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Turn your head to the left and coughTurn your head to the left and cough

2004-07-09 - 12:14 p.m.
It was my first visit today to my new PCP, since my insurance had cut me off from going to the Doc-in-a-box.

'Juan' The Medical Technician (Male Nurse. No, don't even start with me. He's a male nurse. Its a noble profession. A Med Tech is an unneccessary trumped up name) stuck me, took my BP and gave me an ECG, which took him a long time. I guess he had trouble finding my heart.

I know I do, sometimes. Just call me Tin Man.

"Where you from, man?"
"England"
"Yeah yeah, I thought so, I saw the accent. I was going to tell you."
"Thanks, I knew already"
"Cool"

The Doc came in.

"Ah, you must be Doctor Whom-I-made-an-appointment-to-see"

"No, he's here too, I'm Doctor Who-you-didn't-make-an-appointment-to-see"

Handshake. Wet fish. Hmmm.

"Computer Geek?"
"I'm sorry?"
"You put down computer geek as you're occupation."
"Oh yeah, I just wanted to make sure you were paying attention."

Sadly, they weren't. Or my little glibness on the insurance forms threw them off they never got to read the stuff about PLEVA, Potential Sleep Apnea etc.

"Ok, drop your pants please"
"I guess we're going to go looking for Jimmy Hoffa now?"
"Heheh, no not today. Not until you hit fifty. Unless there's a history of colon cancer in your family."

I had to think about that for a second. My dad had three cancers - Skin, Bladder and Stomach. It was the stomach that finally did for him, after 10 years. My mom had breast cancer I think, but they caught it early.

"No, no colon cancer."

He grabbed my nuts and told me to cough, then took my BP again. He pumped his little bulb so hard, the end shot off. I started laughing.

"That'll do"
"Sorry, Doc *snicker*"

Since I was at the Big 4-0, they put me down for a cardiology referral, although the ECG came back normal.

One of the questions on the form was: "How many ounces of beer/day?"

"You put down two bottles of wine per week."
"Yup"
"How many glasses is that?"
"3 good ones, 4 normal ones per bottle. Eight glasses per week."

Truth be told, it varies. This week for instance, I haven't had a damn thing since Saturday. Other weeks I may have a bottle on Wednesday, one on Friday, and maybe some beer or more wine on Saturday. After a party, I may drink solidly each night for two weeks straight. Depends on how good the party was, I guess. But on average, its about two bottles per week. A glass is 187 ml, which means there's four in a 750 ml bottle.

"Well, maybe you could spread it out. You should be drinking two glasses every night."

I waited for his internal calculator to figure out what he was telling me.

"Which means you'd be drinking twice as much as you are now."
"Best not, then, eh?"
"Right"
"And you smoke?"
"Eclipse"

I went onto explain what Eclipse are. How they don't burn the tobacco, just heat it up. All the usual stuff. Damn, I should work for RJ Reynolds. Except I haven't finished paying off my soul yet.

"Well that's good. You should stop entirely though."
"Naturally."

In the end, I got my Lisinopril prescription, although I forgot to mention the ACT inhibitor, so it didn't have that in it. But I don't mind starting off slow. I didn't talk to him about the PLEVA. Didn't see the point. Nor did I talk about my briefly brain going off the hook every night and scaring the shit out of me. No biggie. I'll get round to it.

After the exciting physical, I went and got two new front tires, finally. So I'm now poorer by $200, which means I have just under $300 to get me through the next two weeks, and truth be told I'll probably piss that away this weekend. Oh well.

I also have a new interview that I have to put online on the website. Don't hold your breath. It's okay, if you like cats, but its not a well known name this time. Not yet anyway.

Now I'm bak home and I have work to do. So I guess I'd better do it, huh?

Enjoy your Friday...

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  • Name: Catpewk
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