It has been some time since I last wrote, but for good reason. I got in an accident while taking the [screening for license] driving test with a DMV evaluator as my passenger. I didn’t yield to an oncoming Alaska Salmon Bake bus, but the jaws of life did a smashing job of providing paramedics quick access to my bloodied body. My right arm sustained a couple fractures and I’m told my organs were swimming in a pool of friendly internal bleeding, but my condition is doubtless more appealing than that which befell the poor DMV employee; his close family is calling relatives one by one with the funeral date. My most major injury is my cracked skull, which is still healing. Indeed, I’ve been subject to a series of long and arduous surgeries, one of which was a procedure involving the opening wide of my skull so as to allow the removal of bone debris and also to install permanent metal staples to keep the crack closed for good. I am of course still here at the hospital and writing this now only after having been adamant with the nurses as to the importance of writing. They finally rolled in this computer up alongside my bed, probably wondering amongst themselves whether it would be easier to just knock me out with some morphine. They’ve put a restrictive time limit on the length I can be online, though, so I ought to wrap up. Add to that, I’ve just self-administered the maximum allotment of morphine into the I-V drip and the effects will start their action shortly. Of most importance is that you know all is well. I am healing as planned and I don’t expect I will experience any physical or mental limitations as a result of the accident. A lasting consequence, however, will be the sounding of metal detectors each time I walk through one in an airport. I’ll ask the hospital for an x-ray copy I can carry with me as proof of metal staples in my head. That ought to be a fine visual aid to use while arguing my case with airport security.