Being that I was lying on the side of Highway One at 8:05 in the AM, I thought that I'd be straightened out, casted, doped up, and sent home by 1:00 in the afternoon. But .......no, not even *that* afternoon, but at 1:30 the next day.

In the interim at San Francisco Kaiser Emergency I mostly lay in a room where various small dramas played over a period of many hours. Occasioanally Dr. Burri, the orthopedic surgeon would look in on me and make small talk about this, that and even the state of my dislocated wrist and fractured radial stylus.

The morphine kept things tolerable, and Diana made sure that I wasn't neglected or forgotten.

For some reason the operating room was not available till sometime around 11:30 PM.

Did I mention that I wasn't able to eat or drink anything all day, except a short swig of water I had when I first got up?

So the thought of that first cup of coffee I never had started eating at me, as well as a very dry mouth and growling stomach. The reason was that you are not supposed to eat or drink anything at all for 12 hours before going under general anesthesia.

Dang, I sure was thirsty by 11:30. At that point I didn't care too much about the whole wrist thing as much as getting something like a hot cuppa coffee.

After 15 and a half hours or so it was finally time for me to be rolled into the operating room to get my wrist repaired. I was still thinking mostly about the possibility that i could get a cuppa coffe when it was finally over.

There I was surrounded by the five medicos who all reported in to Dr. Burri. They had a checklist of items to go over with me before they put my lights out and got to work. Oneof these was a confirmation of which wrist was to be worked on. As if it wasn't obvious enough. Well at least they were paying attention!

I came to in a recovery room where I seemed to be the last and only patient of the night. it was nearly two AM. I finally negotiated a can of cold cranberry juice, and at long last a cup of coffee. The coffee was only fair and somewhat lukewarm, but it was so long in coming that it was the best I'd ever had.

Dr. Burri had juiced the surgically tormented wrist with a long acting local anesthesia, and he warned me that it might wear off suddenly. So I ought toi be prepared by taking a couple of pain pills prior to that suddeness. It felt pretty much OK when Diana drove me home in the wee hours, and it was only moderately uncomfortable when I woke up the next AM.

I called my boss that Sunday and let him know I'd be out of work for a week at least, due to the broken feet and wrist.

I spent the next two weeks hobbling around the house, intermittantly sleeping and eating pain pills to keep myself as comfortable as possible.

There are a lot of channels to watch when you subscribe to DirectTV, but other than Judge Judy, there wasn't much worth watching. I couldn't type or read very well either so mostly I slept, and the time passed.

Diana was a living saint from the minute she got that call the morning of the accident. Over the coursem of my two weeks at home, she made sure I was comfortable, well fed and that I had everything I needed. My friend John and his wife, Joanie were also quite kind, sending me a care package of magazines to read.