I'm packed...with loose clothing and irrational fear.

Just before I took my knees for their last ski.  The guest bed will go here and it will be my convalescing space.  Very cheerful.

"Is there anything I can do for you?" asked my friend John today on the phone today in reference to my surgery and rehab.  I thought for a second then said, "I have a Netflix at the Post Office and I don't have a car.  Can you pick it up for me?"  He left work and rode his bike to the PO.  Knee surgery = Power.

Tomorrow. By early afternoon I'll be sitting in a hospital bed with two new knees which should make me feel good except I will have had to be inside all day and it's supposed to be 54 degrees and sunny.  Please make the forecast be wrong.

My new community is a very welcoming group of local 70+ knee replacement survivors.  They're advising and outfitting me for the procedure.  So far they've passed along, two CryoCuffs, a walker, a commode (yes, I'll be using a used commode), gel packs, phone numbers and good wishes.

Elinor was walking down the road next to the ski trail today. (Elinor has two new knees and is part of my new community) "How is it today?" she hollered when I skied by.  Well of course I thought she was asking about my knee and I went into this long boring scenario, comparing it to yesterday, how I think the boot/ski combination I have on is good...important stuff.   Then she said "I meant how is the skiing?" 

Today.  I skied for the last time with my old knees which was oddly sad.  OK, now I can say it.  I hated skiing so carefully (i.e. slowly) this winter.  I tried convincing myself that it was good enough just being out in the fresh air but was never totally committed to that theory as much as I'd wanted to be.  Next winter I'll be able to ski with my arms AND legs.  YIPPEE.

Coming soon...

NYC hotel

•NYC trip.  With my high school girlfriends.

In case you've ever wondered what it looked like behind the doors of one of those airport clubs

•Tallahassee trip.  Florida State University MFA film program interview.
•Athens, Ohio trip.  Ohio University MFA film program interview.

Me And The Knee(s)

Vince put little piles of hay around the yard for Max and he'd go from one to the other all day

Diane at the post office said it was a lovely DAY and I said "only 11 more DAYs until I get my new knees".  I can't even have a conversation these days without relating it to my knees!*

My big day went from being March 12 to March 15 when I told my surgeon I'd decided I wanted to do both knees at the same time.  He caught himself midway through a sigh of exasperation and rolled with it.  It would be like someone who was getting 50 cycling jerseys, during our VOmax days, calling to say they wanted to double their order.  He should be psyched. 

The thought of having no legs for a while is a bit overwhelming, albeit all part of the 'big adventure', but when I went to my 'joint class' and the surgeon started telling the group of 30 or so (the hip people were in there with us) that we had to stop taking vitamins a week before surgery; anti-inflammatories, 10 days before; no dental work, even cleanings, for 6 months following.....then there were the catheters, infections, EKGs, blood tests, special soaps........I knew I wouldn't be able to keep track of all that stuff twice so even though I may have a tough first couple of weeks, I have no second thoughts about 'doing' both.

Whether it was my meloxicam (the anti-inflammatory that is like the one we give Max) or that my knee has been swollen so hard for so long that it's all stretched out, my pain has become pretty tolerable and I've been able to ski almost everyday (skiing is easier than walking) so I hope no one spent too much time feeling sorry for me thinking I was just sitting on the couch.**

I'm not sure I'd ever really stood and looked at myself in a full length mirror before (mostly because we didn't have a full length mirror until now) but I wanted to see what my knees looked like head on.  I noticed my right knee was a bit knocked and my right hip was a tad skewed.  Hmmmm.   I was pretty sure, even without a mirror to prove it back then, that I used to be straight up and down.  I dug out a photo of me a few years ago standing on a beach in a little bathing suit and you could see that, sure enough, I was straight.  So.  I put on the same little bathing suit, stood on the concrete floor instead of the beach and took a photo of my skewed hip and knee.  I ganged the before and after shots and sent them to the surgeon.  For my own peace of mind I need to send them.  I was going to email them but thought he might delete them as porn.  Before my great idea of wearing the same little bathing suit, for continuity and a straight forward comparison, I was thinking I could take an au natural shot, encompassing the hip and knee, then photoshop a four leaf clover or something over the crotch area.  Whatever...I don't think I'm going in for my fix a minute too soon.

I used to have a thigh muscle

*I started another blog.  A journal.  Just knee talk.  Boring unless your knees hurt a lot and even then it's not all the interesting.
**how does all that food get UNDER the cushions?

Winter. Movies. Knitting

My view from the couch when it's snowing.  The ski trail is in the middle of the picture.

Snow.
Here in Craftsbury, when people (me usually included) 'pray for snow', it's to make the skiing better.  Today I needed it to cover up the ashes and big hole along the driveway before Vince came home.  It's not that I would never tell him I went off the road but I wanted a chance blame it on the car before he sees the hole and assumes it was my fault.  Even if I would have had my right hand on the steering wheel instead of in the potato chip bag, my rented Ford Focus would have ended up in that snowbank.  

When Vince takes the car to school, I'm carless.  So, one sunny, clear roaded  (I'm sure that's not a word) day I rented a car for a month without thinking to ask about snow tires.  Today as I crutched (I'm sure that's not a word either ) up our 200 yard driveway with a backpack full of groceries to swap for a bucket of ashes and a snow shovel (it worked pretty well as a crutch actually), I knew I wouldn't forget to ask about the tires next time.

 All dug out and parked at if nothing had happened, I called the rental car people to see if I could get a car with snow tires, he said that no rental cars in Vermont had snow tires, 'it's the law' (now that sounds a little odd) and that the car was 'fine' since it had all-season tires.  I asked him if he wanted to come and drive the car out of the ditch.

Rental car with miraculous go-anywhere all season tires.

Customer service.
Our 'Six Feet Under'  Netflix addiction got to the point where the nights we didn't have one to watch were almost unbearable.  Pathetic, huh?  We finally decided the suffering was just too much and it was worth four dollars a month to upgrade our membership from one dvd at a time to two.  I clicked on 'my account' and noticed I'd been paying 15.99/month (one dvd + streaming) and not the 7.99/month (one dvd) for which I had signed up.  Of course we had never used the streaming because we didn't know we had it and wouldn't have anyway because we both like the anticipation of that red envelope in our mailbox and it being as close as we'll ever be again to the thrill of our photos being in at the drug store.  Evidently during the Netflix fiasco last summer, if you didn't say "don't add streaming," they added it, and since they had your credit card, they charged it.  They just didn't tell you.  So.  For 4 months I'd been paying 15.99 instead of the 7.99 I'd agreed to be paying.  I figured it would be as easy to get my money back as it was to upgrade my plan but she told me she could 'only credit me for three months and I was lucky because until recently they could only credit one month'.  I think that's stealing.  Shouldn't I be making up the rules in this case?


aforA.
I haven't knit since I finished a sweater for my girlfriend's baby that I never saw her wear but I'm finally over the knitting self-confidence issues enough to pick up my needles again.
"afghans for Afghans is a humanitarian and educational people-to-people project that sends hand-knit and crocheted blankets and sweaters, vests, hats, mittens, and socks to the beleaguered people of Afghanistan".  

I'm unreasonably proud of the hat I knit to contribute.

January 2012, World Service delivers our wool gifts to girls and boys in Kabul!

Little bits.
The emergency room doctor had conjunctivitis (pink eye) and kept dabbing his weeping eye with a piece of toilet paper.  Should he be in there?

I have a new favorite movie this week....'Rocket Science'.  About a stuttering boy who joins his high school debate team.

My friend Fred bought a bail jar of pennies at an antique store the other day and there were 1157 pennies in it.

Did you notice?  Nothing about my knee.

Life Goes On

 

Before.  The Vermont house when we bought it.  This is the entryway looking into the living room where I sit on the couch and ice my knee these days.

After.  The Vermont house now.  This is the entryway looking into the living room where I sit on the couch and ice my knee these days.

When I decided I was going to get a new knee I told the PA I wanted to talk to some patients that had had a similar operation.  She thought that was a great idea(to my face).  A few days later I got a call from the person in the office that gets handed the tasks the 'higher ups' would rather blow off.  She told me that it's pretty unlikely that someone would want to talk to me and that I should just go online and google petellafemoral replacement because I would be able to get all the info I needed that way.  I didn't like that answer...would you?...so I called the office again saying I need the referrals they were going to get for me.  In one form or another this went on for a half dozen phone calls over 6 weeks.   I kept leaving very specific messages with the phone person because they won't ever transfer you to the person you should be talking to.  Because I was never called back I assumed my messages weren't getting translated correctly...  so you know what I did?  I wrote and old fashioned letter, put it in an envelop with a stamp and mailed it.  The next day I had more referrals than I wanted.  I pretty much had their data base.

So then today...I won't get into the ambulance and the emergency room story....but I ended up getting my knee drained again by the person I told you about that promised me the referrals then handed the task to the person that thinks google is magic.   The draining usually goes better than it did today and when I got home I called the office to ask why there was a bruised egg-sized lump that was bleeding on the outside of my knee that had never been there before and should I be concerned.  Lisa, the phone person, said Leah (the knee drainer) was with a patient but she would have her call me.  A half hour later Lisa (note, not Leah) called back basically telling me to 'take two aspirin and call me in the morning' (except she meant 'don't call me in the morning').  I asked Lisa several questions, none of which she was able to answer except when I asked her what her position was there at the office and she told me she was a scheduler.
 
Yesterday I rode the bike trainer with one leg for 70 minutes which I'm sure that is going to have it's own set of problems before long.  I watch old  'curb your enthusiasm-s' for a distraction and once as I momentarily drifted back into reality, I realized I wasn't even peddling so the 70 minutes was probably more like 20.

Today is another couch day.  A divot has settled into the couch that is only going to get bigger and more embarrassing.  I think I'll be able to finish our Christmas card ( a month late...not eleven months early) which is something I wouldn't have been able to do without my forced rest. 

Picture this.  Me on the couch and Vince two feet behind me swearing at inanimate objects and plastering the chimney.  Then two days later and two feet behind and to my right, he rips out a door, studs out the wall, sheet-rocks, paints. 

"Excuse me.  I'm trying to relax here...."

I'm babbling.

Weak In The Knees, To Say The Least

My knee.  I must have really stretchy skin.

Yesterday I had a surgical consult with Dr. Huber.  We both knew it was just a matter of time before I scheduled a day for him to take out my old knee and put in a new one.  Gives me the creeps.  Looks like I am a candidate for a patellofemoral replacement often referred to as a 'partial' in knee replacement converstions. The knee has three compartments and it appears that only one of mine is totally trashed so that will be the one he replaces.  Even though a 'partial' sounds less creepy, they still go in and take out part of my knee.   Ick.

"He has some time March 12,"  office person Amanda said.
"I'll take it,"  I said.

The consult was productive.  He was able to answer all of my questions.  I'd prepared myself by contacting five of his previous patients before I went in and everyone was happy.  One ran a marathon this summer.

Most skiers would wait until the end of the season for the operation but since I can't ski anyway,  I'm doing it now.

When I say I can't ski, it's not entirely true.  I can double-pole on the flats.  I always wear my down jacket because I can't go hard enough to sweat.  Yesterday I felt cocky and skied the 3 km man-made loop a few times.  It's not really fun...at least it wasn't yesterday when it was 5 degrees.  I have my bike on a trainer and spin once in a while.  Last time I did that was Sunday, and Monday was '10 on the pain scale' day so the bike may not be a good idea.

Of course I'm not the first person in the world to go through a surgery like this but I feel like I am.


Good News.
The doc wrote me a prescription for an anti-inflammatory called meloxicam.  (I can never tell if an anti-inflammatory works or not but whatever) I looked it up and it's pretty much what we give our dog Max when he's stiff.  He responds to it really well...almost immediately...and I've always said that I wish there was a human version.  Bingo!

(Number Fourteen) GOOD LIFE

I had a bad feeling about ending the year with 13 posts.....


Just got back from a week of visiting my dad at "GOOD LIFE" a resort for active seniors...(seniors meaning 55+!) in Mesa, Arizona where the gum chewing drove Vince crazy.

Twelve hundred, 400 square foot trailers 5 feet apart and if there were neighbors that hated each other, I wasn't aware of it.

Dad pretending to understand everything Vince is telling him about his (Dad's) new tablet.

Dad (cane) and me (crutches).

Dad pedaling at level 10.

I met Harris, 90, from Balaton, Minnesota. He'd ridden his bike with a basket to the fitness center then ridden the stationary bike for 30 minutes before riding to the post office to mail his lavender enveloped Christmas cards.  I mentioned something to Dad about Harris's degree of activity and he said "Yah, but he only has the exercise bike at level-one." 

This sign, posted at the Good Life fitness center, must have been effective because I didn't see anyone wrestling the whole time I was there.

On the flight back the flight attendant acted like the plane couldn't take off until I put my Galaxy Bookshop bag, holding a sandwich, under the seat in front of me.  Meanwhile, the woman beside me had an un-anchored one year old in her lap.   That doesn't make sense to me.

For Sale, One Seed-Sprouter

"I forgot to lock the car," said Vin as the plane's bulkhead door slammed shut. Our car was in the Bradley/Hartford airport parking lot with my passport and two heirloom diamond rings.  It would be there, unlocked, for a week while we were in Phoenix visiting my dad.  (Before you ask why I would keep diamond rings in the glove compartment...have you ever moved something from a place it's always been to a 'better' spot, never to see it again?)  I had just enough time, before I screwed up the planes navigation system with my cell phone to call the number of the Toyota dealer on our key chain.  Good news.  He said you could lock the car without the keys.  Now all we had to do is find someone who would drive two and a half hours to the airport to see if that was actually possible.  In the meantime our best bet was to point the automatic door locking gizmo at the car as we flew over the parking lot and push the lock button.  We were transferring in Charlotte and as soon as the plane landed I called Jay, one of our best friends ever, who thought the situation was epic/funny/typical enough to drive the two and a half hours to the airport to lock the car for us.  We told him that there was a chance it may already be locked which to him made the situation even more epic/funny/typical.*

I spent two entire days learning how to list a few things on ebay.  I figured out if I sold everything at the 'buy-it-now' price I would walk away with $46.97. 
Example: I had the starting bid for a 'seed-sprouter' (are you wondering what a 'seed-sprouter' is?) at $1.99 with a ' buy-it-now' price of $3.99.  It had 34 hits and 7 watchers (ebay language)....what I wondered was....why didn't someone just buy it for the $3.99?  In the end, no one bought it which was good because the amount I was charging for shipping was a lot less than it would actually cost me to ship it so for me to get rid of my 25 year old never-used 'seed sprouter', it would have cost me $2.40.   I'm taking a break from ebay for a while.

I remember 25 years ago, how excited I was, when I realized there was such a thing as a seed-sprouter.

Vin and I are applying to a few more film programs.  Florida State is the only application we've sent in so far.   The 'Statement of Purpose' (where I used the word 'thus' for the first time in my life) is the letter where you tell the people that require a 'Statement of Purpose' everything you've done in your life and how it relates to being the ideal film student.  Being 55, it was hard to keep my life to the 1000 word limit...the same number of words a 20 year old applicant is allowed.  How is that fair?

*Jay and Denise (Jay's wife) drove to the airport.  They found the car (they said "because it was the dirtiest one there") and it was unlocked.