Tickets, Lockers and a Telling off

Visited the Physio again on Tuesday and this time I've been bad and got told off for practically everything, still using two crutches and not doing enough of the exercises. I think he may have told me off no matter how much work I had done. So its more exercises including balancing on one foot and stepping down stairs. I'm to give up the crutches but I think I'll still carry on with one for a bit as it easier to get a seat on the tube with one.

The Raffle for the 22 available lockers (staff is about a hundred so this isn't the most well planned feature of the new office) in the office happened today and I managed to get one. I'm planning lots of lunchtimes at the gym in order to build my leg up so in a couple of weeks it will be handy to have some extra storage.

Further fallout from the festival happened today, after yesterday's revelation that the Kaiser Chiefs played a secret gig at the festival which we missed and reading all the people on the forums laying into how rubbish the Red Hot Chili Peppers were, Russ found out that they are selling tickets to next years festival at this years prices so he got some, we're going and I owe Russ some money.

Leeds Festival with crutches

Well thanks to lots of help from Nick, Russ and Vicky. I successfully managed to go to this years Carling Leeds Festival. I took my crutches and the guys carried a camp chair for me so the whole thing wasn't too uncomfortable. A great weekend away even although the parking was managed by the numpty squad. So I'm a bit tired now...
The Band were a mix of the good to the down right rubbish with Lost Prophets, Fall Out Boy and Kings of Leon in the first group and the Red Hot Chili Pepper leading the second group.

Appraisal Twice

once with the physio

once at work

physio was fine said everything that I expected him to say about stopping using the crutches and brace and trying to walk normally again. roll the foot from heal to toe he gave me three new exercises sitting on the floor with a towel under my heel try and get my leg as straight as possible (a bit achy)lying on my back bring my knee up to my chest and try to make my heel touch my backside (v. painful) called the roman chair I think leaning back to a wall go down into a sitting position and then hold it for a bit.

it's appraisal time at work again, well actual they had it while i was off but I'm having mine now. so Rob and me go off to talk about what I've been doing, what I want to do and what's going on with the company. Generally I'm doing well if not particularly senior work mostly straight forward development. I've mostly been working on our most critical project (I generates most of the money) and that's been going well (good for this years personal bonus).
However I'm not so happy about the way things have been going and this was a good opportunity for a good venting. I'm a senior developer and as such should really be doing some project and team leading. Now I've been promised an opportunity to do this sort of thing three times now only to have it taken away again before I started. So I'm getting a bit frustrated with them and took the opportunity to remind them. Rob (who's also been having quite a rough time of it with his big international project getting cancelled) said that He would make sure that working in the new traffic project I would get the opportunity lead some development. Sounded a bit woolly to me and I said it sounds like b****cks as they have promised before and not delivered.
So the meeting had its lively moments, at one point he tried to say that me being off having surgery was part of the problem until I pointed out the several members of the department have had more time off on holidays since I got back and managed to hold down senior positions.

So I've given him some stuff to think about and write up.

Maybe it will help...

Back to Work

Wednesday was back to work its a bit of a hassle going into London. It takes a bit of time to walk anywhere but with crutches and a brace I do get a seat on the tube.Work isn't too bad although I have to get kind people to carry my cups of Tea etc back from the kitchen.The increase in exercise should be good for me in the long run but by the time I got home my knee had had enough and was quite swollen.

It was no surprise to me that the department organisation at work had changed again while I was away. I'm now in the marketing IT team which looks after different project which have been requested by the sales and marketing teams. At the minute I'm just one of the developers in the team and someone else is doing the team leader work. Rob said that the team leader position will be rotated over time so all the seniors in the team get to do it (there are three of us) but I'm not really buying it. Very frustrating.

Still I've got my Appraisal on Monday so I'll be making my views clear then.

Destapled

Had my two week checkup with Mr Parmar on Tuesday and he gave me the OK to go back to work He also, much to my relief, he removed the staples with a device which looked like a miniature version of the staple removers you get in offices.

He had some video of the operation to show, as well, but only once we managed to get one of the computers to work enough to show it. He had about 20 minutes of tape from the camera that goes into the knee. So I saw the scraping, the cutting and the drilling. I now know the whole process in quite alot of detail and I know that the screws are made from polymers which will blend into the bone over time and that the threading process is similar to how a knitting machine works.

Power cut

Friday morning was a bit different I awoke to a power cut, it lasted about 2 hours.

I'm still on my crutches and my parents are currently away for the weekend, so not being able to go anywhere I had no TV, no Internet, no radio and no way to make a cup of tea!

Basically no more civilisation!

So I got a book (a Rebus novel) and went and sat at the bottom of the garden next to the river and waited, in the morning sun, for civilisation to return.

Bruises

One week on I'm still on the crutches but much more mobile. Its not so painful now which is fortunate as my supply of pills is getting short. The knee looks fairly normal, except of course for the holes in it with the bits of metal sticking out. the rest of the leg is developing some lovely bruises mostly across the shin and around the back of the knee.

10 Staples

Took the main dressing off today and found I had 10 staples in my leg. Looks very Frankenstein! Three small wounds around the knee cap and one inch long one lower down and on the inside of the leg.



Oh and I finished Harry Potter, a very satisfying ending.

Hospital Trip 2

Well it was early start but with a little help from Dad and TomTom I was there for seven a.m.

It was still a long wait until the operation as I went in about 11:30. The dress code was similar this time with an anti DVT socking on my good leg. They didn't make me wear the scary string net pants like last time but keep my boxers on.
It was much more of a major operation than last time and the anaesthetist warning me he would be using much strong drugs (on me) than last time. however despite it being more major I was still out after about an hour.

The drugs definitely were much stronger with me being blotto for most of the rest of the day. the other effect of the drugs (morphine I think) was me being sick all day long and not being able to keep anything down. I didn't help that when ever anyone asked me a question I either nodded or shook my head which set me off again.

The rest of the day was me sleeping or the nurses taking my temp and blood pressure which was up and down due to the drugs.

In the evening my Parents visited but since I was still drugged up they didn't get much out of me and I was nodding off again.

Day two sort of started when they gave me an anti-biotic shot at around 2 am and some pain killers.

The day started for real around 6 am (I remember it starting really early last time as well). it consisted of lots of tea and waiting (reading Harry Potter).

The physio came by and we talked about exercises and gave me some new crutches (elbow style much better to use than the Canadian ones). I said I would reused my brace I already had, once she had ok'd it, otherwise a new one would have cost me a hundred quid (not covered by the AXA).

Finally around 6ish Mr Parmar turned up and asked me if I wanted to go home. I said 'you bet I do' and he said 'Ok, off you go. I'll see you in two weeks'

My Parents came and took me home.