Or Why Does Bad Luck Always Seem to Come in Threes?
Based on my recent posts, I suspect that some of my regular readers are beginning to wonder why, if my computer problems have at last been resolved, I have been so slow to resume my usual pace of blogging. The answer to this question, I'm afraid, is that (proving, I suppose, that there really is no fool like an old fool) I suffered a major bout of heat exhaustion several weeks ago, and I am only now beginning to regain both my mental and physical stamina. Looking back, I am still amazed that, having spent decades working under the blazing Arizona sun, I could have allowed myself to succumb to such an easily preventable malady.
My health problems actually started when, having time on my hands during the period when my computer was down, I decided to embark on several outdoor projects that I had hitherto been postponing. The fact that it was high summer did not, wrongly it turned out, concern me because I had spent much of my adult life working outdoors in the Arizona heat. It turns out, however, that I am no longer the same man who a half decade ago tramped around the center of a sand arena for hours at a time (in tall black field boots and cavalry twill breeches, no less) six or seven days a week with only a baseball cap for protection from the sun. In those days my student riders might wilt after a half hour or so of instruction and their horses might begin to blow, but I considered myself virtually impervious to the heat. No longer; and, although I really should have known better, the fatigue and other problems that began to manifest themselves after a day or two working outdoors, I wrongly chalked up to old age; so naturally, I soldiered on. Fortunately, my long-suffering wife — who was unaware of my stupidity because she works during the day — became alarmed at the mysterious deterioration in my physical condition and finally sat me down (I was getting increasingly wobbly, as the days passed) and checked my blood pressure and heart rate. To make a long story short, her intervention undoubtedly saved me from a trip to the emergency room; it also, for better or worse, marked the permanent end of my outdoor summer projects.
So where does this leave "Map and Counters"? The good news, such as it is, is that the lethargy and lack of concentration that followed on the heels of my brush with heat stroke have both slowly begun to fade with time. I am still not operating at 100%, but I can, at last, sit at the computer and actually compose for more than fifteen minutes at a stretch. That being said, I am hopeful that it won't be too much longer before I can resume my old pace when it comes to blogging. There are, as I have already noted previously, still a lot of old and new wargaming topics that I am eager to cover; now that I am at last feeling better, I hope to finally begin publishing some of this fresh material in the near future.
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