Doctors Be Damned

I awoke yesterday morning to find my condition far worse than I had feared. My head was throbbing, my throat a cascade of mocos and pain, my body on the level with any man in his mid nineties.

I knew I needed codeine quick, but how does one attain this "dangerously addictive narcotic" while living in the suburbs of a Minnesotan city?

Go to the doctor and pretend that death is near. This is about the only way, and still it's precarious at best.

Of course I take my chances, as the only alternative is to lie around in agony wondering what would have happened if I would have taken my chances.

I grab a book of Strindberg plays and climb into my freezing truck with full intentions of going to the nearest clinic to wait and read until a doctor agrees to see me.

On the way, however, I realize that my breath may still reek of last night's home remedy: brandy, lemon juice, and honey. I start to think that it may be difficult to convince the doctor I'm dying if he/she smells liquor on my breath, so I go to McDonald's and eat a sausage and egg biscuit, washing it down with a coke.

Now I'm set, but I have an urge to smoke a cigarette. I give in of course and smoke it down, trying to find a gas station where I can find some kind of mints to cover the scent of smoke. Afterall, I'm supposedly dying.

I finally score some Halls and head to the clinic.

As I enter the clinic, I'm slightly amazed to find hardly anyone there. I wonder if this is luck or its antithesis. I fill out the papers and sit down with my Strindberg. As I begin reading, my mind drifts off into thinking, "What kind of a dying man sits in a waiting room reading a book?" So now I only read a few lines when I think no one is looking.

After all that nonsense is over, I find myself in the doctor's office pleading my case.

"It's been days of sleepless nights, coughing, headaches. I just have to get some sleep." I say this while thinking I'm pretty clever because my hungover appearance is the perfect proof of my story.

The doctor just says something like, "yeah, it's going around."

"Oh, yeah" I say.

"Yeah, have you tried cold medicine?" the doc asks clinically.

"Oh, yeah" I say "I've tried all that stuff, but it never seems to work."

Then I look over and see that the good doctor is writing a script for Robitussin DM. Without being able to contain myself at all I scoff, "That stuff won't work."

"This is what I recommend." the doc responds.

Inside I'm screaming and just as I'm about to unleash my crazed monkey, the doctor continues with, "I could give you Robitussin with codeine if you want."


Thoughts and stories are racing through my mind at this point. My panic is slightly reduced, and eventually I realize that this is as good as it's going to get so I say demurely, "yeah, that would be better."

"Be careful though. It may make you drowsy."

"Oh yeah, of course. " I say. All the while I'm thinking, this shit is so weak I'd probably have to slam the whole bottle to get any effect at all.

Then, the doctor abruptly rises and heads toward the door, but before leaving turns and says, "you should stop smoking."

I just sit there with my lame scripts and think, "God damn, why did I even bother with these fucks."

Nevertheless, I got my script filled, downed three or four tablespoons and drove around for a half hour waiting for relief that never came.

Now it is day two, the bottle is almost gone, and I slept four hours. So much for "may cause drowsiness."

It looks like it's back to home remedies.

Analysis:

A) I look like a dope fiend and will, therefore, never get any decent scripts from doctors around here.
B) Doctors around here are scared morons who thought that going to med school was a good idea at the time.
C) It's time to take a trip to Bolivia to make sure this shit never happens again.
D) Don't even bother with doctors as a general rule.
E) All of the above.