Dreams, studies, and waiting to shed the crutches

The day is fast approaching when I go back to hospital for an x-ray to find out if my bone has knitted enough for me to put weight on it again.  It’s been nearly two months since I had the accident now, and I’m hoping that I’ll be able to start walking around again sooner rather than later.  I don’t want to get my hopes up too much, as I’ve been warned that breaks that have been patched up with as much metal as mine can take longer to heal as blood flow to the area can be restricted by all the screws.  I’ve been taking fish oil tablets (found in a cupboard in the kitchen, and only slightly out of date…but can fish oil really go off??), thus hopefully improving my blood flow with the omega-3, as well as calcium tablets for obvious reasons.  And garlic, because I like it.  Admittedly I’ve been very bold about doing the exercises I was given for my leg and ankle since I was discharged from hospital.  It’s only just occurred to me that this would probably be the most effective way of increasing the blood going to the leg.  I’ll have to get back to them, starting today.

For the past week or so I’ve been having dreams relating to my situation.  Usually I’m dreaming about something not linked to my injury (at least not perceptibly, but then again I’m no analyst) and I suddenly become aware of the fact that I’m walking unaided, and I turn around to see that I’ve left my crutches leaning against the wall, and I go and collect them, but I’m confident that the leg is all better.  However, twice last night I dreamt that I was on my crutches, and for some reason I accidentally put weight on my leg.  There was no pain, so I think to myself, ‘Phew, my bone must have set, that was lucky,’ before I looked down saw that the foot was at an odd angle and that the bone is perceptibly pushing up under the skin.  Mildly disturbing, although I don’t remember being too upset in the dream.  In fact, the second time I remember it didn’t look too bad, so I think I shrugged and thought that it’d probably be alright. 

In other news, I’ve had big plans about improving myself while I’m off the leg and hanging around the house.  The main thing that I’ve been trying to do is study Japanese, seeing as I decided to buy An Integrated Course in Elementary Japanese from a friend in Niseko.  I find the book really good, but I’m not sure if I’m only doing well at the moment because I already know a lot of the material covered in each chapter (so far – I’m only at chapter 4) and so I can focus on grammar points, and a few new words, instead of having to learn all the vocab as well as the hiragana and katakana alphabets on top of everything else.  We’ll see how I get on as the material gets a little bit more challenging.

I’ve also been trying to learn the kanji (the Chinese characters used in Japanese along with the other two alphabets) which has been tougher, and less stimulating.  I’ve been trying to learn them using the Heisig Method But I’ll try to keep it going.

The problem is I’ve always been pretty bad when it comes to sitting down and focusing on one thing, and I manage to find distractions very easily.  Been threatening to make a schedule, which, if memory serves I also promised to do when I was doing my Leaving Cert.  And possibly for uni as well.  Never happened though.

Furthermore, as if I don’t find it easy enough to get distracted already, the long-awaited technology necessary to allow us broadband access has finally made its way to our corner of the country, so while I was one of the first to complain about how slow our connection was before, it kept me off the computer for considerable lengths of time, and the lack of wireless access meant that I couldn’t connect from anywhere in the house.  Concentration has become even more of an issue.

If I can at some stage remain focused on this voyage of self improvement, also on the list of things that I want to learn or become some way good at are a few other languages:

• Greek
• Spanish
• Irish

On top of that there are a few other things that I’d be interested in picking up:

• Typing with only my left hand
• Typing with only my right hand
• Meditation
• Not procrastinating (I'm saving that one till last)

Now, obviously there is plenty on this list to keep me going well after I’m back on my feet but it’s good to have enough to keep you going.  The one-handed typing is something I’ve wanted to get down since a scene in the villain in a Bond film (internet research tells me it was Tomorrow Never Dies) was holding his keyboard in one hand, while his fingers danced across the keyboard.  I only really appreciate how useful this skill would be when I was travelling and spending a lot of my time standing on streets and in parks or outside McDonalds, swiping internet and trying to write emails while holding the computer in one hand. This is when I didn’t have my mobile office on the go (pictured, in case your forgot it).

Finally I am considering continuing with the blogging, but I'll probably start under a new heading soon enough, as soon I can think of something clever to call it.  I still don't like the name of this one.

Trouble on the moving stairs and other exploits

Right, now once again for the news in brief.

First of all, my sister left on Sunday after enjoying much of her week’s break from working in a hospital in Singapore…in a completely different hospital, which I’m sure was thrilling for her.  Luckily a few of my visitors from CS brought her around to see the city a bit, and she finally decided to join the CouchSurfing community, and on Friday joined a group trip to some nearby waterfalls, so it wasn't a total waste.

I have still been getting visited fairly regularly by couchsurfers since then, and I’m still getting new faces in. Last time I posted I was heading out to dinner for the first time since the op, and I’m glad to say it went very well, although by the end of it my leg was getting pretty tired as the protective boot I wear can get a bit uncomfortable after a while.  I’ve been out of the hospital a few times since, but can only really hit shopping malls because the streets are ridiculous – the good ones are crowded, and the bad ones require careful vigilance for gaps opening into the sewers, uneven ground, lack of footpaths and other various obstacles that can catch out the unwary crutch-handler.  I lost control of the crutches the first day, when they slipped from under my arms and I ended up putting my weight on the bad leg, which gave me more of a fright than causing any pain, but since then I've taken to taxi-ing around.  My first attempt at mounting the up-escalator was also a bit frightening, but I've gotten the hang of that now aswell.  It's all about timing and getting the good foot on one step, instead of half way between two of them, so when the panels start coming up you don't start falling backwards (which is especially likely to happen when your under-arm crutches are on the upper step as well).  A concerned friend has enquired whether the physio had actually taught me how to use the crutches, and I assured her that he had, but a normal staircase is a completely different kettle of fish from an escalator (of which the hospital has none) and thus training has to be done in the field, in my case while my sister watched in horror as I teetered backwards before grabbing the railing and stepping back once again on my bad leg.  I also tend to skip some of the steps that I was shown for standing up (out of bed, off chairs, etc.), instead of taking both the crutches on my injured side and using them to support myself as with the other hand I push myself up off the bed, before transferring one crutch to my other side putting both under my arms and being on my way, I choose to hop from my bed onto my good leg, pull my crutches from where they rest against the wall shove them under my arms and take off.  It is a much faster and convenient method of doing things, but it does upset the nurses and physios considerably when they see me doing it, but I'm sure they'll get used to it.

In other news, I've gotten through nearly all seven seasons of The Office US, seen a few films that I'd been meaning to get through (namely Terminator Two - Judgement Day and Blade Runner the latter of which was referenced at least once in every lecture of my Science Fiction module in fourth year - verdict: it was alright, but not sure I understand the hype)  Also saw Boy, a kiwi movie that I'd been told about while in Niseko.  I enjoyed it a lot, although it was possibly down to the ridiculous way they pronounce things. By the way if any of you haven't seen the Beached As clip, now's the time.

Further newsworthy events include the fact that I’m getting alternate stitches out tomorrow, and the remainder out on Thursday, and after that I should be ready to fly as it will be exactly two weeks after my op and thus I'll be at less risk of falling victim to the dangers of DVT on the long flight home.  The insurance company is paying for me to go business class (score), but they seem loathe to book the flights until I've actually got the all clear.  Which is fair enough I suppose.  I'm not going to whinge about it, anyway.  But anyway, this means that I should be on terra Hirenses (I think that might be right) within the week. 

Now all I have to do is try to meet up with the people that have visited me once more before I leave, if at all possible.  It’s going to be a busy few days, but it keeps things interesting.