Monthly Archives: September 2021

Return to Work and Another Senior Moment

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I went back to work yesterday after having my dressings changed. You can tell I’m going to the doctor too often because the receptionist just shouted across “Take a seat Mr Wilson, I’ll book you in.” to save me walking to the desk and back.

Everything is healing well. I have a selection of photographs showing the development of the problem, followed by the progress towards healing, but I think this probably falls in the area known as “over-sharing”.

At work I lost my camera cable. I know I had it when I arrived because I had it in my hands. Then it disappeared. For three hours I looked for it, worried about it and muttered. Eventually, as we left, Eddie said “Simon, what’s that hanging round your neck?”

It was the camera cable, in a safe place, and hidden by my lockdown beard. I really do need a trim.

Unfortunately, my knee was quite tender so, to ensure more comfortable driving experience, I bought myself a knee brace. I am currently having a free month on Amazon Prime and was able to order it with free next day delivery. I’m wearing it now and it is doing some good. I’m going to try a new route tomorrow, using as much motorway as possible. It’s another stage in the aging process – making sure you know where the toilets are.

Today, having heeded the warnings of my doctor when discussing my return to work, I got up and moved about more. As a result I feel much better. I’m aiming to do full days on Thursday and Saturday next week, so I was pleased today went better than yesterday. I’m aiming to be fully fit and back at work full time in two weeks, so am keeping my fingers crossed.

Back to work, fully fit and free from senior moments may take a little more work.

As I wrote that line, one of the neighbours brought us some figs off her tree, so I re-used the picture from last year. I’m quite fond of figs.

Overdoing it

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Yes, you guessed. After weeks of sitting with my leg elevated, I finally, after a week of building up to it, managed to overdo things. After my haircut and shopping I spent the rest of the day gradually deteriorating as my knee stiffened and my leg throbbed. Maybe “Back to Normal” was a bit optimistic. Just one more day on the zig zag of recovery.

It’s at times like this that you appreciate the magic of WP. I’ve been reading about Captain Moonlight, dining out and the Dave Clark Five over the last few days. Life would be a much poorer place without this ability. I don’t use the internet in the living room these days, as |I’m trying to restore the art of conversation (which is basically me talking while Julia grunts and uses her laptop. To be fair, she does take her work seriously, and does do a lot of planning, even though the general culture of the organisation is to take the money and do as little as possible.  I won’t go on, but as I watch her fill out forms, do training and plan sessions for hours every evening, I do a lot of thinking about the unfairness of life.

I’m going to go to the doctor soon, then will go to work for the first time in just over three weeks. I have grown lazy over that time. It hasn’t been like lockdown where I had plenty of time to do things – most of the time was spent sitting down like a vegetable, unable to concentrate for more than a few minutes at a time.  Four pages of a book has been a struggle.

In the last week things have improved and I’ve been writing again, though I haven’t actually typed or submitted anything. Good news is that I just had a haibun accepted, so things are still working their way through the system. I am able to write, but so far haven’t typed much. I’m going to have to start the whole, dull, copy typing process again if I’m going to get back to making regular submissions. I need to get a couple of submissions knocked into shape as the end date for two magazines is 15th of this month – five days is cutting it fine even by my standards.

Generally, despite the up and down nature of my recovery the week has been a positive one and I’m better now than I was when I started. Even yesterday was a positive, despite the knee pain – it was me that caused the pain by trying too much. My immune system just keeps chugging along and healing as fast as it can.

Back to Normal

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I went for a haircut today.  Julia’s orders. Because of my lack of dress sense she’s keen on my looking as tidy as possible in case someone mistakes me fora tramp. I was going to do my own hair (it hasn’t been done since the start of lockdown) but it can be tricky getting it right so I agreed. I haven’t actually had my hair cut by anyone else for about ten or twelve years, when I had it done on a whim while was in the barber with the kids. For some reason they would never let me cut their hair.  The time before that was about 25 years ago. It’s saved me a fortune. Anyway, after enduring a conversation that hasn’t changed a lot in the last 25 years (despite the fact it’s a different barber from the one that did my hair in that shop 25 years ago), I was then charged a price that hasn’t changed a lot in the last 25 years. To be honest, I may start going there regularly as it’s so much tidier when someone else does it. And I had my eyebrows touched up. That’s when you know you are getting old.

The nurse who took my blood this morning is the mother of a kid who went all the way through school with my kids. He joined the army when he left school, went to work on cruise ships and liked the sea so much he’s now joined the Royal Navy. Quite an adventurous life so far. It was nice to catch up.

I also went shopping. They ask you to be considerate to their staff by wearing a mask (and most people do). Sadly, two of their staff and a security guard couldn’t be bothered to wear a mask. Makes you wonder why you bother. Also makes me wonder what message they think they are sending.

I’m now going to think about trimming my beard. If I’m careful I can tidy it enough to satisfy Julia whilst leaving it long enough to scare small children.

Oh, the shopping? I bought her some flowers. And a quiche. I’m back at work tomorrow and I fancy a slice of quiche.  also bought steak. I’m going to cook tonight. Baked potato, steak, salad. Looks good, virtually no effort. That’s my sort of cookery.

Zig Zag

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If yesterday was a zig on the zig zag road to recovery (think of one of those cartoon-style graphs as you read,) today is a bit of a  zag. It’s not bad, but I’m definitely not as perky today. OK, I’m not generally known for being “perky” at the best of times, but I use the term comparatively.

Considering that three weeks ago I wasn’t entirely sure who I was, and that two weeks ago I was a festering wreck, I’m not doing badly. Most of my faculties are back, my walking is back to where it was and although I have to sit with my leg up, I’m nearly back to the state of imperfect health where you normally find me.

Nothing brings this home as much as a nurse saying they will have to “do something” about something you regard as being perfectly normal. They love tinkering, do nurses and, unlike doctors they never take no for an answer. I discussed the statin question with a doctor and they told me that even where cholesterol is good they like to put certain people on them as it might help. I looked at the figures on the NHS website – yes, they reduce your percentage chance of having a stroke or heart attack. By a couple of percent. What they don’t tell you is the chance of them interacting with other medication. or it being something else for the pharmacy to get wrong. We have agreed that I won’t take them. I will look at my diet again and see if I can lower the level that is causing concern.

Yesterday in the surgery I was listening to people being told that they couldn’t have liver function tests because we don’t have enough blood tubes. Only about a year ago they stopped prescribing my arthritis medication because I was behind with my testing. Double standards, or what?

Road to Recovery

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As part of the process of hardening myself off to get back to work I set myself a 30 minute target on the computer this morning. I have already had breakfast, been to have my dressing changed and had a drive in the country.

After waiting for the computer to start, checking emails, reading a the headlines and checking comments, I now have 17 minutes left to either read blogs or write one. As I haven’t been writing many posts recently I thought it was time to write again.

Medical news is that I am much better, the leg is definitely healing, the swab showed only normal bacteria, my weight is decreasing and everything is returning to normal. Coming downstairs this morning after another good night’s sleep I really felt wonderful. By the time I got halfway down the stairs my legs were feeling a bit heavier, and things weren’t quite so rosy, but it was still good.

There were butterflies on the shrubbery at the surgery – a Speckled Wood and a Meadow brown, which was good as I have struggled to see anything other than whites this year. The front garden is still full of bees and hoverflies, though deficient in butterflies.

I’m currently concentrating on nature haiku and am having to write about what I see from the house windows, so it was good to get out for a drive after seeing the nurse.

Talking of which – I let several deadlines slip by in the last couple of weeks, but if you aren’t feeling 100% is it worth putting out substandard work? I decided not. I did have some bits I could have sent, but the filing system is a little chaotic and there was a risk of sending things out that I’ve already sent elsewhere.

As I have recovered I have been writing more, but haven’t typed a lot, which is also something I need to take in hand. In the next few days I’m hoping to send some submissions out, which will be a sign that I’m back to normal.

Sorry it’s a bit rambling, but as it’s not unusual, the only excuse is poor focus. This is one thing  can’t blame the illness for.

Picture is a Speckled Wood from about this time last year.

My timer just went, by the time I have added tags etc I will have done about 35 minutes on the computer. It’s a start.

 

 

Pathetic Shambles

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Julia went down to pick up some dressings for my leg. There were none, and the pharmacy denied all knowledge of them.

Rewind for a moment – a couple of posts ago I referred to having an argument and informing the GP’s reception that I considered their actions unacceptable.

It took me about half an hour on Friday and I left it that the pharmacy would order the dressings (if the doctor could be bothered to process the prescription) and have them ready for either Tuesday or Wednesday. I told them that I needed them for Tuesday, so it was urgent.

On Tuesday I queued, was told they had no dressings for me. Went to the nurse, who found some bandages in the back of a cupboard (GPs no longer carry stocks of dressings because they don’t want to pay for them out of their budget) and then went back to the pharmacy to queue again and listen to other people complaining about the service. I was given various excuses but told that they would be ready for me this afternoon.

And so Julia went down to pick them up (as mentioned in the first sentence). It took her two hours to sort it out. Yes, two hours.

There was no prescription, so I don’t know what we had discussed in the pharmacy the day before. Julia had to collect one from the GP. She took it to the pharmacy, queued, and discovered that it was addressed to another supply company (that’s the second time the doctor has done that, and unless you have the paper in your hand you can’t tell). Back to the doctor. Back to the pharmacy queue. They don’t stock them (which we had already discovered – they don’t stock any dressings due to space constraints) and they will have them tomorrow afternoon. I have an appointment for new dressings tomorrow morning but the surgery searched round and say they have enough in the cupboard to change the dressing.

Some of the dressings I have had over the last week have been pathetic. No wonder it isn’t healing. I could do better myself, but they won’t give me the name of the things I need. I am, however, going to search Amazon tonight as this is getting past a joke.

So, in case you got lost in the detail –

Pharmacy, pathetic shambles.

GP surgery, equally pathetic shambles.

The sad thing is that they are both staffed by people who are generally friendly and helpful, but trapped in some sort of system that encourages failure.

To give you some idea of what I do at work – I pack about 150 parcels a month and once every two or three months I get one wrong. Even if you say I only do 100 parcels and get one wrong every month the defect rate is 1%.

In the last eighteen months I have had about 40 interactions with the surgery and pharmacy. The surgery had let me down at least eight times and the pharmacy about the same. It’s a little difficult to remember as I don’t actually keep notes. Defect rate 40%.