Stand-Up Doctor

Wednesday I had my annual visit with the OB-GYN. Or as some
people here in Blogland call him, the Cooter Doc. Since I am a
high-falutin' hillbilly puttin' on airs, I am not going to give you the
details of THAT part of the visit. And I will just call him Doc.

This annual visit is a bit like going to see a stand-up comic. White-
haired Doc is pretty funny. After running through the updated health
questionnaire, he asked about some medicine that he had prescribed,
since I needed a refill. Then he said, "Do you have any with you? So
I can see what it looks like?" (Uh, yeah. But didn't you prescribe it in
the first place?) Then he gave me the gown and said, "Leave on your
socks. I'll be back in a minute to humiliate you."

I wonder if his assistant ever gets tired of his routine? He's good at
it. Not like the poor college kids at Silver Dollar City, who you know
are giving the same spiel on the hour all summer. (For their little shows,
silly. They don't look up women's cooters.) Doc acts like you're
the only one he's ever made these jokes to. (And what is worse, girls...
having that durn exam, or having it with somebody watching? I know,
lawsuits and stuff, but I'd rather not have the audience.) So we got done
with the business end of the appointment, and Doc put his hands tightly
around my neck and said, "Swallow." Which was kind of hard, because
he had his hands squeezing tightly around my neck. He said, "Hmmm..."
(OK, that's not something I want to hear in a doctor's office.) Doc said
he wanted to test my thyroid.

So after I was dressed again, Doc came in and typed on his laptop to
get the prescription refill. Then he said, "Now what else?" So I
reminded him "Thyroid." He typed a bit and said, "Oh, yeah. We'll
need a diagnosis. Goiter." I'm sure he was just talking to himself about
what code to use to bill my insurance and co-insurance within an inch
of their lives, but all I heard was the word "goiter." Then I started to
laugh out loud. Doc looked at me like that wasn't really part of my
routine. I told him, "I just watched that Seinfeld the other night where
Elaine volunteered to visit the woman who had a football-sized goiter."
Doc said he can't stay up late enough to watch Seinfeld. I haven't
figured out if that is a good thing, or a bad thing.

Then we proceeded to the bloodletting room so Doc could get a
blood sample for the thyroid test. The chair was a brown leather-
look recliner. Usually the other offices have a student desk. And
usually the other offices have a nurse or phlebotomist take the blood.
Doc went to tie the big rubber band thing around my arm, and he
had picked up two. Oh, and did I mention that he was on his knees
beside the recliner? Then he flipped my vein like a heroin-shooter
(I've seen them on TV, OK?) and said "I've never done this before,
but the video I watched last night made it look easy." After sucking
out some blood (sorry to my teacher friend who does not like
stories about blood being sucked out of people's veins with a needle
into a tube, but is OK with shots of dead or weakened virus cells
being shot into people with a needle), Doc put on a piece of gauze
and that tape that rips off three layers of skin, and said "Leave this
on long enough to get sympathy so someone will take you to lunch."

I think he is a real doctor. If not, we've got to stop meeting like this.