The Doctor's Office

I'm sitting there in the Doctor's office and he looks at me with this really doctoral expression and asks,"Ken, how many b.m.'s do you have a week?"

So I put on this really, really bewildered face and in this really soft, querulous voice I say, "Bladder Malfunctions?"

Then HE gets the really, really bewildered face going and I say (Still in that really soft, querulous voice),  "Bloody Mary's?"

At which point the really bewildered face he's got going slips a bit and just the faintest hint of exasperation starts to show around his eyes and I ask(Still in that really soft, querulous voice),  "Bitchy Mother-in-Laws?"

That does it.  His face turns pink, the vein in his forehead starts to protrude and his mouth starts to open.  Before he can interrupt me, I say (but not in that really soft, querulous voice), "I hope you didn't mean Burly Men, Doc, because I don't swing that way and it's bad for Doctors to proposition their patients!"

The forehead vein turns a darker purple than his face and he shouts, "Bowel Movements, Ken!  How many Bowel Movements?"

In a perfectly normal voice and wearing a perfectly normal face (at least as close as I can come in either case) I reply, "Oh." His color starts to go back to normal and I put a stop to that by asserting,"they haven't moved, Doc, they're right where we left 'em last time I was here!" and as his color rockets toward blood-red and his forehead vein starts to throb again, I put on a terrified face and yell, "Oh God, Doc!  They can't fall out can they?  Tell me they can't fall out?"

At which point he actually gets up out of his chair and takes a step toward me.  Then, regaining control (somewhat) he shouts, "A crap, Damnit!  How many times a week do you take a crap?"

So I let understanding wash over my face and ask, "Why didn't you just say that, Doc? One"

With this incredulous look on his face he says, "You only have one bowel movement a week?"

I give him this innocent, childlike face and wide friendly smile (yeah, I'm capable) and as I'm spreading my arms wwwaaaayyyy out like a kid describing catching a whale, I say, "Yeah!  But it's a really, really big one!"

Everything turns purple, head, neck even his ears and the vein is so big and throbbing so hard it looks like a boa doing the serpentine mamba on his forehead.  He starts making these loud, non-language noises like he's speaking in tongues and runs out the door.  I can hear him standing in the hallway outside the waiting room making those weird noises no doubt still waving his arms around and I listen, hoping to hear the sound of him hitting his head against the wall.

But he doesn't and I don't.

That's okay, though.  There's always my next appointment.

He once told me (in a very condescending tone) that I needed to have goals.  I think he was right.