Annals of Medical Triumph, Vol. Whatever

I went for an MRI late this afternoon.  This was not one of those “I don’t have anything better to do, maybe I’ll go in for an unpleasant medical experience” things.   Having gone to my back doctor for more than a year, I think he realized I was not just going to go away and so he ordered one to have a little look see at what is actually going on inside my back.  Why am I whining all the time, in other words.

Sweet pancakes of mine, I had always heard how LOUD an MRI is, but was unprepared for the reality of it.  It is stick your head in a jet engine loud.  I am of the generation that shared in the hearing damage of serious rock shows and none of them were this loud.  And that was with earplugs and these sound deadening blocks on my ears.  “Sound deadening.”  It is to laugh.

They shoved me into a tiny tube after repeatedly asking if I was claustrophobic.  How I wish I said yes, maybe they would have given me drugs.  mrpeenee’s new Rule Number 1: Always demand drugs when in a hospital.  Even if you’re just visiting some patient. Then the racket cranked up.

I remembered reading about some christian who chanted “Christ’s mercy” as he was being martyred (and these pagan guys in charge of martyring were terribly inventive.  Saints are depicted usually with some reference to how they met their grisly fate; Saint Lucy with her eyeballs on a plate, Saint Agatha with her titties on another plate, Saint Lawrence, who was grilled and toasted alive, is shown holding a griddle, which usually looks sort of like a waffle maker.  In the Sistine Chapel, Jesus is getting up from his chair and turning away from all the damned with this air of “I am through with you.  Later bitches.” and all the saints form a sort of scrimmage line between him and the out of luck souls trying to scramble out of hell.  But Lucy, Agatha and Lawrence, ready to tackle them and still holding those damn plates and griddle, give it the air of very odd buffet.  Christians.  So weird.)

Anyway, I tried mentally chanting “Christ’s mercy”, but it didn’t seem to do much, possibly because I am a heathen, so I switched it up to “RuPaul’s mercy, RuPaul’s mercy.”  That didn’t do much either.  I just gave up and started hoping I would begin hallucinating soon.

They finally dragged me out.  The tech cheerfully said “Well, that was a long one, but we got some great pictures!” I was literally staggering and limping from being cramped and not moving for 45 minutes, but it was after 6:00, these guys were ready to get out of work, so they kept announcing that I just had to go through the double doors.  They had the air of a bartender shoving the last drunks out the room.

I didn’t care.  I was so glad it was over, I would have crawled out if I’d had to.  So now I’m  home eating Oxycodone and ice cream in about equal measure.  But we got some great pictures!  Maybe I’ll get some wallet size ones.

Or maybe I would prefer these back pictures

Definitely.  Better than my back.