Slightly Off the Mark: August 2025

The Hand, the Books, and the Typing

The surgery went well, or so I assume. The bandage doesn't come off until next Wednesday, so in theory there should could be some kind of horror movie eye inserted into the palm of my hand that I won't know about until then. My wrist is itching like crazy, so maybe that's eyelashes blinking.

Is it the all Seeing hand?

The meds they had me on can cause thinking like that. I tried to go off the painkiller early, because I'm not a big fan of the heavy duty drugs. That's when I found out just how much this would be hurting if I didn't have the heavy duty drugs, so I'll try weaning myself off in a few more days. Until then my biggest activity has been sleeping, although we did get a chance to catch up on watching Strange New Worlds.

I got free non skid socks out of the deal. Well, I haven't seen the bill for them yet.

Yesterday I managed to read an entire writer's Digest magazine, although I skipped the poetry page. It took all my brain power, especially after a dose of Benadryl because of the itching under my bandage. Stop blinking, third eye! But that's been about all I can complain about.

(Actually, Emily read the fine print for the pain med and realize that I am suffering from every single one of the side effects listed, from upset stomach to, yes, back pain--including itching.)

Oven warmed blankets!

We ordered 45 copies of Haunted Noble County Indiana, and as of yesterday sold 40 of them. That's pretty darn good, considering I haven't left the house other than to go to the hospital. That includes those sold by Butterfly Alley Gifts, a shop just up the street from us. It doesn't include Amazon and other online sales; our website is live, but not set up to take orders just yet.

I waved a copy of the book around while they were wheeling me into the OR, but nobody seemed interested.

So as soon as I came out of the mental fog I ordered 50 more copies, and they should be here in a few days. Here's something weird: I also ordered 10 copies each of Storm Squalls and The Notorious Ian Grant. For some reason, they're sending them to me piecemeal: three copies here, five copies there, and twice I got just one copy in a package. It seems like it would have saved a lot of shipping trouble to just send them all at once.

Anyway, I'm finding talk to text, or whatever it's called, to be very frustrating. Way too much time spent going back to correct it -- maybe I just need to work on enunciation. Typing one handed is even worse, so for now I'm going to take my special happy pill and call it a day. Thanks to all the well wishers!

You can preorder, order, and generally make contact here:

· Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/-/e/B0058CL6OO

· Barnes & Noble: https://www.barnesandnoble.com/s/"Mark R Hunter"

· Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/4898846.Mark_R_Hunter

· Blog: https://markrhunter.blogspot.com/

· Website: http://www.markrhunter.com/

· Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ozma914/

· Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/MarkRHunter914

· Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/markrhunter/

· Twitter: https://twitter.com/MarkRHunter

· Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@MarkRHunter

· Substack: https://substack.com/@markrhunter

· Tumblr: https://www.tumblr.com/ozma914

· Smashwords: https://www.smashwords.com/profile/view/ozma914

· Audible: https://www.audible.com/search?searchAuthor=Mark+R.+Hunter&ref_pageloadid=4C1TS2KZGoOjloaJ&pf

Remember: Pain and meds might make you blah blah blah maybe.

Give Me a Hand ... For Surgery

Chances are good that I'm about to disappear.

I'm having surgery on my hand, thanks to a non-dangerous affliction called Dupuytren's contracture. This was named after a scientist named Guillotine Dupuytren, and I hope he's happy. I'd give him the middle finger, but it won't bend that way.

Over time, a patient's fingers can bend toward his palm until he--that would be me--can't use them anymore. In my case it's the two middle fingers on the left hand, where tissue under the skin hardens and draws them in.

I know what you're thinking: "Mark, how did you get Kleenex under your skin?"

No, no, it's not facial tissue, I think. It's one of those medical terms, like when they call a person who draws blood a phlebotomist, instead of the obvious title of "blood sucker". A phlebotomist sounds like someone who collects spit. Thank goodness for knowing terminology, because the medical establishment classifies Dupuytren's contracture as a "tumor".

Think of it more like paper towels when they get squeezed together while wet, then dry into a hard mass you can't break with a hammer. My sewer once got blocked that way. Unrelated to my hand.

In the United Kingdom, where many of my ancestors come from, about 20% of men over 65 have, as the drug commercials would put it, D.C. I'm not that old yet, but you gotta start somewhere. My Grandmother had it, and her maiden name was Welch, which is Welsh. But you knew that.

It's often painless, although it's started to hurt me--and hurt way more after the ortho doctor poked and prodded at it for half an hour. There's also the time he tried to ease the pain by sticking a five foot long needle through my hand, but never mind.


Proof: the needle mark

The man ran an iron bar through my palm--to make the pain go away! It did eventually, but I broke my other hand while punching the wall.

It wasn't the pain that worried me: It was the fact that I keyboard for my fulltime job and for my part time job, and now that I'm no longer an active firefighter, I keyboard for the Fire Department. You older people, that means typing. Typing with one hand clenched into a fist would cause issues.

So the doctor's going to put me under, then use a fork and steak knife to dig the tumor/tissue out. Then I won't be able to use my left hand for about two weeks.

You see where I'm going with this.

I once had a boss who had one hand, and he could do just about anything a two-handed person could do, out of necessity. I'm not that kind of person. I've been practicing, and it's no go. I'll have to wear sweatpants and zippered hoodies I can't zip up. Cooking will be even more dangerous than before.

Okay, usually Emily cooks, but as for doing the dishes, we'll have to stock up on paper and plastic. Mowing the lawn will be up to my grandkids. (I actually like mowing, when it's not so humid you have to shoo fish out of the way.) I have to take two weeks off work, which is fine, but everything I do at home involves a keyboard, too.

"No, you type with your left hand--oh, let's just watch Expedition Unknown."

Which brings me to the internet.

Some would say I spend too much time on the internet, and they'd be right. I submit that some of that time is necessary, both to keep up with friends and family and to promote my writing. I also submit that I can't type well one handed. I'll try some speech to text writing, but based on experience with my phone, I'd have to type that much more to correct mistakes.

So I declare late August to be a vacation from the internet, and if you see a long piece of writing from me it was probably prescheduled. Once the pain and pain meds have subsided enough for me to think straight, I want to catch up on my reading.

But what I'll probably do is watch TV.

Just because I'm not around doesn't mean you can't find our books--including the newest, Haunted Noble County, Indiana:

· Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/-/e/B0058CL6OO

· Barnes & Noble: https://www.barnesandnoble.com/s/"Mark R Hunter"

· Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/4898846.Mark_R_Hunter

· Blog: https://markrhunter.blogspot.com/

· Website: http://www.markrhunter.com/

· Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ozma914/

· Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/MarkRHunter914

· Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/markrhunter/

· Twitter: https://twitter.com/MarkRHunter

· Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@MarkRHunter

· Substack: https://substack.com/@markrhunter

· Tumblr: https://www.tumblr.com/ozma914

· Smashwords: https://www.smashwords.com/profile/view/ozma914

· Audible: https://www.audible.com/search?searchAuthor=Mark+R.+Hunter&ref_pageloadid=4C1TS2KZGoOjloaJ&pf

Remember: You only need one hand to turn the pages.

It's Book Release Day! Sort Of.

Yes, today is the release date for Haunted Noble County, Indiana. It's hit the bookseller websites (although not as an ebook yet), and I just received a box of what may or may not be copies of the book, although I've been too busy to actually open it. In my defense I was going to take a video of me opening it, and Emily and I haven't been in one place long enough to do it.

I don't know, maybe it's something else.

Things started going right immediately, starting with a flood of people wanting a signed copy straight from us. That was also something that went wrong because--despite me constantly talking about it online--the date sneaked up on us. As of when I write this, I haven't made arrangements for a local author appearance where I can distribute copies before late September, and there are way more people wanting them than I have time to deliver to.

Which is good, if you think about it. I always worry about whether anyone will want our newest book. This is the twelfth published, and I still have imposter syndrome.

On a related note, I should have gotten another book out earlier, so the book about ghosts and hauntings would be our 13th.

I even went around taking spooky photos to promote the book with. The irony is that the Old Jail Museum--arguably the spookiest looking structure in Albion--has no ghost stories associated with it.

So, what went wrong? There were some personal and family related things that I can't talk about here. I can talk about the prep for my upcoming hand surgery, which will happen on August 18th, and I just realized the joke: I really can't hand deliver the copies.

It's minor surgery, but starting last week I had to stop taking any form of certain pain medicines. Due to the wording on the pre-op papers I was led to believe that meant all pain medicines, including acetomenoph ... aceta ... ac ... Tylenol. Specifically the paper said I couldn't take paracetamol, which is another word for, yes, acetaminophen.

As all fourteen of my regular readers now, I have chronic pain issues. I stopped all meds on the 8th, and the following weekend was really, really rough. On Monday I called the ortho doctor, because all our internet overlords said taking Tylenol was just fine. He said, "taking Tylenol is just fine!"

So I took six, then crushed a bottle full and spread them over my body, then emptied a case full into the bathtub and soaked in it for six hours.

Where were we? Oh, yeah, the book.

Long before all this started, Emily set about updating our https://www.markrhunter.com/ website, so the new book would be there along with links to buy it. You people who want it mailed to you, that's where you can go to make the order and give me your mailing address.

Except Emily realized the entire website had to be completely redone. At exactly the same time her seasonal job is at its busiest. After working on it every spare hour, she punched the domain name transfer request with one day to spare.

Except the domain name transfer doesn't happen in one day. It may, in fact, take several days, and there's no way to rush it. So I don't know when you'll be able to order it, I don't know where I'll be passing copies out, and I have to work this weekend ahead of the surgery.

And there you have it. Both an apology and a sob story, and an epic fail. Whoever knows where I live is welcome to stop by, of course, if you don't mind the clutter, and I'll update things as we go along. But in the end I can only blame myself and my hand, and my back, and sometimes my head.