I’ve been away from this space. In fact, I’ve totally missed a series of meetings and commitments over the past week. But for a reason better than “the dog ate my homework.”

My appendix burst. Painful and nasty.

And in hospitals in Canada, the nursing staff sure makes short work of your BlackBerry when you tell them you’re trying to Twitter your emergency surgery. So, no WiFi. No Internet. No BlackBerry. No nothing for several days.

These things never come at a good time. It forced me to miss several important meetings without notice. As for my trip to Vancouver this week, not a chance. So, I’ll miss ThirdTuesdayVancouver and Web Directions North, two events that I was really looking forward to.

Without doubt, it will take me some time to get back up to full speed.

And as I consider the 358 new emails in my office inbox and the 207 unread emails in my gmail box, not to mention the unanswered telephone calls, I realize that I should really look on this as an opportunity to pare back on some of my commitments. So, while I’m going to try to get back up to full speed as quickly as possible, I’ll try to focus on doing fewer things that really require my attention and keeping out of the things that can be done better by others (this will make the people I work with very, very happy).

That’s enough sitting up for now. Time to rest and get stronger.

Not sure when I’ll post again, but hopefully it won’t be too long.