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.