Aloha, Biglook! We're getting ready for triple digits in the Federalplex the next couple of days.
Today is an anniversary of some note for me. 27Jun1969 I developed an infection in my right hand after a couple of blisters popped. I had been digging a drainage trench around my hooch, and of course they got infected. My hand swelled up to the size of a softball and I was medevaced out to Danang. At 1st Med the surgeon directed a subclavian block be established. A couple of attempts were made. They finally found the subclavian nerve, but when they did, I jumped almost out of the cot.
They decided to go for a brachial block. After a couple of injections, they did nothing but anesthetize my triceps. I was lying on the cot and could flex my arm but could not open it back up. The surgeon came back, enraged, and said to put me under general. Said my injury was as as serious as a sucking chest wound.
They put me under general and performed the operation. When I woke up, I asked the Corpsman attending me whether I still had all of my fingers. He looked at my hand and counted off the fingers in series. Whoever bandaged me had left the tips of all five fingers exposed, sparing me much anxiety.
I was sent up to USNH Yokosuka, where I spent the month of July. My hand was a mess - I won't go into the gory details, except to say that I had no motion in the fourth and fifth fingers of my right hand. A month later, I was sent back to 'Nam and my hand was still impaired - I got no PT.
I got back in-country 4Aug and was assigned, again, to 3/5 - this time with Lima Company. That picture of me and Doc Simpson in the 3/5 Corpsmen's Quarters with all the piups on the walls was taken between 4 and 8 Aug. 8Aug69 I went back out into the bush and was hit ten days later. A story for another day.
Genuflectimus non ad principem sed ad Principem Pacis!
Listen, O isles, unto me; and hearken, ye people, from far; The LORD hath called me from the womb; from the bowels of my mother hath he made mention of my name. (Isaiah 49:1 KJV)
29 posted on 06/27/2012 8:06:56 PM PDT by ConorMacNessa
(HM/2 USN, 3/5 Marines RVN 1969 - St. Michael the Archangel defend us in Battle!)
