The Big E

If you are not a regular reader of Peter King's Monday Morning Quarterback column, you may have missed what is now being called simply, "the colonscopy story."
Enjoy!

"Aggravating/Enjoyable Travel Note of the Week I

I was scheduled for a colonoscopy on Thursday in West Paterson, N.J. If you've had one, or if you've had any intestinal procedure, you know that the day before such an internal snaking you've got to be, well, cleaned out. One problem for me: On Wednesday, I was covering the Vince Young workout in Austin. My cleanout was due to begin at 1 p.m. My flight was due to leave Austin three hours later, and I was scheduled to get home by 8. In other words, I was not going to have the home-bathroom advantage for a good portion of the internal preparation.

Pretty tricky. I've had two prior colonoscopies -- you should have these things fairly regularly after turning 40, and I'm 48 -- and know that once you begin your prep work, it's about a six-hour process. So I figure, OK, I'll start on the plane home, then finish at home. When I advised a friend, Rich Fitter, of my plan, he shook his head and invoked an old Cosmo Kramer line. "Wet ... and wild,'' he said.

I took the first of the preparatory medication (and believe me, that's putting it very nicely) just before the three-plus-hour flight took off from Austin. I was in fine shape until maybe 40 minutes from landing when the captain came over the intercom and said, "Ladies and gentlemen, we've been told by the tower in Newark that we're going to have to slow things up a bit because of traffic into the New York area. They're putting us into a holding pattern, and we're going to head over to Pennsylvania to circle ...''

I heard nothing else. All I could think was: My worst nightmare is coming true. It would get worse 10 minutes later, as we were banking bumpily somewhere over southeastern Pennsylvania. The flight attendant came on and said, "Ladies and gentlemen, because of the bumpy ride, we're going to be turning on the fasten-seatbelt sign for the remainder of the flight...'' AAAAAAAARRRRRRGGGGGHHHHHH!

Take deep breaths. Long, deep breaths. Bumping around for 45 minutes. An eternity. Hold on. Just hold on. You raised two kids not to be ax murderers, you can survive this. I'm going to have to get up and brawl with this flight attendant in a minute because of the seat-belt sign...

Out of the holding pattern. And seven or eight minutes later, like the God of Aviation knew what was happening inside me at that moment, the captain came on and said, "Ladies and gentlemen, we're on our final approach into the Newark area.''

Day of my wedding. Births of my children. Red Sox win the World Series. Landing in Newark.

Once off the plane, I was as dignified as was humanly possible. I brisk-walked to the men's room, and the rest is history."