Gathering Goat Eggs

Since I've used the blog to whine about my injury, it would be unfair to not also use the blog to note that, in contrast to Logisticare's local Maryland office, the corporate office in Atlanta has been helpful, professional, and competent.

Last night I took the dogs for a short walk, for the first time since I was injured. Walking the dogs is usually my exclusive province, and although I gripe about it from time to time, particularly during howling rainstorms at midnight, it is one of the things I missed most about having my mobility curtailed. (Here strenuously resist temptation to repeat Steven Maturin's horrible pun about the dog watch being cur-tailed.) John had been doing the evening walk, but he seemed very harassed and overworked when he got home from the office last night, and I had been feeling steadier and more confident on my feet yesterday. So after extracting a promise from both the hounds that they would behave themselves, not chase after deer or rabbits, and avoid doing that bit where one circles me clockwise, the other counterclockwise, and they pull me off my feet with their leashes, we set out for the euphemistically named "wildflower meadow" which is really just a 3/4 acre patch of weeds I'm too lazy to mow more than twice a year.

Dogs' promises are not something I'd usually depend on, but they were as good as their word last night. It was a pleasant, if very short, outing. I heard the neighbors' demented rooster crowing again (he proudly announces the coming of midnight and moonrise, but dawn bores him), flushed a couple of mourning doves that the dogs dutifully ignored, and listened for awhile to that one insomniac mockingbird in the windbreak. Made it back up the porch steps without major mishap, and came to bed with a flush of unreasonable pride that I'd managed to do something I've done thousands of times without ever thinking about it.

Now, off to Lanham to retrieve the x-rays of my leg so that the orthopedic surgeon can look at them tomorrow. I have a feeling I'll be told I've more or less mended without further intervention, although he'd be a sorry excuse for an orthopedist if he didn't at least give me thirty minutes worth of painful exercises to do every morning.

I will practice the harp at least one hour per day. Picking out the choice bits of Planxty George Brabazon or Si Bheag Si Mhor instead of learning the bloody things properly doesn't count.

I will balance the checkbook once a quarter whether it needs it or not. Failing that, I will stop interpreting a bounced check as a personal moral failing. I'm just absentminded; accept it.

I will not order the damn seeds if I'm not going to plant them until June.

I will spend less time listening to Rush Limbaugh and more time listening to the covey of quail in the hedgerow.

I will spend less time reading the Drudge Report and more time reading the Office of Readings.

And finally....

I will stop muttering "Sue the bastard" under my breath and practice waiting -- with patience, good grace, and an absence of greed, malice, or vengefulness -- for a sensible settlement offer.