Month: November 2011

Oh, Wait

BobbieLeave a comment

Totally forgot why I’m home and have time to blog in the first place.  Yesterday I got my second viscosupplementation shot.

It was exactly like the first time, only more painful and the Male Person was there with me.

You can read about viscosupplementation here. There are five or six options of what kind you get — in my case, I vote for the 6cc-once-every-six-months version, instead of the 3-shots-every-3-months version. It means that a very large needle is inserted behind my left patella and, in about thirty excruciating seconds, a liquid mass is inserted there.

To address the pain and discomfiture I get to ice my knee for 15 minutes. Then there is a spray-on anesthetic. (Note: topical anesthetic? does zip for the actual needle in the leg thing.) Then there is a vibrator — apparently applying a vibrator to your left femur “confuses” your nerves because they’d like to pay attention to that more than the needle in your kneecap. The Male Person was on hand to hold my leg down, because a bizarre side effect of putting 6cc’s of unexpected liquid behind your kneecap is that your leg wants to stretch out, closing off the entry for the needle; ergo, Male Person. And then there is my favorite method of avoiding pain: making ridiculous conversation.

Last time I was in for this, I mangled reading all of her diplomas (she’s Canadian French, so all of her diplomas are dual-language, and my french is le crap). This time, I carefully studied her anatomical maps, starting from the skull and making it to about the elbow before it was done. I mangled those just as nicely; she laughed at me just as much.

I spent most of yesterday not able to walk properly, and today I hobbled about this and that. By tomorrow I’ll be normal again.

For me.

Not an It Getter

Bobbie1 Comment

One of the reasons I’ve been writing so infrequently is that there isn’t much I *can* write right now — some stuff I have to keep silent on for work, other stuff I have to keep silent on for, well, me.

About a year ago I was working on a Big Project for work that I had to keep quiet on for many, many months. Part of working on this project involved working with a person whose reactions and actions made no sense at any time given any of the data we were privy to, or indeed any of the conversations we had with this person. My then-boss and I declared a new term within our working relationship: Not an “It Getter”. As in, this person did Not Get It.

That person is no longer with the company and the project was indeed delivered, so my working theory is, eventually, after a long period of winding pain (perhaps like getting over the flu), Not It Getters go away.

Right now I’m dealing with another sort of Not It Getter (not at work this time). Despite whatever sort of data presented this person does not Get It. The latest demonstration runs roughly thus (nouns and verbs have been changed to protect the dubiously innocent):

Me: You can have your Lemurs on day 3, 5, 7 or 9.
Them: Hm, I think we want to pick up our Lemurs on day 1.
Me: As discussed, your Lemurs are not available on day 1, however you can pick up (or have delivered) your Lemurs on day 3, 5, 7, or 9.
Them: How about day 2? Day 2 is only one day away from 1. That’s good, right?
Me: No, it’s not. Day 2 is day 2, and Day 1 is day 1, so you can pick up your Lemurs on day 3, 5, 7, or 9.
Them: How about this: you give us backrubs each day for two months, and we pick up our Lemurs sometime after Day 3?
Me: Are you for real?

This is naturally all paraphrased and will of course meter out in the end (based on previous data). Some of us are It-Getters.