One of my favorite movies is Road House. Patrick Swayze plays James Dalton, a “cooler,” aka bouncer, or “bar consultant.” When a bar or dance hall needs to clear out the riffraff, he shows up and kicks the sh** out of bad people. If fact, he knows how to rip a man’s throat out with his bare hands – and does.

The end of the 80s and the last of the neon fonts.

Great movie. Masterpiece.

In one scene, after Swayze’s character is stabbed, he walks into the ER with a thick stack of medical records outlining his long history of injuries, and passes on the pain-killer while the model-hot doctor staples the cut closed. Awesome.

So, I’m pretty much the opposite of this guy, except for the medical paperwork.

Sunday, I broke two ribs, but not in a bar fight, which would have been a 1,000 times more exciting than how I did break them. I fractured them while coughing during a breathing treatment.

I’ve never been shot but I can’t imagine it hurting more than the cough that broke my ribs, or the subsequent coughs that came with blinding, nauseating pain. Luckily, I had an unused bottle of expired Vicodin handy.

After a couple of rough nights of not sleeping well, and not knowing I had broken ribs at that point, I visited the Ortho doc. And even though the half-a-dozen x-rays didn’t show cracked ribs, he told me that I had one. He was half right.

Prescription for healing: pharmacy-fresh painkillers, rest, and Motrin – as much as possible without creating a blood fountain in my lungs.

The next day, not satisfied with the broken rib diagnosis, and thinking it was my intercostals because it hurt in areas other than where the Ortho Dr. thought the break was, I went to my CF doc and he sent me for more X-rays.

The Ortho doc must have purchased his X-ray machine from Craigslist, or in a back alley, because the hospital’s machine showed two broken ribs, numbers 6 & 7, and looking at the film even I could tell they were broken.

But that still didn’t explain the additional rib-cage pain was I having.

The next day, a red bump and blotches that were sensitive to the touch showed up on my lower right side – SHINGLES the clown, where have you been?

F’ing two broken ribs and shingles?

Bar-keep, my good man, mix me a Valtrex & Norco 5/325 cocktail, please. Help myself?  Why thank you very much. I will do just that. 

Yes, once again cystic fibrosis hit me with a 1, 2 punch., and expanded my fat file of medical injuries, hospitalizations and surgeries.

The good news, and this may be painkiller driven, is that I’ve been in a pretty good mood about the whole situation. I laughed when I saw the shingles on my side. Who gets two broken ribs AND shingles at the same time? That’s gotta be kind of rare, huh?

It’s good to be King, even when it’s King of the Idiots.

Oh, and the fun of treatments and making sure I don’t cough too hard – well, it doesn’t get funnier than that.

Some days, I just have to laugh at what cystic fibrosis throws at me. That is until I learn how to rip its throat out.

Yeah, swallow this CF. [Throat ripped out, gagging sound.]

Oh, to be the coolest of all coolers.