Tuesday, September 29, 2009

To life

Chris at a roadside inn in Northern Germany, 2009.Dear Gentle Reader,

I have returned to Hong Kong, but not yet to this e-world.

A brief e-glance at the e-mails e-piling up and e-spilling over is not a sufficient e-return, but, it will have to suffice until the end of October.

It appears, though, from my email inbox, that there has been some concern that my noggin might have been scooped clean in my absence from blogville.

Fear knot...

(An oblique R.D. Laing reference?) No, let me try again...

Feer nought...

(No, that could mean becoming a companion of nothing [feer is an archaic form of fere, from Middle English, which has one meaning of companion and companionship]... but this would convey the wrong idea...)

Rats. Maybe something did go wrong with the brain pan oil change.

Wait, I have it...

Fere not.

Perfect. My noggin [the implicit subject] has not fallen, or become anything else, like detached [the Middle English "feer" can also mean to fall by right, to become].

Harkening back to potential concerns about the potential scooping of my brain...

...It (my brain) was not (scooped clean).

It was sudsed and rinsed, with German beer, but that was medicinal... ...to keep those neural connections shiny.

So, all is well. And the beer in Northern Germany was terrific; after a few glasses my brain definitely felt shinier.

I have to write this post, you see, because some of the pictures of sliced sections of my brain, which I have previously posted, left some readers perplexed.

You were in good company.

A few doctors were perplexed, too.

But, no brain removal programme has been agreed to. Yet.

...At least, not that I remember...

Anyway, I haven't looked at blogs, and I will continue to hold off until the end of October when I officially return.

But, after perusing a few emails in the inbox, I decided that I ought to clarify my condition as some of my recent postings have been a bit ambiguous.

My ambiguity has been with reason, but there is no need to go into those reasons as the only thing that conclusively has been shown to be wrong with me has been (note the past tense of the verb) an overly fat wallet. Everything else is just a syndrome or a condition.

Fortunately, medical techniques have been shifting my fiscal burden into the experienced hands, and, presumably, safer wallets, of medical professionals.

Soon the fiscal alleviation protocols shall be complete and the proddings and noddings, dicings and slicings, prickings and stickings will, presumably, come to an end.

I will be grateful.

So, with that in mind, I look forward to returning to this space, and to many regular life spaces, with the zesty attitude of a hipster dancer rather than the slightly morose attitude that was beginning to afflict me.

So, long story short, all is (mostly) well, and I appreciate the comments of concern I have received, and I apologize for worrying you, if I did.

In conclusion, and returning to the opening image, I propose a toast...

לְחַיִים! (La'chaim!, or "To Life!")

Tschuess,
Chris

5 comments:

Teresa said...

Dear Chris,

So glad to know that all you are suffering from is a surfeit of OED on the brain. But I'm sure the clever Chinese can remove that by attaching a small tube to your ear and draining it while you sleep. Who knows what other horrificly weighty tomes might run out overnight? Encyclopedia Britannica? The Domesday Book? The Analects of Confucius? The Books of Later Han? Or Caesar's Gallic Wars and the Code of Hammurabi? Not to mention both the Egyptian and Tibetan Books of the Dead...?

Just a matter of too much learning addling the brain. And of course, the tonic of choice had to be excellent North-German beer with Schnapps chasers or do I have that backwards? In the end, it doesn't matter: schnapps, bier, schnapps, bier, schnapps in never-ending rotation all churn together in the stomach, and contrive to cleanse the brain of anything you thought you might have known (they are also good at cleansing the digestive tract of anything you thought you might have eaten).

Welcome back. Welcome home. We missed you!

Teresa

jjdebenedictis said...

Hair! Never mind the fact the doctors proved you have a brain, you have hair!

As in more than I remember. It looks good on you!

Also, thank you for the lovely postcard. (You have our apartment number incorrect, but our next door neighbour knew to give it to us.)

El Husbando is taking several months academic leave starting Jan 2011, which is also my non-teaching semester. If you guys want to do another road trip, that would the time frame to start suggesting plans for...

Cloudia said...

HOOORAYYYYYY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Aloha, Friend!

Comfort Spiral

Teresa said...

And I forgot to say Prosit! (I think I've spelled that right. It's been decades since I've used my German--at least the non-swear word kind.)

Teresa

Richard said...

mazeltov! and thanks for the card.