the fun thing about gallbladder surgery is that you can't die from it, but if you could it wouldn't be painful.

Really? Do divulge...

what's to tell, what at first seemed like really bad heart burn ended up with me writhing in pain and in the emergency room, a day later surgery, and a day after that I'm back to smoking cigars and drinking vodka.

You can die from any surgery requiring general anesthesia. There was a story not long back about a high school cheerleader who died following a boob job.

Shit...

I thought this thread was about the band.

lol

Here's another post-immortality story.

I recently took up Aikido. While practicing some of the
tumbling movements, I blew out a disc in my neck. C6/C7
vertebra.

Disc pressed and intermixed with the spinal cord fibers
and I can now redefine the word ' extreme pain '. Neck
left shoulder and left arm all affected.

Cervical Laminectomy fixed it. ( Shaved off some of the
vertebra and removed the herniated disc material ) A week
later and I'm still sitting at home recovering from that.
:|

Moral of the story is:

Technique becomes a lot more important in your mid 30's
You don't bounce back from injuries quite as quickly as
you did when you were 18 !

QFT

I agree whole heartedly, now at the tender age of 36 I find challenges in almost anything physical