Waves of Jura

So after 2 weeks struggling to get a clear diagnosis on my foot, I'm finally on my way toward healing. The MRI turned up a fracture line exactly where the doctor suspected it would be, and no other surprises. But it would need surgery to fix because the end of the bone wasn't where it belonged and could cause trouble later on if left the way it was.

Friday morning at 6:30 I checked in for surgery. The surgery was scheduled for 7:30, and I was expected to be awake and ready to go home at about 9:45. Turns out a little anesthesia goes a long way for me and I didn't even wake up until 10. Slowly I shook off the groggy, took the first of what will be many pain pills, got the rundown on what to do the next few days (foot up, don't get it wet, take up to 5 different drugs as needed, whatever you do don't walk on it), and went home with A to start healing.

I've been on the recliner in her living room ever since. Well, except when I carefully crutch to bed where I again lay on my back with my feet up on a big stack of pillows. Sleeping isn't as hard as I feared it would be. I worried that having so little range of motion would make it hard to fall and stay asleep, but it turns out I seem to be able to do little else but sleep. One of the 5 drugs I was given is Percoset, which it turns out makes me sleepy and (and makes my skin itchy!). I've been sleeping easily 12-14 hours a day whether I want to or not.

All day Friday my littlest toe (and the next two, on and off) was totally numb. It was crazy swollen and purple, and I couldn't feel it at all. I loosened the bandages a bit to make room for the swelling, which helped, but it wasn't until late in the day yesterday that the swelling went down enough that I could feel all 5 of my toes. It's the little things these days...

So for the next week I'm in all sorts of bandages over the stitches, then a splint that runs along the underside of my foot and up the back of my calf, then ace bandages holding the splint in place. I go see the doctor again at the end of the week, at which point if things look good I should be able to go back to the boot.

I'm so grateful to have A & E nearby, they've been so helpful. Being able to stay at their place, where there's company, someone keeping track of when I last took my meds, making food, has made this so much easier. And M & V are so cute. They come sit with me, tell me stories, M even made a "get well soon" book of paintings she made for me. (She still says she wants to be an artist when she grows up.) I'd much rather be able to walk on my own, but if I have to be immobile, this is pretty good. :)

It snowed this weekend and I didn't get to play in it. :( There was about an inch on the ground when I woke up yesterday morning that pretty much melted by lunchtime, but during the afternoon another 2 or so inches fell. Yesterday was a perfect day to go play in the snow, but my gimpy self couldn't :( By this morning, another inch had fallen, but now it's raining and quickly melting away.

I'm still waiting to begin the healing process on my foot. I saw an orthopedist on Thursday. The ER sent my xrays on a CD instead of actual printed pictures, and I was shocked to hear them say they couldn't look at them because in the entire office there's not one computer with a CD-ROM drive. So, he x-rayed it again. It was actually pretty cool, the pictures were live on a screen right there so he could show me what he's looking at. The bad news was that the bone appears to be displaced after all (meaning it's not lined up with where it should be) even though the ER said it was. What's more, the x-ray didn't give him a good enough view of it for him to be able to make a plan for setting it properly. He wanted a CT scan. I got to keep the CD from the ER since it's useless to them, and when I looked at it at home it looks just like the one the orthopedist took. On the one hand that means that I didn't manage to displace it after Sunday, but on the other the ER docs screwed up in the first place which is irritating.

Friday morning I went to the Radiologist to get the CT scan of my foot. That was interesting - I'd never had a CT scan done before. The tech showed me the pictures and honestly, they didn't seem to show the break any clearer than the x-ray did. But then, I'm not trained to read them so I still have hope in my heart that it'll show the orthopedist what he needs to see and we can be finished with the investigation phase of this whole process.

I go back to the orthopedist Monday at lunchtime to go over the CT scan with him and hopefully get it set so I can start healing. I'm worried that the bones have already started to knit back together in their current places - it's been a week already, after all. I don't think will make setting them any more pleasant... The worst case scenario, though, is having to trade the boot for a real cast. It's hard enough to live in the boot, but at least I can take it off to sleep and shower, and if it gets wet nothing bad happens. I have no idea how to shower with a cast on one foot, and cozying up to sleep with a big plaster thing on my foot won't be comfortable. So I'm hoping I'll get to keep the boot.

I spent this past weekend in San Diego and dare I say it, it was foggy! I had a great time and the weather was definitely better than Seattle, don't get me wrong, but foggy?? K said something about moist air over the water hitting warm dry air from the desert, but excuse me SD should be all sun all the time!

Ok, kvetching done... great trip. With some notable speed bumps.

Bump #1: 2 days in SD, my bag spent day 1 in Orlando. Here's the story.
My flight out was Friday evening at 8:45. I arrived at the airport just before 8, perfect timing. Should've been. I checked in at the little self-check thing and then hunted out Alaska's new "there's no ticket counter, now there's this other place with a line to check my bag" thing. Ahead of me in line were two very slight guys each bringing two bags that I and my whole family could comfortably fit into. In addition to being a comical sight, they ended up being the root cause of what would end being my baggage saga. The woman at the counter wasn't the speediest at processing bags, these guys didn't speak much English, and between them they needed to manage paying over-weight fees for these bags. It took a good 10 minutes for these two guys to get their bags processed. The guy processing my bag (the woman was evidently worn out after dealing with these two guys, she went on break when she finished with them) took the bag, gave me a bag check ticket, and off I went to the gate.

Cut to arrival in SD. I watched all the bags come out on the carousel, mine never showed up. I and a few other people whose bags also didn't arrive were told that our bags didn't make the flight but would come in the following morning around 10:30. I got called out in particular for having checked my bag too late to make the flight. Remember the two tiny guys and their ginormous bags? My bag got checked 35 minutes before the flight; their cutoff for even TRYING to make the flight is apparently 40 minutes. Not that the guy at the counter told me that when I checked it or anything.

Ok, next morning K and I go back to the airport to get my bag. Huh, it's not there. Back to the counter. The guy there, bless his heart, was brand new in baggage and had a hell of a time trying to understand what happened to my bag. The computer was telling him my bag was in Orlando, which obviously didn't make much sense. A few phone calls later, and a ridiculous plan to send my bag back to Seattle and then to SD on that night's 8:45 flight canned, my bag would arrive from Orlando via Dallas on an American 7:20 flight. Better than 11:30, we'll take it.

All day that day in old clothes (all I have to say is thank goodness I thought to wear a t-shirt on the plane instead of the long-sleeve thermal shirt I'd worn to work on Friday). Drove all over the place playing tourist and went back to the airport at 7:30. WHEW, my bag is there at the American baggage carousel. So it ultimately went Seattle -> Orlando -> Dallas -> San Diego. I hope it had fun at Disney.

When I checked in for my flight home, the guy at the ticket counter looked at my ID and said "oh, we lost your bag." Granted SD is a small airport and my name is distinctive, but that was funny. He assured me my bag would get on the flight - SD being a small airport, my 8:30 flight out was their last for the day so they were highly incented to get that bag the heck out of there that night. It made the flight, got to Seattle the same time as me, all is now back to normal.

Bump #2: I got sick. Eew.
Day two (at least I had my own toothbrush...) between brunch on the beach (got to see Slomo for those of you familiar with the quirkier sights of the SD boardwalk) and the zoo, my stomach got seriously upset. I didn't feel THAT bad and I was certainly not about to waste the day laying around at home sick, so we went in anyway. For a while there I was worried I'd be visiting every bathroom in the place instead of all the great exhibits, but things started to settle a bit as the day wore on. I still felt like doo-doo on a stick, but definitely not willing to give in. Leaving my sweatshirt in the car was a definite mistake...I don't know if it was being sick or spending so much of the time in the shade, but by the time we left I was freezing. K did his best to warm me up, but I didn't actually feel warm until after blasting heat in the car on the way home and a nap before my flight. The flight back was thankfully uneventful and by the next morning I felt pretty much fine again. Great, just in time to go to work!

So all that aside, I had a great time. On Saturday we drove all over the place, including what we figure is 3-4 miles from the Mexico border. Walked around the famous Hotel del Coronado and stuck our toes in the sand, had fish tacos at South Beach (so good I didn't know what to do with myself...if you're ever in SD, go there, have a Mahi taco, you won't regret it.). Drove through some funky neighborhoods (officially, we were meandering for the fun of it, but frankly I think K got lost here and there...), accidentally found the Navy (was it Navy?) base there, and saw where the SEALs train on the beach south of Coronado.

On Sunday we met up with one of K's friends for brunch. Lousy coffee (I think I've officially become a coffee snob...regular coffee just doesn't do it for me anymore), good breakfast, great view. We went to a place called the Green Flash, named after the thing that sometimes happens right at sunset when light is scattered just right and there's a flash of green just as the sun dips below the horizon. We sat outside, which backs up right on the boardwalk - perfect for people-watching. I heard tell of someone named The Flash who feels the need to wander the beach in outfits just this side of legal, the kind of sight you hear of and are mildly curious about but once you see it you're instantly regretful at having looked. Also heard tell of Slomo, who we did see. This guy is hilarious, he roller blades up and down the boardwalk in super slow-motion evidently spending most of his time in a pose reminiscent of a figure skater doing a spiral. Unlike the Flash, worth seeing and not at all painful.

Other than a violently upset stomach, the zoo was great. We saw tons of animals including a bunch of babies which were super cute. There was a baby chimp playing with a female orangutan, I could've spent all day watching them. All kinds of antelope-type creatures, bears, koalas, birds, you name it. A disappointing number of them were sleeping so we didn't get to see everyone in action (a sleeping panda is just not that interesting.) Next time maybe some of the lazybones from this trip will be up and at 'em. :)

So, all in all a great trip, great way to spend a weekend. Thanks much to K for hosting and playing tourist with me!

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Shameless plug: Windows Live shipped yesterday! This is (a lot of) what I've been working on since January (mostly Messenger, but the whole thing was a group effort), finally out in the wild. AND, in Lithuanian for the first time! Go check it out, it's good stuff!

OK, I've never heard anyone use these phrases in Seattle before, but they're pretty funny. It doesn't take much to make me laugh, but these definitely had me laughing out loud. I think "holy crap" is the funniest, with "crotchety" a close second.

They came from today's Daily Candy Seattle mailing. If you've never heard of these folks, check out their site. The mailings aren't typically all that useful but they sometimes have funny stuff and are easy to skim through and trash on days when they're no good.  

beardy cat
n. Someone who is terrified of bears.

crotchety
adj. The feeling of grumpiness brought on by hours spent on a rock-hard bike seat.

ditch a tent
v. The act of bailing from a campground in the middle of the night and checking into the nearest motel. (Suzy’s such a beardy cat: One fake growl from Mike and she ditched a tent.)

holy crap
n. The first visit to indoor plumbing after a weekend in the woods.

liecra
n. The lie that bikers tell themselves in order to wear spandex. (She pretended her thighs didn’t look like sausages, but she knew it was a liecra.)

marshmellow
adj. Being patient enough to roast a marshmallow slowly and evenly, rather than sticking it directly into the flames.

mile highgraine
n. The splitting headache caused by a combination of altitude, a cheap air mattress, and heavy drinking around the campfire.

REIteous
adj. The attitude of smug superiority displayed by employees at outdoors stores.

trail mixer
n. The Chatty Cathy who insists on talking to everyone on the hiking trail.

tryathlete
n. A person who attempts to complete a triathlon without training (and nearly drowns in the swimming portion).

Paul, Diego, and I make bets on Survivor. It's low stakes, the winner gets lunch on the other two, but it makes the season more fun as we watch our choices do well or tank and sometimes even start rooting against our own choices when they're being obnoxious. The first time it was just me and Diego. Paul heard about the bet and wanted in the next season, so we expanded. We also expanded the types of bets we make. Instead of just picking who we think will win and seeing whose choices make it farther, we made several bets. We continued the same bets this time.

Blind bet: This is almost all about judging books by their covers. CBS puts photos and bios on their website before the show starts, we use whatever information is available online to choose two people who we think will go far. Twice in a row I've actually managed to choose the ultimate winner in this bet. I forget how it went in the first bet.

Merge bet: After the first episode, we choose 3 people who we think will make it to the merge roughly halfway through the season and get points for each choice who made it.

Individual challenges: After the merge the game turns from a team event to individual competition, so we choose 2 people who we think will win lots of individual challenges.

First losers: Also judging by covers, before the start we choose 2 people who we think will tank early.

The second season we did this, we all made excellent choices. Our 6 blind bet choices were the final 6 in the game, it was very cool. Diego did the numbers, which I've long since forgotten, but the odds against that were high. This time around we had more eliminations early on, but the game was close all the way through. Diego won the first losers bet fairly early on, and we all got 20 points for getting 2 choices each to the merge. Then in the final show Paul won the challenge bet, making it impossible for Diego to win, and not only did I win the blind bet because everyone else's choices were eliminated before the final 3, my choice actually won!

Paul and Diego would tell you I had an unfair advantage in the second set of bets because there was a Lithuanian guy in the show and I made a deal with them that I could choose him for the blind bet with no risk of losing him as a choice in a conflict situation. In exchange, I agreed to give up any choices I'd made if they conflicted with their choices. They'll further tell you it was unfair because they think I only chose him because he's Lithuanian, as a show of solidarity to my people, and he just happened to do well. But the reason I chose him is that as a Lithuanian, I knew he'd go far. (NEVER count out the Lithuanian, I'm telling you!)

They're just jealous that I've won the bet 3 times in a row.

Work has been hiring at such a fast pace that we've long since filled up the office space we have in our possession. Not that it's stopped us from continuing to hire like mad... So, a lot more people are doubled up in offices than the buildings were designed for, and on top of having had to give up my own office there's now not enough parking spots.

For a while we just had to fend for ourselves. It got so bad that I'd regularly get mails from people that said some version of "I spent 30 mins looking unsuccessfully for a spot, so now I'm working from home today." Eventually they brought in valet parking so when the regular spots fill up a valet double parks the remaining cars. Now even that's not enough. I've actually been turned away by the valet after coming back from a late lunch. "Where am I supposed to put my car?" "I don't know, lady, sorry." Nice.

Most recently they've added signs all over that indicate whether each lot is full or not and a person standing at every entrance with an airport-like flashlight directing wand thing to direct people into a lot that actually has free space. I have to pass by 6 people on my way into work, each of whom seem to be working on commission to get me to park in their area of the lot. Meanwhile I park in the exact same place I've been parking all along... I sure am glad we're paying all those people to help us park!

I usually manage to avoid having to use the valet, but the other day I had to after coming back from lunch. Not a late lunch, mind you. It was actually pretty quick, and we were back by around 12:30. The very bottom level of the garage by my building said it had free spots, so in I went. Turns out the only spots were for valet, so I had to do that.

At the end of the day, I paged the valet guys with my ticket number so they could bring the car around from wherever it was stashed all afternoon. Since I left it in the bottom level of the garage, I figured that's where I'd pick it up. I packed up and headed out, but when I got there there was no attendant at the bottom level anymore. As I turned around, scanning to make sure there was no one there, I saw my car driving out of the entrance, and a sign on the wall that said cars left at that level could be picked up one level up after 5pm. Ok, up one level.

Got there, still no attendant. As I turned around to head back into the stairwell to try the next level up, I saw my car driving by. At this point it's become truly comical, I'm chasing my car around the garage! Up another level and down to the other end of the garage where the attendants and the garage entrance is on that level...there goes my car again, this time at least it was pulling in. By the time I got there I was laughing out loud, the attendants must have thought I'd lost my mind.

I can't wait until space starts to open up again. I like my office mate but I miss having my own office. And, of course, having somewhere to put my car when I get back from lunch!