The day after tearing my incision point for the umpteenth time in Florida, I could barely move. We decided to hook up with our friends and head over to the Drive-In Church. This was originally a drive-in movie theater that they converted to a church and broadcast over your radio. We saw it on TV and it looked cool, plus you can take your dogs to church with you! We pulled into the lot and they had taken down the screen and put up a regular church, nothing like we saw on TV. We drove around the lot until we saw a small section labeled for the "drive-in" congregation and it told us what station to tune to. We could barely hear it in our Highlander, it was coming in, but hard to hear over the static. Our friends heard it fine in their Jeep and they were farther away. So, we moved to the closest spot, they moved in again next to us. We still had trouble hearing, but our friends heard it just fine, confirming my theory that God loves Jeeps and doesn't pay attention to Toyotas. I will be releasing a research paper on that subject in a few months. After straining to hear God through the Jeep next to us, we realized we were the only ones a part of the drive-in part of the congregation and decided to leave. My wife wanted to take the basenjis to see the person that had originally rescued them, and I wanted to do anything but talk about nothing but basenjis for the next four hours, so the men went back to town while the women headed up for some "pup chat".
After I got home, I realized we still hadn't gone grocery shopping and I was carless, so I ate pizza for the third day in a row. I decided to slide into the pool and do a little rehab on my recent injury. The pool hadn't had time to heat up yet and this is when I realized, whether you have two nuts or one, you still scream like a little girl when your nether region hits cold pool water. I was able to walk around a bit without pain. Luckily, from my sedentary lifestyle from months of cancer recovery, I was much more buoyant than I usually am, taking more weight off of my hips/incision as I exercised.
After my wife returned with the car, she asked if I would like to do the grocery shopping since I have been cooped up so much with working on the car and being injured. At this point I had been in Florida for 96 hours and still not made it to the beach, so I decided to just drive by the beach on the way to get groceries. I start to go across the causeway over to the island beaches when a fire truck flew by, then another, then another, and a host of cops and as I got close to finally seeing the ocean...they all blocked off the road. Just my luck this trip! I make it inside Wal-Mart and grab a cart, half for groceries and half to lean on as I walk. The place is empty and I am able to walk slowly without hurting too much and not worry about impeding any crazed bargain hunters. Towards the end, I can tell if I do much more I will be hurting myself worse, so I head back to the house.
The next few days are spent walking with my hiking stick (I refuse to call it a cane!) around the local nature park with the dogs. I could feel it slowly getting better, but I knew I was walking that thin line (pun not intended) of getting stronger and making things worse. By Wednesday morning, I decided to head out to the local flea market (with a real farmer's market) and look around. The place seems a lot bigger when you are having trouble walking. The hiking stick my wife got me has a removable disc that you use for soft terrain like sand, which I left on for the time being, that makes it look more like a ski pole. While wobbling and dragging myself through the place one of the booth owners decided he would be funny and asked if I was going skiing. Hurting, depressed, and tired, I just said, "No, it's cancer."
The guy's face went blank and he said, "Sorry, sir."
I know it wasn't the nicest thing to do, but I wasn't in the mood for jokes at this point. Then I hear the same guy say another comment in the same smart tone to the gentleman behind me. I can't make out what the booth owner asked him, I just heard the other guy say, "No, my wife just passed away."
"Sorry, sir."
I am hoping the booth owner quit trying to joke with his patrons, because I don't want to hear what the next guy would say.
By Thursday I have built up a little stamina on my injury and my wife really wanted me to hit Disney in some form. Now before you say, "Aw, that's sweet." It's because she said I would complain until I was 50 if I didn't get to go for my 40th birthday. She may be right. She also made the point that since we were fixing to make the eighteen hour drive back home, I might as well tear the heck out of my incision doing something I love, because I would be just sitting around the next few days anyway. We ran through our options. First I was NOT going to be one of those jerks in the wheelchairs. I am not talking about people who need wheelchairs or scooters, I am talking about the people that have never been in a wheelchair in their life until they get to Walt Disney World, but as soon as they get there, their ingrown toenail becomes unbearable and they need a wheelchair so they can get on all of the rides quicker. After being around my father-in-law that frequently used a wheelchair, I know how much people who really are in wheelchairs prefer their wheelchair. His was set up, adjusted, and padded just for him. So, when I see someone in a wheelchair that was rented from Disney for the day, I immediately give them the old stink eye and try to fart as they and their party of 17 other people they brought with them, cut past me in line. I didn't want to be one of "those people" or get farted on by people like me.
Our other decision was, as much as I love the Magic Kingdom, I knew I couldn't handle the hills there (as small as they are). I wouldn't be able to get in and out of a lot of the rides. And there are a lot of rides I simply wouldn't be able to do because they would jostle me around too much. After thinking about all four parks, their rides and their terrain, we settle on EPCOT. It may be the most walking, but it is fairly flat, the rides are easy to get in and out of, there are only a couple I won't be able to handle, and there is a special tour I would like to do there. We run it by our friends and they decide they would like to join us, and we make plans to tear my body up the next day!
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