(There is a clue here about what this depicts. Check it out. It might not be what you think. Image businessinsider.com)

Let’s take a break, shall we? It is hot and muggy and I feel sluggish this morning. Plus, I am the Poster Boy for Cabin Fever. The Better and Better thing continues, blah blah, yadda yadda.

It is day 42 of 84. I am precisely halfway to completion of the post-op recuperation and on to resumption of normal activities.

I think you are tired of hearing it, and I am tired of talking about it.  I saw Czar Peter as I hobbled up the sidewalk next to the pool on the west end of the building yesterday.

Czar Peter has that Fabio thing going. I admire him- he parlayed his life-guarding days as a teen at the pools around Arlington into a prosperous small business. He services the out-sourced needs of the various pool complexes around the county, and does human trafficking with Mittleeurope to provide labor in the summer.

Being his own man, he gets to set his own standards. Accordingly, he has that Fabio thing going- lean chiseled torso above practical cargo shorts, leonine chestnut hair gathered into a long ponytail and fed through the hole above the strap of his Deep Blue logo ball cap.

He was talking to Lukas, this year’s model of the Polish Life Guard. I had a shoulder bag slung awkwardly over my right side, where is caught on the crutch and threatened to send me sprawling onto the low brick retaining wall of Joe’s patio.

“Thought you had died or moved on,” he said. Peter has the rich mahogany tan that is reputed to be so bad for you these days, and he is a happy guy who gets to work outside.

“I don’t think I died,” I said, stopping to lean against the black steel mesh of the pool enclosure. “I have been worried about the Higgs Boson and didn’t have enough space in the unit to do empiric research. I was working on the Commerce Clause and the Tax code, but not making much progress. And as to moving on, it will be another few weeks before I can get in the water.”

“Hah. I warned Lukas about you, but he said he you were no problem, since you have been invisible.”

“He will live to regret that remark,” I vowed. I could see Mila sunbathing and Jiggs splashing in the refreshing blue water. “He will see more of me in the last month of the season than anyone needs to.”

Lukas laughed uncertainly as Peter grilled me on the surgery. As I said, the topic bores me, and there is nothing in the world I want to do more than throw away the damned crutches. I smiled a little grimly, and made my adieus. I had fresh produce in the bag, and too many devices, and a reefer to clean out, and fireworks to watch on the big-screen television.

I cursed the lazy people who had all parked closer to the door than I could, and to the short-sighted Condo Board that refused to provide decent handicapped parking near the door. I sighed. If I complained, they probably would get around to lining out something with the blue wheelchair sign the week I returned the wheelchair and threw the crutches off the balcony towards the pool.

Then I would be cursing the Condo Board for catering to those handicapped people as soon as I wasn’t. It is not that you can’t win. It is that the timing of life is just very tricky.

I cleared out the dead food from the icebox, marveling at how far beyond the shelf life a dedicated preservationist can go. I made a note to clean the inside of the thing before I got my Guardian Ensign to take me to the store again.

The air conditioning felt good, once I had horsed the inedible former proteins to the garbage chute down the hall, and sat down to check email before the Capital Fourth came on with a tall frosty beverage. I saw a note from Soul Mountain, who still labors in the Pentagon and as a condition of service, has to believe at least three impossible things in the morning before getting her Starbucks from the Ethiopian ladies at the stand down the corridor.

I slapped my forehead. Of course that is how it works.

The link to this presentation explains everything. I strongly recommend it. Now, I am afraid it is back to work. Who ever put a holiday all by itself in the middle of the week?

I tuned in the fireworks on the big screen, and realized I could actually hear the bombs bursting in air through the open door to the balcony.  Sort of like Stereo, I thought, and when it was over, I picked up the crutches and tapped my way tentatively back down the hall to the bed.

(A Capital Fourth, as viewed from my chair in the living room. Photo Socotra of live coverage by WETA.)

Copyright 2012 Vic Socotra
www.vicsocotra.com