So there I was in the doctor’s reception room, doubled over like a lawn chair in storage. I began rocking and groaning. Groaning and rocking. The involuntary cries brought a great many eyes my direction. Could it be Donna Summer had an appointment with Dr. Stark? But, no, just some overweight guy with bad hair in shorts doing “Dying to the Oldies” exercises.

Mrs. B. lovingly filled out the paper work and shoved it under my nose for a signature. I’m not sure, but I think it may have been a five million dollar life insurance policy. (Not that my life is worth five mil, mind you, but any company willing to fork over that much is entitled to a discount.) I didn’t care. Let her have the poodle washing business in Bel Air and miniature golf course in the Mohave. After years of faithful service she was entitled to live her dreams. I just wanted to be cured or evaporate like those folks in the Jerry Jenkins novels. And right now I didn’t care which.

As we migrated to the next waiting room the most intense nausea I have ever experienced settled in. My intestinal systems, with alarms blaring to a John Phillips Souza march, were beginning their countdown to Chernobyl. I asked She-Who-Doesn’t-Do-Florence-Nightingale-All-That-Well to swab my sweating brow with wet paper towels which she did graciously, pausing only twice to read some fine print and exclusionary clauses on the policy. Seems if I died in a doctor’s office it was his bad—not theirs.

And then, when it seemed I would have to finally use the profound words I’d prepared as my deathbed utterance (“Buy low, sell high.” Well, it cracked me up) . . . the pain completely stopped and Dr. Stark walked in.

“What seems to be the problem?” he asked.

“Well, actually, at the moment . . . uhhhhhhh . . . nothing.”

I recounted the details of the past twenty-four hours. The kidnapping. The church that is no longer a church. The horsy ride at Joe’s. The Gene Kelly shower. Breakfast with Dr. Strangeglove. The swinging hunchback. The long, bumpy ride home. The phone call from Dr. Heckle and Mrs. Hide. The death scene from Camille played out on his waiting room floor. Then . . . tranquility and harmony as he entered the room. I asked if he were The Promised One and could I touch the hem of his lab coat.

“Well you’ve had yourself quite a day, Mr. Blogs,” mused Dr. Stark, refusing to recognize my messiah complex. “Where was the pain?”

“Well, it’s been jumping around quite a bit.”

Although I will spare The Three of You the biological details, suffice to say I pointed to areas you usually don’t mention in a family blog.

Just then a light bulb blinked on above his head. He turned it off to conserve electricity. “I want you to give me a urine sample.”

“Well, I don’t happen to have one on me right now,” I deadpanned, patting me side and breast pockets.

“That’s a good one,” he deadpanned right back like two dueling comics meeting on the barren streets of Dodge. “I’ll have to remember that when I enter Last Doctor Standing.

He handed me the specimen cup and sent me to a private room. Now normally I have no problem in this area. I mean, Niagara falls in the Spring comes to mind. But this urine on demand concept was more than a little intimidating.

I have to say, though, these guys really knew how to help a fella out. The nurse handed me a two liter bottle of a Perrier knockoff called “Le Wa Wa,” an abused copy of Field and Stream, and insinuated I’d know what do. While these diversions were helpful, I’m pretty sure it was the looped video of the Colorado Rapids playing in the darkened bathroom that eventually helped me reach the promised land.

Fifteen minutes later the doctor came back with my test results. “You don’t have a hernia, Mr. Blogs. You have kidney stones. We found traces of blood in your urine along with a significant sampling of Le Wa Wa.

Boy, was I relieved.

If it was only kidney stones then all I had to do to end this misery was the equivalent of the biblical passing a camel through the eye of a needle.

He ordered a CT-scan of my urinary tract to see what kind of stone we were dealing with and left humming “Bridge Over Troubled Water.” I didn’t know whether to be happy or scared. On one hand, I had dodged the surgeon’s scalpel. On the other hand, watermelons and garden hoses began figuring prominently in my dreams . . .

Stay tuned for part five in this three part series- Deep Stone II: This time It's Painful!

When we left our intrepid hero he was semi-consciously speeding down the 101 freeway en route to the Family Blogs Secret Lair, somewhere deep in the bowels of Los Angeles. We'd give you the exact location, but then we'd have to . . . you know . . .

Mrs. B. had pedal pressed to the metal and was attempting to create her own unique siren call to clear all lanes of traffic. It went something like "A-Rooooooooooo . . . A-Rooooooooooo . . . A-Roooooo-oo-oo-oo-oo-oo-oo!" While I deeply appreciated her passion for the moment and her commitment to spirit me home before whatever was wrong inside my lower torso exploded, it was also comforting to know she could be counted on to attract wild game in a pinch if we were ever stranded together in a place where signs of life were fleeting and nothing appeared to be edible—say, Bakersfield.

Before she could say "Don't die on me now, Honey" (which she would never ever do because she abhors pet names that involve food—don't you my little Twinkie?), I waddled from the car like Burgess Meredith after some bad chile, used the Secret Lair secret stare in the Home Optical Recognition System, and entered our house like a man who didn't know whether  he'd eaten his last Swedish Pancake. (And once a man has eaten his last Swedish pancake it likely is time for the last roundup because it just may be life is not worth living in a Swedish Pancakeless world.)

The pain had subsided. But the fear of its return was enormous. She-Who-Is-Cool-And-Collected-During-A-Crisis-That-Does-Not-Involve-Childbirth logically began dialing nurses and doctors we know to suck their brains dry of any and all information hernia-related. I think she'd seen this maneuver performed once in a 60s sci-fi movie.

I took some pills I believed to be Ibuprofen but may actually have been orange flavored Pez for all the pain they were masking. We finally raised my doctor, or more precisely a doctor whose turn it was to be bothered by patients she’d never met on this, her only day off in twelve years. She was fairly patient and kind while explaining to me the worst thing I could do right now, besides calling her, was to take any Ibuprofen or Pez.

“These would mask your pain. Especially the orange Pez. I don’t know why, but the grape ones are fine. You don’t want to cover up the symptoms because you need to know if something in your body is on the verge of exploding. If nothing explodes—you’re OK until tomorrow. Then you want to get in and see a doctor who isn’t me.”

I thanked the doctor for her pithy advice and she thanked me for interrupting her golf tournament on the 17th tee.

Once I flushed all the Pez from my system I lay myself down on our king-sized bed and drifted away from consciousness like that feather in Forrest Gump. In a day or so I’d see my doctor, or at least somebody in his office who drew the short straw, and we’d get a read on whether this was a hernia, a groin pull, or some intense organ timed to detonate soon.

It seemed at though I’d been through so much in such a very short time. As it turned out, pain was merely wooing me. We were going to become intimate in the weeks ahead.

Stay tuned for part four in this already way-too-long series. Collect 'em all! Or don't . . .

Despite the mass protestations which I fully expect to fill the comments box and clog up the internet for a day or two, I will leave the next seven hours and twenty-three minutes to your fertile imaginations. Suffice to say Mrs. B. and I slipped into our night clothes, nibbled on dessert that had been delivered to our room, and settled in for the second half of O Brother, Where Art Thou?" Nothing like the Cohen Brothers and their whacked sense of humor to get you in the mood for whatever it might be you're hoping everyone in the room might, indeed, be in the mood for. Chess, Yahtzee . . . you name it.

Seven hours and twenty-three minutes later I was enjoying a rinse in one of the finest showers I've ever had the pleasure being exposed to. The shower was almost entirely made of stone, laid by hand by the owner of this fine establishment. There was the usual shower head, of course. But there was also an old fashioned one directly overhead. One could choose to turn a handle and presto--you felt as though you were back in the 1940s with a rainstorm directly overhead and Gene Kelley dancing on the smooth cobblestones. Of course, how I was going to explain Gene Kelly in my shower to the intoxicating Mrs. B. was a dilemma I was ill-prepared for. So I flipped the handle again and took my normal morning-after-checkers shower.

As I stepped from the stony enclave I felt a tug in the area of my groin. Actually it was less of a tug and more of a Hunchback-of-Notre-Dame-hanging-from-the-tower-bell kind of ache. I didn't exactly know what was happening, but I did know one thing. I wanted to get that hunchback off that rope--and pronto! I sat down for a moment on the only seat in the place and nearly fell in. Why women always leave the toilet seat up I have no idea. After a few moments, the tension eased and I made my way back to our room to get dressed.

Breakfast was a delightful affair with Swedish Pancakes as the main entree. Yum, these were fantastic. Conversation around the table was guarded at first. But then, as we realized there were likely no stringers for the National Enquirer present we began to open up a bit. There was a doctor and his wife. A nurse and her friend. A husband and wife who arrived late and nearly missed the meal. And us. The doctor shared stories of how he'd sometimes been called upon in the strangest situations to aid his fellow man. One story about how a man passed away and the stewardess, knowing if the man was dead would have to turn the flight back, asked the doctor if he wouldn't mind tending to the dead man as if he were still alive. Once they reached a certain mileage regulations allowed for no turning back and he could then be pronounced as dead as he'd been a half hour before. As the doctor had a meeting in a few hours that couldn't be missed, he gladly obliged.

I managed to mention I was excited about going to see the Giants and Dodgers play later on at Dodger Stadium. This begat a few baseball stories all around and soon it was time for us to leave. Only I had the darnedest time getting up out of my seat. That old hunchback was at it again.

Somehow I managed to say goodbye to all as we made our way back to the room to pack. It wasn't long before discomfort became agony and agony morphed into wishing I had no lower torso. She-Who-Is-Uncommonly-Wise-At-Times suggested she go get the doctor before he left. I informed her I would rather die than face the humiliation of being examined by a guest at a bed and breakfast inn. Just then the pain came around again and I dropped to the bed, writhing and moaning. All of a sudden I had no pride. I felt no shame. I just wanted to pay a sniper to pick off the hunchback.

The concerned Mrs. Blogs left abruptly. She returned with the good doctor in tow. "What seems to be the problem here, G.P," he asked in his rehearsed tone.

"It's the hunchback! The hunchback is killing me! You've got to get the hunchback off the rope before the bell falls off."

"Well, why don't you lower your pants and let's take a look-see."

A look-see? A LOOK-SEE ??????? Was he kidding?. This is a man I had not fifteen minutes earlier asked to pass the breakfast rolls. Now he was going to be using those same hands to become more intimate with me than any man since . . . well, ever.

After poking around the premises for what seemed like two hours and thirty-seven minutes but was actually forty-five seconds the good doctor gave a preliminary diagnosis: "Looks like you've got a hernia. Just lay there for about thirty minutes (Don't worry, I'm not going anywhere) and then gravity will probably have its way."

At last, a reason to praise Sir Isaac Newton. I thanked the doctor for his generosity of spirit and told him how embarrassed I was. "Oh, don't be," he pshawed, "I've seen much worse." As he left the room, my Fruit of the Looms and trousers bunched around my ankles, I began wondering what exactly he had meant by that remark.

But the pain was receding, my pride was in tatters, and I was sprawled in a Victorian church in a way I would never have guessed possible. One thing was for sure. The ball game was off. I needed to muster all my strength to get dressed and navigate an old staircase. No way could I climb and descend a mile of concrete steps while walking funny.

Now if we could only get back to Los Angeles and see a doctor Monday morning. I'd gone fifty years without a broken bone or an operation. But, as we made our way back down the coast I gazed out over the waves to the morning clouds melting in the late morning sun. Surgery seemed to be looming on the horizon . . .

Stay Tuned for Part Three in this breathless series. Collect 'em all and trade with your friends.

Let me tell you sumpin', lasses and laddies. Turnin' 50 aint for sissies . . .

Remember a fortnight or so ago I was mentioning how my beloved, She-Who-Can-Almost-Do-No-Wrong, was about to kidnap and whisk me away for the weekend of my sweet, geriatric dreams? Remember the anticipation The Three of You felt when promised a blow by blow account when we landed in our pastoral hideaway by the sea? Or the smoke signals I'd send from high atop Mt. Killamockingbird?

Well, the trip didn't go exactly as planned. Actually, nothing I've done here in the shallow end of my second half century has given me much hope I'll make it to my third. And therein lies the tale.

Blinded by love and the chance to experience it outside the proximity of certain precious minors, Mrs. Blogs and I pointed our trustworthy vehicle, Old Blue Fred (the women in my house have an annoying habbit of naming their transportation), north on the 101. Little did I know at the time my bride of eighteen years was stealing me away to a little church in Ventura, California.

She-of-the-Leaded-Foot delivered us to our destination in record time, pausing only twice to clean the bugs from our otherwise pristeen teeth. Turns out this was not just any church, but a quaint old wedding chapel which now housed a bed and breakfast inn.

Sipping wine and tasting cheese was the first order of business upon landing. I missed these opening festivities with handshakes exchanged all around, owing to a previous appointment with a certain pillow that knows my face better than my I do.

The Victorian Rose exceeded expectations. She was a grand old dame who made up in colorful character what she lacked in youth. I could tell immediately we had much in common.

Upon waking we had plenty of host recommendations to pick from for a five star dinner at three star prices. But Joe's Crab Shack was calling and it was my birthday celebration after all. Although She-Who-Bit-Her-Lip-When-I-Said-Let's-Eat-At-Joe's was a good sport, I could tell she was a bit disappointed in my choice of romantic dining spots by the way she told the waitress it was my birthday and she had better darn well grab a trio of waiters and embarrass me musically if she wanted any kind of reasonable tip.

Five minutes later I was standing under a cowboy hat, astride a stick pony with instructions from Joe's loyal employees to ride Old Paint around the dining room while listening to a western version of a happy birthday song. Modesty forbids me from detailing the Joe's record I set while falling off only once.

We walked about a mile back to the VR and talked all the way. This reminded old GP of an earlier day with the same girl when he was more loaded down with dreams and promise than crabcakes and fries.

But I digest . . .

Stay Tuned for Part Two in this breathless series. Collect 'em all and trade with your friends.