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Tonight the role of Colin-G is being played by his lovely and talented wife, the-bookgirl as his left (and dominant) arm is in a sling and it would take him most of this week to just type a paragraph. And did I mention he's on percocet? That alone would provide very interesting commentary from him.

No, I'm not letting him near the computer.

Colin went under the knife once again this morning to correct some damage inflicted on his shoulder and elbow last year. Although his surgeon's office had scheduled his appointment for the barely civilized hour of 8:00 am, they called at 6:37 this morning to ask him to come in half an hour early. This made very little impact on him - he was already getting up and dressed and was on orders not to eat or drink. I, on the other hand, had just enough time to throw on some clothes and brush my teeth before departing. Both of us were kvetching a bit about no coffee but the surgical office was prepared - for him at least.

Along with the usual questions, they asked how much coffee he drank in the morning. Oh, six or seven cups. I assumed this would result in an admonishment on too much caffeine in one's diet but instead the anesthesiologist injected caffeine right into his IV to ward off any potential headaches he might suffer later on. (I, however, had to walk across the parking lot to Starbuck's.) I can't imagine the effect a combination of caffeine and whatever medication they gave him to help him relax for the nerve block might have been on my own brain. Mike looked decidedly uncomfortable. The anesthesiologist remarked that most people enjoyed the sensation. I informed him that my husband wasn't in that category. Ah, he nodded. Control freak. It must be the red hair and freckles. We're all like that. And he went on to hypothesize on melanin's connection to dopamine and other things while he played around with the nerves in Mike's neck, making various muscle groups twitch until he found the right ones.

I'm not certain this is the sort of guy I'd want to hang around at parties.

I didn't meet his surgeon until after the procedure, when he came into the waiting room to let me know it was all over. He paraphrased the operation for me, informed me that the nurse would call me back to the recovery room "in a while," noticed the book in my lap and abruptly changed subjects to "Hey - I read that last summer!"

After about an hour, the nurse finally summoned me and lead me to Mike - propped up in a recliner, groggy as Rip Van Winkle and demanding to know when he could go home. They fended him off with a diet coke (not in the IV this time) while I went over his discharge instructions with the nurse.

Tomorrow we go back for his postop checkup and find out about his PT and when he can go back to work. More fun (and coffee) later... for them what care.

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