I hope Hot Air readers will bear with me, but a close friend of the First Mate could use as much prayers and positive energy as possible.  Melinda has known my wife for many years from their days at Braille, but while we’ve been blessed by restored health through transplantation, Melinda hasn’t been as fortunate.  She’s had chronic health problems from her diabetes, including a quadruple-bypass last year.  She has been in kidney failure but too sick for a transplant.  She had just begun improving enough to move from a hospital to a nursing home and had looked forward to going home this week, in time for her 49th birthday.  Instead, Melinda just got sent back to ICU with an MRSA staph infection.

Please keep Melinda and her husband Larry in your prayers.