So I made an appointment for an MRI and then, after 1,776 (it was probably more, but I'll use that number because it was around the 4th of July holiday) phone calls with and live visits to administrative personnel at the referring doctor's office, the physician's assistant, the provider's scheduler, the provider, the health insurer and (brace yourselves) the health insurer's outsourced MRI reviewer, and after an actual unwelcome appointment cancellation followed by a last-minute rescheduling of the appointment, I was able to have my MRI. Some of the people were really nice and were quite sad for me for what I was going through to keep this appointment; some were just horribly awful. You might suggest that I just should've rescheduled, but I'm not built that way. (I practice in this area and it took me over four hours to keep my appointment; I honestly don't know how people navigate these thickets.)
Anyway, I get to the MRI appointment and immediately ask if I can select music through the headphones. The technician said yes and I tried to convey that I wanted heavy metal - but not thrash/death metal. She looked at me sorta funny and nicely said that I could simply pick a band. Naturally, AC/DC it was. (I also told her as I was preparing to enter the machine (gotta be a Pink Floyd reference here) that I didn't think I had a mechanical bee in my ear, but the joke was lost on her because she wasn't a Black Mirror fan.)
The first song was an AC/DC song ("You Shook Me All Night Long", which I don't even really like). Audio-wise, it was very (very) lo-fi, but, under the circumstances, that was OK. (See how flexible I am?) The second was ZZ Top's La Grange.
Well, the MRI machine was doing its clicking/clanking/beeping thing and then eventually started a long succession of rapid-fire beeping noises. And here's the thing: the beeping was keeping perfect time with La Grange. Once I noticed it, it became almost surreal, and, to add to the experience, it went on for a long time. Now y'all are free to take from your MRI sessions whatever you want. That (in addition to how hard it was to keep my appointment) was what I'll remember.
Happy 4th (belated)!!
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