Raptor Jerky

Xandert

Dear Hubby’s appendix quit. Between you and me I can’t really blame it. If I was fed a diet of some lunch meat called Old-Fashioned Loaf and Meat Jerky, I’d quit too. (Notice I said Meat Jerky? He’s not a persnickety man. If Slim Jim made Raptor Jerky he’d be all over that.) Anyway, he’s healing up nicely now, after a miserable week in the hospital. He’s also encouraging everyone to get their appendix out before it turns on them. I’m planning to keep mine and continue feeding it a healthy diet of field greens and chocolate to keep it purring along and doing whatever it is that appendixes do that no one can figure out.

My buddy, Angel, says that appendixes are like souls, you really can get by in this world just fine without them.

Speaking of souls, some Jehovah Witnesses just stopped by. It really says something about the solitude of writers when I greet these women with enthusiasm. Real People! Yay!

Lately I’ve been writing a story to be included in an anthology that will be published later this summer. The proceeds of the book will be given to cancer charity—a most worthy cause. I’d been working on that and fell asleep in my office the night that Dear Hubby staggered into the room and woke me up with, “Hon, I need to go to the Emergency Room.”

You are probably aware it is possible to go from zero to sixty on the scale of consciousness without hitting any of the digits between those two numbers. In all the years I’ve known DH he’s never said those words. This is a man who functions with broken bones for weeks before finally succumbing to a doctor and X-ray. How many times have I watched him wiggle a hand or foot back and forth while saying, “If it were broken, I wouldn’t be able to do this!” Since he only has one speed in life (a speed which can only be summed up as Nads Out) he considers broken bones a consequence of living. As I child-proofed our house after the birth of our first born, DH said, “Broken bones are part of childhood.” Wait, what? Not unless you’re having a movie of the week childhood!

After rousing me to warp speed mentality, the ride to the nearest hospital in my Time Travel Jeep was a slow and miserable one for him. Maybe now he’ll get to work on that Stargate, because it would have come in handy. By the way you might want to negotiate some sort of deal with your appendix so it doesn’t turn on you during a holiday weekend. You don’t want to arrive at the hospital when everyone obviously has way better things they could be doing. You also don’t want people trying to get to the hospital to see you to get stuck in a parade.

Jdurhan

When I say stuck in a parade, I don’t mean stuck behind it either, or being rerouted around it. On my way to visit DH, post-surgery, I ended up in a Memorial Day parade right behind the kilted men with bagpipes. That is not such a bad place to be, if you ever get stuck in one. I mean it has its perks. But I was in my Jeep, and I was totally wrecking the whole Scottish theme. The worst part of that experience is not the police part. They saw and ignored me, because frankly I’m not sure they could figure out how the heck I got there anymore than I could. The worst part is now I have to go back to my Time Travel Jeep book and once again insert another scene before getting it to you, because face it, there are things in life just begging to be immortalized in fiction. Am I wrong?