I had a pretty good thing going when I started this blog--it was fun and I had some ideas for it. But, I sorta fell apart since last September, but I've got a good excuse--heart problems! Yah, really, and it ain't like "my dog ate my home-work."

No, as in "I had a heart attack."

Remember I wrote about stopping smoking and how I had to "die" to quit smoking? I was really rather prophetic. I almost DID die and I was failing quickly before the surgeon got me onto the table. I don't know if YOU know what happens in a heart by-pass surgery, but the surgeon actually has to stop your heart from beating while he patches up the veins and arteries serving the heart muscle. Technically, your heart stops beating, but you don't officially die because you are hooked up into a machine that continues to oxygenate your blood and circulates it through your body.

But, in a manner of speaking, you DO die. What else would you call it when your heart stops beating for a few hours? It takes a while for the surgeon to fix that defective heart and grafting in new arteries to by-pass the blockages!

So, as far as I'm concerned--call me dramatic if you wish--I died for a few hours and was "resurrected" into a second-chance life. (But don't worry--I'm at home now, recuperating from my "sudden death incident," as the medical pros prefer to call a heart attack.)

And I HURT. Every day I hurt. It's been four weeks now since the operation and I hurt, dammit! My chest hurts where they cracked me open. My back hurts. They split open my breast bone and spread open the chest cavity just like you see in those horrible creepy "hack-and-slash, mad scientist" movies and those equally horrible "reality" TV shows! Open heart surgery is no fun for the patient, let me tell you!

OK? That's the reality of what happened to me recently. What about events leading up to the heart attack and what about this business of a second-chance life?

Well, I was failing in my every-day life. Not so you'd notice anything highly dramatic, but I was tired all the time and slooooow. I took naps whenever I could. I could wake up in the morning, go for a few hours, take a nap in the afternoon, go for a few more hours, nap again in the evening, wake up and go until bed-time, and sleep a full night through. Yah, really! Made my wife crazy.

And, of course, it all makes sense, now, because I was slowly strangling myself from oxygen throughout my body. My arteries at the time of the heart attack were essentially closed off, except for a tiny trickle making it through one of three arteries--a 10 per cent trickle, was all that was keeping me alive for months and maybe even years. Two arteries were totally blocked and the third was down to a 90 percent blockage! 10 per cent was all that was keeping me alive!

Weird, isn't it? Wierder still, is that about 50 per cent of everyone that has a heart attack dies from it! AND...The first indication of arterial blockage like mine is usually a heart attack. It doesn't show up on EKG tests or stress tests--walking on tread mills hooked up to EKG's. And yes, I've had a stress test before and nada! Nothing for a cardiologist to look at and say, "you got a problem."

So, but for the Grace of God, go I. I coulda died, but didn't. Yet. I could die tomorrow or I could die in 20 or 30 years yet to come--no way to know until it happens.

So what am I gonna do with my "second-chance life?" There's a good question, aye? I started this blog because I enjoyed writing about GI Joe and 1/6th stuff. You may notice that I haven't written much about 1/6th for some time now. I think maybe there's a good reason for that that I might discuss in the near future.

Or...I just might get back to talking Joe stuff and be done with all this hard-core reality stuff--I haven't decided yet.

Thanks for reading.