Tuesday, January 10, 2017

Barbara's Broken Patella

Happy New Year everyone.

My health continues to hold steady which is good. Hardly seems worth an update, but some people like to get the news, even if there is no news. At least not on me. But Barbara got back to the apartment yesterday after two weeks in the hospital and rehab. More on this below.

We managed to make it through the Christmas hassle without difficulty. Normally,we do not exchange Christmas gifts, but this year, Barbara purchased a couple of small gifts for "the family". The first was a tiny electric egg poacher. You put the raw egg into a small holder and then place this plus some water into the poacher. You plug it in and several minutes later, it beeps. Open it up and voila! You have uncooked eggs. If you repeat this several times, you end up with cooked eggs that are sort of rubbery and tasteless.

The other machine is a pancake cooker that works much better than the egg cooker. Mix the batter, put a precisely measured amount into the machine and five minutes later, you have one perfectly cooked pancake. About 3 inches in diameter. Very tasty. Repeat this with more batter and 5ive minutes later, you have a second pancake. Keep this up long enough and you will have enough pancakes for breakfast. Sometimes by the next day. Alternatively, the two of you can take turns eating the pancakes as they come out of the cooker. Unfortunately, at the rate this thing produces pancakes, it is difficult to actually gain on your hunger level.

So, now, we'll talk about Barbara's little mishap.

For years, Barbara has been saying that she does not want to spend winter in New Hampshire. "Too much snow and at our age, you have to worry about slipping on the ice." So, on the day after Christmas, Barbara slipped on the ice and broke her knee cap. Not in New Hampshire, but in Massachusetts.

Anyway, ambulance, surgery, 4 nights in the hospital and 10 days in re-hab. One of the nice things about living at Fox Hill Village is that there is a re-hab facility attached to our building (named "Clark House" coincidentally enough). This of course made it easy for me to visit several times a day. Which I did not mind once I learned that there were "free" guest lunches. Also they put out coffee and pastries in the morning, cookies in the afternoon. Of course, my main reason for visiting was because I missed Barbara. But I could not bear to see the pastries or cookies go to waste. No worries about weight gain on my part. "Clark House" is at the absolute opposite corner of the building from our apartment. I think it was about a two mile walk.

While Barbara was not very happy about being crippled up, she was not in a huge hurry to leave Clark House. She was getting a couple hours a day of excellent physical and occupational therapy. Also, there was a red button she could push and people would come to assist her with things that she needed. The biggest problem was that she missed the cats. She quickly found a solution to that.

She explained to me that the doctor had ordered that she have a "Cat Scan" every day and it was up to me to bring the cat. So, I would load a cat into a cat carrier, put the cat carrier onto a hotel cart and bring the cat to her room. The cats were less than enthusiastic about the cat carrier but I managed to do this every day without ever requiring actual stitches.

As of Monday, Barbara is back in the apartment. She now has the cats, but no "red button". I am thinking of getting her one of those "Easy" buttons from Staples. I wonder if anyone will come when she pushes it. One of the neighbors suggested that I get her a bell, but I explained that the bell would make noise and bother me. Even if I were to show up, it is unlikely that I would be as obedient as the red-button people from the rehab center.

The good news is that the doctor says she should be able to get back to "nearly" normal. The bad news is that it will take 3 - 4 months of hard work. In the meantime, I will be scooping the cat litter.