Car park sniggering

Just a quickie. (Careful now.)

It’s pouring down in Cape Town today. I’m not complaining: we need the rain [links to millions of drought posts].
Earlier, I described the morning as “gloriously filthy“, and I fully stand by that.

Unconnected with the prevailing meteorological conditions, my knee remains really rather sore. This makes wearing long trousers uncomfortable. Hence, I am wearing shorts today.

I covered this in my recent blog post, amusingly entitled No News Is Good Knees.

When I got out of my car at work today (in the rain, wearing shorts), I became aware of a group of five or six young individuals poking fun at my wardrobe choice, while having a cigarette.

“Whatevs”, as they say. Water off a duck’s back. (No pun etc etc)
I’m way past caring what unimportant people think of me.

But, I will just point out that I was wearing shorts in the rain because my knee is painful. Those twats were voluntarily standing outside in the pouring rain (in long trousers, admittedly) attempting to give themselves lung cancer.

I’m really not sure I should be the one being giggled at.

Real life is exhausting

I’m ready to take the big step of returning to work tomorrow, a mere four weeks, seventeen doctors appointments, twenty-six scans for DVT and one additional operation after I was supposed to go back. It’s been a complete shlep.
There are unpaid medical bills littering the floor of the house. Yesterday, I found the beagle nibbling on one from the anaesthesiologist, which might explain a lot about why it sleeps so much.

Or it might just be really lazy.

I’m still not “right”, but I am getting there. I did a bit of driving (as documented here) last week, but the rush hour traffic is not conducive to a phased return to activity (clutch control is important, people), so the long-suffering and always admirable Mrs 6000 will be my taxi at least for tomorrow. And possibly Tuesday as well.

I’ve been up and about a lot more in preparation, and it’s all going well aside from the fact that not being laid up in bed in full RICE mode is actually completely exhausting. And that’s manageable while I’m at home, because I can just go and lie down somewhere.

That’s not really an option in a TB lab.

There’s also the question of drugs. My nighttime regimen includes stuff that leaves me feeling seriously dopey (yes, more so than usual) for large parts of the following morning. I’m expecting it to be rather challenging.

So… this week is surely going to be interesting. At least I have the benefit of a public holiday on Wednesday to break things up a bit and to allow me to recover from what promises to be a bit of a re-baptism by fire.

First Drive

I got a mildly panicky voicenote from the Boy Wonder just after he arrived at school this morning. He had left some schoolwork at home. This doesn’t happen often, and normally it would be his indaba – the learning curves here are steep, hey?
But, being fair, there were a few mitigating circumstances with this one, so I used it as an opportunity to try my first drive since… like… forever… and took the missing flip file up to the school once the local rush had subsided.

I had to test my leg a bit before I set off, but to be honest, the clutch work (for it can like to be my left leg what are the problem) was actually just like doing my exercises, once I’d moved the seat forward a bit.

We live close to the school – it’s only a 3km round trip – but it was still quite tiring (because my leg muscles have basically disappeared over the last month) and required more concentration than I remember: 60kph seemed awfully fast.

But it was really, really good to be able to get around again.
Another box ticked.

I’m getting there – by car, nogal.

Bored?

I’m being good. I’m being sensible.

“Just don’t be silly,” were the last words of the surgeon as he popped in to check that I was still alive after the surgery.

So I’m being good. I’m being sensible.

But it’s so boring.

I am being limited a bit by the pain, and between that and the party over the back wall that was still going after 1 this morning, I didn’t get much sleep. But still, I have tried to be up and about as much as possible. And once I’m up and about, I want to do more. And then I remember about being good and sensible and I head back upstairs (always fun) and lie on the bed a bit more.

But it’s so boring.

Tomorrow, the bandages can come off and then on Tuesday, I’ve been told I can do a quick 10km or so. In the car.

In the meantime though, I’m being good, I’m being sensible.
Thank god for the curling…