Weekend before last, Biggy and I were out riding at Blankets Creek, and I inhaled a bug. Of course this set off an awful coughing jag, which has now lasted for more than ten days. For the first few, I figured it was the bug working its way out. I pictured its little body breaking up the way a roach once broke up in Biggy's cocktail at the Chamber back in '97. (Dancing in the dark club, he kept finding pieces of something in his rum and coke, spitting or rubbing it off his tongue until he realized what it was.) I thought I'd cough up wings and antennae, etc. and be done.
Somewhere along the line, I started feeling like I'd been hit by a Vespa--you know, not like Strep or the flu, where you feel like you've been hit by a truck; more the way you feel when you've performed sty surgery on yourself with tweezers, Q-tips, and a bottle of peroxide--on top of having bronchitis and a sinus infection. Yeah, what I have.
I sat in a Wellstar URGENT Care facility for three hours to find that out. THREE HOURS. I watched the View, read two old Family Circles, listened to some greasy old pharmaceutical rep work his magic with the office manager, and still had time to imagine the scenario in which they discovered I had lung cancer (which never would have been caught if it hadn't been for the bug). I was giving myself the pep talk about being brave for those around me and setting an example of dying with dignity when they called me back.
I did like the doctor, though. She was probably about 11, but she did not laugh when I told her the bug story. She didn't tell me I was crazy, that I'd "probably just SWALLOWED" the bug or that a bug would have already been "absorbed into my system" (Biggy, Hank). SHE ordered lung x-rays. SHE was afraid I might have aspiration pneumonia.
I didn't, but still.
And I think I fixed my eye.
15 comments:
I wanna hear more about how
the << greasy old pharmaceutical rep work(ed) his magic with the office manager,>>
glad you're all better
I miss the Chamber. :(
so, did the x-ray show any part of a bug?
m.rupere, what's better is watching perkie young barbie reps work their magic with the doctors.
i don't like it when the neighbors talk cryptic stuff. what's the chamber?
oh. sorry familydownthestreet. i missed it the first time. chamber must be a club or something.
Wow, I bet you look pretty hot...
Do you need me to come home and take care of you because your disease could be life threatening and you want me to be there to comfort you??? huh, huh?
Oh my god, the CHAMBER!!! Maybe Biggy was in a roach fetish room.
Is that place still there??
Alas, Button, it closed a few years ago.
George, I could use someone to bring me my pills.
Mamoo, no bug parts in teh x-ray.
thefamilydownthestreet, REALLY?
m. ru, the "magic" was all about him getting into her email contacts, not her pants.
dont spray Raid down your throat.
i learned a hard lesson
And here I was thinking you were so smart...
now i want Mamoo to post about the perky barbie reps w the perky you- know-whats working the poor vulnerable docs
Tania, I probably saw you at the Chamber back at the day. That used to be one of our fave hangouts. Although we were going more in the early and mid-90s when it was still gothy and not so "frat boys and burb babes looking for a thrill at the weirdo bar." :-)
Yeah, what is it with the baby doctors these days?
Speaking of the reps, this obnoxious one asked me point blank, "what does it take for you to prescribe five prescription of @@@@@?"
I almost said a lap dance. But I was afraid he may have complied!
The reps can be extremely annoying. I hated to be them and be treated by folks like me.
TR, did they give you any antibiotics?
Dr. Alavi! She did give me antibiotics--Biaxin. And an inhaler.
I'm feeling good as new today.
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