Sounds like something vampires do, doesn’t it?

VAMPIRE NO. 1, RISING OUT OF HIS COFFIN, STRETCHING AND LOOKING OVER AT VAMPIRE NO. 2: “Man, I am famished. I didn’t get enough to eat last night. I think that skinny guy must have been a vegetarian. I definitely need some protein.”

VAMPIRE NO. 2: “Yeah, I seem hungrier than usual myself. Let’s get out of here and do some blood work.”

So the vampires turn into bats and fly off to do their blood work (this is when they are most dangerous because they can crawl into your attic through those narrow ventilation openings).

OK, that’s not really what blood work is all about. Blood work is what your doctor orders when he wants to check out certain floatyaround things in your bloodstream. Blood work often requires some preparation, normally a certain foodfree period prior to the blood work process taking place.

NURSE: “We want you to come back in the morning to have some blood work done, so don’t eat anything after midnight.”

What’s that all about? What am I, a Gremlin (the critters from the movie of the same name; if you fed them after midnight, they turned into nasty varmints)?

I had some blood work done myself a few days ago. It’s not something I look forward to or care to have done because, you see, I’m one of those persons who does not like needles.

No, make that CAN’T STAND to even be in the same room as a needle.

Needles give me the willies. Ever since that “Pinhead” movie came out, I can’t stand the thought of a needle anywhere near me. Actually, I was pretty queasy about it even before that movie came out, but now needles just make my brain shut down (I know, I know, you’re saying to yourself “that ship has already sailed, pal”).

The other night my wife came into the den carrying her sewing kit and as she passed by me on the way to the sofa, I saw those needles sticking out of that pin cushion top and I fell right out of my recliner. It took paramedics an hour and a half to bring me around. I would have been alright when I regained consciousness the first time but when I opened my eyes one of them was standing over me with an intravenous tube attached to – guess what? – a needle. So BAM! I passed right back out.

I figure if nature had wanted us to be comfortable with needles and similar kinds of skin-piercing things, it would have made us more porcupine-like.

In order to endure the blood work, I have to make sure I LOOK AWAY FROM THE NEEDLE at all times because if I ACTUALLY SEE that little plastic tube filling up with blood — MY BLOOD — I will go into Level 4 system shock (and there are currently only three known levels) that will require defibrillator paddles so powerful that no doctor’s office in the world would have them readily available (I mean they will have to be the kind of defibrillator paddles that could jump-start the space shuttle) to get my heart re-started.

After the blood work is completed, technicians are able to ascertain certain things about your body chemistry and health status.

Anyway, a few days ago, my most recent blood work indicated that my triglyceride level was much higher than it should be so now I have begun a process to help get my triglyceride under control.

How about that?

I told ya it was technical.

It’s out of the scope of my little pea-brain, I’ll tell ya that right now. I didn’t even know I had a triglyceride. I think I saw one in that Jurassic Park movie (the first one, not those two awful sequels) but I had no idea they were floating around in my body.

So if you hear something that sounds like that noise that the anvil makes in the Road Runner cartoons as it’s falling from the cliff and Wild E. Coyote is at the bottom of the canyon under the umbrella, waiting for it to hit him, well, that’s just the sound of my triglyceride level falling.

Here’s hoping your triglyceride (whatever that is) always remains at a normal level.

And that your attic is bat-free.

Klonie Jordan (editor@gaffneyledger.com) is executive editor of The Gaffney Ledger.