Hopefully I won't have to dip into the Imodium too much

I am less than a week away from leaving on a trip around the world, and no matter how hard I try, I cannot keep the following vision from running through my head: I am in outer Mongolia being pursued by a pack of wild dogs, all of whom are frothing at the mouth. As I scramble across the uneven frozen terrain, the pack gains on me. It's raining and the grey light of day is getting weak.

Two months ago, I visited a travel clinic so that I could be inoculated against some of the diseases that still rage across various parts of the globe like scarlet fever, polio, pertussis (something I'd never heard of, but involves a lot of coughing), hepatitis, the measles, what have you. I received seven shots, and I am just now able to lift each arm above the shoulder again. But there was one shot I did not get, because it cost $500: rabies. The doctor asked me about my route, and eventually narrowed his inquiry to this: Will you be hiking in rural Asia? I said that I would. He went on to inform me that there are a lot of stray dogs in Asia, and that rabies is a much bigger problem there than it is here. Then he told me the price. "Do you know anyone who'd ever gotten rabies in Asia?" I asked. He said no, so I politely declined the shot. I was on my way back to the car, not more than 30 feet from the clinic, when the wild-dogs-in-Mongolia visions began.