Crisis and Triumph on the Northern Front: A
Review of No Middle Ground
by Jim Werbaneth
Nathanael Greene
at War: Two Battles of the American Revolution, in GMT’s Guilford
by
Jim Werbaneth
Designer’s Response to “ISIS and the New Modern: A Review
of Islamic State: Libya War”
by Javier Romero
Humanoid
Vehicles: A Glimpse into the Future of Infantry Combat
by Jason Guard
Levels of Difficulty: The Challenges of Artificial Intelligence in the
Standard Game of Age of Empires II HD
by Jim Werbaneth
The
Tactical Turning Point: Lessons from PanzerBlitz
by Jim Werbaneth
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by Jim Werbaneth
Color me stupid. That ended up resulting in a serious case of hubris. I learned
the hard way that declaring victory over health problems can be a dare to the
gods, a matter of waving a red cape in the face of a cosmic bull with no
dis-cernible sense of humor.
For the last few years, I’ve had some
problems, and last summer I started telling people that they were under control.
Yay me. Then came reminders that I wasn’t quite as much in control as I thought.
To make a really long story short, I had an old problem with syncope, what
non-doctors call passing out, reassert itself. In July that lead to an ambulance
ride and a night under observation in the hospital. Nobody there had a really
clear idea of what might be the root cause, but I was dehydrated and under a lot
of stress.
Well, it did lead to an amusing exchange with a neurol-ogist
once they finally took care of me in the emergency room.
Neurologist: Do
you live alone?
Me: Yes, why?
Neurologist: If you live alone, then
how did you know that you passed out?
Me: The first clue was when I
opened my eyes, and I was face down in my bedroom carpet.
Neurologist:
Oh.
I had another series of incidents right after New Years. I might have
let it go, and just watched my fluid intake, but one episode couldn’t be
ignored. I was in the express lane at a local Giant Eagle supermarket, wondering
why it was tak-ing so long to get up to a register. Then things got very quiet,
and when I opened my eyes, I was on the floor. The manager called 911, and
before I knew it, I was off to the emergency room again.
This time, I got
some better answers about what was going on. First, the ER doctor emphasized
that I had to “destress my life,” something with which I wholeheartedly agreed.
Then I got a Holter monitor for two weeks. I’d had one in the summer, but the
data was lost between the lab and my doctor, then discovered in January. That,
and the read-ings from the new monitor stuck on my chest, indicated that I had
heart arrhythmia. It wasn’t life threatening or anything, it does need
addressing though, so now I have a cardiologist, and one more medication. I also
have another heart monitor, this one an implanted loop recorder, which I’ll have
under my skin for maybe the next couple of years. I got that in early March, and
it indicates that my medication is working. So far so good.
Now back to
the stress. I won’t go into all the factors involved, but it certainly was
aggravating matters. There was ordinary life stress, and some that was
extraordinary, though I didn’t realize it at the time. Hopefully the worst of it
is over now. Between that and the meds, I don’t expect to do any more faceplants
into the carpet, or the express lane at Giant Eagle, for a while.
Then
too, there were two injuries. In August, I fell again, this time due to
clumsiness and not a heart condition; I tripped over my own stupid feet in the
garage. The resulted in a sprained knee and strained quadricep, and visits with
an orthopedist and physical therapy. That was aggravated by my girlfriend’s dog.
I was dog sitting Cosmo, who might be a little Jack Russell all of eighteen
pounds, but he is a champion at taking up all of a queen-sized bed. When I was
re-covering from the leg injury, he pushed me out of bed. It must have taken me
half an hour to get off the floor.
The fall in Giant Eagle resulted in
another injury, pulling muscles in my back. That got better by itself, no
medical help, and this time I didn’t need a cane to get around.
All those
stressors, illnesses and injuries too took up time. It ended up being very
difficult to work on Line of Departure. Weeks went by, and then months,
while I was trying to get a magazine out the door. I was aiming for October,
then it went to November, and then 2018.
One funny thing is that I was
working two jobs the whole time, as I have been for about ten years. I had the
opportunity to take a third job, a short-term gig writing mate-rial for an
online military strategy course. While this has taken up a fair amount of time,
it is not really adding to the stress; this is more like an opportunity. I am
going to miss the extra paychecks a lot more than I’ll be thankful for the extra
time in my life.
All the while too, I am determined to game more as well
as write about it. Looking back, I think that one of the big stressors was from
being cut off from both more than I would have liked. Also, I would really like
to design at least one game this year; that always seems to get pushed to the
back of the line, with work and life always getting in the way.
There is
one thing that I won’t do, and that is taunt the gods again. Right now stress
and my health are under con-trol, and I want them to stay that way. But you
won’t be hearing any confident declarations of victory.
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