My poor little blog has fallen silent for the past few weeks due to a sudden turn of events. All this summer we've been trouble shooting aspects of my perennial stomach problems. I had some minor work done in July along with numerous evaluations. The surprise came in late August when we found out that my herniated stomach had lurched up to a whopping 1/3 of its total size between my lungs. The nature of the hernia had also changed putting it in danger of strangling itself or my esophagus. Not only that, but the hernia had also seriously displaced my other internal organs. So, last Thursday, a wonderful team of doctors lathroscopically dragged my stomach back down, patched my diaphragm, sewed the top of my stomach into a knot to prevent reflux, and carefully placed my other internal organs back in order. The process went "textbook" and took 2 and 1/4 hours. Right now, I'm in the middle of my recovery period and it will still be about a month before I return to a completely normal diet. I'm tired and in pain, but I am deeply grateful to God, the surgical team, my wonderful wife, my Mom who flew out for yet another stay in the hospital with her son, my Dad (who provided a last meal complete with alligator), my grandmother who floated us some help with food bills, my siblings and relations who have called numerous times, and my community who have showered us in love, prayers, and Texan cookery. Anyhow, as soon as I'm a little more fit I'll be back at blogging with an update on how summer reading went. Until then, the Platypus will have to do most of the Truth-speaking around here.
I needed a break from A Treasury of Modern Fantasy (too many authors and too many styles coming in too fast) so I decided to turn back to an author whose work I've enjoyed exploring: Robert E. Howard. This time, however, I decided to skip over Howard's famous Conan yarns and instead take a look at one of his earlier creations, Solomon Kane. The idea of a puritan occult detective was too intriguing to pass up. I have the whole collection of Kane's tales and I do intend to blog them all. Right now, my little literary detour has only encompassed the first two short stories so I'm going to record my thoughts on them right away and get back to the rest as I have time. Skulls in the Stars Solomon Kane makes his debut with this classic bit of English Gothic including a haunted moor, a vengeful ghost, and a solitary miser. Howard's Kane fits the portrait of the archetypal puritan: grim, principled, metaphysical, with an iron sense of right and wrong. I h...
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btw, last Sunday, Adam and I sat next to a new student attending our church, and when he found out I'd been in Torrey, he asked if I knew you. Sounds like he thought you were a pretty great teacher!