I’m Back In My Burrow Again

And it’s been so great.  I came home Thursday, so this is the third day I’ve been home.  I’ve been able to get some sleep and that, more than anything, has helped ‘knit up the raveled sleeves of care’ — to go all Shakespearean and English major-y on you.   The hardest part of my day so far, wounded knee not withstanding, has been positioning the pedestal fan to blow on me while I’m at the computer.

The physical therapy guy  came on Friday.  He helped me double check the house for “booby traps.”  He did end up switching my couch and my armchair in the living room so that my TV- watching seat is now the armchair rather than the couch.  (The couch was so hard for me to get up out of.)  One big point that he made was that my new knee is mine.  I can put my full weight on it and walk around on it right now without worrying about screwing up the implant.  I’m good to go.

What pain I’m having is 80% from the incision — which is over 12 inches long and has whacking great sutures in it, so duh!  — and 20% from postoperative swelling. The reason I’m having to use the walker is because of the swelling, which limits my flexibility and that messes with my balance; once the swelling goes down, I won’t need it.  I’m not pain free by any means, but what pain I do have is controlled by a couple of Tylenol (ibuprofen).  He says it’s very likely I won’t need the walker after about 10 days, and that it is entirely possible that I will be driving myself to outpatient physical therapy, which will start after I see my orthopedist on the 10th.  The risky bit is not the driving itself — my car has an automatic transmission — but getting in and out of the car! (In the US, the driver’s side is on the left, so the left leg is the major weight-bearing leg.)

We’re having a thunderboomer at the moment.  Line of thunderstorms moving across the city.   Rumbly, bumbly, rain.

When I sat down at the computer, I noticed this — it’s a collection of note cards that feature the art of Rima Staines.  I love the art so much that I put a loop of tape on the back of them and stuck them to some black posterboard and put them in an el cheapo poster frame.  It’s hanging on the wall behind my computer table so I can look at them whenever I wanted to.  It’s going to drive me crazy until I am able to get to where I can lift the frame down and fix it.  Sigh.

Last night I had one of those dreams that leaves you thinking, “Wow! Where did that come from?”  Part of it was about the Handel aria “Lascia Ch’io Pianga,”  A lot of Handel’s music, and 17th and 18th century music in general, that is now only sung by women (sopranos and contraltos) was originally written for the male castrati, and the only men who can sing it now are countertenors.  In my dream, though, there were two women singing it together in harmony — but Handel never wrote it as a duet!    One of my favorite versions is sung by Sarah Brightman, and I love music sung in harmony, so I guess my weird brain just dreamed up a harmony part and stuck it on.  It’s a shame I couldn’t remember the harmony part when I woke up, but I couldn’t have written it down if I had as I don’t write music, only sing it.  I’ve had the original version stuck in my head all day, though.   As earworms go, I’ve had far worse.