Monday, January 01, 2007

Limping Into 2007

Well, somehow I managed to limp into year 2007 - literally.

Overall, 2006 wasn’t exactly a raging Duke lacrosse party for me but somehow still left me feeling like one abused exotic dancer. It was a rough one indeed. And trying to recall it in all its halloed crappiness is nearly impossible at the moment as I have a head full of Benylin and a chest full of Bronchitis.

To top it all off, my wits are about as foggy these days as Willie Nelson’s tour bus.

And, sadly, the biggest victim of all is you, dear readers, what with having to go without your regular doses ‘ol Crazytigerrabbitman lovin’. At least for the past few months anyway. So lets back this train ‘o fun up a little bit and let me try and put some perspective on the past few months for you.

I am alive and I am well. But as I mentioned before – I’m sicker than bejesus*.

The entire latter half of 2006, as a matter of fact, I’ve been a physical and emotional wreck. At the moment, my nose is running like a diuretic gerbil, it feels like somebody is blowing glass in my chest, and my lips are so chapped that I look like Linda Blair in ‘The Exorcist’. The Benylin cough medicine I’m currently taking has my brain doing summersaults so that I can barely recall what I had for breakfast, much less what’s been transpiring over the last few months. And I’m afraid that if I slip into any more of a medicated state I’ll completely lose grip with reality altogether and next thing you know I’m walking around with Emmanuelle Lewis on my shoulders and dangling babies from hotel balconies.

But Benylin isn’t completely without its charms. For example, I spent last night in a medicated stupor trying to sync up Frank Zappa’s ‘Joe’s Garage’ with ‘Agnes of God’. Not exactly Nobel Prize worthy research, I agree, but in comparison to the rest of my past two months, it was a regular Jerry Bruckheimer movie.

Before I got myself hooked on this miracle syrup, I tried that NeoCitran crap**. What can I say? A picture of some happy, smiling woman wrapped up in an afghan and sipping on a nice, steaming cup of lemony goodness suckered me in. As it turns out, drinking NeoCitran is about as warm and comforting as drinking the Devil’s piss. It doesn’t even taste lemony so much as it tastes like evil! Besides, after investigating the ingredients on the box, I discovered that NeoCitran contains the decongestant ‘Analgesic’.

Now, I have no idea what Analgesic is or what healing properties it has, but it sure explains to me why NeoCitran tastes like complete ass! I don’t want to taste, smell, touch, see, or even come within 15 ft of anything with the first four letters ANAL in it. You don’t have to be a David Livingstone to figure that out.

Lets back it up even further.

For the past few months, I have been dealing with the pain of having developed flat feet. I know, I know...arn't feet supposed to be flat? How else would you balance on them? There have been times when my brain has practically imploded trying to figure that one out. But whatever, it’s like walking around on two bruises. There have been times when I get home from the gym that this constant nagging pain has had me ready to solve the problem by hacking off my feet at the ankles, replacing them with wooden pegs and changing my name to Sinbad. But somebody usually talks me out of it at the last moment (usually the cashier at Home Depot).

Instead, I reluctantly ventured back into the ‘Lair of the She Beast’. That is, I booked an appointment with my family doctor’s receptionist.

For those of you long running fans that have somehow managed to prevent your brains from wasting away over the past three years of reading this little piece of Blogosphere lovingly referred to as the ‘Den of the Crazytigerrabbitman’, you will hopefully remember the original post that started it all: Terror of All Terror’s.

Back then, it was in regards to a bad case of heat rash on my Charlie Brown’s. Mostly, I have blocked the incident from my mind completely, but lately I had to revisit the scene of the crime. I was immediately flashed with images of me standing there with my pants down around my ankles and my doctor crouching down to check out my boys like some kind of monster squirrel inspecting his acorns. I remember feeling extremely vulnerable and like that was the start of something unexpected, like I might next find myself zipping across the Mediterranean in a boat towards Mekenos wearing a pair of assless chaps. I remember sweating like Ryan Seacrest at a screening of ‘Brokeback Mountain’.

So it was very unnerving to now have to walk back into the office again after only three years. There was one other patient in the lobby wheezing like an asthmatic giraffe. She sounded like a bag of party favors in a windstorm. Yep. This was the place.

As was custom, I coldly greeted by Receptionzilla. I was startled to note that she looked even more terrifying than I had remembered. The years had not been kind to her. Her face had contorted itself into a permanent scowling expression and she had more lines on her face than a compact mirror left on the back of a Studio 54 toilet. Her fingernails were the color of school buses and her hands had twisted into two talon-like claws. I had to take a moment to compose myself and quickly check to see that I had not wet myself before taking a seat in the lobby.

Receptionzilla didn’t even look up from her spellbook. It seemed like I was home free.

“MR. NASH! EXAMINING ROOM B!” she bellowed suddenly while extending one boney finger in the direction of the same examining room where I had been defiled three years ago.

The sweats returned instantly and my Joey’s clinched up in my under shorts like drying grapes on a vine.

Thankfully, this examination wasn’t much to speak of and was over before I could even my shoes off***. Instead, the doctor forwarded me to another “holistic” practitioner that happened to reside in the same building.

I was in; I was out.

Okay, this was a seemingly happy and welcome development. After all, "Holistic Medicine" by definition implies the care for the mental and spiritual aspects of life as opposed to just the physical. It includes such menacing practices as aromatherapy, massage, Thai Chi, yoga, herbology, homeopathy, and Medical cannabis.

Shit, you mean I might get high? Sign me the fuck up!

It’s always seemed a bit fluffy and limp-wristed to me anyway (particularly the homeopathy part), so I wasn’t really nervous – rather, I was eager - about making another appointment with the new doctor.

Or so I thought.

In comparison, the receptionist was lovely and cheerful and yet her name was not ‘Star’ or ‘Moonflower’ or something equally hippy-dippy.

The office was bright and welcoming. This was not the Nazi torture chamber that my normal doctor has. There were current magazines, sunlight cascading through the blinds in the window, and flowers in vases. I’d vacation at a place like this! So that was an instant bonus to this whole holistic medicine thing. Unfortunately, this is also where the experience started to go south.

I immediately noticed that there were no people in this Shangri-La of a lobby. That was either due to the fact that everybody was either healthy or, well, lets just say I didn’t finish the thought since I wasn’t given the opportunity to linger on it for very long. The pretty receptionist immediately upon checking me in escorted me to a standard medical examining room to await the doctor.

Now, first, I have a few questions for doctors.

Question #1: why do you insist on making us wait in those examining rooms by ourselves?

That’s pretty damn unsettling.

And considering the rather cold nature of the environment already, I’d think that’s totally defeating the point. I mean, I’m already anxious about even being in the office, but I can deal with that in the reception area with the assistance of some bright lighting and National Geographic’s. Searching out tit among the ragged pages of old National Geographics helps me keep my shit together. Why then do receptionists lead us into those cold, sterile, holding cells? Particularly when the doctor is even ready to see us yet! If he were really ready for me he’d be already there in the room waiting for me patiently.

Instead I'm plopped into an examining room, unceremoniously told to strip, and left to contemplate my fate in hushed silence. Don’t get me started on why I had to get naked when I was just there to see about my sore feet. Doesn’t anybody even read those medical files?

Which leads me to Question #2 for doctors: why all the model body parts and medical posters?

Let me tell you, when you’re naked and sitting on a metal examining table, the last thing you want to see are the skeletal and muscle charts on the wall.

The worst part was that the chart in this particular examining room was also life sized and happened to feature a penis the size of a Himalayan yak. So on top of feeling pretty anxious about the whole being vulnerable and everything, I’m developing feelings of inadequacy thanks to a medical poster. Great.

And what’s with the model parts?

I know you’re a doctor and this is an examining room but I have never seen you refer to them in any manner. No doctor has ever picked up one of these models, or made me stand in front of a muscle chart for that matter, and used to it explain some medical predicament or other. But yet there they are. Hearts, lungs, spinal columns, ears, livers, pancreases, pee-pees, hoo-hoos, and what-fucking-have-you. It’s like sitting in Jeffrey Dalhmer’s trophy room.

Are you trying to creep me out on purpose?

At least in the lobby I had sunlight, puzzles, displays of custom Orthotics, a receptionists ass to stare at (God help me if I’m ever so lucky to see her file away ‘Edgar VanWilhelm’ again), and maybe a shot of some African tit in one of the National Geographic’s. Instead, I’m alone feeling like the new fish at some maximum-security prison. I swear, if that doctor had come into that examining room wearing a little hat cocked on the side of his head I would have started crying like a little school girl.

Question #3: how many diplomas are required to be a doctor exactly?

I know doctors are very proud of their accomplishments and they have every right to be. They also go through great lengths to displays these laurels on their examining room walls – apparently to prove that they are indeed qualified to do the kind of things to you that would have you otherwise filing charges in any other circumstance.

So is there a minimum number of certificates required? Does a doctor with two walls of diplomas have a better chance of healing me than a doctor who has only one wall of diplomas? Would any doctor with less than, say eight diplomas on their wall be a complete quack?

I think one certification would be enough to say that the bearer is certified to aid you.

“THIS DIPLOMA IS TO HEREBY CERTIFY THAT ONE, DR. TERRY NASH, WILL NOT FUCK YOU UP WORSE THAN YOU ALREADY ARE”.

Does anyone ever read these certificates and diplomas? I know I don’t give a shit.

Besides, they’re all written in scrawling official-looking penmanship that you can’t fucking read or make any sense out of. It could be congratulating the certificate bearer of being a total shit-sucking fuck weasel and few people would never know. As long as it was made out in the doctors name in flowery illegible calligraphy, set in gold leaf, and put behind glass we’ll take it as proof that the doctor isn’t a complete fuckwit. And so we act impressed.

Anyway, on with the story.

The doctor eventually arrived and immediately set about to seeing to my feet. I meant to ask him what the point of stripping me down was all about, but then thought better of it since he had so many certificates and diplomas hanging on his wall ‘n all.

Within 30 seconds of small talk, the doctor began to wind wires through my toes and attached electrodes to the end soles of my feet. The other end of the wires he hooks up to this machine called the ‘PES 1000’ that looked like a cross between a 70’s BOSE amplifier and a car battery. I was pretty sure that this machine would not be dispensing any fruity flavored candies anytime soon, that’s for sure!

Then he breaks out a set of small pin-like needles.

Holy shit! I’ve seen something like this before in the movies and if I remember correctly, it didn’t turn out too well for poor Rambo, did it? I thought this was supposed to be sissy painless ‘holistic medicine’?

This was becoming all too Orwellian for me. What’s next - the ‘Helmet of Rats’?

After I had finished hyperventilating, the doctor began to describe (in no particular detail - he may as well as been reading his grocery list or the instructions for baking lemon loaf ) the advantages of acupuncture. As best as I could recall, I hadn’t agreed to let feet to be jabbed with pins. Had I unwittingly signed away my human rights or something? But this didn’t seem to deter Dr. Jekyll in the slightest.

Next, he did the strangest thing. He proceeded to go around the room closing the blinds blocking out what little sunlight was coming into the room anyway and turned the overhead lights down low. The sweats really began again in earnest when he lit some incense. Was this guy going to treat my feet or fuck me?

Let’s stop the story here for a moment. I had never previously considered acupuncture in the past, and had pretty much assuming it was something that was not likely to enjoy. Yet, here I was about to allow myself to be used as a human pincushion.

Also, if he was going to begin inserting sharp instruments into my feet you'd think he'd want as much light as possible to see what he was doing. Shit, turn the lights on! Open the damn windows! Roll in an entire airport spotlight for fuck sakes! Lets make it totally visible.

Now to address those of you who could only swoon and tell me “acupuncture is so relaxing, eh?”**** when I informed you about the treatments i was undergoing. What, are you like complete sadists or something? They’re sticking needles into my body. How in any way can that be considered as “relaxing”? I want to dropkick these people in the head.

Once the doctor had me all wired in and had his needles all arranged for sticking, he reached for the power switch on the blinking car battery thingee and says in a perfectly monotone voice: “Are you ready?”

Ready? GOOD FUCKING CHRIST, NO!

Talk to me here Goose! How about a little preparation first, huh? A little pep talk maybe? How about a nice reach-around before we get started. If I was feeling vulnerable in the examining room before, I felt downright violated now. But it was too late to turn back.

And with that, he flicked on the switch.

In all honesty, it wasn’t that bad. That is to say I didn't die.

I wouldn’t say it was “relaxing” or as “comforting” as everybody claims it is. A shot whiskey and a leather strap to bite down on might have made the experience a little more bearable. But I can’t deny that after a few sessions the pain in my feet began to recede.

And so the appointments have continued three times a week for the past month and a half.

I know this adventure really has nothing to do with the fact that I haven’t been faithfully upkeeping this blogspace as often as I’d like. As a trade off for walking without constant soreness, my stress levels are through the roof and thereby limited my creative time in front of the computer. That’s what constantly being jabbed with needles does to you I suspect – or at least to me anyway.

Instead, I'm now more prone to sit around the house in the fetal position staring out the window when I'm not at work, the gym, or in the doctor's examining room. I've been traumatized.

My name is Luka
I live on the second floor
I live upstairs from you
Yes I think you've seen me before

As a result, you bumpkins are now having to go without your regular fixes of my usual bullshit. But don’t wait for me faithful readers, go out and continue to grab yourself a big handful from this bowl of cherries we call ‘life’. I’m not dead yet – I’m just temporarily taking a breather and getting more ornery by the minute.

Rests assured that I’ll be back in 2007 sooner than later and proceed to lay a total smackdown on anybody or anything daring to defy basic logic and reason. Or at the very least, manages to piss me off.

Which I am assuming, if 2006 was anything to go on, will be often.

* Yes, it’s a word. Because I said so and going forth in 2007, I will make it my mission to reincarnate this word from the graveyard of dead vernacular.

** And when I say ‘crap’, I mean it in every stinky, sticky, peanut encrusted sense of the word.

*** Which is funny, seeing as how I was there to have my feet checked out n’ all.

**** I’m Canadian remember.