Photo by Bill Stokes
By Bill Stokes
Kickass, the doorstop dog, passes along the keeper’s report that, as everyone knew she would, Phyllis sailed through her Monday hip replacement surgery as if it were nothing more than a pedicure.
As a woman who has hiked in every National Park in the US and has the medallions to prove it, Phyllis informed the keeper that as soon as her new hip heals in, she would like to get back on the Ice Age Trail; and she hopes that he will accompany her. He will, of course, if Phyllis doesn’t hike too fast and if she will allow a small medicinal flask in his backpack: Phyllis may be unstoppable, but the keeper needs an occasional brandy-break to keep a Wisconsin tradition alive and to catch his breath.
Phyllis’s surgery was by Dr. Scott Anderson’s team at the “new” UW Health Hospital on the east edge of town, and the keeper recommends touring it even if you don’t need a joint replaced: it is a spectacular facility, and if it were a spaceship on the way to Mars, it would get there. Its grandeur speaks of the exorbitant cost of health care; and the obvious scientific staff’s professionalism and the latest equipment make pitiful fools of the Covid unmasked, anti-vaccines and horse-wormer crowds.
Phyllis comes home today after an overnight hospital stay, and the keeper may hire that small orchestra that he once promised her on another occasion. Then again, being the big spender that he is not, he may just play “Home Sweet Home” for Phyllis on his button accordion.
