Fundraising Part 3

So, recently so successful at raising money at the school, I foolishly told the Chair of our Cub Scout Troop that I could do one for their annual Blue & Gold Dinner. I used the same mailing list I had already built. Got all sorts of stuff. Meanwhile, as it's getting closer to the day of the thing, I have surgery to remove varicose veins from my right leg. I was having serious circulation problems with open sores on my feet that wouldn't heal, so it had to be done. I came home like this:

And never being one to take it easy, I proceeded to drive around and collect things and got it all to the hall and got it set up and ran the thing that evening. This bandage was getting tighter and tighter and I was running a fever. I called to talk to someone at the doctors who did the surgery and their secretary told me she thought it was just the flu. (I didn't know at the time it was a secretary giving me medical advice.) After the whole thing was over and I think we made 2 or 3 thousand, I began to get sicker. I went to the doctor. He unwrapped the leg- it was agonizing to bend it or walk very far. It turned out that I had developed an abscess under the wrapping and they cleaned the lumpy blood out and put me in the hospital for 2 weeks under forced bed rest and an IV full of antibiotics. The hospital stay is another story unto itself. My first room mate was a guy who had a three organ transplant and slept all day and stayed up all night with his family in attendance even after visiting hours. I was miserable and got no sleep. I finally complained and they gave me another room with an old guy that was comatose and dying. Ir was very quiet there. He died while I was there I think  I did read William Least Heat Moon's "River Horse" and Jim Harrison's "The Road Home" both really good reads- both something to hold on to while you are confined.