This year was definitely less than perfect from my own personal perspective, dealing as I did with (among other things) a seven-month-long bout with shingles; its evil twin, post-herpetic neuralgia; the death of a dog; a week-long hospital stay that included an endoscopy, a colonoscopy, two blood transfusions, and the medical team of Thelma and Louise; and finally, in December, an out-patient procedure that involved my swallowing a camera and walking around all day wearing a monitor that continuously blinked yellow, green, and blue, which prevented me from entering a grocery store or a schoolyard or a commercial establishment of any kind for fear that I would be mistaken for someone with a bomb and tackled to the ground. As Jack Paar used to say, I kid you not.
Other than that, Ma, 2013 was a year like all other years, except (as Walter Cronkite said on many occasions) “YOU ARE THERE.”
But the world is bigger than my own personal interaction with it. Our own national treasure, humorist Dave Barry, has captured the year 2013, at least from an American perspective, in his own inimitable style in this column, which I heartily recommend to you. It is impossible in some places to discern Mr. Barry’s words from events that actually occurred.
I am facing yet another medical procedure on January 10th, after the completion of which it would be just fine with me if I never had to visit a gastroenterologist ever again.
Interesting fact #17,643: MoviPrep has absolutely nothing to do with attending the cinema, unless you are a gastroenterologist, and then in only the most tangential way.
You are now ready for 2014.
Interesting fact #17,644: If you lived in the American South, you would need to have ham hocks, hog jowl, blackeyed peas, and some form of greens (turnip or collard preferred) at the ready for your New Year’s Day dining pleasure. Don’t ask why. Some things are just self-evident.
