wow — i haven’t blogged in 11 days. and, while i’ve thought of it a few times, and would have posted had i had internet access, i was wonderfully at peace about letting this baby just sit here. and i had pretty good reason for not posting:

– my family flew to detroit to be with our extended families (everyone’s here, on my side and jeannie’s), which we always do. a couple days after getting here, i started having some back pain, which eventually grew pretty significant, and radiated around into some very specific pain up and the left of my stomach. all of this was vaguely reminding me of the pain i had when i spent 4 days in the hospital with pancreatitus about 3 or 4 years ago. so while my family and my parents were standing in the middle of the detroit institute of arts (bad timing, really), i decided i needed to go to emergency. sure enough, it was pancreatitus again, and i was admitted to the hospital for four days — including christmas day. it was a very odd christmas, to say the least, sitting in a hospital bed, doped up on pain meds, fevers coming and going (leaving me constantly soaked in sweat). to treat pancreatitus, they basically have to starve you — no food or water can enter your mouth (including water). so i was on an IV, and was granted the occasional ice-chip; but that was it for four days. i was released on the afternoon of the 26th, in time to join in the 2nd half of my extended family’s christmas celebration.

– the next morning, jeannie and i took off for a 4 day get-away on our own. when we realized how long we were going to be in michigan over the holidays (which had to do with what flights were available), we decided to take a little get-away for our 24th anniversary. so we searched on vrbo (the best place to find vacation rentals in any price range, btw), and found this wonderful little cabin in SW michigan. big stone fireplace, cozy river views, big snow-covered pine trees. we read books and watched movies and relaxed (and i recovered). it was perfect.

now i’m back in the land of the living and active. tonite (new year’s eve), we’re having another family gathering, including a big texas hold ’em poker tournament, which should be a kick. sunday i fly home (jeannie and the kids stay a few more days), and head into a fairly busy january, which i’ll blog about later.

so many of you saw my hospital updates on facebook and were praying for me — thanks so much for that. i don’t think i’m going to take the time to create my usual series of “best of the past year” posts. i might make a summary one in the next few days, like i’ve seen on some other blogs. but we’ll see! i’ll have a couple announcements to make in january also (nothing huge — don’t hold your breath).