Out of Action for a Bit

On Thursday, I go in for my long-delayed shoulder surgery. I have been putting this off for about, oh, uh, almost 40 years. I originally wrecked the shoulder in 1975 in a skydiving accident.

Isn't that dramatic?

I, unfortunately, am kinda telling a lie.

It wasn't really skydiving. It was a pathetic static line jump in Massachusetts from about 1200 feet out of an old Canadian-built De Havilland Caribou. I came down kind of hard on my left shoulder and it has never been right (no pun intended) since then; I blame Canada, in case you are wondering.

It got further aggravated when one of my sons and I got into a weight-lifting competition with each other a few years ago in Miami. I was bench-pressing way too much weight when I felt a "crack!" in that shoulder, and was basically left with only a right wing for about 18 months--I did, however, win the contest and that's what's important.

It gradually healed, or so I thought, and then about six weeks ago, reaching up to a top shelf for a small box--wham!--the shoulder went out again. I haven't been able to raise my left arm above my waist since; I would make a lousy Communist.

So, off to arthroscopic surgery I go. I want to do it before Obamacare turns my local hospital into a Dickensonian DMV, or, anyhow, how Dickens would have imagined a DMV, if they had had DMVs when Dickens was around.

I hope to resume writing by the weekend and will be in a foul mood, more foul than ever, so maybe I actually will write something interesting and good for a change. One can only hope and change.