Friday, April 25, 2003


AMP OF THE WEEK

For refusing to quit despite having his leg gnawed off by Delphinapterus leucas, my very first Amputee of the Week award goes to the ass-kicking Cap'n Ahab from Moby Dick.

This exchange between the Captain and the ship's carpenter, who is fashioning him a new artificial leg, uncannily reminds me of a conversation I had with my prosthetist just the other day:

"Look ye, carpenter, I dare say thou callest thyself a right good workmanlike workman, eh? Well, then, will it speak thoroughly well for thy work, if, when I come to mount this leg thou makest, I shall nevertheless feel another leg in the same identical place with it; that is, carpenter, my old lost leg; the flesh and blood one, I mean. Canst thou not drive that old Adam away?" "Truly, sir, I begin to understand somewhat now. Yes, I have heard something curious on that score, sir; how that a dismasted man never entirely loses the feeling of his old spar, but it will still be pricking him at times. May I humbly ask if it really be so, sir?"

Cap'n Ahab -- you rock.



Discuss Northern Iraq -- and Beyond

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