the first autopsy of the day had begun, the homicide autopsy was “scheduled to follow”. The third autopsy (on the victim from yesterday) was ultimately postponed until tomorrow. While I was still trying to get my act together for tomorrow’s meeting of the Lake County Suicide Prevention Task Force, some guys came by to replace the broken window in my office forcing me out to the conference room for a bit. File reviews, case reviews, review of material from this morning’s meeting, review of other stuff, talked with a recent decedent’s family member about a couple of issues, media calls (about today’s homicide, yesterday’s death and a couple of other matters), this blog post and my day was done.

Although I will be leaving for the day soon, I am always on-call and I look forward to the interesting stuff to come now and into the future. (Did I get the stuff done for tomorrow’s meeting?)