Today was the day. I wasn't allowed to eat for six hours before the procedure to have them removed, lest I gag and choke on my own vomit whilst unconscious. Gruesome to keep my attention.

Anyway, I stayed up until around 7:30 and crashed after having a bowl of cereal. After making it to the appointment, I was hooked up to an array of gadgets not altogether unlike the everything-meters from the original Star Trek. A nurse entered and prepped my arm with some surgical tubing to make my veins protrude. It actually kind of hurt. Heroin must be quite the job to pull that off with only one arm with which to do it.

Anyway, the needle hurt more than I remember any needle ever hurting. The nurse suddenly adopted a worried tone and asked, "Does that sting?"
"Not really. Well, it does now that you're tapping it."
"Yeah...your vein blew."
"'Blew'?"
"Yeah."
"What do you mean, 'blew'?"
"Well, sometimes when the needle enters, it damages the vein."
"So...I'm bleeding out?"
"Uh...yeah. But it coagulates quickly. You're okay."
"I've never had a vein severed before."
She chuckled. "Not severed. A little cut."

I figured it was a laceration of some kind. Anyway, on to the right hand, which went smoothly and far less...achefully. The knockout drug they used was very cold - I could feel it course up my arm slowly. Again, a mental comparison with heroin was in order. I developed a body buzz within a few seconds.

The surgeon appeared as it was being pumped into my system. He asked, "How do you feel?"
"I'm getting a body buzz...and it's cold."
"A body buzz?"
"Yeah..."

I don't remember anything from before the procedure after that.

Waking up, though, was a different experience. I was angry - furious, even. I don't recall myself, but I do recall being told that I punched the nurse in my rage. Everything after that is me staggering out of the office, bleeding from the mouth and steaming out the ears.

----

Well, that's my odyssey. Someone else share?