Category: General

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Progress report

It’s been almost two weeks since my knee replacement, so I figured I should fire out a quick line on where I am right now.

I still have quite a bit of pain. When you consider that the surgery involves cutting the ends of the bones off, hammering and gluing metal replacement mating surfaces on the end of the tibia and femur, and cutting one of the largest muscles in the human body and stapling that back together, I’m not really surprised. My biggest problem these last few days is my left hip and left hamstring. Both scream at me constantly and I don’t really sleep much at night because of it. I suspect it comes from learning how to walk properly again and I assume it will go away eventually.

I may have avoided a nasty infection in my knee. This is a bad thing, but after three days on antibiotics, I’m feeling much better. This is important, since infection is the worst case scenario for a knee replacement. At the really bad end of the scale, it requires removing the new joint, waiting until the infection clears, and then reinstalling it.

The infection has me behind on my exercises, though. Rehabbing a joint involves mixing pain and frustration and scheduling this regularly. I do want to get back on track and go back to my regular physio appointments Mondays and Wednesdays. These were to start Wednesday, but my physiotherapist thought visiting the emergency room and dealing with my infection was a better idea.

I can’t wait until I’m allowed to drive again. This should be any time now, and it’s not like I’m going anywhere specific. I dislike not being able to get up and go when I want to. And, as you can imagine, I probably suffer from unsurvivable boredom.

One more thing for the progress report. I still have a sizable number of staples in my knee. These come out Monday and I’m looking forward to getting them out. Actually, it’s probably more accurate to say I’m looking forward to having them out. The “getting” part is not my favourite past time. I could post a picture, but a rather long incision picture with about 40 staples doesn’t appeal to most people. Suffice to say, I look like an office supplies accident, and leave it at that.

 

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Busy, busy

I’ve been more than usually remiss with posting in the blog. I didn’t get a chance to do much during the election, whose results were an improvement. How much of an improvement remains to be seen, but an improvement nonetheless.

My issue is that I was finally approved for knee replacement surgery in June and have been working with the date for surgery I was given then. This was approximately the end of February, or possibly, early March.

This resulted in a number of issues, such as dealing with my classes scheduled for next semester and finding a replacement instructor or instructors. The question also arose as to whether I would teach the first part of the semester and have my replacement step in when I went for surgery.

This got turned around a bit last month when I discovered that my surgical date would be early January rather than later. Suffice to say, I’ve been trying to finalise things in a huge hurry. I need to do a bunch to things around the house to get ready for the winter, as well as now needing to be prepared for work things to be arranged before that point as well.

This does clarify how my teaching schedule will pan out next term. From a budget standpoint, it does mean replacing me for the full term. However, several classes I was scheduled to teach were cancelled and this does provide a cheaper solution.

This also means a spate of more or less last minute medical appointments to prep for the surgery.

Now, after six repair jobs, there really isn’t much to do with what’s left of this knee beyond replacing it. Four of those, by the way, were during the 1970s, when knee surgery was a thing of cold chisels, pry bars, and big hammers. This is very much like that, although with a far daintier end result. And, I am really looking forward to that end result.

I was told In 1985 that I needed a replacement knee. The surgeon I saw at the time did offer the additional comment that I “might want to wait until they got better at making them.” I didn’t know the wait would be quite this long…

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Cats and meditation

I’ve been a bit remiss in posting, since I’ve been on the road visiting family and came back to go back to teaching classes. And, now that things have slowed down a bit, I can do a bit of writing.

I get a chance to consider some of the meditation apps I’ve tried to deal with the fact that I haven’t slept properly for more than six months. I’m going to look at this in consideration of comparing meditation to cat ownership.

First of all, you aren’t going to get a chance to really relax. Putting on the headphones and stretching out with the meditation app usually means that one cat will climb on your feet and go to sleep, while the other will perform the same task on your chest. Once the surprise ends, mind you, this is really relaxing. But, you probably will want to restart the app from the beginning, particularly when Darcy jumps on your chest. She often lands on your stomach and she does weigh almost 13 pounds.

Second recommendation: wear socks. That relaxation thing plays second fiddle to your reaction to having two cats simultaneously decide to lick your bare toes. I don’t know why both decide to do exactly the same thing at the same time, but it’s happened more than once.

One app I tried told me, “I must learn what complete calm looks like.” I listened to these words looking down at Furball lying on the top of my legs, upside down, with all four legs in the air, and Darcy sprawled like a corkscrew… a cat in liquid state…  laying across my feet. (As I sit in my recliner writing this, I currently have two cats demonstrating complete calm on my lap.) I think I know what calm looks like without someone else telling me.

Lastly, the newest one I tried tells me at the beginning that, “Meditation is safe. You are in complete control.” I have three cats. I don’t think I have control over a damn thing….

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Back to the Future?

Given the reminders that 2015 represents the year when Back to  the Future II takes place, we should look at a few more upcoming movie temporal placements:

2015: Back to the Future II

2018: Rollerball

2019: Blade Runner

2022: Soylent Green

2027: Children of Men

2029: The Terminator

Most of these aren’t really good to think of, given that most don’t speak well of the future to come. However, don’t panic. After all, look which movie settings have passed:

Early 1950s: War of the Worlds

c. 1960: Fahrenheit 451

1977: The Omega Man

1984: 1984

1997: 12 Monkeys

1997: Escape from New York

2001: 2001: A Space Odyssey

2010: District 9

How much of this has happened? Oh wait. Some of it has…

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That time of year

Dove imageOnce again that time of year has come. Quickly, as you can guess. I’ve had no time to even get around sending my Christmas cards. Fortunately, there are 12 days of Christmas so I can still send them off in the season.

Tomorrow, I’ll get a chance to make a few phone calls and talk to family and friends. Until then, I wish you the best of the season: peace on earth and goodwill towards all.

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Analog to digital

In May 2013, I posted that I had started using an electronic cigarette on occasion. The brand I use is Canadian, from a company out of Edmonton, and do not contain nicotine. As such, they are completely legal for sale and use in Canada.

I used both for a considerable period of time, and then, several months ago, moved on to just the e-cigarette. I like to think that I’ve moved from analog to digital.

This is a combination of a lithium ion battery and atomizer, which connects to a cartridge containing the liquid that is used. The liquid is water, glycerin and flavouring. My latest favourite is apple, although I also am quite fond of coffee and chocolate.

I am, frankly, a little confused over Health Canada’s somewhat odd approach to these. While their comments tend to deal with those that do contain nicotine, they seem somewhat against the idea of them. I find it odd that Health Canada would be against a tool that reduces smoking.

Yes, there are studies that indicate just that. A recent one, out of University of Massachusetts Boston, revealed over a three-year long study that people using the nicotine type e-cigarettes for at least one month are six times more likely to quit than those who do not. The recommendations of the authors following the study were:

“Policy makers need to think carefully before enacting any laws that make adult smokers less likely to try these products, such as taxing e-cigarettes as heavily as tobacco or eliminating flavors.”

Given the success rates, it would seem that there would be a reasonable amount of support for these. After all, nicotine really is a stimulant that functions much the same as caffeine. Nicotine replacement products, such as the nicotine replacement patch or Nicorette inhaler (called that in Canada, but the Nicorette E-Cigarette in European marketing), are completely legal when licensed.

Health Canada, however, must also be remembered to be a government body and, as such, answers to the federal minister of health. The minister has the ability to overrule any Health Canada decision (including the results of drug testing, by the way).

Depending on whose figures you use, there are either five or six million smokers in Canada. If you average one pack a day and use the lower number, with approximately $12 of federal and provinces excise taxes and sales taxes on each pack, you can see a probably $60 million per day influx of cash into federal and provincial coffers.

Two month ago, I emailed Health Canada and asked if their lack of support for e-cigarettes are a department policy or at the instruction of the minister. I haven’t gotten an answer…

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The driveway

I’m still having a few issues in trying to get the driveway fixed. You can’t find an excavation contractor to come in and change the slope of the driveway before September or October.

This leaves me the choice of not taking the motorhome out of the driveway before then, or doing something else. I opted for the latter.

I figured that, if I removed the pavement from the bottom of the driveway, at least when I scrape, I’ll hit something softer rather than several inches of asphalt. This meant that I would have to rent a jackhammer and use one for the first time since I was about 17 years old.

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The name is Hammer. Jack Hammer.

It took a little longer than I had hoped, about 3 hours of work, but I did get the pavement out. This took longer because it was 8″ thick in some places. I suspect there has been multiple patch jobs done by simply over-paving a previous bad job. Note that in part of the area I did, the asphalt was just laid down on sand, with no gravel. It isn’t hard to guess why there may have been a multitude of patch jobs done in the years previous to us buying the lot.

That being said, the job was semi-successful. I still scrape, even with extra weight on the front by putting the storage rack in the front bumper hitch and putting my 4000 watt generator on it. However, it’s a lot nicer to just scrape in gravel than the alternative…

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I want to go luging

Since the Olympics are coming up, I can once again admit that I have always wanted to try luge. I know, the sanity level involved in laying exposed on a sled hurtling down a track at about 130 kph may be questionable.

And, now, albeit on a small scale, I may get my chance. One of the college students is supervising the construction of a short luge track. I will be small, but I’m sure will function to get this out of my system.

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Top of the luge track
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The curve

Interestingly, this interest in luge does not apply to skeleton. Yes, you are exposed and still go at about the same speed. However, unlike luge where you go feet first, skeleton goes head first. And, some mental oddity makes me think that, if I hit something at 130 kph, it’ll make a lot of difference if you hit feet first…

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Hoarfrost

We’ve had a marvellous winter. Our January thaw lasted almost three weeks, with temperatures at or above 0°C throughout. In short, it has not been the traditional Yukon winter, although we haven’t really had a really cold winter in quite a while.

The advantage of the warm weather has been that it hasn’t been quite as dry as usual. My sinuses and hide are both quite grateful over that, by the way. And, another advantage has been that when the temperature eventually did drop south of freezing, we get a nice freezing fog and hoarfrost.

I like the way that frost and sunlight interact, so went out on the front step while the sun was starting to drop and grabbed a few pictures. After all, it’s nice to have an excuse to play with the new camera…

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