Tuesday, August 11, 2009

Done and Done

You can stick a fork in me, or one of them laproscopic jobbers as it were, cuz I am done. Apologies to Mr. Keeling, my 7th grade English teacher, who used to say "Turkeys are done. People are finished!"

Done, as in, the litany of insurance requirements and hoops have been satisfied and can heretofore and thusly be considered jumped.

The last doctoral hurdle was this week's visit to the Good Doctor's office for my "final nutritional evaluation." That's a tad misleading, since it wasn't really an "evaluation" in the sense nothing was truly evaluated.

I was honestly expecting the thin and pretty nutritionist to take a look at my daily food logs, cackle in amusement, bring in others from the office to look, point and snicker, then turn to me and say as she struggled to keep a straight face, "You really eat all this? No wonder you want weight loss surgery?" before falling over in a final fit of uncontrollable laughter.

Fortunately, that's not how it went down. Miss Thin and Pretty, who in case you were wondering was well tanned from her week-long vacation that delayed my "final nutritional evaluation," simply covered a few more suggestions for behavioral changes in preparation for surgery, as well as what to expect during the week before and the weeks after surgery, which by the way - HOLY CRAP! (more on this in a later post).

SIDE NOTE: It's good that the Good Doctor's food specialist is thin and pretty. Because really, would you trust the nutritional advice from a a lardo who also was in desperate need of lapbanding?

I've heard that the first week is the hardest. Mrs. Thin and Pretty says, "It's just plain gonna suck." And considering that protein supplements are the only thing on the menu, I'm not inclined to disagree.

But I haven't come this far just to give up now. Besides, I gotta see this through, if for no other reason than the fact that for the past five years I've been living in fear of catching a surprise, right out of left field mule-kick to the gonads. Lemme 'splane.

A number of years ago I was hanging out with some high school chums at a small reunion-type get-together. As is the case at these little "relive the memories" shindigs, there were a few there whom we hadn't seen since the halcyon days. One in particular had apparently eaten every small animal within a five state radius because he was L ... A ... R ... G ... E!

I turned to one of my pals, we'll call him Johnny Cocobutter, and said, "Johnny Cocobutter, if I ever get that fat, you have my express permission to walk right up to me on the street and kick me right square in the nuts." That, of course, is not the most sensitive thing a man can say about a friend, but hey, I would never have imaged in my scariest of dreams that I would end up surpassing that big boy by about 25 pounds. Now you know the REAL reason I've been wearing a protective cup for half a decade.

So now we wait. The Good Doctor's ducklings will package up the paperwork and teleport it to the Insurance Industrial Complex. If I dotted all the I's - which I did - and the Good Doctor and crew crossed all the T's - which they did - then the AETNA Fat Police should send back their rubber-stamped approval within two weeks.

Once we get the go-ahead, then it's another consult with the Good Doctor for final flight instructions and we'll be go for launch sometime in late September. Provided I first don't end up in the hospital with blunt-force trauma to the scrotum.

I've got my eye out for you, Johnny.

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