A CONFIDENCE BUILDER

Went to the cardiologist to get a scan done.

Sitting in the waiting room the TV is on with a movie, and I don’t know which, but the foul language that was emanating from the it was enough to make a man get up and go over to the receptionist window to complain to the point that she shut the TV off!

My name is mispronounced, mangled and screwed up, not to mention said wrong. A woman technician escorts me to her den. The technician asked me to take off my shirt and lie down. The room was dark and it was just the two of us, so I figured, what the heck, let’s give it a ride. She sits next to a computer monitor and has in her hand a probe that she stuck in my sides. After applying some kind of gel, pushing hard she slowly runs the probe along the ribs, trying to dig deep enough to rearrange my kidney with my intestines, a job she is apparently adept at.

Suddenly she stops in mid dig, alarm comes over her face and calls in another techie, as she says: “What does this MEAN?” pointing to the screen. He, an astute young man, puts his Sesame Street lunch pail down and says: “Maybe it is left over from another patient?” This is the part where I generally start to cry for my mommy. She says: “I NEVER saw THAT before!” (No matter how loud you scream for your mommy, if she is not in the vicinity, she will not respond.)

“Uh, is this anything for me to get excited about, or do I pretend I didn’t hear it?” say I.

“Oh! Just relax Mr. DelBloggolo, just relax!”

The young man shrugs his shoulders as he looks at the screen and picks up his lunch pail and goes back into the other room from where he came. She looks at me and shrugs HER shoulders and continues. (Bedside manner is so important)

Having had to starve up to three hours before the test and only one lousy cup of coffee: I am famished. Shaken but hungry I leave and get into the car, which was parked in the parking lot on the hottest day of the year so far, it was so hot a dog was chasing a cat and they were walking! I drive to McDonald’s (Yes, from the Cardiologist’s office) and have a steak and egg on a bagel to reward myself for starving and to up my chances of a heart attack, in the heat of the day. If you don’t put a little adventure and risk into life, you wind up eating corn flakes!

As I am done eating I go to empty my tray, and a little old lady, holding a tray herself is teetering on the brink of disaster, struggling to hold on with one hand, so I put my tray in front of her and ask her to place hers on top of mine. She thanks me and says as I empty both: “It cost you extra work for your kindness!” 

“I need to work off the extra calories, and yours looked like a calorie burner!”