Well, it’s a done deal. I had my back surgery today, and now I am resting at home.

And – miraculously – most of the pain in my legs and lower back is gone!

You never really know how much pain you’re in, I think. until it goes away. Then you realize what you were missing out on. I am pinching myself every few minutes just to make sure this is all real and that I am not just dreaming… It’s truly amazing.

I’m not a proponent of surgery unless it’s absolutely needed. As testament to that fact, I have been dealing with back pain for several years, trying to deal with it in a variety of ways. As I said yesterday, it was time.

And so today I can stand on my own two feet without much pain at all, I can balance better, and I feel just great.

Really, it’s incredible. With any luck, as I heal things will stay this way.

The most amazing Christmas gift I could possibly get this year came early. My doctor (Dr. Olson) and my friend/neighbor (Mike, who spent the whole day driving me to Salem for the surgery, waited around for several hours and then drove me back home, all while making sure I was doing okay) really and truly provided me with something I needed today.

I have an attitude of gratitude, as they say – and am happy beyond belief.

The Microsoft TechNet crew has posted their Best of 2004 list.

Best content, best resources, best webcasts, best tools… Nice selection of stuff.

“We asked the TechNet team and customers like you to name the best features, pages and sections published on TechNet during 2004. Here they are!”

From a technet email recieved this morning…

Microsoft Anti-Spyware Tool Coming Soon

As you might have heard, Microsoft recently acquired Giant Software, Inc., the maker of a well-regarded anti-spyware tool. Although we'd hoped to be able to provide you with a link to a beta release of a Microsoft-branded version of this tool, it isn't quite ready yet. We're told the beta software will be freely downloadable from the Download Center sometime in the next few weeks. Until then, here's the press release outlining the capabilities of this spyware blocking and removal tool, and another statement explaining some little-known facts surrounding a legal agreement between Sunbelt and Giant that preceded the Microsoft purchase of the Giant technology.

Not the same way one New Hampshire UPS truck driver does. I bet his last name is Murphy – It almost has to be.

CLICK HERE for the story...

John Dvorak posts a great little article for people new to the blogosphere: Understanding and Reading a Blog (for Newcomers).

(via BlogWrite for CEOs)

Mid-day Wednesday I’ll be getting drugged up and surgically repaired. The time’s come for a microdiscectomy for my back problems (which I have written about here at a high level in the past). After trying exercise (ouch), stretching, medications, therapy, hanging upside down, chiropractors, you name it… Well, it’s just time.

What many people don’t realize is how incredibly debilitating back pain can be. My condition is a herniated disc at the L5–S1 joint, which is in the lower part of the small of your back. The disc is that flexible shock-absorber that sits between your vertebrae. The herniated part is bulging out and pressing on the roots of two nerves that go all the way down my legs and into my feet. When I have back pain, it’s not just in my back – It’s shooting from my back, down my legs, and out the tips of my feet. At times it’s the kind of pain that keeps me from being able to get up off the floor, or even from being able to move without screaming. At other times the symptoms are clumsy legs and twinges of shooting pain. Other times my back just aches.

Anyhow – after nearly 10 years off-and-on of real pain and discomfort, I am looking forward to the decent possibility of lessening the pain and related problems.

People have been asking me if I am nervous. Truth be told, I’m really not. I trust my doctor and have confidence there. It’s not complicated surgery, and I will be home under my own power the same evening. I won’t be able to drive myself because of the medications they use for surgery, but hey, that’s why God made friends, to drive you back and forth when you’re in bad shape, right?

So, with any luck, by this time tomorrow night I’ll be feeling less pain than I am now.

If that should come to pass, it will be the best Christmas present I could possibly wish for. I’ve been good this year, so I hope I get my wish.

 – gh