The first thing I should comment on in the blog is why I signed the last message JG. Was it a typo or was it a lead in to this next installment? You decide.

I have had many nic names and all of them I have been given by my family. When I lived in Ontario and wanted desperately to move to Calgary, Alberta I often wore a cowboy hat. This often brought about the nic name Tex and at one plant I worked I made up a sheriffs badge and pasted it to my jacket. Some of my staff got into the act and wore a cowboy hat too and we had a couple of gunslinger moments right in the middle of the plant. But it kept everyone laughing and we actually had fun at work. Now isn’t that a novel idea?

The J stands for Jack or to be more specific Jack Nicholson. Ever since the Batman movie with the Joker in it my daughter has felt that my smile can sometimes remind her of that Jack. Sometimes when she would ask me a question, a question that she should already know the answer too: Did she need to clean her room before Friday night so she could go out on a date? I would often just give her the Jack smile and thus the nic has stuck. Lately my wife has started calling me Jack too. She knows it makes me smile – I think she secretly loves my smile.

Why do I tell you this? Well we need to go back to the Foothills Health Center for the explanation. They had prescribed a different hormone treatment and it sure improved my skin crawl situation. When My wife came in to see me she walked into the hospital room and said,” And how are you feeling today JACK!” This was probably not the best thing to do with the nurse in the room. They are so paranoid about who the patient is and ID bracelets etc. that when she heard this she went into panic mode. She was looking after the wrong patient in the wrong room. It did not take too long to explain the situation to her but it did provide us a round of laughter.

That day I did not require any pain medication and I was hoping that my bowls would shake loose from the codeine grip they were under and start to produce. As I eluded to earlier that was not to be the case.

That night I had one of the best sleeps I have had in a long time. I am not sure why and I really did not fall deep asleep until 4am but when I woke up at 7:30 it felt wonderful. Perhaps it was what happened at 2am. I went out to get a glass of ice water and a container of milk. My stomach was bothering me a little – probably the hormones. I walked out of the room and the nursing staff was on a break. They were drinking Timmy’s. They all turned to look at me. I had a white rolled bandage looped up below my nose and I had a smile on my face that looks like the joker and I said,” I smell Tim Horton’s Coffee.” Well it cracked everyone up. To their credit I did get a response. They said they would check with me the next time they were going on a coffee run. If you don’t quite get the humour well remember my nose is plugged with drainage and it is impossible for me to smell anything.

The best news of all came at breakfast. My new nurse assignment informed me that they were thinking of giving me the boot that day. Surgery Saturday afternoon and going home Tuesday afternoon. Works for me. My daughter Jenn was coming up with Lucas for a visit and I told her to be prepared to take me home.

The ride home was a little bit much. I don’t think my body was ready for a trip down the dearfoot during rush hour. I had not felt any nausea since the surgery but when I got home I felt like I had just got off the eliminator or whatever you call your favorite roller coaster.

I do need to put one myth to bed. You have probably often heard the expression – don’t believe everything you see on TV. The hospital had no intention of putting me in a wheel chair to get to the front door. I think this may be the final test. If the patient can carry all his belongings and the floral arrangements and make it to the car without falling down then he is good to go. I even asked about the chair. So it was not a mistake. We don’t do that.

Next stop – healing at home.

JG