"You complete me" and other prostate humor
Tick-tock. Deadline coming for the Gleason competition--11:59 p.m. Eastern Sept. 15
(Get your prostate jokes ready for the Gleason prostate humor competition—Putting Glee in Gleason Scores. Details below. Deadline Friday.)
By Howard Wolinsky
The digital rectal exam has to be a stand-out on the medical stage in the Theater of the Absurd.
You’re standing—or laying there—half-naked with a gloved urologist lubricating your rectum and doing the “finger wave” to the feel of your prostate, trying to find lumps or bumps that might find prostate cancer.
Danny DeVito, playing the urologist, and Michael Douglas, playing the patient, in “The Kominsky Method,” capture the hilarity of the situation in this segment entitled, “You complete me.”
This video absolutely goes down in the Prostate Humor Hall of Fame.
Now you can submit your prostate jokes, cartoons, limericks, whatever—on DREs, PSAs, BPH, and prostatitis—to The Gleasons—Putting The Glee In Gleason Scores, the first prostate humor contest.
Send your entries to me by 11:59 p.m. Eastern Friday , September 15, at Gleason Humor at howard.wolinsky@gmail.com.
The contest, started by Jim-Bob Williams, a therapeutic humorist, and me, is open to doctors and patients alike.
A distinguished panel will announce the winners later in September, Prostate Cancer Awareness Month.
Valuable prizes will be awarded, including a plush prostate doll (I’m not kidding), prostate keychains, golf shirts T-shirts, sweatshirts and autographed books on prostate cancer from the likes of Dr. Mark Scholz, author of “Invasion of the Prostate Snatchers.” (Scholz’s book changed my life and saved me from unnecessary surgery.) More details to come.
We’ve added a professional category. It may not be surprising that comics like to do observational humor on their first prostate exams. Nominate your favorites.
Check out these bits from:
Hurricane:
John Mulaney
Andrew Santino
Marc Maron:
For more:
BTW, here’s Dr. Brian Helfand, my urologist—about to give me the finger.
How about submitting a caption for The Gleasons to go with this photo?
Thanks: We’re in the “Active Surveilor Army”—1,000 subscribers
By Howard Wolinsky
I mentioned the other day that we were close to hitting a milestone in total subscriptions to TheActiveSurveillor.com.
Last night, we made it to 1,000 subscribers.
My son David told me at this point I’ll have my own “AS Army” and magical things will happen with a critical mass. We’ll see. Thanks for joining in.
]I also have seen a jump in paid subscribers. After I ran a story on subscriptions, 10 of you paid $50 or more for subscriptions. I don’t require paid subscriptions, but I appreciate them because they help pay the bills, such as for Substack fees (15%). There are now 135 paid subscribers. You’re the Delta Force of Active Surveillance.
If you haven’t signed on yet, hy wnot give me a bit of insurance and join the ACtive Surveillor Army now.
Webinars on prostate cancer
By Howard Wolinsky
—PHEN (Prostate Health Education Network) will address issues relating to AS and Black men in a webinar, the 19th Annual “African American Prostate Cancer Disparity Summit.” https://tinyurl.com/mu7ebh4d
—Active Surveillance Patients International (ASPI) is sponsoring a free webinar on lifestyle research and low-risk prostate cancer from 12-1:30 p.m. Eastern, Saturday Sept. 30. Register here for “Applied Research and Lifestyles and Low-Risk Prostate Cancer: https://zoom.us/meeting/register/tJwvdOGoqjwuE9CC8AI45nYdsj63e-iUnop6
The program features Drs. June Chan and Stacey Kenfield from UCSF.
(Stacey Kenfield, ScD.)
—Want to learn about focal therapy? Listen to AS pioneer Dr. Laurence Klotz: https://ancan.org/webinar-is-focal-therapy-right-for-your-prostate-cancer/
—Lifestyle? Catch ASPI’s webinar with Dr. Stacy Loeb, of NYU, on lifestyle factors, such as diet. Great talk on a plant-based diet: https://aspatients.org/meeting/as-101-program-on-diet-and-nutritional-lifestyle/
—DNA. Todd Morgan, MD, chief of urologic surgery at the University of Michigan (Go Blue!) presented a great program on genomics to an AnCan webinar on Aug. 31. The video is available now for your viewing: https://ancan.org/webinar-how-and-why-prostate-cancer-genomic-tests-work/
Is there a collective noun for this? Like a murder of crows? How about a hassle of prostates!
Howard,
Congratulations on "batting a 1000!" Dat's a lotta prostates!