Wednesday, it turns out, is the craziest day of the week at Kaiser Permanente’s South San Francisco surgical department. Or so I was told, by a rather nervous, green-seeming nurse who finally called me from the exceedingly packed and increasingly cranky waiting room, where the Manly Fireplug and I had been sitting for over two hours. Thirty minutes prior, I had clicked off Angry Birds in a huff, stormed up to the receptionist, and pointedly asked when she thought I might be getting my wrist cut open. She shrugged and said, “Many people today.”

“Fine,” I said. “But can I ask you a favor?”

She regarded me warily. “What is it?”

I pointed at the waiting room television. “I haven’t eaten anything in over fourteen hours, according to the surgeon’s directions, so could you please for the love of God TURN OFF THE FOOD NETWORK?!?”

Behind me the waiting room erupted in a chorus of “AMEN!”s and the receptionist scurried to the TV in order to stave off the insurrection.

I didn’t bother saying to the nurse who finally called my name the obvious, i.e. maybe they should schedule fewer surgeries on Wednesdays, for fear of losing my place in line. Instead I stripped down to the hospital gown, kissed the Fireplug good-bye, and slipped into la-la land as the anaesthesiologist injected into my IV line what she called “the good stuff.”

Three hours later I woke in the recovery room, where another very nice nurse monitored my vital signs and asked me two separate times if I wanted any apple or grape juice. Parched and groggy, I nodded and croaked “grape.” She brought me apple. Later the Fireplug returned from the pharmacy with a bottle of different good stuff and some grape juice, and took me home. That is one of the reasons why I love him.

For the surgery they had “blocked” my entire left arm, which when released from its sling flopped around with a mind of its own like something out of a horror movie. I propped it up on a pillow and was joined on the couch by the Fireplug and our three dogs for a couple episodes of our new favorite show, “Friday Night Lights,” even though lately the show makes me mourn for the recent loss of softball, now that the season’s beginning.

Of course we’d been given separate and conflicting instructions for pain management by doctor, anaesthesiologist, nurses, and take-home instructions. But as a slight tingle returned to my left arm, I downed two Percocet and figured I’d be fine.

Flash-forward an hour, when I grabbed the phone from the Fireplug, who was speaking in a tense voice to a Kaiser advice nurse, and yelled into the receiver, “THIS IS A TEN, OKAY? ON YOUR CUTE LITTLE PAIN SCALE OF ONE TO TEN THIS IS A FUCKING TEN!” I then handed the phone back to the distraught Fireplug, and went back to pacing around the house, grunting, as the dogs stared at me with wide eyes.

I am going to risk immodesty here by saying that I began to imagine how Jesus Christ must have felt, crucified, his wrists hammered onto that cross.

Flash-forward forty-five minutes, to the San Francisco Kaiser’s ER, where they very slowly unwrapped my bloody splint to check on the condition of the surgical site, and where a total surprise awaited me and the Fireplug. You see, when the surgeon told us, post-operation, that he had opted for three pins to hold my wrist together, we both imagined that these three pins were internal. But in the ER we discovered three pins sticking OUT OF MY WRIST, beside a long jagged stitched-up scar.

“Oh,” I said.

Long story short, the surgery itself was deemed successful, and a very nice Russian nurse named Vladimir or Nikolai or something injected me with Dilaudid every twenty minutes until my senses returned to something closer to normal. I really grew to love Vladimir or Nikolai, you know, as a person, and later I grew especially fond of a charmingly funny nurse named Riley who wheeled me into a private room around three a.m. Considering the last time I ended up in Kaiser’s ER, the night my lung just up and spontaneously collapsed for no good reason, I now have a soft spot in my heart for all of Kaiser’s male ER nurses.

Several hours later the surgeon said he had told both of us to give me as much Percocet as I needed that first night, (“I mean, I did re-break your wrist, you know”) but I suppose we’d had a lot of conflicting info thrown at us in a few short hours. I took a couple of days off from work and watched a lot of bad television, which I fortunately don’t remember, just like I barely remember taking the photo above, but then pictures don’t lie. For those of you who enjoy ugly photos, here’s a link to a photo of my wrist, post-sugery, unwrapped. The rest of you I’ll spare.

Back to work tomorrow, mildly dazed and perfectly agreeable.

Surely one of the better gifts life has to offer is returning home to a dog or two at the end of a hard day. Witness the Manly Fireplug getting kiss-attacked by a Norwich Terrier and a Pit Bull. The camera can’t even capture how quickly Buddy’s tail is wagging.

As hard days go, the last week has thrown a few my way. I can’t write openly about some recent developments, but I can tell you that my wrist hasn’t healed right, so I’m going under the knife tomorrow and will begin the 3-6 month recovery over again.

My return to softball this year is looking pretty doubtful at this point, and I’m typing this with only one hand, but as I look at this photo I’m struck by how my love for its three subjects just keeps getting bigger and bigger, so it’s hard not to count my blessings as no less than three. The Fireplug has been taking good care of me, and will take the day off tomorrow from the barbershop to get me home, woozy-headed and one-handed, to the dogs again.

Having someone, or a few someones, to count on when the crap hits the fan belt is another gift not to be taken lightly. Not sure if the next few days will be quiet, blog-wise, or busy with narcotic-induced observations. But either way I’ll be (ha ha) in good hands.

The Manly Fireplug, aka Joe Gallagher, is a finalist for About.com’s Best American Barbershop, so of course I am asking for your vote. He started out renting a chair at my old barber’s place back in 2002. When Pasha died of a heart attack, Joe saved up his money and eventually opened his first tiny four-chair shop in 2004. Two years ago he moved to his current location on Market Street, near Church Street, with eleven chairs. He really is the hardest working man I know, and he’s built more than a barbershop; he’s built a neighborhood institution.

The award is just plain bragging rights, and I love to see the Fireplug brag, so if you want to make two guys extremely happy, just click over and vote for the guy.

As you can see from my Hipstamatic pics, I snagged one of the early Verizon iPhones, which I’ve been waiting on for, oh, a few years, and its delivery on Monday currently ranks as the high point of my week. Yesterday, for about an hour, I had a different high point: my graduation after three weeks in encasement to a short-arm cast. I had my elbow and thumb back, and boy, did they hurt. Still, my spirits remained high until I returned to work and my brand new iPhone rang with a call from my orthopedic doctor, who told me that he’d just showed my x-ray to a colleague and they were now concerned my wrist might need surgery.

This was the second time he’d called me after a cheery visit with a more sobering second opinion, and I felt my confidence in the guy starting to slip. I found it hard, though, to accurately gauge our conversation because, as the Manly Fireplug put it, orthopedic doctors are assholes. Or, as another friend put it more diplomatically, while the rest of us spent our college years getting drunk and sleeping around, they spent them looking at bones.

A series of missed calls, crossed signals, and “Are we speaking English here?” doctor-patient conversations stretched on over the last two days, and I found myself wandering the halls of the law firm and staring at the walls of my cubicle, trying to grapple with the prospect that the last three one-armed weeks were a total waste, and that my recovery had yet to begin.

In that time my sense of humor, which I stumble across every three days or so, abandoned me again, and I de-friended two Facebook saps who had the temerity to leave more fisting jokes on my profile’s wall. I banished them from the warmth of my virtual aura, and yes it felt good.

So I began to type this with one hand, muttering to myself during my hour covering reception, mourning the possibly extended loss of softball and the gym, two pursuits that have reliably taken on and vanquished my noonday demons, picturing myself withering away to that scrawny kid I used to be, and and and my little violin played on…

Then an email popped into my inbox with a rather demanding subject line: “Write your book, damnit!”  Blushing already, I clicked it open and what followed was less an admonition than a plea, laced through with more than a few very kind words, asking me to, yes, finish the damn book.

The last three months distracted me with money worries and day-job negotiations. It felt good to start earning some money again, and to be, after six weeks, fielding more than one job offer at a time. Still, that nagging little voice, common to every writer, nibbled away at the back of my brain, saying the same words contained in this email.

So, Sandi, thank you for reading this blog, thank you for the email, for the kind words and the little nudge. You have good timing.

Last week I was on the verge of turning into a one-armed “Get off my lawn” cranky old man. But I live in San Francisco, where nobody has a lawn, so who the hell knows what kind of twisted pet peeve I would have latched onto in its place.

Since I like having friends and an anonymous reader or two, I readjusted my attitude. No more carping about my eternal thumbs-up. Just embrace the damn thing:

My name is Michael McAllister, and I approve of this barber.

I approve of this ocean.

I approve of this dog.

I approve of this team.

I approve of this toy.

I approve of Carrie.

I approve of this Saturday night.

Believe me, you guys, I know how it looks.

For three weeks I’ve been walking around with a permanent thumbs-up.  24 hours a day, even when I’m sleeping, my thumb sticks up in enthusiastic, near-imbecilic approval for everything and everyone I encounter. A thumbs-up wrapped in blinding white, inflexible fiberglass, a thumbs-up that no long sleeve in my wardrobe can stretch across without tearing – a bright, white, all-the-way-past-the-elbow thumbs up that proceeds me everywhere I go.

And I know how badly I am disappointing you, those of you whose paths I cross in the so-called real world, with the scowl that hovers about 18 inches above my thumb, right here on my face, and the bitter, caustic, much-too-short remarks that slip from my mouth when you dare flash me your own thumbs-up in apparent solidarity.

It’s sad, really, the sense of humor I seem to have misplaced. It’s sad that after the 700th gay dude who asks me if I’d had a fisting accident, I can’t find it within myself to even crack a smile at the 701st dude, that I can’t find the generosity of spirit to make him feel okay about his display of unoriginality. Or that I can’t give the 702nd dude – who thinks it’s funny to make a fisting joke even after I’ve complained to him about the 701 fisting jokes, as if the 702nd fisting joke somehow rounds the bend of pure unfunny back again to funny – that I can’t give him the rich, deep, full-throttle belly laugh he so clearly deserves.

But I promise you this; if you should ever find yourself in the unfortunate fixed-thumbs-up position of a long arm cast for three weeks, I will not laugh at you. I will not call you a gimp. I will not make the 703rd version of a lame joke and expect you to laugh. I will sympathize with the challenges to your daily grooming rituals, your limited wardrobe, and your deep, overwhelming three-week-long need to extend your fucking elbow for the love of GOD.

I will sympathize with your search for a plastic shower cast-cover manufacturer that has the foresight to indicate on their boxes if said shower cast cover will actually cover a long arm cast, and not just the short ones.

If you are single I will ask the most attractive and generous of my other single friends to swing by and help you take said shower several times a week.

I will slice your bagels without asking. I will ask you non-cast-related questions so that, for variety’s sake, you can talk about work, Egypt, your mother, and Tabatha’s Salon Takeover.

Most of all I promise to never ever flash you a thumbs-up sign, and I promise to laugh like really hard when you tell me the doctor wouldn’t give you the thumbs-down model instead.

So I had one of those dark-night-of-the-soul moments last week. Like a lot of my fellow countrymen, I’d recently found myself unemployed, flat-broke, and scrambling to pay rent. I had a Master’s degree from an Ivy League school that qualified me for no particular job, a not-yet-finished book that I’d been working on for six years, and a promising freelance gig that seemed to be dissolving before my very eyes. I’d just interviewed for a three-month entry-level job at a downtown law firm, where three separate interviewers asked me why a guy with my “credentials” would, in essence, bow so low.

I am now writing to you from their cubicle, a hired gun sneaking in a few sentences on my lunch break, a large turkey chili from the SF Soup Company rapidly cooling on my desk. I’ve just spent four straight hours folding the company holiday cards, which, in keeping with the pro-labor stance of the firm, are multicultural, printed on recycled paper from “well-managed” forests.

Given these rather prosaic surroundings, it seems like a million years since last week, when I found myself stuck on a thought that had regularly occurred to me over the course of my adulthood; after 39 years I had yet to figure out my niche in the marketplace. On the heels of this woe-is-me sentiment came another: what’s the fucking point?

This was not a casual what’s-the-fucking-point. This was the kind of what’s-the-fucking-point that morose adolescent girls who’ve read all of Sylvia Plath entertain. I then found  myself wondering what it would be like to check into a psych ward for just, you know, self-protection.

I’m not sure how long I entertained these thoughts – a few minutes, an hour or two. Long enough to remember that self-pity only feels good for a very short time. Long enough to realize how stupid it would be to throw in the towel just because the world hadn’t given me what I thought I needed to be happy. Long enough to know that I didn’t want to end up like David Foster Wallace.

DFW, the genius writer, was a hero of mine. He’s still a hero, but a dead one, since he hanged himself two years ago. I don’t know the reason or the reasons he hanged himself, but he’d long suffered from depression, and the one drug that had made his life bearable had stopped working.

He’s my hero not just because he was a genius writer, but because by all accounts he was a pretty amazing human being. I’ve read a few dozen interviews with him by now, and that quality is hard to miss. Normally I’d steer you towards a few of those interviews so you could see for yourself, but I’ve been folding holiday cards for four hours and I have exactly 27 minutes left on my lunch break. So you can just check out this memorial site instead.

“Good writing,” DFW once said, “Makes the reader feel a little less lonely inside.” Before reading that, my reasons for writing had all been intuitive, amorphous, and unspoken. But with those words DFW articulated my internal mission statement, or at least what I secretly hoped to do with my writing. Like most good writers DFW could put things into words you’d long felt but had never expressed.

Turning to the writing of a suicidal man when you yourself have been teetering on the edge is a questionable decision. But though DFW may have died of an incurable loneliness (and what is depression, really, but acute, soul-killing isolation?), he had accomplished his goal in making at least this one reader feel a little less lonely inside.

I turned to an essay (in this book) he’d written about attending the Illinois State Fair, many, many years after his childhood there. He wrote hilariously about dessert competitions, steer judging, and the dangers of observing teams of pre-teen girls whirling batons, many with more enthusiasm than skill, in an enclosed space.

Then, strolling through the midway, he turns a bit more somber: “It strikes me hardest here that I am not spiritually Midwestern anymore, and no longer young ­­– I do not like crowds, screams, loud noise, or heat. I’ll endure these things if I have to, but they’re no longer my idea of a Special Treat or sacred Community-interval. The crowds in the midway – mostly high school couples, local toughs, and kids in single-sex packs, as the demographics of the Fair shift to prime time – seem radically gratified, vivid, actuated, sponges for sensuous data, feeding on it all somehow. It’s the first time I’ve felt truly lonely at the Fair.”

Later in the essay he looks down at the fairway from a distance, in the middle of a storm, describing it as, “A whole lot of neon in the rain.”

That sentence stuck with me. With a handful of simple words he turns something garish and cynical and seedy into something almost beautiful. With those words he let me step into his head for a bit.

It didn’t take me long to get a little angry with myself. How stupid it would be to give up on everything just because you couldn’t find your way into the right job. And a couple weeks of work, even folding holiday cards, put some money in my pocket and filled a bit of my soul with some sense of purpose and satisfaction.

I’ve been thinking about changing the course of Dogpoet a bit. Not so much the format of stories and anecdotes and random snapshots of scruffy terriers. More like a change of focus. On the things that do and don’t make me, and maybe you, feel a little less lonely inside. I am going to risk looking way too earnest and defenseless and uncool in an effort to look at the things in life that do us some good. Which is not to say that I won’t also poke fun at the things that DO make us feel empty and sad and disconnected. Cause those can be instructive too. My little “Neon in the Rain” project.