I got to experience the joys of middle age last Friday night when I got a sudden creeping pain on the right side of my abdomen. I called both my sister and father in law (both nurses) and was told that if the pain didn't diminish that I should probably be planning a jaunt to the local emergency room. About half an hour later the pain went from "this is most unpleasant" and warped drived into "dear god is an alien about to burst out of me?", so off to the emergency room I went with my concerned wife in tow. I don't know how many of you have had the utter joy of checking into an emergency room in a relatively populous city on a weekend night, so let me regale you with a visual. Picture a line at an exclusive restaurant where everybody is so hungry that it is nearly killing them and half of them have screaming babies and you sort of get the picture. So while I am nursing the alien that is surly about to burst forth from me and terrorize the hospital, I get a cacophany of angry voices in more laguages than the tower of babel, robotic and uninpressed nurse replies and the oh so soothing chorus of at least a dozen angry babies to keep me company on what has to be the world's most uncomfortable chair.

 

Well, a crappy IV insertion (the back of my right hand is still one huge bruise), a blessed dose of Morphine, two huge glasses of contrast dye served in generic fast food cups, and two CAT scans later I find out that I'm the proud father of a bouncing baby kidney stone. I get a perscription of percocet, a directive to drink as much water as I can handle (and maybe a beer, but not while I'm on the perc), a stack of what look like coffee filters and a specimen cup to catch said stony intruder, and a pat on the back 12 hours after I was admitted.

 

When I finally did expell said crystaline intruder, I find out that the worst pain I have ever endured was caused by something that looks like a few granules of Sugar in the Raw.

 

Welcome to your mid-thirties, enjoy the complimentary rebellion of your body's excretory system.