The other Jewish Elvis in Cajun country

It's hard to take yourself too seriously when you're sitting in an overly air-conditioned room, shorts around your ankles with another man's rubber glove-clad hand on your nuts.

For the first time in a year, I went to the doctor today to check out some symptoms that are more than likely in my head. Despite a somewhat harrowing experience, I remembered how much I like hospitals. That's not to say I have great memories of hospitals. I remember being frightened to death going into surgery for chronic ear infections when I was 7 and watching my slightly delirious grandma deteriorate after brain surgery last year in less than dignified, fluorescent-lit circumstances.

But the open-backed gowns, the fear and the vulnerability are all part of the draw: there's simply no bullshit.

The hospital waiting room is a great leveler. People from various backgrounds sit quietly in plastic chairs, worry and read five-year-old issues of Country Living. Moms look nervously at their ill children and people flip through pages more to fidget than to read, wondering what the doctor will tell them.

In the first waiting room of the day, I caught up on my Reminisce magazine, as that was the only magazine available. Reminisce was an appropriate title, as none of the copies in the room were newer than 2002. I may be a bit out of the demographic for "the magazine that brings back the good times" but I dove into it, learning more than I ever could have imagined about pie recipes and why that darned internet is so confusing.

Then a nurse called my name, took my weight, and left me to stare at the wall until the doctor arrived. When he did, he gave me a head to nuts to toes physical as I awkwardly answered questions like, "Do you drink?"

"Well, yeah, but, you know, not regularly, I guess."

Following that, the doctor sent me down for a battery of tests that quickly put me in my place.

The bloodwork went relatively smoothly. I looked away, like a pussy, so as not to get queasy at the sight of my own blood, filled the vial and moved on.

Then, a rather curt nurse taped a bunch of very cold electrode-like squares on my arms and chest and hooked up an EKG to check my heart. There was no problem until she started tearing the adhesive strips off with much of my chest hair still attached.

Despite my employer's rather Draconian drug testing policy, I don't regularly pee in a cup and it's more of a challenge than I had envisioned. I followed the instructions, swabbing my junk with anti-septic, pissing a little in the toilet before pinching it off, positioning the cup and the peeing. Despite my efforts I still managed to spray my hands and my pants.

Mercifully, the nurse did not laugh at me when I handed her the cup with droplets dotting the front of my pants.