September
2019
It’s been so danged long since I wrote a
newsletter, I almost don’t remember how to write one. What the heck. I’ll fake
it.
First of all, the shoulder-replacement surgery
scheduled to be performed on May 20 got rescheduled for June 10 and then got
RE-rescheduled for July 8, when it actually took place. I now have a new left
shoulder, and it doesn’t hurt a whole lot anymore, although it aches
occasionally. The physical therapist said I wasn’t giving him enough to do,
bless his heart. Then there’s the surgeon. I can’t remember ever giving a man
as much pleasure (get your mind out of the gutter) as I have this orthopedic
surgeon. The first time he saw me, when he was looking at the X-rays of my
shoulder, he was positively thrilled!
Said he’d never seen such hideous, wide-spread osteoarthritis on any patient
before (although I don’t have osteoporosis. Go figure). So happy to give him joy.
Then, during my last visit with him, he was
thrilled again. Better, he had a student nurse with him, and he told her about
the gigantic sac of synovial fluid on
my shoulder. He had to aspirate it the first time I visited him (which hurt
like heck), and he was happy as a lark as he explained to his student nurse,
“It was as big as a cantaloupe!”
Always glad to make people happy, you know? At any rate, the shoulder is
healing nicely, and I won’t make you look at a photograph of the surgery site.
I posted it on Facebook, and received reports of people screaming and fainting.
It’s just a long red scar now. It winds a bit. I mean, it’s not a straight
line. About six inches or so long.
By the way, the first weekend after my shoulder
surgery, my perfectly angelic
great-niece visited along with her perfectly angelic son, and Sara (niece) made eggs Benedict for us! I love eggs Benedict! That was so nice of
her! Sniffle.At any rate, I now have a metal ladder holding my lumbar spine together, a metal left hip and a metal left shoulder. If I even drive past an airport, alarms go off. Just kidding. Sort of. Every airport I’ve been to since my hip was replaced has had a security person pat me down. Even LAX, for Pete’s sake. Also, I learned that after a person hits the age of 75 (almost there, by golly) s/he doesn’t have to take her/his shoes off at the airport. I consider this ageist, and I’d warn airports to beware of disgruntled elderly people with regard to terrorism, if I ever did stuff like that. The good Lord knows I’m a disgruntled elderly person. I hate being old. Think I’ve mentioned that before.
Also, I have to undergo one last surgery before the end of the year. This next one will require me to have a colonoscopy (wheeeee!) first. The surgery itself is of a rather delicate, personal nature, and I don’t want to think about it, much less talk about it. Oh, what the heck. I have a prolapsed rectum, and it has to be repaired. I had to have this same surgery two years ago, and I think it’s totally unfair that it has to be re-done. Grumble.
My army-medic grandson has been deployed (again) for a year. He’s already served two tours in Iraq. This means his kids, Andrew and Kasumi; and his wife, Emily, will be left to deal with life without him for the duration. Ah, well. He volunteered for this. Unfortunately, Emily has to take care of her senile mother as well as the kids while Dai’s gone. Life could be a whole lot easier for Emily if it only wanted to be, but life seldom seems to cooperate with anyone in my family.
However, there is some good news in the book department. First of all, ePublishing Works is going to republish all my Mercy Allcutt books (set in Los Angeles, CA, in the 1920s), and I’ll be writing more of them. What’s more, they’ve given the books smashingly gorgeous covers, and the chapter headings are downright adorable. Look here:
Daisy Gumm Majesty’s next book, SCARLET SPIRITS,
will be published this coming October (I think), and I’ve already begun the
next book. Must think of a new Mercy plot, too. I took a fairly giant plunge
and have stopped editing books for Five Star’s Frontier Fiction line. I loved
reading all those wonderful westerns, but boy, editing is hard on the old
eyeballs. I swear, I had permanent, painful eyestrain while editing. Plus, I’ll
have to write more books, and editing takes up too much time. Just hope I can
make enough money to keep the dogs in kibble and me in potatoes and onions.
Maybe cheese, too. Rice. Beans. You know. Cheap, nutritious stuff. Well, I
don’t know about the cheese, but life wouldn’t be worth living without cheese,
so what the heck. Plus, I don’t have all that
many years left to me, and I’ll be dinged if I’ll allow old age to rob me of even
one more of the things I used to love to do and/or eat.
I’ll be in touch individually with all the
people who won copies of the audio edition of DARK SPIRITS, narrated by Denice
Stradling, who makes a great Daisy. She’s working on SPIRITS ONSTAGE now. I
love that book (ONSTAGE, I mean. I was appalled by Daisy’s bratty behavior in
DARK SPIRITS, truth to tell).Lemme see. What should I give away at the end of September? Beats me (and it hurts). If you’d like to be entered into my giveaway for September, please send me an email at alice@aliceduncan.net, and I’m sure I’ll have figured out which book to send you by then. In fact, send in a request. If you win (and I have a copy of the book) you’ll get that one.
Um, anything else? Well, there’s always Daisy Daze. I love Daisy Daze. Iris Evans and Leon Fundenberger founded the DAISY DAZE Facebook page. On this page, people post all sorts of historical stuff about Pasadena, sewing machines, fashions from the 1920s, houses in which the people in the books might live, stars of the silent screen, and lots and lots of other historical (1920s-era) stuff. It’s fun, and if you’d like to be a member, check it out here: https://www.facebook.com/groups/905100189878318/ .
If you’d like to visit my web page, here’s the link: http://aliceduncan.net/ . And if you’d like to be Facebook friends, please go here: https://www.facebook.com/alice.duncan.925
And I do believe that’s all I have to say for the month. Thank you.
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