sup

I guess, while I'm posting gruesome photos, I might update, since I haven't done so since Christmas.

I had a quiet Christmas, really. I chatted with Chris and Mick in Basel, and my family in Toowoomba, both via webcam, and also with the extended family who were in Mullumbimby by phone. I watched a bunch of films, and had a pretty luxurious dinner with ham and smoked salmon, followed by a roast chicken, and date and walnut pudding for desert. A bottle of Champagne awaited me in the fridge, but my medications forbade it, so it remains in the fridge, perhaps awaiting submission of my thesis. I also managed to find a nurse, who came around in the evening to give me my shot of anticoagulant.

The nurses (3 in all) came every day until last Monday, to give me my heparin shots, change my dressings and take my blood test. On boxing day, I also started physio, which I've been doing 3 times a week since then. I've been impressed with my progress, which has been noticable, and the physios tell me I'm coming along very quickly. The rehab doctor, who I saw last Friday, agreed but encouraged me to take it slowly.

In between physio and being stabbed by nurses, I've been making progress on the thesis. Its been a bit sporadic, though. After Christmas was pretty slow, then I had a good week after New Year's. Mick arrived for a few days on the 5th, which slowed me only a little, since he was happy enough to amuse himself for at least one day catching the train down to Vannes.

I went into work last Tuesday for a meeting with Jean-Marc, and he seems to agree that I'm still on schedule to send it off in early February. I hit a bit of a speed-bump on Thursday, with a design change to Kermeta setting my finish date for Chapter 3 back by a few days. I got back moving yesterday though, and today has also been productive. With a little luck, I will start Chapter 1 tomorrow, and after a week or so on that and Chapter 5, I can give Jean-Marc a fairly complete draft. Mark has been kindly riding me to keep making progress every day, which is good of him.

I guess the other thing I've been doing is watching films in ridiculous quantities. I've seen 42 in just 22 days since getting out of hospital, which is obscene.

Anyway, back to it.

knee to now

A little slideshow about the progress of my knee since surgery. This was taken on my phone while I was in hospital - I think it was the day after the operation, or perhaps two days after. The little tube is draining out bad blood into a bottle strapped onto the brace. The left leg has a compression stocking as collateral damage.

A few weeks later, at home, before taking off the last bandage.

Skip to today, nothing left except a scar, pretty much. There's a stitch hanging out at the top, and a couple on the side, all of which I'm assured will either dissolve or fall out at some point, presumably without my knee falling apart at the same time.

cut up

Monday, after submitting my paper, I checked myself into hospital. I had the afternoon to myself, since my operation wasn't until Tuesday, and amused myself watching the fourth day of the third test (after consideration I will, for Mr Tratt's benefit, write up my thoughts on the ret-urn in another post).

On Tuesday, a nurse came by around 11-ish to shave my knee. After that, I took a betadine scrub shower, and jumped on a trolley to be wheeled downstairs. They punched me full of holes for a little while: for a drip, a hip-catheter (for pain blocking), and one in the back to knock me out from the waist down, in what they called rachianaesthesie (something like, but not the same as, an epidural).

Then, after a small wait, they wheeled me into theatre 13 (unlucky for some) and hooked me up to some machines that went beep. People buzzed around me and occupied themselves with my right leg. It was a very strange experience to see them moving it around in preparation and not feeling anything. Before the surgeon started, they strung up a sheet between me and the battlefield, so during the exciting part I really couldn't see much. To be honest, it was a little lonely there, while everyone else was busy behind the sheet, with only the anaesthetist to keep me company from time to time up in the DMZ. I was very coherent, too, which surprised me. Others had suggested they'd drug me a little to calm me down, but I really felt more tuned than normal rather than less.

Getting back up to my room I was plugged in to 3 tubes: my drip with what I assume was glucose or saline or something, my catheter with marcaine, and another draining blood out of my knee. These were disconnected gradually over the next 48 hours, and by Thursday afternoon I was able to go for little tours up and down the corridors on my crutches and in my Big Lebowski dressing gown.

In between times, I managed to watch a half dozen or so films, read a couple of hundred pages of my book, and make yeoman progress on my thesis, mainly cutting and pasting in the recent paper, and blocking out structure for a couple of sections. On Thursday and Friday I also chatted with the third of my room-mates, a young bloke getting his patellar tendon seen to who had spent the previous summer in Australia, of all places. Also on Friday I had a visit from Liz and Sophie, whose brother had coincidentally had the same operation with the same surgeon a week earlier, and who was in for physio.

On Saturday morning it was all over, and Seb came in to give me a lift back to my apartment, via the pharmacy for my prescriptions.

In all, I was very impressed by the efficiency (from a user perspective) of the whole process. The hospital was clean, staff was helpful and generally communicative and neither before nor after was I burdened by administration at all. Even the food wasn't too disagreeable (although they did struggle with the concepts of cereal and tea for breakfast), which for a hospital is about as much as you can expect.

a tale of two bureaucracities

Two bureaucracies, unalike in virtue...

Bureaucracy the first.

My unending battles with residency continue. Having won the bout a few weeks ago, I had almost forgotten that the war raged on. During the summer, some people at the lab here had claimed the priviledge of "regularising" (regulating? making regular, anyway) the acquisition by PhD students of work permits from the Direction de Travail (Ministry of Employment?). Foolishly, I thought this would be a good thing. In any case, having obtained my recepissé, I gave them photocopies of that and every other paper in the hopes that my work permit would magically appear before my invitation to pick up my carte de séjour (residency permit), envisioned for 6 weeks after the acquisition of my recepissé.

I went down to their office yesterday and asked how it was coming along. Well, it wasn't. They were waiting on my carte de séjour. I assured them that at the same time, my carte de séjour was waiting on my work permit, which they didn't believe. So, this morning, I showed them the little letter I'd received saying that I could come pick up my carte de séjour any time I liked, so long as I brought my work permit. Well, the lady was very confused, and called the prefecture up to talk it over, and afterwards encouraged me to go see them with my scholarship contract and use a jedi mind trick to convince them that they don't need to see my work permit.

We shall see.

Bureaucracy the second.

After my operation moved up to next week, so did some other things. To that end, I went for a tour of the hospital yesterday. First I dropped by to see my surgeon's secretary, apparently to get a tiny little slip of green paper saying that he would cut me open on Tuesday. The surgeon didn't seem to be in, so I didn't have to queue to see her, which was nice. From there I went down to pre-admissions to tell them about my insurance situation and what kind of room I wanted. Again, no queue. After that, I had about 45 minutes to kill, so I found a lounge and did a little work on my ECOOP paper. Around 4, I went up to anaesthesia for my appointment. I had to wait 25-30 minutes, then saw the anaesthetist, who got a quick history, informed me of my options for the operation, and told me what would happen afterwards to manage the pain. She then sent me away armed with a letter for the lab to take some blood, which I did directly, and again with neither queue nor delay.

All in all, I saw 6 people (all women, curiously) in 4 departments within a period of about 2 and a half hours, including about a half hour on my paper. Impressive.

change of plans

I got a call from the hospital the other day. Apparently they had a cancellation, and the asked me if I'd like to move my surgery up a couple of weeks to the 19th (instead of January 2). My initial thoughts were (a) do I really have to make this decision within the close confines of a single phone call?, then (b) better sooner than later.

So, I'm off to the anaesthetist on Tuesday to talk, I expect, about drugs, gas and needles, and which of them will or won't either kill or paralyse me. Then I get a week to finish off my ECOOP paper before I check myself in Monday week.

With a little luck, I should be able to check out by the Saturday afterwards. That's the last Avenir game of the year, and Sandy is back for a visit. It would be nice to see everyone before what could be a fairly lonely Christmas not going outside too much.

on a tear

I had been coding like a tiger for a few weeks, chasing a deadline arbitrarily set at Tuesday, and in the end pretty much got there. I lost some impetus on the weekend when I realized that I'd gotten the implementation pretty much to where I wanted it. What remained was building a convincing example, which was less than inspiring as a task, and thus I didn't pound out the LOC like I had beforehand. Anyhow, its in a state where I can write some examples for my thesis and justifiably claim that it typechecks and works.

To be fair, Tuesday wasn't entirely arbitrary as a deadline. I had a meeting with Jean-Marc scheduled for the afternoon and an MRI scheduled for midday, meaning that I was going to lose half a day anyway, making it a good candidate for thinking about direction rather than trying to write or code.

The MRI went pretty well. I was called only 20 minutes or so later than the appointed time, and from there was treated to an amusing parody of an old Seinfeld sketch I remember about doctors and hospitals. I was called and taken by someone into a small room, where I was told to remove my pants and wait. After 5-10 minutes someone else came and got me and escorted me to another small room for another 15-20 minutes of doing nothing. OK, to be fair, this second small room had a million-dollar MRI machine in it, and although I was doing nothing, I was inside a tunnel and the machine was going clunk-clunk-whirrr, so I guess it wasn't entirely time wasted. From there it was back to the original small room, pants back on, and another little wait. I then met the esteemed photographer in a third small room where he showed me pictorally how my ACL is, as suspected, not what it once was. Too subtle? It's torn, and my surgery will go ahead as the specialist had predicted. Anyhow, in all, I was back at work by 2:30pm, which was reasonable.

My meeting with Jean-Marc went pretty well, too. He had been watching the CVS stats, so it was no secret I'd been churning code pretty hard, and we had a good chat about the paper we have planned for the ECOOP deadline in a month's time, which will hopefully also cut-and-paste itself in as a chapter of my thesis.

rundown on being run down

I got run over this morning. It sounds worse than it was. I was on my bike going through the roundabout near the cemetery, turning left, coming from left of screen, indicating and all like a good nerd, and a girl driving from the south apparently didn't see me (y'know, I'm only 6'2") while entering the roundabout. She wasn't going too fast, but she got me pretty good, and I pretty much went arse over tit. I stumbled off the road, to check myself, but other than some bruising on my left leg, didn't seem to be hurt. The girl stopped to see if I was alright, needed to go see a doctor or anything, and if my bike was damaged, but I waved her off. I was a bit shaken, so I walked for a while then got back on and rode the rest of the way into work.

Getting into work, I noticed that my watch face had been smashed, which really pissed me off, since the watch is a very nice mechanical automatic I inherited from my grandfather. The hands had stopped too, which was really worrying, but apparently only because they were being blocked by some pieces of glass from the lens.

Now, come lunchtime, my knee (other knee) is hurting a bit, and I reckon I'll have a pretty nice bruise by tomorrow.

I suppose that from a certain point of view I've been lucky. Between St Lucia and Rennes, I've been commuting to uni/work for a quite a few years and had never had an accident until now.

coming to grips

I have to confess that I got pretty freaked out when the specialist told me I'd busted my ACL, and I've been thinking a lot about it since.

Perhaps the reason I got freaked out is that, being a fairly keen follower of sports, a lot of my heroes are sportsmen, and for these people, a busted ACL is a big deal, for some the worst injury you can have. For them, it puts in jeopardy their profession and passion, which is pretty hardcore. For me, I'm increasingly realising, playing tennis, basketball or football is important to me, but I'm fortunate enough that cutting them out would still leave me with plenty of alternative pursuits.

I'm also coming around to the idea of having the reconstructive surgery in France. A couple of people I've talked to in Australia seem to think that it would be elective surgery in Australia, which would mean no or little public coverage, and a long waiting period before getting it done, neither of which particularly appeal to me.

In the interim, apparently it helps the recovery process if the knee is strong prior to surgery. In aid of that, I went for a run last night, and plan on going and getting my bike fixed up this week so I can go and do some cycling a bit beyond what I normally do to and from work. Who knows, it may even have the effect of getting me fitter, which would certainly be no drawback.

distracted

I got up this morning with the daunting realization that my knee specialist appointment was at lunchtime and I still hadn't even booked the MRI. I called up and did so, getting the pressing date of November 14th, then called the specialist's office to cancel. The secretary suggested I come anyway, so I trotted out to St Gregoire around 11. I got to the office at 1145 for my midday appointment, queued to present myself for 20 minutes then sat for an hour. Good training for the prefecture next month, I figured.

I told the doc what had happened, and he had a look with a little machine for measuring how much my shin moved from my thigh. Apparently it was too much. The doc tells me I have a busted ACL and need surgery before I can play sports like tennis and basketball again without getting hurt and swelling up for weeks at a time. So I'm scheduled for surgery on January 2, unless the MRI goes the other way.

Thinking about it afterwards, though, I'm not sure whether I want to do this in France or wait and do it when I return to Australia. I really need to call some people and get some advice on things like public health system coverage for injuries sustained while overseas, the politeness of turning up to the first day at a new job on crutches, and generally about where is a good place to be unable to walk for a few weeks.

In my head, I had this great big list of "things to do when I finish my thesis". I really hadn't considered adding "knee surgery" (do I get to say reconstruction?) until today. Getting my driver's license and playing organised tennis had both been on there too, but may have to be shuffled down.

vent

In the last 24 hrs I've called the radiology lab and the two knee specialists referred to me by my doc, and all 3 told me the earliest date was mid-september. This is particularly frustrating because my knee is actually holding me back in the meantime. I tried riding home really gently yesterday but could feel that it was stressing the knee sufficiently to not want to do it as a regular means of transport. I also feel it when I walk, and sport is out of the question.

Its tempting to think they can't fit me in because they're busy, but I *know* its because they're closing up for summer. This whole goddamn country with its hopeless addiction to holidays is a dead loss for much of july and all of august, which is hot-weather cold-comfort for anyone who needs a service provider during that time.

So as not to sound too nationalistic about my whining, if I were doing this in Australia I would also have an appointment in September, and its uncertain whether the cause for that being a long waiting list rather than a long holiday would lower my blood pressure.

knee

Knee update. I went to see the doc this morning about my knee. He listened to my tale, and had a look at it, which was a good idea, because it turns out there's a big-ass bruise on the side, which I hadn't noticed. Given that I haven't taken a knock there, this is not a good sign, and I'm off for an ultrasound (if my translation of 'echographie' is correct) on it this afternoon and then back to the doc to see what's going on. There's a fair chance I've torn something, if I understand his quick analysis correctly, but I'm gonna wait on the happy-snaps to believe it. More news as it comes to, er, knee.

forehand wide

Dammit, and dammit to hell.

I finished up the physio sessions on my knee yesterday, and the physio told me in leaving that I was OK to start playing sport again. That was good news.

So I played tennis today. Well, I would have played anyway, but I felt better about playing some singles against Franck. I was hitting the ball OK, too. My serve was out of rhythm despite having been hitting them well in the warmup, and I was stuffing my approaches, but other than that it was fun to be back in the sun and running around. We got to 5-6 and I was serving at 15-15 and went to net to get a simple dropshot. I waited too long on a forehand and pushed a gumby piece of crap into the tramlines and started to shout in frustration when I landed and twisted a little bit on my knee and wound up shouting because my knee hurt like crap.

Since then I've been at pains to walk as its gotten all inflamed again. I left work straight away and came home to put ice on it.

The irony is that yesterday at the physio I was asked to settle up, but didn't have my chequebook, so I was intending to go back this afternoon to finish it off. Off course, I couldn't, because the knee that was fine to play sport on was not, by contrast, fine to carry the weight of a chequebook.

Which would be delicious if only I wasn't a bloody cripple.

Bitter? Two pints please.

in the wars

Silly boy.

So last night was the chanteloup basketball tournament. Tortue booked me in a few months ago, so as well as really looking forward to playing, I kind of felt obligated to play. I shouldn't have, probably.

My knee was feeling a little better, kind of. It wasn't troubling me to walk, but at the same time I pretty much knew it couldn't take weight. I was resolved to take it easy and not jump into things, and I managed for about a game and a half. In the second game I grabbed a rebound in a crowd and got wrapped up, and it hurt. I slowed down, subbing in and out of the next couple of games. Unfortunately, we made the final, and Jim got excited. We got out on a fast break and Soso threw a nice pass that I really liked the look of. Unfortunately, trying to drag it in, I landed and saw my knee kind of buckle a little, and I went down, well, like a sack of shit. And it hurt. I'm limping today, and its a little swolen. I'm icing it, but my freezer is scheisenhausen, so I'm on a pretty slow cycle.

Doctor Monday morning. Crap on a stick.

Update: Sprained (but not ruptured/torn) LCL ( think, not ACL as I previously wrote), with maybe a pinched meniscus. Anti-inflammatories, ice, and some physio sessions.

ow

I jarred/twisted/hyperextended/something'd my knee today at basketball. Perhaps I came down and it locked instead of bending, I don't know, but it hurt. I limped/walked/jogged/ran it off, but contesting a rebound it twinged again, so I abandoned and walked back to Irisa. I asked about ice at the cafeteria, but the best they could do was a vanilla drumstick. After 15 minutes it wasn't feeling cold, so I ate it. Far too much chocolate for it to be an effective medical stopgap, I think.

I'm supposed to be playing in chanteloup next Friday, hope this doesn't affect that.