Doctor wanted, psychic preferred

Mr. Charm employs the strong, silent approach to doctors. He presents the body for inspection, and the doctor is supposed to intuit what, if anything, is wrong with him. If the MD really knows his stuff, he should be able to figure out what is wrong.

Of course, he never goes to the doctor if he actually feels bad. Every winter he has what he refers to as "this cold," as in "I wish this cold would go away," or, "Boy, am I tired of this cold." "This cold," as opposed to your common or garden variety of sniffles, is the Godzilla of respiratory infections. It lasts 8-10 weeks.

He obviously has allergies; he coughs and sneezes frequently, and often scores a Zyrtec from my stash. I asked him why he doesn't ask the doctor to give him Zyrtec; he says there is nothing wrong with him. Anyway, he can use my Zyrtec.

Also, he frequently complains (to me) that he aches all over. When I ask if he ever mentioned this to the doctor, he of course says no. He has diagnosed himself with a hopeless case of arthritis, totally irreversible and unresponsive to medical intervention. Why bother the doctor when the case is hopeless?

He once had a problem with his ear, and went to an ear doctor, who cleaned out his ears and told him he needed a hearing aid. Needless to say, he gave that doctor a wide berth from then on. The man was obviously a trouble-maker in league with the hearing aid-industrial complex and doing their evil bidding.

It was the same story when he started to need reading glasses; there was nothing wrong with his eyes, it was just too dark in the restaurant to read the menu. Any restaurant, any menu. After a couple of years of this, he got reading glasses.

And so it goes.