It’s rainy and dreary outside the newsroom this morning, but I’m doing my part to brighten things inside.

I’m wearing a pink shirt. I’m talking Pepto-Bismol pink. I’m not opposed to the idea of guys’ wearing bright colors, just as males in the rest of the animal kingdom do, but this one is probably making its one and only appearance with me. It’s a bit too precious.

The reason it finally made it out of my closet is that it was the only shirt already ironed this morning, and I’m ironing-challenged today because a sports injury has limited the range of motion of my right arm.

I had closed a window Sunday night and turned to step over some exercise equipment and evidently snagged my foot on one end of it. I crashed to the hardwood floor with a thud. My right shoulder took the brunt of the impact. That qualifies as a sports injury, right?

Anyhow, I stayed home the next day to lick my wounds and by afternoon discovered I could drive all right and my injury was improving quickly.

By this morning, I was moving well enough to head back to the office. But ironing was a challenge. So the pink shirt makes its cameo appearance as a one-off event.

The incident got me to thinking about how one day I might not be so fortunate. I could smash my skull and wind up remembered by my neighbors as The Awful Smell Next Door.

So I’m going to get some extra keys made and pass them on to some trusted friends. Then, when I don’t show up for work some morning and don’t answer my phone, someone can have the pleasure of discovering my fate before the neighbors report me as an offensive odor.

Pretty thoughts, right? I guess the pink shirt wasn’t that inspirational after all.

Irv Dean is the Gazette’s city editor.