Gut check

Not for nothing, but I don't tend to get squeamish or spook easily.

In my lifetime I have:

• Climbed a nearly-vertical 40-foot rock face;


• Rappelled back down from said rock face, as well as from a platform bound between two trees 60 feet in the air;


• Set off thousands of firecrackers;


• Appeared naked onstage in front of over 3,000 people;


• Gone spelunking in a dripping wet cavern with spaces so tight I had to scrape my stomach to get through them, with the only illumination being given off by a small helmet lamp;


• Walked through Bedford-Stuy alone and ridden a motorcycle in the rain; (okay, it was only 50cc's so I guess that's technically a motorbike)


• Successfully launched myself from a trapeze into a forward layout, been caught, swung back and flipped around to catch said trapeze again (admittedly, with a net);


• Danced in a kickline. In drag. Dressed as a sheep;


• Flown from the top of a ridge to its base, hanging from a 200-foot zipwire;


• Hiked down 50 meters into the crater of a semi-active volcano;


• Endured, and actually been fascinated by, four surgeries (two knee, one appendix, one abdominal) and two broken limbs (arm and leg);


• Skied, ice-skated and rollerbladed, all both forwards and backwards, all on said repaired knee and leg;


• ...and even donated blood on a semi-regular basis.

(No, I haven't gone bungee-jumping, hang-gliding or skydiving, but still...)

With this history, why should jabbing a tiny little needle into my wife's stomach make me positively ashen with apprehension? Jeez Louise.

One down, eight to go. Thank God.