Sorry to have missed you on Friday. Thursday night, just as ER was coming on, Hania drove me, writhing in the passenger seat, to the ER.

(Typing that just now, I realized that only an 'h' keeps "writhing" from being "writing.")

I was given pain medication for a kidney stone and sent home, where I spent a kind of lost weekend - either writhing (not writing) in pain or feeling a combination of elation at the lack of pain and anxiety about the imminent arrival of more.

Lying in bed, I discovered the hazards of listening to oldies radio stations. Early last week I had heard a song I hadn't heard in years: The Ballad of the Green Berets, by Sgt. Barry Sadler. It ran nonstop through my head whenever the pain was at its worst. And, like the stone, it is still there, waiting to do its number.

So if you don't hear from me for a day or two, I've either gone to the hospital or gone insane.