I was in my junior year at the Air Force Academy. Our “family-style” meals were served in the cadet dining facility named Mitchell Hall in honor of General Billy Mitchell. General Mitchell was a US Army general who’s regarded as the father of the Air Force.
One evening meal we were served pork chops. These pork chops were particularly savory because my roommate and I ate several of them. In fact, they were so good we had emptied a couple of bread loaves to take some leftover chops in the empty plastic bags back to our room.
I believe the statute of limitations on getting a Form 10 Report of Offense and receiving demerits has passed so I can safely disclose my roommate and I had a mini-refrigerator we kept in an overhead cabinet. We’d sneak it down to my roommate’s car before inspections.
My roommate and I escorted our prized pork chops back to our room. I ate another pork chop before heading off to the library to study. After returning from the library I greedily engorged myself on a few more pork chops before heading to bed. It was a short time before the bugle blew signaling taps – 11 pm.
Shortly after lying down, I began feeling a sharp pain in my lower side. Because of the pain’s location, my roommate, Keith, deduced I might be having an appendicitis. He wanted to notify our cadet squadron commander because he felt I shouldn’t take any chances if it were to rupture.
I objected not wanting to be disturbing people this late at night. However, the pain in my side was intense and it didn’t seem to be going away so I reluctantly agreed Keith should notify our commander, Bill.
Bill, made the call to the base hospital notifying them he was bringing a patient with a possible appendicitis. Now the base hospital at the Air Force Academy didn’t have an emergency room or at least it wasn’t staffed like one. Because of my condition, the flight surgeon in this case a full colonel was rousted from his peaceful slumber to come to the hospital.
As expected the surgeon didn’t seem pleased to be at work this early in the morning. He instructed me to lie down on the hospital table. He began sharply probing my side and stomach with rigid hands. In the course of his probing, I experience a loud release of bodily gas (fart) and the pain immediately was gone.
After sheepishly informing the doctor I was no longer in pain. I could tell he was peeved – I couldn’t understand why after all he did cure me. 😉 In fact later that morning, he called the officer in charge (OIC) of my squadron because he suspected I was using a feigned appendicitis to get out of something – a test or submission of a paper. My OIC shared the call he had with me and we both had a good laugh.
Who me a cradle robber? Read why and who accused me of cradle robbing.
