Umloud! Also, surgery update

Wednesday was Umloud, a Rock Band fundraiser for Child’s Play. It was epic win.
The highlight of the evening for me (besides playing Boston’s “Rock ‘n Roll Band” on the main stage with Twon, Tim, and Witwix) was winning this in the silent auction:

That is a limited edition Brütal Legend statue. They only made 1000 of ’em. And I got it. In part by bluffing the crap out of the other bidder.
See, around 9 I checked the bidding and only one person had bid on Eddie! I couldn’t have that, so I bid. I assumed it was going to go for hundreds of dollars and promised myself to quit bidding before I regretted my actions. Well, around 15 minutes before the auction closed, there was only one more bid, bringing the total to $140. Which: Whaaaaaaa? So I bid again, and then lurked (and wished that Bidnip handled silent auctions too). The guy who’d outbid me before showed up again and bid about a minute before the auction closed. I went over and outbid him and we stared at each other. I grinned and said, “how badly do you want it?” I was projecting “I will bid whatever it takes to win this” so hard I believed it myself, even though my last bid had been my maximum. He looked at me and said, “Naw, it’s cool, you can have it.”
I did a happydance and paid, and the guys running the auction said they’d hold the statue for me, which they did. Twon very kindly schlepped it to the car for me when we left, since I was gimping after such a long night of rocking out and was using my cane.
Speaking of which: my recovery is going GREAT! My knees work really well all things considered, though I’m still very slow on stairs, and I was hardly sore at all the day after Umloud. My physical therapist says I’m doing great. So yay!