Randy’s Report

On Monday, I’ll be able to mark Feb. 20, 2023, as a day for another surgery. I guess that makes Tic, Tac, Toe, three in a row, at least as calendar days go for surgery.

I started having pain in my right stomach/side and back on New Year’s Eve. It was as if Rocky Balboa was using me instead of the sides of meet for boxing practice.

One ultrasound, and two doctor visits later, and I’m heading for gallbladder surgery this coming Monday.

It’s not so much the surgery that frustrates me, I’ve had a total of five. In addition to the ones mentioned, there was a second neck surgery in June of 2003 and two shoulder surgeries spanning almost 40 years.

And that’s not counting two cataract surgeries.

What I hate is I’ll miss the first week of high school baseball and softball season. I enjoy almost every sport, but baseball and softball, along with football, are my favorites.

I don’t care if it’s actually too cold to be playing baseball and softball through, perhaps, the end of March.

I love the diamond sports and the pace that allows you to sit back and enjoy the game while chatting with your neighbor.

I will miss the first day of the season and seeing parents, grandparents, school personnel, fans and the coaches and players that have become family. I’ll miss eating from my bag of peanuts, a healthy protein I might add, as the game goes on.

Without pretending to know too much more than I actually do, there are two types of gallbladder surgery. The first one is what they are plan on doing and would be outpatient surgery. I’ll be back to work in week if that plan holds true.

If they find they need to perform the more complicated surgery, I’ll be out for two or three weeks.
In a perfect world, I’d know I wouldn’t have any more problems with my gallbladder until school gets out.

If it were that perfect world, I’d wait until June for the surgery. The thing is the next attack could really mess me up and I’ve been advised the sooner I get it done the better, thus I’ll be under the knife in Pensacola on Monday morning.

Brian Lester, from our sister paper in Navarre, will help while I’m gone.
I’m thankful for his support along with owner Sandi Kemp, publisher Gail Acosta and editor Dusty Ricketts. I’m blessed to work for people that care about my body more than my body of work.

If you are up around 7 a.m. on Monday and you’re a praying person, please lift up a prayer for the team performing the surgery and that my body will respond accordingly. I’ll be 65 in May so I don’t bounce back as I did when I was a young buck.

The love of this job keeps me young and I’ll be back before you know it in my familiar spot behind home plate as well as on the sidelines for the other spring sports.