Happy belated birthday to Ann.
I spent six hours at the hospital yesterday filling out admissions paperwork, having an MRI and an x-ray, giving blood, and speaking with a neurosurgeon and an anesthesiologist. Among other things, the three most important bits of information I learned were: 1. The surgery is three hours long NOT 30 minutes as I was originally told, 2. Enjoy my shower the morning of the surgery because I can't take another one for five days, and 3. I get to keep the piece of bone they need to remove from my spine in order to get to the disc. Cool.

I have no problem with a three hour surgery, I mean hey, take all the time you need. But then, as soon as it's over, they wake you up from a perfectly good buzz to ask you if you can feel your legs. And if I can't? Gee, you don't think it had anything to do with that piece of my spine you took out, do you? I hang out in recovery for about an hour before they send me back to my room where, hopefully, I'll remain pleasantly stoned for the rest of the day. Wishful thinking maybe, but I'm not taking my computer to the hospital counting on the fact that I'll be too wasted to use it. A few comic books maybe, a finger puppet or two, nothing too technical or that requires any kind of attention span.

I know I always go for the laugh, it's my way of dealing with things and sometimes it actually works. I'd be lying if I said I wasn't nervous about all this, but to use another Popeye quote, "I ain't no doctor, but I know when I'm losing me patience". Over the past year I feel like I've done all I can do to fix or improve my condition without surgery. It's time to resort to modern technology. Dr. King told me there's no reason for me to live like this. He also told me I'll be kicking myself for wasting all this time and not having it done sooner. But if I had had the surgery last year I'd always wonder whether I could have improved without it. Now I don't have to worry about that. Unless of course the surgery doesn't work either.

Oh, and about that piece of bone they're taking out of me, if anybody's kid needs something to hang on the end of a summer camp lanyard, let me know.

... to be continued.

"That's all I can stands, I can't stands no more" ...Popeye.

I don't believe that our lives are predetermined. I do believe that occasionally things happen for a reason, and if I'm lucky enough to pick up on the signs I try not to ignore them. As of Wednesday at 1700 I honestly believed I had improved enough to try going back to work. As I posted earlier, if I wasn't up to it after a couple of trips I would seriously consider having the surgery. At 1715, after an hour on the phone with our medical department trying to determine why they had denied my doctor's fax (for the second time) clearing me to return to work, I had the first sign (or maybe the denied clearance was the first sign). I threw my back out so bad, I felt like I had time-warped back to the day I went into the clinic ...three months of progress gone in a flash. Although not quite as severe as before, the shift and nerve pain immediately returned, and sitting, standing, and walking were extremely painful.

I was able to see Dr. King on Thursday without an appointment, his last day of work before going on vacation (sign #2). He phoned his friend Director Professor Doctor of Medicine Robert Schönmayr (Dr. Bob), who had just returned from his vacation and is completely booked for the next month, and was able to get me in at 1500 that afternoon (sign #3). After consulting with Dr. King and discussing the options with me, he scheduled the surgery (microdiscectomy) for next Thursday, April 8th ...how's that for service (Sign #4)! The good news is I won't miss the MANU v BAYERN match on Wednesday night (sign #5), the bad news is that Dr. Bob is a big FC BAYERN fan. Let's hope the outcome of the game doesn't effect his performance in the operating room the next morning.

Sign #6: Doctor Bob's wife is a retired Lufthansa flight attendant, so I'm thinking maybe industry discount here.

Sign #7: Doctor Bob says there are plenty of football players in the Bundesliga who have suffered this injury, and after having the surgery, continue to play. If the Bundesliga is confidant enough with the results of this surgery to keep paying some guy a seven or eight figure salary, then surely United will see fit to take me back at the poverty level wage at which they retain me.

to be continued..........

Buon Compleanno, Giovanni! To celebrate your birthday I'm making us a very nice Polpi in Purgatorio for dinner tonight.

I am a huge Elton John fan ...up to, and including "Goodbye Yellow Brick Road" and the live album recorded in Australia with the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra. He is my go to artist on those days when I stare at my CDs and can't decide what to listen to. I mean c'mon, the guy owned the 70s and early 80s. My brother gave me his debut album "Elton John" (released in 1970) around 1971 or '72. It was the first record I ever remember being given. I saw him in concert at the Omni in Atlanta on Nov. 10, 1974 ...for $7.50! I was grounded at the time and almost wasn't allowed to go, but when I told my father I already had the tickets and a date, he lifted my suspension AND drove us to the concert. A chivalrous man my dad. Today's post is dedicated to Elton John on his 63rd birthday. Let us celebrate the great artist he once was rather than the raging, bloated, self-absorbed queen he's become.

Isis (pronounced EE-sis) and Tarek gave us an internet radio for Christmas. It's a small box that connects to your stereo and uses your WLAN signal to pick up radio stations over the internet. I really don't understand why these things aren't more popular. You can listen to just about any radio station from anywhere in the world. It's perfect at dinnertime because you can dial up music to go with whatever style of food you're cooking. Wokkin' up some Asian? Radio Bangkok. Heapin' on the Haggis? KSAC, All Bagpipes, All The Time!

Amongst others, we've programmed WXRT in Chicago, DC's NPR station WAMU (for Morning Edition, A Prairie Home Companion, and The Splendid Table), Radio 2 from the Netherlands (the music's so-so but listening to the Dutch always cheers me up), and The Loon from Minnesota. Although it's a local German station broadcasting out of Wiesbaden, one of our favorites is Radio Bob. They play a pretty good mix of old and new, have a retired Air Force Sargent as a DJ, and every once in a while they come out with a song that other stations would never play even though they might play songs by that band. For instance, the other day they played "The Gambler" by Emerson Lake & Palmer from the Album "Love Beach" released in 1978. I still have the album and haven't heard that song since I last played it myself back when I had ... (gasp) ...a record player. It was their last studio album, and was hastily thrown together in order to satisfy contract obligations. The music was panned by the critics (deservedly so), as was the album cover which was likened to a Bee Gees disco-era photo complete with shirts unbuttoned to the waist.

And nothing against the Bee Gees, I've got plenty of their old stuff too. Anybody got a problem with that?

Happy Birthday, Sheri ...a glass of Port to toast, and welcome to the club. And a Happy Birthday to Judy ...who's joining a new one.

I've decided to try going back to work in April for a limited schedule of two or three trips. I'll see how it goes, and if the back, hip, and leg don't cooperate, I'll sign up for the diskectomy at the end of April using vacation time at the beginning of May to recuperate. It's been just over a year since I was diagnosed with the slipped disc. In that time I've tried a number of therapies thinking that I could achieve the same level of comfort surgery would provide ...ain't gonna happen. If this is as good as it gets, It's not good enough. And as the handsome Dr. King told me, I'm too young (thaz right) and active to just settle for a lifetime of pain management.

Wiesbaden celebrated its Easter Market over the weekend, and for us that always means buying wine. Not that we don't buy wine the rest of the year, it's just that this particular occasion is especially fun. At every Easter Market for the past nine years the Hochschule in Geisenheim has sold 1000 boxes of wine, at 20 Euro a box, to raise money for their student exchange program. The wines are from all over the world, the selection of the six bottles in each box varies, and you don't get to open the box before you buy it. When we opened our boxes at home they included wines from Germany, France, Italy, Spain, California, New Zealand, South Africa, Greece, Slovenia, and Macedonia. A worthy cause at 3.33 Euro a bottle.

I can highly recommend the last three books I read. "The Amazing Adventures Of Kavalier & Clay", by Michael Chabon, won the Pulitzer Prize, is truly a great American novel, and if you like it, I can also recommend his latest, "The Yiddish Policeman's Union". Erik Larson's "The Devil In The White City" is the true story of a serial killer, and the logistics of putting together the Chicago World's Fair of 1893. And Leif Enger's "So Brave, Young, and Handsome", which is beautifully written and just as good as his first book "Peace Like A River".

What's Irish and sits in your backyard? ...Paddy O'Furniture! Happy St. Patrick's Day, and a special Namenstag shout to Patrik ...Irishman for a day.

Standing around looking at construction sites has always been popular with children all over the world, especially boys. Even before the movie "Transformers", little boys have watched backhoes and bulldozers, pile drivers and steamrollers, just about anything with a large tread or huge wheels, and imagined these machines as robots. In Germany, this demographic is filled by middle aged or elderly men. German men love to stare at construction sites. And they don't have to be massive city block size sites, either. If there's a guy from a road crew filling a pothole, there will be at a least one old German guy watching him do it. The big sites are the most popular though, with at least half a dozen men, hands ALWAYS clasped behind their backs, noses inches from the chain link fence, muttering to themselves (or anyone within earshot) about the quality of the work. Sometimes there's a tall wooden fence with head-sized viewing portals, sort of like those things you stick your head through to have your picture taken at the boardwalk or an amusement park. Invariably, there are more men than portals, and as no one would ever be so impolite as to suggest you shove over and share your hole, it can be very frustrating for the odd man out.

I bring this up because there's a construction site in the corner of the park next to the building where I go for therapy. It's been active for a couple of weeks now and it gets so noisy they have to close the windows in the practice. Along with the usual assortment of small equipment there's a pile driver, a backhoe, a bulldozer, and a huge drill that looks like something you would use to take core samples in the Arctic. As I left therapy yesterday and passed by the site on my way to catch the bus, I stopped for a few minutes to watch the drill bring up these 40 foot long pretzel rods of dirt and mud. I was standing there for a good five minutes before it hit me ...I had just added another item to the list of things that remind me of how long I've lived here. I'm becoming a middle-aged German man who stands around staring at construction sites. Well, really not very German as my mutterings were less constructive and more like, "Wow, the dirt from that drill looks like a giant pretzel rod." At least I kept my hands in my pockets.

Belated birthday wishes to all the people I failed to note during my literary constipation ...Bill, Caitlin, Gisele, Teresa, Sister Mary Paul, Patrik, Deborah, Krunch, Tyneil, Rhonda, Wendy, and Denise.

The first record I ever bought with my own money was Alice Cooper's "Killer" in 1971 at a record store in Towson, Maryland. When I told him (Alice) this, on a flight I was working, he said, "I bet your mother loved that!" When I told him that I liked it so much I went right out and bought his first album "Pretties For You" (released in 1969) he said, "You, and five other people." Well, five people is a start and look where he ended up. Okay, not where he ended up NOW (he's doing TV commercials here in Germany for a chain of media appliance stores ...really), but where he ended up 35 years ago ...at the top. I don't have such high aspirations, but I dedicate this post to Alice Cooper, and the legions of fans (3) who encouraged me to blog again. Rising like a "Phoenix" (Grand Funk Railroad 1972) from the ashes (slush) of the last 51 days, it's time to "Rock On" (David Essex 1973).

It was 5 degrees Celsius here in Wiesbaden last weekend (for Fahrenheit, the general rule is to double that and add 30)...it's supposed to be 17 on Thursday. I knew spring was on its way two weeks ago when the first flocks of geese started heading north. You hear them before you see them, this honking cacophony of sound that builds like a circus rolling into town. That sound (in both spring and fall) always sends me rushing outside with the same enthusiasm I had as a kid for the Good Humor truck. Wiesbaden is built on mineral hot springs, hence the name. The geese use the thermals above the city as a sort of avian truck stop, resting without flapping, soaring in massive swirling columns. It's eerie, it's the only time they stop honking. After a while they start to break away in small groups, those groups merging with others to fan out and eventually form the biggest V's I've ever seen. I think that's how the Flying V guitar got its name. If not, it should have. It's a beautiful thing to see (the geese I mean, but the guitar as well), and I look forward to it every year.

The back is much better thanks to my stay in the clinic and the physical therapy I've been in three times a week since coming home. The nerve pain in the leg is practically gone, and the inflammation and pain in the hip only seem to crop up when I walk too much. I had an appointment last week in Virginia with an orthopedic surgeon who told me the bulging disc will not get any better (he should have seen me before the clinic!) or worse (he should have seen me before the pain and shift that sent me to the clinic!). He said I can live with/manage whatever discomfort I might have through pain management, or I can have a 30 minute out-patient operation called a discectomy. Apparently it's a pretty simple procedure that involves shaving off the goo that's leaked out of the disc and is pressing on the nerve. I'm still mulling it over.

You say it's your Birthday! It's my Birthday too, yeah!

Happy Birthday to Star, Yanni, and Roxanne! How cool is it to actually know people named Star, Yanni, and Roxanne?!

Today's celebrity Birthdays include; Jools Holland, the late, greats Warren Zevon and John Belushi, the not late, not so great Ernest Borgnine, Neil Diamond, Mary Lou Retton, Aaron Nevile, and Nastassia Kinski.

It's 0850 Saturday morning, my last day in the clinic. The doctor (who of course doesn't work on Saturdays) has forgotten to leave me a prescription for the meds I'm supposed to ween myself off of over the next two weeks, my roommate is watching a German version of Jerry Springer at an ear splitting volume, and the workers have begun hammering, drilling, and pounding on the floor below. I am sooo ready to go home.

While some progress was made in correcting the shift, the physical therapy and core-strengthening exercises will continue for a very long time. I still have some nerve pain in my leg, but I think that's because as the spine returns to it's normal position, there's more pressure on the nerve from the disc which is what caused the shift in the first place.

I'll continue the blog from home, but now I can put the last three weeks behind me and get back to writing about the next 50 years. Those of you who only stuck around to be titillated by the descriptive passages of the sadistic practices inflicted upon my person will be sorely disappointed.

I'd like to thank everyone who called, emailed, sent texts, and came to visit. Your's was the most appreciated, and productive of all my therapies. I couldn't have done it without you.

As I said in an earlier post, I was not going to spend my 50th birthday in this clinic. After much thought, I decided to suck it up, consider my health over my alcohol requirements, and ask Dr. Quackenbush if he recommended a fourth week of therapy. Without even stopping to think about it, he said no. This pleased me in more ways than one. First, it means I get to leave here, celebrate my birthday how and where I want, and at the end of the day go home and hug my own bowl, (at a more comfortable angle I might add) if the need arises. Second, it means that the doctor wasn't just trying to fill a bed for another week. He told me three weeks was long enough, and that the body, and the mind, need time to rest and recover for a few days before starting the next phase of therapy.

I'm actually going to miss this place after I'm gone. The longer I've been here, the more things they find for me to do with my pants down. Unfortunately, one of those things required me to shave my left leg so the therapist could apply Kenesio Tape over the sciatic nerve from my left cheek to my ankle. I didn't really have a problem with that, I mean it's winter and no one's going to see it, right?. What sucked is shaving the back of your thigh is like shaving the back of your head, you can't see either place. I also wasn't dealing with just a day or two of stubble, we're talking 50 years of growth here. One stroke of my razor and the twin blades looked like they were clogged with a small mouse. It was like trying to shave a Wookie with a butter knife.

SPOILER ALERT!! If needles make you queasy, skip to the next paragraph. The good doctor decided to try a different approach today and gave me a shot directly into the spinal canal a couple of inches from the end of the tail bone. DO NOT TRY THIS AT HOME. The first shot (oh yeah, there were two) was a local anesthetic, followed by the second shot which was a cocktail of painkiller, steroid, espresso, and Old Spice. The result was a numbing of my entire pelvic region, and a warmth that made me wonder whether I had just soiled myself. I still don't know what it was supposed to do, but I assure you it didn't seem worth the whole experience. This was at 0830. I thought my day couldn't get any worse, until the therapist sat on my glasses. In a weird stroke of luck, guess who's roommate makes eyeglasses for a living?

So, I'm paroled on Saturday, and not a moment too soon. In the last two days I've heard songs by BOTH Oasis, and Red Hot Chili Peppers on the radio in the therapy room. I could have ALMOST lived with hearing one or the other, BUT BOTH?! I would rather have a shot in the spine every day for the rest of my life than listen to those two bands. Take a blowtorch to my eardrums and put me out of my misery. Let zombie moles burrow into my skull and feed on my brain. Put those alien bugs from "The Wrath Of Kahn" into my ears to drive me insane. ANYTHING, just don't make me listen to the bands whose names must not be spoken. I'm just saying.

Before I even began writing "Life On Tap", I had already decided I wouldn't use it as a forum to vent, either one way or the other, on the cultural differences between Germany and the United States. The following is not a comparison. It is simply the way things are here in my adopted homeland.

The German word "Ordnung" means order, or orderliness. It also encompasses a greater meaning of establishing or following an order, or set of rules. Germans live by many rules, some better than others. Many of the rules, and the abiding of said rules, (The Dude Abides) are what make this such a great country to live in. I don't know whether a lot of these rules are actually laws, or whether they're just unwritten codes of conduct. For a German, the embarrassment of being caught, or seen breaking these rules by one's neighbors (or the general public for that matter), far outweighs that incurred from receiving a ticket from a policeman for breaking a real law.

Arguably the most important example of Ordnung is the Ruhezeit, or quiet time. This is between 1300-1500 and 2200-6000 Monday through Friday, and all day on Sunday. It is understood that musical instruments are not to be played during the midday pause, and between 1900-0800. If you have a party, it is understood that you will give advanced notice to all your neighbors, although you are not required to invite them. Kids being kids, they are not covered by this house rule and are allowed to make general kid noises anytime they please.

During these times (although adherence to the midday pause is going the way of the Dodo) you are not supposed to vacuum, do laundry, play the stereo or TV too loud, drop off bottles in the recycling bin, or basically do anything that might annoy the neighbors. If you're the dickhead who lives above me, this includes walking (read stomping), and singing German marching songs from WW I, or if you're the Russians who live next door, simply opening your mouth in general conversation. In other words, loud.

Sunday is the big no-no. Sundays are reserved for (and this is one of those things that makes Germany a great place to live) going to Oma's for coffee and cake, walking in the woods, or strolling through town looking in the shops, all of which are closed. Everything is closed on Sundays except gas stations, shops in train stations, and bars and restaurants. This is not a bad thing ...if you haven't gotten it by Sunday, you don't need it.

I will admit, I've broken the Sunday rule from time to time. Most people in the building have a washing machine in their apartment, but for those who don't there's a pay washer and dryer in the heated laundry room, along with a number of clotheslines. The laundry room is directly under our apartment, and while I can't tell if someone is doing their laundry, my philosophy is that if they can do their laundry under my apartment on a Sunday, I can do my laundry IN my apartment on a Sunday. I've also found the occasional need (and when I say need, I mean NEED) to vacuum during the Ruhezeit. I try to do this as quickly as possible, and I always close the windows so no one can hear me. So far, no one has complained.

This (finally)brings me to the point of today's post. There has been ongoing construction (hammering, drilling, pounding) on the floor below me since the day I arrived. My old roommate, who left on Saturday, complained about the noise nearly every day, told the staff he deserved a discount, and left early because of it. My new roommate, who arrived yesterday, got in his car and drove home after his therapy today so he could relax in peace and quiet. I understand work must go on, and it really hasn't bothered me that much ...until they started hammering, drilling, and pounding AT 1000 SUNDAY MORNING!!! It's now 1905 on Tuesday night and they're still at it. This country's going to hell in a handbag.

Lunch today was Schnitzel with a mushroom sauce. This gives me the perfect excuse to post my favorite mushroom photo to as many people as possible in one fell swoop. I took this picture in the Morvan, considered by many (Frenchmen) to be the Arkansas of France.

Happy Birthday, Nika!

I started the morning thinking about how cathartic it's been writing this blog. I suddenly realized that the word catheter, which has the same prefix, is also a mechanism for release. That made me think about the name Cathrine. I'm glad I'm not named Cathrine.

"Empire Falls" by Richard Russo, and "The Time Traveler's Wife" by Audrey Niffenegger, were great reads. The former won Russo the Pulitzer Prize. The latter is one of the best love stories I've ever read. A book that's so good I refuse to watch the film. I've read both of their new books while in the clinic. Russo's "That Old Cape Magic", and Niffenegger's "Her Fearful Symmetry." Neither will win a Pulitzer or, hopefully, be made into a film. They are so bad, so excruciatingly boring, it's hard to believe they were written by the same authors. It's as if Ridley Scott immediately followed "Blade Runner" with "A Good Year." I should have just quit in the middle of both of them, but I've always had a hard time doing that. I almost gave up on "The Shipping News" by Annie Proulx, but she hit her stride around page 82 and it turned out to by one of my all time favorites. As far as I remember, the only books I couldn't finish were "A Confederacy of Dunces" and "The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo." I just didn't see what all the excitement was about for "Dunces", and I had the feeling that "Tattoo" had lost something in the translation from Swedish. All just my opinion of course. Sticking with the book theme, if you haven't already seen the movie "The Road", and are planning to, read the book first. Preferably in one sitting on a day when the weather outside is really nasty. Heavy stuff.

And thank you Christel, Patrik, and Marc, for picking me up for dinner on Friday. As always, a good time was had by all. BUT, as much fun as I had, the highlight of my day, and I'm sure you'll all agree with me on this (okay, maybe not all of you), was lying face down on a therapy table while a young brunette stuck electrified suction cups on my bare ass. Ugh, therapy goooood.

Go Vikings!!

Today's post goes out to Isis and Denise who picked me up for dinner last night. I'm getting to be a regular Stammgast at the Glaswerk. Let's hope they let me come back after downing a couple of 7% Andechser Doppelbock Dunkels tomorrow night with Christel, Patrik, and Marc. At least my cellmate is happy every time I leave. I make sure I wait until the nurse brings my tray to the room, then I give it to him before I tell them I'm going out for dinner. You have to stick together in the joint. He told me he's going home on Saturday. I'm gonna miss the guy. I've been pretty lucky having him as a roommate compared to some of the squirrels in this place. When he arrived the day after me, he said his computer was full of movies and could pick up TV stations so he didn't need to pay the €3 a day for the remote control for the TV in our room. Even if we split it, he said, how would we decide what to watch. So, for the next week we just watched the one station we have, until he figured out how to change the channel without the remote. I won't miss his snoring.

The good doctor (who's name is pronounced the same as the German word for "crisis", by the way) missed his mark and put my daily shot of anesthetic too close to the nerve yesterday. My hips were swishier than a drunken runway model. This is the day he decides to take another photo of my spine. He swears the pictures he keeps taking are only being used to chart my progress and will not be published in the Deutsche Medical Journal of Freakish Abnormalities. You know, the one with pictures of Klaus Kinski and Karl Lagerfeld.

It's official, I'll be staying another week, although Dr.Crisis said if there's little improvement by the time I leave he has no idea what to suggest next. He still insists I don't need surgery, but he doesn't know why the shift is so severe while the bulge of the disc is so minor. Frau Schramm, who sees my deformity as a personal challenge and has really worked her ass off to fix it, says she's never seen so little progress in a patient in 20 years as a therapist. Stubborn muscles I guess.

I got a little too relaxed in the Stangerbad today and let my jaw dip below the waterline. All of a sudden my mouth filled with the metallic taste of aluminum foil, or a scallop that's gone off. There must have been a reaction between the electricity in the water and the fillings in my teeth. Seems like somebody should have warned me about that too. Finished the day with a four man group (physical)therapy session that included my roommate, Cheesy Mustache Comb Over Guy, and Navajo Jewelry, Chevy Van With American Flag Guy. Thank the gods those two have their own room.

Happy Birthday, Marc, today's photo is for you. Wish I was where ever you are to split an extra paar Weißwurst with you. Thank you Denise for last night's Asian-Latin fusion dinner. Wow, no institutional food for three nights in a row. If I can keep from dropping the soap in the shower, and continue with the outside dietary assistance, I may survive my incarceration after all.

..."She really worked me over good, she was a credit to her gender. She put me through some changes lord, sort of like a Waring blender" ....Warren Zevon

Black and blue from yesterday's physical therapy session with Frau Schramm, and she's decided to bump it up a notch by scheduling a second session in the afternoon as of today. My ass is killing me. That, coupled with the fact that the toilet seats were designed for golden agers, and are about three inches too high, are making for a rather uncomfortable experience. Seriously, if anyone has any platform shoes left over from the 70's, feel free to send them along.

I had a serious talk with the doctor yesterday and he thinks I should stay for a third week. I had already decided I was willing to do that if I was seeing any progress, so it looks my parole will be delayed. That would have me sprung on the 22nd. I WILL NOT, I repeat, I WILL NOT spend my 50th birthday anyplace where there is even the slightest chance that someone will ask me, "Herr Wrigley, did you make with the bowel movement yesterday?"

Today they replaced the Dynamis with something called Nemectrodyn. I thought that was the robot from the "Transformers" movie that only had sex with dead robots, but my roommate corrected me and said that was Necropheliadyn. This guy knows everything. Nemectrodyn is more muscle-stimulating electricity administered through big diaphragm like suction cups stuck on my lower back. This time I got to lay on my stomach with my eyes closed in a dark room. I was able to nod off, but was constantly jolted awake by dreams of being mounted by a man-o-war. I feel like I'm being Tasered into good health.

Happy Birthday and Prost, Christel! Have a Weizen on me, and a Weizen for me.

All last week the last therapy of the day was at 1330 in the Bewegungsbad, or exercise pool. The pool is five feet deep, the size of my living room, and is not to be occupied by more than four people at a time. And, lest you wish to incur the wrath of Frau Schaefer, you will arrive early so as not to create a backup for the shower which you will use before and after entering the pool. Once in the water, you're led through a variety of exercises designed to be therapeutic, and less painful, because of the buoyancy factor. Unfortunately, everything I do in the pool numbs my leg. Herr Wrigley, put this noodle (one of those long tubular floaty things)between your legs and make like a bicycle ...Nope, that makes my leg numb. Okay Herr Wrigley, put one noodle behind your back, another noodle under your knees, and stretch your legs out with your toes pointed and then bend your legs back with your toes up ...Sorry, numb again. Okay Herr Wrigley, make with the floundering around the pool until we figure out what the hell we do with you ... Actually, that's pretty painful too. Herr Wrigley, hit the showers!

Today they decided to replace the Bewegungsbad with the Stangerbad. I spent 20 minutes searching for the definition of Stanger before my roommate told me it's the name of the guy who invented it. It looks like a giant bathtub with what I thought were jets all the way around the inside, kind of like those individual whirlpools you see football players in after a game. It turns out the jets are metal plates that send an electric current through the water. Now I know why she asked me if I had any metal in my body. The longer I stayed in it, the better I felt. I was so relaxed (remember?, on my back, eyes closed, dark room)I nearly slipped my head under the water until I remembered I still had my glasses on. Doesn't seem like something you should forget to tell somebody.

This is the restaurant where Jake and I had dinner last night. It's a half timber house with a modern twist. The front has been restored to it's original look, while the sides and back have been replaced with glass. Not so much replaced as covered over. The timbers remain, but the mortar that was between them has been removed. There are better pictures on their website www.das-glaswerk.de

What I learned today: Villa Lilly, the former vacation home of Adolphus Busch, co-founder of the largest brewing company in America since 1957, is now a drug and alcohol rehabilitation center. Isn't it ironic?

Tyneil, Denise, and Bill broke me out of stir yesterday for a night on the town. We went to a Gasthaus for Wild Goulash (venison and wild boar, hence the photo)and a couple of Licher Dunkel Weizen. Heavens, those beers were tasty! And they really do taste better if you don't have any for a few days. I'll have to remember that. There's a small cafe here in the clinic for guests and visitors that serves coffee and cakes, but I asked (read begged, pleaded, sobbed like a baby) and they don't have beer. I suppose I could have someone sneak a couple in, the forbidden ones always seem to taste better too.

Not much therapy on Saturday, and none on Sunday, so I'm just killing time until the Ravens game starts. It doesn't seem like a very productive system to me, but the doctor and the therapists insist your body needs a break occasionally. I think it's just an excuse for them to have the weekend off.

My day starts at 0800 with a shot of anesthetic near the problem disc. In theory this is supposed to relieve the pain in my leg and allow a more productive therapy. In fact, all it does is turn my left leg to rubber. Those of you who have been to the Oktoberfest with me should have no trouble picturing how I walk for the next three hours. At 0850 I'm on a traction machine, followed by something called Dynamis at 0910. Dynamis is like electroshock therapy for your back. Basically, you lay on a three foot long wet paper towel that has a metal plate under it that sends an oscillating current up and down your spine. THIS IS SPINAL ZAP. I like this one.

At 1030 I have about 45 minutes of physical therapy followed by lunch, and then Hydrojet at 1230. I'm rather fond of this one, too. Actually, I'm fond of any therapy that involves laying on my back in a dark room with my eyes closed. The Hydrojet machine looks like a one person waterbed with no sheets. Unlike a waterbed, you lay on the bare membrane while jets inside the bed message your back muscles. Just like a real waterbed though, getting off the thing is a pain in the ass.

Jake is coming to take me out for a pizza, so that's it for today. Go Ravens!

First, thank you Denise for letting everyone know about the delay. I apologize for keeping you all waiting.
Also, Happy Belated Birthday Caroline! Hold the door for me, I'm right behind you.
And a Happy Belated Birthday to Blaine (and Elvis).

It's Saturday morning, it's snowing, and the blog is back in business. Let me start by saying the coffee here is great, and as you can see in the picture, the view from my room is spectacular. You've all seen pictures of Gitmo and Abu Ghraib, so I won't bore you with photos of the room itself. The facility is a combination of "One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest", without the elevator music, and "The Road To Wellville", without the yogurt enemas.

I can hear the day nurse in the hall delivering the lunch trays. Meal time is always an adventure here as I discovered on my first day. After filling out the official paperwork, I was given a menu and asked to tick off what I thought were my dinner choices for the week ahead. It turned out that what I was selecting was lunch. When my dinner arrived on the first night, it consisted of, and I am not exaggerating, butter, one slice of bread, one slice of cheese, and one slice of wurst or baloney. That's it. When the nurse asked if I would I like her to put me down for an extra slice of bread the next night, I told her she better put me down for an extra slice of everything the next night!

Food is a precious commodity here. Since that first night, while the nursing staff is having their dinner, I've taken to scavenging the halls for unopened packets of meat products and cheese spread from other peoples trays after they've been returned to the cart. I can't speak for the rest of the "guests", but my roommate and I both have stashes of food under lock and key in our closets. I carry the key on a chain around my neck. I've considered hiding it in a capsule up my ass Papillon style.

Adolphus Busch, co-founder of Anheuser-Busch, died of dropsy while on vacation in Bad Schwalbach. Born in Kastel, not far from Wiesbaden, Busch built a mansion here, named it Villa Lilly after his wife (the daughter of his partner Eberhard Anheuser), and used it as a holiday home until his death in 1913. He is buried in Bellefontaine Cemetery in St.Louis, Missouri. It's nice to know that should I die of dropsy while I'm here, I'll be in good company.

Due to technical difficulty, the next posting will be delayed a day or two. Thanks.

This blog, and my new life, officially begins on Tuesday, Jan. 5th, 19 days before my 50th Birthday, when I will enter an orthopedic clinic in Bad Schwalbach, Germany. While 2009 did have some memorable moments, (and I have the photos and liver damage to prove it), the majority of the year pretty much sucked.

In an effort to avoid the pain from the bulging disc in my back, my body developed a Quasimodo-like shift in the spine which caused my left hip to jut out at a bizarre angle, leaving me looking like I had just misplaced the basket of laundry or small child that should be perched there. The treatment involves shots of anesthetic near the disc, followed by five to six hours of various therapies every day for two weeks. I hear they serve beer there. It's like rehab with alcohol. See you on Tuesday.