Now with new laser eyebeam capabilities
What actually happens when you have LASIK (if you are squeamish about eyes, stop reading now)
1. They make you put on amusing hospital gown over your clothes and shoe/hair shields. Little brother mocks you for this*
*Little brother not compulsory part of procedure.
2. You lie down and they give you loads of anaesthetic drops around your eye, as well as rubbing it with bright yellow sterilising stuff, which is presumably some kind of practical joke because they know you're not allowed to wash it off properly afterwards when you look like a yellow panda and aren't allowed to rub your eyes. Little brother mocks you again. They also give you two of those stress ball things to hold in your hands, which were actually very comforting - at least nobody tried to hold my hand, which would totally have freaked me out.
3. They put a suction ring thingy on your eye and then cut the flap in your cornea - fortunately the suction ring thingy momentarily knackers your vision so you can't see this bit and I didn't actually find out till later that that's when they did it. Little brother feels a bit off and has to move his seat so he can't see. Suction ring thingy doesn't exactly hurt but pressure pretty strong - feels like someone pushing a ring into the space around your eye really hard. Apparently the bit that cuts the flap has a great big long pole thing attached that extends from your eye and I looked momentarily like a cyborg ^___^
4. They take the ring off and your vision comes back but is now all blurry. Flashy red and green lights from the laser give you something to look at. Also they have filled you full of Valium so there is a certain urge to lie there going 'ooo, look at the pretty lights' which is of course exactly what they want you to do, so that's OK then. Little brother able to watch again.
5. Laser is actually the most pleasant part of the procedure because all you have to do is look at aforesaid pretty lights and the fit Polish technician dude is counting down for you while it's going. Also they do it in little ten-second bursts so it's much easier than I expected, I thought I'd have to keep my eyes straight for the full minute. There is a burning smell which would have been very disconcerting if I hadn't been warned to expect it. What is the cornea made of anyway?
6. They put the flap back onto the eye and the consultant then spends a frankly off-putting period of time prodding around smoothing it down. They put a bandage contact lens on (weirder than putting your own contact lens in because you're lying still and can see it coming towards you). Little brother has decided by now that this procedure may not be for him.
7. Rinse and repeat with other eye.
I walked into the operating theatre at 12.15 and was sitting back in the waiting room getting ready to leave by 12.45. ^_^ I understand what my colleague's mate meant now when he said that for the money you pay, you feel a bit short-changed...
...and then my lovely li'l bro drove me home and put up with me going 'whee I can read the signs in Piccadilly Circus / the road names / that car's numberplate' all the way back without actually punching me at any point. He's really very heroic on occasion.
Feels awesome. May have to wait a few days for development of ability to crumble city blocks with new laser eyebeams, but everything else coming along very nicely. And this morning I'm typing this without glasses ^______^ I still have a little bit of blur but that should settle over the next few days, and I suspect it's partly caused by the bandage contact lenses, which will be coming out in a couple of hours at the 24-hr-post-op appointment, hooray. (My clinic works Sundays, who knew?)