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Everything posted by Nidan1
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Bird migration continuing in CMAK?
Nidan1 replied to Brent Pollock's topic in Combat Mission: Afrika Korps
Any desert scene would be lacking without circling vultures....maybe you could select them like air assests. -
Just when you think that you can finally coast in life, fate has a way of laying you low...pulling the rug out from under you, so to speak. One can never be too complacent, a man has to always be on his guard, there are forces in the universe that are constantly conspiring to ruin your day. When I was in Nam, and someone we knew was killed or maimed, we never directly dealt with it...we would say stuff like "boy was his health record messed up" or "at least it wasn't a sucking chest wound". We knew that the same things could happen to us in a flash, but at twenty it would never happen. As one gets older..you learn to appreciate some of the gifts that the Creator has given you, and allowed you to keep. Athletic prowess fades with age, not matter what your mind says you think you can do....the body simply cannot respond the way it did in your twenties. Being a martial artist, I can attest to the way my body protests when I attempt to do things that I used to be able to do with ease. That you can accept, its hard, but you do learn to realize the fact. So you sublimate it into success at work, getting promotions, being recognized for achievement, you know that your days as a hunter killer are over. You learn to temper yourself...to use those strengths that you still have...to use years of training and experience as a substitute for raw speed and power. You say to yourself I can still do it , but you know at the age of 57 that is not the case. About a month ago I noticed some disturbing symtoms in my left eye...flashes of light, large spots floating in my field of vision...things I recognized as symptoms of a retinal detachment. I suffered one of those about seven years ago, so I knew what was happening. I was examined by an othalmologist, and he said there was no detachment, but I had suffered a shifting of the gel in the eyeball, and it had caused some internal bleeding. Seems I am prone to that. About a week ago it happened again, this time much worse, the lower half of my across my whole field of vision went dark. I saw the doctor again, and this time I definitely had a detachment. I also have a condition call "Lattice Degeneration", this causes tiny holes in the retina which bleed and cause floaters in my field of vision. The doctor injected gas into my eyeball in a technique called "steamrolling"..pretty cool huh? The pressure of the gas is suppposed to flatten the retina back down onto the wall of the eyeball. I have to keep my head tilted to the left in order for the gas to cover the damaged area. I have been at this for four days now. Yesterday I had laser surgery. Modern medical techniques are a wonder, but it is no fun sitting, pressed up against an apparatus while a green argon laser beam fries the tissue inside of your eye. Right now it is 99% reattached, but I still cant see well out of that eye. The doctor says that there is no reason to believe that this will continue to happen of the course of the rest of my life. No lifestyle change or medicines are needed. When confronting the frailty of your own body, it requires some real thought, the kind of thought that one never wants to engage in. You think to yourself I've got more years behind me, than I do in front a very sobering revelation that sneaks up on you from time to time. Of course this minor set-back does not influence the playing of CM...I could beat most of you with one eye anyway. So don't rub your hands together with glee and think you can take advantage of my temporary infirmity,