Knee deep

Is it March already?  Blimey.  I always feel a bit shortchanged by February somehow.  But then, as if by magic, overnight it turns into March, and Spring is here, and things seem so much better after all.

Mr WithaY went for a long walk yesterday afternoon around the lakes between here and Salisbury - he has to plan, undertake and document three different long walks with reams of wildlife data for three different terrains as homework for his bushcraft course - and while he was out he saw three kingfishers.  One on its own and a pair flying together.  I've seen kingfishers once or twice on the river through the village, but never more than one at a time.  I love them, they are incredibly colourful and vibrant, like humming birds.

I didn't go with him on his walk because I have been limping around with a massively damaged knee this week.  It was sore - well, they both were - after our sterling decorating efforts on Monday. I'm too old and creaky to spend long periods of time kneeling on the floor, it seems,  but by the time I woke up on Tuesday morning it was a bit sore.  And, alarmingly, my foot and lower leg were feeling weird too. More stiff than painful, really, but overnight it got worse.  

I woke up in the middle of Tuesday night aware that my right knee was really hurting, and moving it made it worse.  Fuck. I limped into the bathroom and found some painkillers which allowed me to go back to sleep, albeit grumpily.

Clearly all the kneeling had caused something to swell up inside the knee joint which had impacted on the nerves or tendons or whatever the hell was twinging all the way to my big toe every time I moved my foot.  I spent much of Wednesday sitting on the sofa whining for ibuprofen and tea, doing bits of hand-sewing and knitting, in between getting up and walking around and swearing about my much my leg was hurting.

Fortunately by Thursday things seemed to have begun to resolve themselves, at least in part, as my knee was still making horrific graunching cracking noises when I moved it, but my foot and lower leg were back to normal.

Today, you'll be thrilled to know, I am sporting a sexy neoprene knee brace which Mr WithaY found in the back of a cupboard, and am not swearing quite so much.  We will see how things go.

I hate being old and crap.

Recovering

I have discovered the bus, of late.  It's much easier than the Tube and MUCH cheaper than a taxi.  And, also, I can hop off and walk the remainder of the way to the office down Victoria Street, which is helping to keep my ankle on the road to recovery.

So, yeah, the ankle.  I went to see the doctor about it a week ago, as it was still swollen and tender, much like an unpleasant fleshy grapefruit.  Also, when I went downstairs first thing in the morning, stabbing pains assailed me, making me stop in my tracks and shout "Ow! Fuck it!"

Not a great start to the day.

So.  back to the doctor I waddled.  He was very nice, poked my foot, commented on how swollen it was compared to my non-mutant foot, and told me to get some physiotherapy.  I had the choice of waiting for a referral to an NHS physio (free but probably several weeks wait) or paying for a private session that I could have very soon (ooo-er matron).  I went private. 

The phyiso told me that I have severely damaged two of the three main ankle ligaments, although not the one she was expecting to be damaged, also the ligaments that go across the front of my foot, out to the toes.  That explains all the bruising and swelling of that bit of my foot, then.  She's shown me some exercise to do that will help to break up the scar tissue on my ligaments (ugh), build up the "wasted" muscles on one bit of my calf (ewww) and improve bloodflow to the "inflamed joint"  (ack). 

Oh, and she rubbed gel on my foot and did ultrasound.  That's like normal sound, but for SUPERHEROES.  She has strapped me up with gaffer tape (or the medical equivalent) to encourage me to walk around more.  I might post photos if I can work out how to take some at a non-terrifying angle.

Anyway, it's all mending and I am not limping any more.  The physio showed me how not to, and I have told everyone at work that if they see me doing it, they are to tell me off.

So far, so good.

Other news:  I've had a FANTASTIC idea for a film.  It's about a group of people in transit in a confined space, unable to get out or away, with a terrifying, venomous creature (or creatures) in there with them.  The working title is "Wasps on a Bus!", and I think Samuel L Jackson ought to be involved.

Bee do bee do bee do

I am sitting here, trying to type as best I can with one and a half hands.  No, we haven't had another Lawnmower Incident, in case you're worrying.  Nothing so exciting. 

For a while now I have noticed a weird tiny little lump on the palm of my left hand, almost exactly in the middle.  Last night, I realised it had got a bit bigger, and so of course, I started dicking about with it.  I rubbed it, and it moved around as if there was something stuck under the skin. 

How interesting*. 

A bit more dicking around, and I realised that there was a little lump of something under the skin.  I fiddled with it a bit.

Well, what would you have done? 

I kept playing with it till I had managed to squeeze the lump right out.  It was hard, like a bit of chalk, or a teeny bit of gravel or something.  Very weird.

Once the initial excitement of getting a foreign body out of my hand (right out from under my SKIN!  Ew!) had passed, I inspected the damage.  There's a surprisingly large hole there now, which is bloody sore.  As the evening wore on, it got more and more painful, till I ended up slathering it in antiseptic and sticking a plaster over it.  Now it just looks absurd.  A plaster right across the palm of your hand makes you look like some clumsy galoot who has had a run-in with a particularly tough ketchup bottle.  It's really not impressive, and it feels weird.

This morning, as part of the Spring Madness that is currently gripping the WithaY household**, we went out to the local garden centre and bought a load of plants.  We've got some thyme planted in the flowerbed in front of the house, so it will smell nice as we walk past, and whenever the postman tramples on it.  We planted some Woodruff under the huge hedge out the front, which (apparently) will brighten up a gloomy corner.  We'll see.

We planted two blackcurrant bushes in the fruit bed out the back.  I have high hopes.  The raspberry canes have started to show some green shoots, and the redcurrant bushes have lots of buds.  There might be jam in the summer.

There are now two new climbing roses against the fence at the side of the house, but I am not very confident about them as the soil there is terrible***.  I chucked in a load of compost from a bag, but if they aren't happy then we will have to move them. 

More roses have been planted in the front garden; two ramblers at the side of the drive in an attempt to repress the weeds, and two taller bushy ones in the bed the other side of the drive to add some height and colour.  Fingers crossed that they don't die.

We chose varieties that have old-fashioned open flowers to allow bees to get in and feed.  Apparently the more modern hybrid tea roses are not very bee-friendly.  Speaking of bees, we attempted some bee rescue yesterday.  As we sat on the bench out the front, surrounded by all the flowers showcased in the last blog post, yeah you remember, we spotted a bumble bee.  He didn't look very well. 

He sat sadly on a leaf on the bay tree, so Mr WithaY carefully picked him up and put him on the heather, in case he was hungry.  Nothing.  He just hunched up, looking wretched.

Mr WithaY decided that he needed to make up some sugar and water solution to feed the bee, in case it was too tired to find food in the flowers.

It wasn't very interested, so we left it on the heather, and hopefully it will recover.

Other gardening news:  The potatoes we planted have yet to make an appearance.  Bloody things.

My camellia's have flowered, although they are a bit feeble.  The one at my lovely Mum's house is about 8 feet tall and laden with huge flowers.  Mine do not look well by comparison.

Please admire the delightful pipework on the wall behind it.  All adds to the charm and ambience.  We've got shitloads of charm round here. 

*By which I mean "slightly gross and freaky" of course.

**Mr WithaY is spring-cleaning his study as I type.  That time of year again already. 

***I dug a hole in three different spots, each time hitting fucking hardcore or paving slabs about 4 inches down.  Lord knows what the previous occupants had buried under there.  Some kind of Doomsday bunker/fallout shelter possibly. 

Broken

Well, I feel like I have a cold now. Bloody great. Woke up with a sore throat and sniffed unattractively* through my meeting this morning. Lovely.

My lovely guitar teacher has fractured his hand (playing cricket, the careless idiot) so no lessons for me for a bit. And of course he can't play guitar either, so his band might be a bit grumpy too.

Other news: Mr WithaY's car seems to be improving slowly, but it is still too screechy and scary to drive any distance at at speeds of over 30mph, so I have been taking him to work and picking him up in the evenings. It's rather nice. Maybe we will car share more often. It takes me about an extra 10-15 minutes, but it means we save fuel, and I like us both getting home at the same time.

I have been smitten with a cooking bug (so to speak) and have been perusing recipe books for inspiration. I might make brownies later. Or soda bread. Or a pie. Can't decide. Will definitely be baked though. Unless it's soup.

Oh yes, we need some date recipes. The fruit, not the chronological things. Mr WithaY's runaway successs re: the quince chatroom makes me feel confident that we wil find something suitable.

Am listening to Rush "A Passage To Bangkok". Bloody great. Funny how you go through phases of liking stuff. And now it's The Sweet's "Hellraiser". All good desk-based music.



*I did have a tissue but sometimes you just have to sniff.