Jeez, where has the month gone? Well, oing yard work. Lots of yard work.
It’s 6:18 a.m. right now and we have to leave at 7:30 for my torn meniscus surgery. It’s so lovely and quiet at this time of day, but I doubt that will make me get up this early on a regular basis.
It’s been a month of worry about my knee, about getting the surgery, and of frantically trying to pull so many weeds and put down so much mulch so that things will mostly be done post-surgery. I worked at the side of the house for three hours on Sunday and ended that session with dumping a bag of weeds into the ravine, but it was a bag from a while ago and a wasp shot out and stung my shoulder.
I didn’t think it was so bad, not too red, here’s a picture from Sunday evening.
But in the night of course it got really red and sore and it’s finally getting better, just in time for the surgery this morning. Here it is the morning after:
Ow. Like I said, it’s mostly better now, whew.
Last night while we had a delicious salad nicoise for dinner on the deck, Kevin told me that after his meniscus surgery he was pretty much incapacitated for a month, or a couple of months, or maybe three months.
He assured me that he thought things won’t be that bad for me. But really, who knows?
Deep breaths.
I got a packet of information from the Orthopedic Center about my surgery, including a list of things to do before the surgery and what to bring to the surgery and afterwards.
The thing that made me laugh was when it said to wear loose, comfortable clothes and slip-on shoes, and no high heels.
Obviously they wrote this because somebody coming in with a serious issue that needed surgery was wearing high heels.
In the instructions it said that I couldn’t have anything to eat or drink, not even water, after eight p.m. last night. But when a woman from the surgery center called me for my final pre-op instructions she said I could have 24 oz of gatorade last night before midnight and then 12 oz this morning before six. I felt like I’d won the lottery!
I set my alarm for 5:45 and had a refreshing glass of gatorade and last night Kevin susggested that I could go back to sleep, so I was happy to do that.
But back in bed, I figured that for the rest of the day I’m going to be lying around and sometimes unconscious, I might as well get up and enjoy the morning, one more little bit of time with my fully-intact meniscus.
So now I still have about a half hour before I have to take a shower with Dial soap. Because of the Covid, I was going to gave to get a Covid test on Monday and then quarantine til today plus I was supposed to take a shower last night and this morning with something called “hinibiclens,” a super-duper antiseptic soap. This sounded a little bit alarming because the instructions said DON’T USE ON YOUR HEAD OR FACE BECAUSE IT CAN CAUSE PERMANENT BLINDNESS.
I was also supposed to leave it on my body for two minutes.
Because of the easing Covid restrictions, however, I found out on Monday that I didn’t have to take the test or quarantine because I’ve been fully vaccinated, and instead of the hibiclens I could use dial soap. Score! Last night I took my first dial shower and when we leave for the Orthopedic Surgery Center I’ll be mighty squeaky clean.
Here’s a Friday night weenie roast on June 4th. I’ve been able to still make it down the hill to the dock and hopefully I’ll be able to continue to do that, but maybe Kevin will have to drive me down there. Probably not tomorrow night, but it’s supposed to rain tomorrow anyway.
The next day I babysat Amy and Jim’s dogs and spotted a chipmunk on their front porch.
That evening we took a boat ride and saw a goose ws comfortably nesting in somebody’s flower pot at the end of dock on Long Bay.
When we got home, there was the gaggle of around 23 goslings with their parents.
On Sunday a tiny baby fawn was curled up in the yard. I was going to rush out and take a picture but Amy said DON’T SCARE IT BECAUSE THEN ITS MOTHER WON’T BE ABLE TO FIND IT, so I crept out very quietly to get a picture. I was actually up on the deck taking this, so yay for my new camera phone that takes a great close-up.
The next day a giant limb fell out of our very old and beautiful Bradford pear tree in the front yard. This is a little worrisome because it’s such a lovely tree and hopefully the whole thing won’t come down. Since we have so many very old trees around here, it’s always a possibility.
Here’s Riley, admiring the blooming flowers in the fenced yard.
That’s all the photos for now. I’m starting to feel a little hungry. I have to be at the place at eight and they said the whole thing will probably take four-five hours, so I imagine I’ll be mighty hungry by then. Hmm, it seems like a good opportunity to get some decadent fast food or something, but maybe I’ll be too sleepy to care about that.
Hopefully everything will go quickly and smoothly. Never having had any kind of surgery before, I’m a little skittish.
Deep breaths.
ok then,
Pre-Op Grace.