We are in the wrong business.

That’s right folks … You heard it here first.

Dermatologists in Swapington, D.C. are making $1,200 an hour (thanks to Frosty for the quick calculation) to prescribe tetracycline to pimply teenagers and refer poor grad students to other dermatologists who charge $2,000 for “scratch tests.”

No joke. I spent 10 minutes and $200 with a quack this afternoon for the following diagnosis:

1. Something is irritating your skin (no shit cocksucker … That’s why I’m here at 3pm instead of trying to figure out which one of my press secretaries is lying through their teeth).
2. We need to figure out what is causing the irritation (Thanks doc. Is this what you went to medical school for? Is thy why you aren’t practicing real medicine)?
3. I wouldn’t want to guess b/c there are a lot of possibilities, but I can refer to a friend of mine—a world renowned woman who scratches skin to determine what a person is allergic to—one of only two in the DC-area (Isn’t that his fucking job … to tell me what the fuck is wrong with my skin? For $200 he should have brought in a donkey and a dwarf and put on a tijuana circus show).

Then he tells me he is going to prescribe me an ointment and recommend some soap and sunscreen. That should have been my clue to get up and walk out, but I decided that I’d at least take the script.

As I prepared to pay the nice lady in the waiting room, she handed a small sample of soap and a photocopied cut-out of a tune of Banana Boat 50.

“Jesus Christ,” I thought. “50! I’ve never used anything higher than 30 and that is only after several long days of non-stop exposure to the sun and large quantities of alcohol—and still I only use it on my face.”

Then she dropped the price tag: $200 for a 10 minute visit.

I was madder than a hornet. No, I was madder than a nest of hornets—poked with a stick by a kid like Nery.

By the time I returned to the newsroom I had considered several options. First I called my bank and found out the standard procedure for disputing a charge. Then I called back to the office and asked to speak to the business manager.

After I voiced my complaint I was put on hold and told the doc would address my complaint.

“Great,” I thought. “Frosty is going to be sucking some South Carolina politician’s cock next to me while I’m telling this charlatan to suck mine.

To my surprise I found he listened to me more during the five minutes we were on the phone than he did during the 10 minutes I was in his office.

I didn’t cuss or raise my voice and he agreed to void the charge if I would send him a check for $100 … which I agreed to do.

Too bad that snakeoil salesman is never going to see a goddamn dime from me, because even $600 an hour seems pretty steep to look at my hands for 10 seconds and ask me how may cigarettes I smoke in a week.

Since studies tell us that reader attention span is declining, I’ll tell the strong readers about my pending story correction if you keep dialing in.

“Mamas don’t let your babies grow up to be [journalists] don’t let 'em [tap keyboards] and drive them old trucks, let ‘em be [dermatologists] and lawyers and such”

--Waylon and Willie [sd]

That is all.