Today I had to go to a dermotologist. At my last doctor’s appointment, he noticed a mole on my back and said that I should have it looked at, so off we went to the specialist today. I can’t imagine a more exciting way to spend a lunch hour.
The dermotologist looked at my back, told me how horribly sun damaged my skin is and that there is no need to worry about the mole on my back. However, she did look at my arms and noticed a bump that might lead to something down the road so we should just freeze the little thing right off. She scowled at a couple of other marks on my arms, and one newly exposed (from shaving my beard off) mark on my chin, which she said was probably an ingrown hair, and told me to grow my beard back to protect my face. She did all this in around 55 seconds, leaving with a curt “Get dressed”. I guess my sun damaged body was suffering more damage from the flourescent lights. Either that or my clean shaven face repulsed her.
A few minutes later the freezer queen, for lack of a better title, came in to the examining room. She was carrying a styrofoam coffee cup of liquid nitrogen. It was emitting a dry-ice type mist and making various hissing noises. The coffee cup was marked “do not discard this cup!” Apparently the coffee cup budget is very low for 2005 as this cup was rather beat up looking. I found her humorous looking as she had black hair that zinged all over the place. She looked a little crazy. I guess I would look crazy too if I was walking around with liquid nitrogen hissing in a styrofoam coffee cup. Most people mark their cups with their name. “Betty” “Vera” Not her though, her’s just said “Do not discard this cup.” Crazy.
So she read a prescription for the liquid cold stuff, “apply no more than 8 seconds”, which she promptly did. I hardly noticed. The little mark on my arm didn’t stand a chance, it promptly turned white (a la Mr Freeze) and then blistered up. I’m not suppose to do anything to it for 48 hours. I don’t really find that last directive fair, as the dermotologist circled the spot with a heavy black ball point pen. Sort of like “X” marks the spot. “You are here”.
I managed to wash the black ink off without touching the spot on my arm that is now twice the size it used to be. I’m told it will fall off soon.
I hope I don’t look like a crazy person with skin falling off my arm.
