I hold the medical profession in the highest esteem, by which I mean I avoid it at all costs, lest I be subjected to an involuntary colonoscopy. I have long believed that the only proper bodily portal for incoming objects is the aptly named pie hole, and the objects in question should be of an edible nature, preferably composed of sugar and/or fat.

This is not to say I don’t have the utmost respect for doctors, who can only achieve the level of knowledge and experience needed to handle my infrequent requests for assistance (“I don’t want it cut off! I want a pill to make it all better!”) through years of study and practice. For that reason, I’m convinced there’s more than meets the eye to recent news reports that resident physicians at Maine Medical Center in Portland have engaged in a “tradition” during trips to an annual conference of visiting a strip club and taking part in lap dances. 

Receiving them, I mean, not giving them.

If this were a bunch of lawyers or insurance brokers or even journalists, I’d have an entirely different opinion about their motives for watching women pole dance and then squirm around on their crotches. Since such activities could have no relation to their occupations (unless the journalists were working undercover on a Sunday feature story about what it’s like to be the passive recipient of a lap dance), I would be forced to conclude that such behavior is unworthy of their professions and ineligible for a deduction on their income taxes.

But when it comes to physicians, it’s a different matter. After all, doctors get to see naked people all the time. They probably even get to see strippers in their examining rooms with all their clothes off. And they don’t even have to slip dollar bills into their garters. In fact, the strippers have to pay the docs to cure whatever occupational ailment is interfering with their ability to bump and grind.

Given that situation, there are only two reasons that licensed medical professionals would waste their time at nude-dancing emporiums. Either they’re thanking the dancers for their patronage by sending a little business their way, or they’re engaged in important research into the major health issues affecting people who can’t just cover up their beer bellies with looser clothes.

I assume in the case of Maine Med’s residents, it’s the latter. Even in the throes of lap-dance-induced ecstasy, I figure the closed-circuit video from the strip club will show the docs in question, taking notes and snapping photos that will later prove to be of immeasurable worth in the ongoing fight to wipe out Cooper’s droop. 

Also, there are silicone implants to be examined, collagen injections to be tested, Botox-smoothed skin to be caressed, as well as all the nips and tucks of plastic surgery to be given their fifty-thousand-dance inspections. Given the numerous opportunities for professional observation and intervention in these important fields, it’s a wonder topless bars don’t qualify for tax exemptions as medical research facilities.

So, don’t let the recent negative publicity over this innocent incident get you down, men of Maine Med (for some curious reason, those involved were all men). Your motives were pure, even if your pants were a little wrinkled.

While I’m on the subject of nudie bars, I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention a news report from earlier this month that must have caused considerable excitement among local hospital physicians. A new bar in Portland’s Old Port called Mark’s Place ran a full-page advertisement in the June 8 Portland Phoenix showing the silhouette of a female form engaged in either pole dancing or an extremely unconventional approach to pole vaulting.

The ad also urged readers to “Grab some Buds.” I assume that has something to do with medical marijuana.

Before the first Maine Med resident could drop his scalpel and head for Wharf Street, the news broke that this wasn’t a topless bar, after all. Even though the place is owned by Mark Deane, who opened Mark’s Showplace, a strip club on Riverside Street now known as PT’s Showclub a couple of decades ago, the new establishment will not feature anybody with their clothing askew. The ad was a joke, Deane said, a mistake. The sort of hapless combination of circumstances that could happen to anyone. No nudity as his bar, Deane insisted, and no medical pot, either. Conservative prudes were momentarily appeased, until they discovered there’d be same-sex marriage and classes espousing Darwin’s theory of evolution.

At last report, Portland officials were assessing their legal options for restraining Deane. But while waiting for the opinions from their lawyers (which were delayed because they were busy attending an important conference at PT’s Showplace), the City Council decided to find something it could ban without a lot of law-book mumbo-jumbo.

Such as Styrofoam. 

Councilors have directed one of their committees (the Committee on Banning Things) to draft an ordinance outlawing polystyrene foam in containers used by restaurants and other businesses, both because it’s an eco-hazard and – heh, heh, I bet you thought I was about to make some cheap crack about Styrofoam having something to do with nude dancing, didn’t you, but such an unseemly (and untrue) reference was never even on my radar – it’s believed to be one of the causes of Cooper’s droop.

Portland would not be the first municipality in Maine to ban the foam substance. Freeport did it years ago, which forced L.L. Bean to stop selling Styrofoam Bean Boots.

In another exciting development on the environmental front, an enterprising farmer in Exeter has discovered a way to heat his house using poop. According to a story in the Bangor Daily News, Stonyvale Farm is using something called anaerobic digestion of animal and food waste to create what an expert called “energy, heat and other sustainable products.” Among those “other” products is cow bedding (just one more reason it sucks to be a cow) and biodegradable plastic cups that can be used in place of polystyrene if you don’t mind drinking coffee with a faint taste of poo.

There was lots of lobster news in the past few days. For instance, the Democratic primary to choose a U.S. Senate candidate was won by a lobster. 

The Republicans also held a primary to choose their senatorial candidate. The victor was said to be a human being. 

Meanwhile, the Maine Lobster Advisory Council (motto: Don’t Go In That Wire Thing, It’s A Trap!) has been trying to come up with a snappy advertising slogan to replace “Lobster: Not Nearly As Dangerous And Disgusting As It Looks.”

The council is also seeking a better name for soft-shell lobsters, known locally as shedders, a moniker that evokes visions of lobster hair all over the furniture. So far, the leading contenders are “sweet shells,” “crabs,” and “steak.”

Finally, Portland was subjected earlier this month to something called a “yarn bombing.” This a guerilla activity in which somebody knits nice, artistic-like cozies to fit on objects that wouldn’t normally be caught dead in a homemade sweater. One such bomb appeared on “Michael,” a piece of public art near Temple and Free streets, making the rusty steel creation look like an infant Transformer wearing one of granny’s gifts.

But the most shocking use of yarn were the burqas surreptitiously wrapped around all the dancers at PT’s Showplace. Just when it appeared the strip show could not go on because of forcibly imposed modesty, doctors from Maine Med were summoned to surgically remove the garments.

See, that training at the conference paid off.

Al Diamon has fond memories of the Stardust, a combination neighborhood bar and strip joint at the base of Portland’s Munjoy Hill. It featured a carved wooden sign that read, “The Stardust features GIRLS FROM BOSTON plus our own girls.” When the place was burning down, he had to be physically restrained by firefighters from rushing inside to save it. And he wasn’t even a doctor. He is, however, always on call by emailing aldiamon@herniahill.net.

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