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Thursday, January 15, 2009

Witz Pickz: Medical Mysteries Unsolved

Welp, I can no longer say that I've never gotten an ultra-sound. Last night, some champion driving got me to my ENT doctor's appointment right before he left despite a major train delay (Witz 1 - Environmentally Conscious Public Transportation 0). Dr. Salvatore La Quinta (last name vaguely disguised to be more like a hotel chain) was not what I expected, but he was finally a doctor that took my horrible immune system and proclivity for getting every cold imaginable seriously. Which is why I now know that my neck is not pregnant.

After some initial questions, he cut right to the chase and told me to, "Lie back so I can get an ultrasound of your neck." Boom. After talking extensively with my other doctors, they were wary of even offering the advice to get "Cold-eeze when you start to feel sick." This guy went from zero to hero and busted out the ultrasound right out of the gate. And why not?? If I had an ultrasound machine hanging around, I would be looking at the phosphorescent insides of EVERYTHING. Leave me in a room with an ultrasound for more than 15 minutes, and I guarantee you'd walk in on me naked as the day I was born, with ultrasound gel all over me like I was straight outta the womb.

Unfortunately/Fortunately, he didn't leave me with it, but used it to look at my lymph nodes and salivary glands. I wasn't able to turn my head and see the screen, but my peripheral vision let me understand that on ultrasound, they look exactly like a game of Asteroids with that old school computer coloring of yellow and black. In fact, there's a pretty solid chance that this guy just smeared some vaseline on my skin, rolled an Atari controller over my neck and played video games while I waited:

"Ok, everything looks-- FUCK!"
"What?"
"Oh nothing-- you're...triangle gland...just teleported right in front of...a large moving lymph node."
"Triangle glands can teleport!?"
"Yes. Yes they can. But no more than twice in a row or they blow up."
"Issss that something I should be concerned with??"
"No, no, you should be fine."
"Hah, wow-- evolution's neat."

In the end, the doctor was only able to confirm that I didn't have anything horrible, like a thyroid cyst or a tumor. He asked if I was fatigued a lot as a symptom of mono, but he didn't ask if I went to sleep too late, slept terribly, occasionally drank on weeknights, had 32 cans of Sparks in my fridge, was currently in a territorial war with an overly aggressive cuddling cat, ever regained consciousness into the business end of a police flashlight, or knew the La Barca bartenders by name-- so I said "no," to avoid any confusion. I remain undiagnosed.


PHOTO:


This is a self-admittedly unnecessary photo by Nitro. It is meant to depict me being owned by disease. It also looks like I am either a Mexican Wrestler about to square off against this Mucusal Marauder in an epic performance art manifestation of my physical state, OR I am about to reveal some magic tricks-- er-- illluusssions-- to a crowd on FOX. Either way, I'm bound to develop a cough.

Almost Friday,
Witz

1 comment:

JKow said...

One (by that I mean "ME") might also interpret this photo to mean that you have neither an angel nor a devil on your shoulder guiding you- you just have mucus... at least when you where your rey mysterio mask.