The one ultrasound I recall having was borderline painful, but that owed more to the technician pressing a piece of plastic right between hip and thigh where I'd caught myself with a table corner than to the actual ultrasonic waves.

The standard thinking these days is that Metropolis is NYC. Gotham is in Jersey.

Gotham may be geographically located in New Jersey. I think in a metaphorical sense, it was definitely based on New York City, and Metropolis probably owes mostly to early 20th century NYC as well although the newspaper setting is probably Chicago-inspired.

I've had a number of different types of ultrasound and never had any pain. Just goop.

Grammar question:

Is it "Department staff maintain..." or "Department staff maintains..."? The former looks right to me, but Word's grammar checker is disagreeing.

I say the first looks right. The second seems to me would only be right if there is a monolithic entity called "Department Staff."

Unless they won't let you--like those bastards at NY Methodist!

That must vary by department, because I saw all of mine. I have the printouts on my desk right now, AIFG!

Oh I'm sure they let you if you are pregnant, that's why that "legal" talk was all bullshit. And actually, I understand the whole "we don't want to scare the shit out of you" argument. But persisting when I clearly knew what the hell was going on? Annoying.

Oh, ugh--I just looked at my flight itinerary for tomorrow closely, and noticed that the plane I'm supposed to take on American is one of those MD-80s that are being inspected right now. From their website, it looks like the flight is still scheduled, but that might change by tomorrow. I hate possible flight cancellation!

hivemind question: trashcan or garbage can?

Both, but I guess I use "garbage/garbage can" more often.

Hmm. Trash can for non-kitchen, garbage/garbage can for kitchen. Just because I'm difficult.