Bush gives speech a day after fainting

Former President George H.W. Bush was in good spirits as he gave a speech in Los Angeles on Monday night, a day after being overcome by sweltering desert heat and staying overnight at a hospital.

Bush walked with a cane onstage at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion and joked with the audience before beginning his lecture on values. He said that he felt tired while playing golf with some friends in Palm Springs on Sunday afternoon and went to sit in a chair.

“The next thing I know, I fainted,” Bush said, adding he wasn’t happy with what happened next.

“The ugliest part of what happened was that my [male] friend ... gave me mouth-to-mouth resuscitation,” he said with a smile.

A spokeswoman for Eisenhower Medical Center in Rancho Mirage said the former president stayed overnight at the desert hospital and was released early Monday.

Bush and former First Lady Barbara Bush were visiting Lee Annenberg, widow of the late Ambassador Walter Annenberg.

Bush Chief of Staff Jean Becker told the Associated Press in Houston that Bush fainted while playing golf with friends in 94-degree heat.

“He’s fine, he really is fine,” Becker said. “He became dehydrated, and he had a fainting spell. He came to right away, but as a precaution they took him to the hospital and then -- much to his dismay -- as a precaution, they held him overnight. The doctors released him first thing this morning.”