Use the Clean Hand
My new doctor had a similar physique to the Pillsbury Doughboy. During my physical, he sat on a small stool that was only an eighth of his size, typing into the computer with one finger at a time.
He wore a pair of reading glasses held together by a magnet, which split apart in the middle when he needed to take them off to relay obvious health advice like; drink more water, eat less red meat, don’t drink four cocktails a night. The basics.
There was a bit of confusion regarding whether I wanted a rectal exam.
To be clear I did not WANT a rectal exam, but I believed it might be necessary. So, when he asked, I replied with a hesitant, "Yeah, fine."
This response seemed to confuse him. He asked, "Yeah, you want to wait until the specialist? Or yeah, you want one now?"
I answered in an equally puzzling manner, "No, I will do it."
This seemed to irritate him, and he removed his magical magnetic glasses as angrily as he could for impact. It just looks like a really lame magic trick for people who want to look more intelligent than you. "You will do it now, or you will wait???” he nearly shouted.
My Midwestern instincts wanted to blurt out, "YES, PLEASE TAKE YOUR FINGER, AND GIVE ME THE OLD TWENTY THREE SKIDOO! THERE'S NOTHING MORE I'D RATHER BE DOING ON A WEDNESDAY AT 10 A.M.!”
But I restrained myself and simply said, "Yes, let's please do it now."
To cover himself legally, he brought in a nurse to observe the procedure. No one wanted any misunderstandings in that regard. However, I had been conversing with the doctor for a solid twenty minutes by then, and we had a pretty good grasp of each other's personalities: he gave medical advice in a condescending tone through his librarian glasses, and I responded with answers that were confusing and vague. A real Laurel and Hardy situation. And now Maria is introduced into the comedy dynamic? I felt like I needed to call my wife of nine years to make sure she was cool with all of this.
But (see what I did there?), in the end (did it again. boom! butt jokes!), the examination of my Death Star thermal exhaust port happened, and it was uneventful.
I'm a man of science, so I understood the procedure. In my attempt not to make things awkward, I probably made them even more awkward. Story of my life.
