Busy Wednesday

It's been all go today. We awoke sharp at 6:30 and I went through my usual morning routine, all in good time for Jo to head to the hairdresser's at 9 am. While she was away, the Penicuik builder came round, unannounced, to finish off the external work under the window sills after the new ones were installed last week.

I had been invited to join Dan and Archie for coffee at the Douglas at 11 am, but I knew there was a delivery arriving between 11:30 am and 1:00 pm, and I still had errands to do. I dashed to the shops, did my errands and tried to get back in time for the delivery, but just missed it - sod's law, he was a few minutes early. No matter, he had left it with our neighbour, Trish, so I picked up the console that Jo had ordered and carried it home. It's not the same one as was on the blog last week, and Jo's now decided it goes in the kitchen, not the stairway, but here it is anyway:

Jo had been delayed getting home, having sidetracked to Orvis, so I ended up having to miss coffee with Dan and Archie, but I got another invitation a little later to meet up with Colin, Ian Sharp and Malcolm Lodge in Tease after their usual Wednesday cycle. In fact, I had lunch there, as I knew Jo was heading out for afternoon drinkies and mince pies at one of her pals.

It took some persuasion for Jo to allow me to drive her to her friend Jill's little matinee party, but we got there safely and I then went round to the tip and emptied my car with junk from our garage. No sooner was I home than Raemoir Garden Centre's van arrived with the tree that Jo had ordered at lunchtime.

Next was a phone message from TNT - they wanted to come round and pick up the massive drum kit that has been littering our house for 2-3 years now - since one of Ross' pals' pals, a Hungarian, left them here one year when we were away. The only problem is packaging - TNT have had to go back to their contact in Hungary to find out what their plans are here. We really thought this time we were going to get rid of this drum kit - and before Christmas too - but this late snag may delay things further.

So I picked up Jo from her afternoon do and we went straight to Morrison's to stock up on some goods for the chalet that Lucy and Kelly and families will be staying in from Friday. We FaceTimed Kelly this morning for any last minute requests. As I write this, they'll be getting up and heading to Adelaide Airport soon.

That's the story of my busy day.

Sleep returns!

A semblance of normality the last couple of nights. I slept for 3 hours without interruption on Sunday night and then 4 hours last night. After an hour or so of twitching around, I managed to get back to sleep for an hour or two after this as well, so, really, I can't complain this week - yet.

No electronic stimulation, lavender sprinkled liberally around, a chapter or two of my book and, last night, a new trick - smearing castor oil on my eyelids. All of these may be old wives' tales, or sound advice - who knows? - but it shows I'm ready to try any tips I receive.

The latest piece of advice came from Frances Simpson, and turned out to be a fairly expensive experiment. I went to the chemist/pharmacy to ask if they had any castor oil and was initially told no, but they could order it for me. The assistant then remembered that somebody else had ordered a bottle a few weeks ago but had never picked it up - I soon found out why - it was £18 for a 500ml bottle!

I definitely feel my progress has moved on another notch this week - I feel more able now. Yesterday, I was down the village and popped in to see Ross in Tease - he had borrowed the car on Sunday to go to Costco to buy goods for the coffee shop. Ross had parked it next door in the museum car park, so I asked him to give me the keys and I would take it home - it's only a short drive. I managed fine, and when I got home, I decided to start filling the car with some of the junk in the garage that had to go to the tip.

I'm able to do several minutes on the static bike now and usually I can get it going straight away - that's something I wasn't able to do a few days ago. I managed 8 minutes today - a paltry amount, I know, but a huge improvement on the pathetic weakling who could barely manage a few revolutions before.

Today we were at the physio again and she seemed pretty pleased with my progress and told me just to keep going with what I was doing - and also told me I could ditch the last walking stick, except for when I was planning a very long walk, when she thought it might still be a good idea for me to take it with me as moral support, if nothing else. That's a bit of a breakthrough as well.

She measured my angle of bend again and was a little surprised to find it was still only 90 degrees, but the measurement is done when I'm lying down on the bed and I have to slide my leg up. I find this the hardest way to do it and I know I get more than 90 degrees when I do some of the other exercises, particularly those under stress.

My next appointment with the physio is not until the end of January now, which will be 12 weeks after the operation and she reckons that's the very worst part over then. She hoped too that the fluid/swelling on my knee may have gone down a bit by then, which should also help me get a bit more bend hopefully.

It's Tuesday and Jo's away to pick up Luca from school, as usual. Carole's coming over tonight for tea and will take him home. I've been putting a few pictures etc up downstairs. I had planned to just use tacks/screws/drill as necessary but Jo had bought a little tool which is meant to be a simple, clean way of fixing them to walls:

Simple enough to use, but will it last, particularly with the larger, heavier items? Time will tell. Meanwhile, here's some of today's work in the study/exercise room downstairs:

So Andy Murray easily won the BBC's Sports Personality of the Year on Sunday - I should think so too. I felt I had to make sure there were no last minute anti-Scots votes which might deprive him of his just desserts and, for the first time ever, I went online to vote for him. In the end, it was a landslide.

With Xmas coming up a lot of TV and radio series are coming to an end. On Saturday, it was the last episode of Borgen, the Danish series about politics. I enjoyed it, but I know the principal character (Birgitte Nyborg) annoyed Jo a bit - she's a bit of an idealist and sometimes a bit too good to be true - Birgitte that is, not Jo.

It was also the penultimate episode of Homeland on Sunday - the finale is this coming weekend, and we were left with a real cliffhanger.

It's now early Wednesday morning in Adelaide and Kelly, Chris and little Miller will soon be getting ready for their long journey - they leave there first thing on Thursday morning their time. Scott, Lucy and the boys have a bit more time before they're on their way from Oregon, but both families are scheduled to arrive within roughly half an hour of each other at Dyce on Friday morning.

It will probably be Ross and Jo that will take the cars and pick them up. I'll probably head to their chalet at Inchmarlo and wait there for them, while making sure everything's in order for them.

Countdown - 5 days to go!

Less than a week now until the visitors from Outer Space - sorry, Australia and America - arrive. It's going to be a busy week. Jo's got a lunch tomorrow, then we've got my physio and Luca on Tuesday, salmon to collect on Wednesday and the surgeon to see on Thursday, amongst other things, like more trips to the tip, pictures to put up - and a letterbox too - we forgot about that when we got the new front door!

That's the week ahead, but what has this weekend brought? On Friday night, I had my first night out at the pub since early/mid October, then on Saturday, I paid my first visit to Pittodrie this season. Aberdeen won 2-0 and it wasn't too bad a game considering the windy conditions - it must have been very difficult for the players. Even more so for one poor unfortunate elderly spectator who, with the aid of some friends, managed up the steps in the Richard Donald Stand and then, thinking he was safe being back on the level, promptly put his two walking sticks down on the wet surface and they immediately skidded forward and he took a headlong tumble. I sympathised - and took this as a warning as I gingerly made my own way out of the ground.

I just had time to shower and change and then we headed next door to the Tor-na-Coille Hotel for our annual Xmas dinner with the squash/golf crowd - and very good it was too.

When we got home after the dinner, we prepared carefully in an attempt to avoid yet another sleepless night for me. We'd had lots of advice - much of it from Jo's sister Mary. Lavender oil was liberally sprinkled everywhere, all electrical stimulation and LED lights from TV's, phones etc were doused and I took all my meds, including Nytol again. I read a couple of chapters of my book and then settled down for the night. An hour and a half later and I was up and awake again. I probably spent a restless 30 - 60 minutes after that, but then I must have fallen asleep. I awoke at 6 am, but stayed in bed until Jo got up at 7 am, by which time my leg was crying out for some pain killers. I actually felt quite sleepy at this time, but I knew I had to sit up to take the pills.

Today, I've done my exercises twice, including a couple of reasonable spells on the exercise bike, and I've walked to the shops and back, but the rest of the day has been a typically lazy Sunday watching sport on TV and reading the papers.

So that's my weekend. My other blogs contain most of the photos of this weekend, but here's the selfie I took of Jo and I last night:

Friday 13th news

Black Friday, but no disasters yet - fingers crossed!

So I did take 2 Nytol tablets last night, but I awoke after just an hour or so's sleep, thinking it must be 5 or 6 in the morning. I was mortified when I realised I still had the whole night to go.

It seems the tablets give me a relatively deep, but short, sleep - they haven't stopped me from waking every hour or two. Another thing - why does my leg begin to hurt when I'm in bed? I had no pain at all prior to going to sleep. Note to self - ask the surgeon next Thursday.

I must also ask if he has a copy of my post op X-ray - I'd like to see what it looks like. I should also try and remember to get a letter that I can carry on my travels through airports to explain why I'll always be beeping the security machines in future.

That's about it for today. I spent most of this morning - after the Test Match from Perth was finished - writing Christmas cards, so I'll head out this afternoon and post them when Jo's away to Costco.

Think I'll manage out for a beer tonight with the Friday night boys - it'll be the first time I've been able to join them since mid/early October.

Got an invite to go to Pittodrie tomorrow afternoon as well - I think I can manage that now too, but I'll need to hurry back for our Xmas Dinner at the Tor-na-Coille - it looks like we're up to 24 now.

Broch trip

It's Thursday afternoon and we've just arrived back home after our trip to Fraserburgh. We got to my work just after 10 am and left again just after 1:30 pm, stopping for a late-ish lunch on the way back at the new Formartine's (http://www.formartines.com/) cafeteria/shop/visitor centre at the entrance to the Haddo estate between Oldmeldrum and Methlick - and very nice it was too. We even brought a doggy bag home, so that's tonight's tea sorted.

Now for the (lack of) sleep report. In short, even the Nytol didn't work last night. In fact, I was so bad that Jo gave up on me about 4 am and came downstairs to watch TV and lie on the settee. Partly on the suggestion of the pharmacist, we had bought the 2-a-night pills, rather than the stronger 1-a-night, and I only took one of them to start with - but, by midnight I was already up and rolling around, so I took another one, but even it didn't seem to have much effect until after 3 am. We'll try again tonight - but I'll definitely be taking 2 pills this time.

My leg was sore during the night and we wondered if I'd done a bit much yesterday, with 2 separate walks, plus the usual round of exercises and also 3 short stints on the exercise bike. Today, I'm easing off a bit - I still need to stretch and exercise a little, but I'm not going to push too hard - and we may ease off a little on the leg massage as well.

My exercise regime is now geared towards strength and balance, and Jo managed to acquire proper sand-filled ankle weights at Tesco on Tuesday:

Much easier to use than our mocked up efforts.

It will be 6 weeks tomorrow that I had the operation, which means that I'll finally be able to ditch the compression stockings I've had to wear - that'll be a relief. When I went in to hospital, I promised Lucy that I would do a blog every single day with an update on my progress. Looking back, I didn't quite manage every single day, but 38 postings in the last 40 days is a pretty good effort I feel. Of course, I'm far from finished yet, but there may be a bit of a tailing off in blog postings now, back to more normal levels.

To close, we noticed one blemish after the windows were installed on Tuesday - one of the new kitchen doors was smeared with what looks like some of the glue the window installer used:

Barely noticeable - but we know it's there now and it's annoying - and we don't know how to remove it without damaging the door. Suggestions on a postcard please.

Wednesday's news

Let's start with the usual moan about lack of sleep - yup, it was another bad night last night. Enough is enough, we decided, so we went out this afternoon and bought some Nytol (http://nytol.co.uk/) for tonight. I've never in my life felt the need to use sleeping aids in the past, but after 5 or 6 consecutive nights of very little sleep, I've had to resort to desperate measures. Look out for tomorrow's exciting sleep report.

What else has happened today? Lunch at Tease while Jo went swimming - I met up with Colin Kilgour, John McWhinnie and Ian Sharp after they had finished their regular Wednesday cycle run. They have been doing this for a month or so now - today they caught the bus to Culter and cycled back along the Deeside Way to Banchory. Wish I was fit enough to join them - not yet, but the good news is that I jumped on the exercise bike this morning and got my knee going immediately, with little hesitation or preparation - another small sign of progress.

Kelly FaceTimed again this morning/evening and Chris demonstrated Miller's latest trick - holding his bottle himself - with all fours! (Miller, that is, not Chris).

Tomorrow, it's the long drive up to Fraserburgh for a key meeting with the Union. Jo's driving - in her car. I have to confess, however, that I stepped in to my car this afternoon when Jo was out, just to see if I could manipulate the pedals OK - and I could, so my next trick was to let the car slide down the driveway, then reverse it back up - no problem. Next stage will be to take it in to the Tor-na-Coille Hotel car park and drive around a bit.

Jo's been toying with buying this console for the hall over the last week or two:

What do you think? Should she buy it? Available for Christmas.

On Saturday night, it's our annual Xmas dinner with our golfy group and wives - and we're returning to the Tor-na-Coille Hotel for the first time in many years - the scene of former crimes. Just dinner - no dancing, no party.

Tuesday week 6

I thought last night was a little better - but Jo didn't agree. We stayed up fairly late - for us - watching some of our TV recordings (Borgen, The Blacklist) and settled down about 11:30 pm. By 12:15 am, I was up again - no pain, just awake. I took a couple of Paracetamol (it was time to) and decided to read a few chapters of my book before putting the bedside light out some time between 1:30 and 2:00 am. My next awareness was just after 5 am, so it seems I had 3 hours + of sleep.

I lay awake until precisely 6:30 am when I thought it was a decent time to get up. Jo's first comment was that it had been a bad night for me again, but that hadn't been my perception - it had been the least troublesome night I'd had for several nights - not great, but a slight improvement.

Anyway, after the usual 3 hour routine of meds, breakfast, exercise, shower, massage and ice treatment, I headed down to the village where I'd arranged to have a coffee with Dan Corbett and Archie Cook. On my way back, I took a photo of the latest hole in the ground to appear at the former Tor-na-Coille Garage, which has now been lying vacant for over 2 years. Gleaner Oils are having to clean up the site before they can complete the sale to a local builder, who plans to erect houses there. It looks like they are having problems with the underground tanks and/or seepage in to the ground. Will they ever complete this - or even tidy up the site a little?:

Back home, here's the new front of the house, from the outside:

The old windows in the kitchen and study were removed this morning, leaving a rather nice panoramic view from our kitchen:

It's now finished, however:

That's about it for today. Jo's away to Inverurie now to pick up Luca, so it's just me and the window installer here now.

Monday week 6

I'm in to my 6th week now since the knee op, so, officially, the (compression) tights come off on Friday. My follow-up appointment with the surgeon is next week - the day before the invasion from America and Australia.

Regrettably, last night was another sleepless one for me - how many of these can I have before I collapse completely? I'm beginning to hate my bed - it's full of bad memories just now. I doze for an absolute maximum of one hour at a time, but then I'm awake for at least the amount of time that I've been asleep, before dozing off again. Last night, it was sharp pains in my leg that kept me awake, but I was damned if I was going to revert to Tramadol again.

I long for the alarm clock to display 6:30 am - I feel that's not an unreasonable time for me to sit up. Any earlier and it's not fair to Jo. Today we had to be up anyway as the new doors and windows were being fitted. Surprisingly, it was a one man show, but soon he was laying out all his materials in the driveway for his first day's work here:

He's finished for today now - he's done the 3 doors:

Front door (from inside) - brown externally. Same 3 pane layout as before.

Door to garage from utility room.

Back door from utility room

Tomorrow, it's the windows in the kitchen and the downstairs study, where the exercise bike is now located. Talking of which, how would you like to see another video showing how my knee is improving? It's a bit of a rusty start, but once I get going, the movement is relatively seamless, I think. My main problem is that after almost 6 weeks of doing very little other than lying on my back, I am as weak as a kitten and 30 seconds on the bike and I'm knackered! Hopefully, I can improve on this as time goes on. Here's the video:

We managed to connect with Kelly (and Miller) this morning on FaceTime. Miller's favourite cuddly toy is one Aunt Mary sent him:

Sorry - it's upside down again! Kelly sent it to me via i-Message and no matter what I do, I can't get it to appear the right way up in Blogger.

Today, Kieran and Julie posted the family photo that was taken at the wedding on FaceBook. It took absolutely ages to get everyone to turn up and pose and yet the finished article shows Luca sticking his tongue out!:

To close, yesterday we finally got round to booking some of our flights for our USA holiday next year. We plan to descend on the Lesinas at the end of July - the very day that Lucy's friend Lorna and her family leave Oregon after 2 weeks. Jo and I are flying in to New York and planning to spend 5 days just south of there in Galloway, New Jersey - near where Uncle Alex lived - before flying over to the West Coast. We'll hire a car and visit nearby Philadelphia, and, of course, we'll visit the famous Boardwalk in Atlantic City - we've been watching a lot of Boardwalk Empire on Sky - tales of evil deeds in Prohibition America! Here's an image of the resort:

That was very easy for us to book as it's a Marriott resort and we acquired additional points with them this year. We were also able to book just 5 nights here at the lowest rates, avoiding Friday/Saturday night premiums. We don't have the same flexibility, nor the ease of booking at other non-Marriott resorts, and we've left it a bit late this year to book another holiday with the Lesinas, but Scott and Lucy will have to use up a good bit of their holiday entitlement when Lorna and her family are over there with them anyway. In light of this, I have just put in a request for a week locally at any resort in Oregon when we're there and we'll see what happens. If we get something relatively close, hopefully Scott and Lucy will manage to duck and dive a bit between the resort and work.

Sunday morning catch-up

Well, it's not been a great couple of days for me. I picked up a slight bug and haven't been eating but, more importantly haven't been sleeping at all. I dread going to bed at night, knowing I'll just toss and turn all night long. Last night, we were in bed fairly early - 9pm to be exact - but within an hour I was up again. I went downstairs and watched Match of the Day, and thought I would take a Lemsip to see if that helped (I'm told not to take these as they don't mix with my other meds), but still couldn't sleep when I returned to bed about 11:30 pm.

I got up again after midnight and again went downstairs and watched some sport on TV - this time the Test Match from Adelaide. At 2 am, I returned once more to bed and, feeling slightly desperate, took a Tramadol - I had been weaning myself off these and hadn't had one for 3 days. I did eventually get a few hours sleep, thank goodness, and feel marginally more human this morning - I'm ready to go a walk and get the papers now, after not having walked at all the last couple of days.

Now here's the question going through my head - did I finally get a few hours' sleep this morning because the bug I had is now going, or was it the Tramadol? Perhaps my inability to sleep over the last few days has been withdrawal symptoms? In either case, I really don't want to take any more opiates and hope I don't get desperate enough to slip back again.

Yesterday, I managed to help Jo a little bit in loading the back of my car and taking some of the junk that has been filling our garage up to the tip - all without using my walking stick, so things are improving.

We missed Kelly's Face Time call last night - pity. She did send us a photo of Miller at a wedding:

Cute, eh?

Tomorrow, our new windows and doors get fitted, so it's going to be noisy and busy round here.

Friday update

Last night's dinner at the Marcliffe went OK. I was a bit late getting out, but, no matter, my chauffeuse was late arriving to pick me up anyway, having spent a good part of the evening chatting on the phone to her sister. Incidentally, they have agreed that Mary and Brian will be bringing Julie's & Guy's boys up to Banchory on Sunday 29th December. I've yet to hear from my sister and her family when they are going to manage up, but it'll also be the week between Xmas & New Year.

Anyway, back to me and my knee - today hasn't been a good day. I've got some kind of bug and haven't eaten all day, and nor have I had much chance to do exercise. Hopefully better tomorrow.

We didn't manage to source ankle weights locally anywhere so we'll have to cast our net a bit wider. Jo's rigged up a temporary fixture which will do for now.

Watched the last hour of the Test Match from Adelaide this morning - looked lovely - wished I was there!

Belated blog

Yesterday may have been the first time I didn't do a daily knee update - I guess I was just too busy.

By the time we did our usual morning routine, it was virtually time for us to head in to Aberdeen - Jo was swimming at Westhill and I was popping in to the office for a couple of hours. We didn't get home until nearly 4 pm - just enough time to do my exercises and then head off on the long walk up the hill to the Legion, where I'd arranged to meet Keith Gray and Richard Simcox for a rare beer.

I managed the walk OK, but struggled with the beer - just a pint and a half, but it was a bit too much. I guess I'm out of practice. I got a lift back home from Archie Cook, who was also in the Legion with Jas Bhagrath.

We had supper and then headed for bed, preceded by the usual exercises and massages. I couldn't get to sleep afterwards - I was up and down, sitting on the side of the bed and considering going downstairs - sleep seemed impossible. I must have drifted off eventually, because it was soon 6 am and I needed to get up to have my meds and do my exercises before my 8:40 am Physiotherapy appointment.

It was a stormy start to the day. The forecasters had been warning us about high winds and they were right - we thought the trees were coming down. The power flashed off and on a few times and Jo searched around for candles in preparation for a difficult day, but, after an hour or so, it seemed to calm down again and we were able to inspect the damage. In Arbor Court, all we had lost was a large branch off one of the trees:

Jo was concerned it might partially obstruct the exit to the main road or perhaps scratch her car as she went out, so she took great delight in getting her "loppers" out and trimming it a little.

I was a bit concerned that I would get a telling off from the Physio as I felt I hadn't made enough progress since I had last seen her, but that was far from the case. She got her knee "protractor" out and measured the angle of bend, which was now 90 degrees - 5 degrees more than on my last visit. Then she checked my walking and told me I could now ditch one of the walking sticks. She gave me a new set of exercises, some strength related and some balance, and suggested we buy ankle weights (they didn't have any spare to give us) to help build up the muscles. She also told me that I should be able to drive again in a couple of weeks and that I should experiment in a quiet area first of all.

So that was all good, wasn't it?

Since then, I've been along to Tease for a coffee with Dick Taylor and Les Gray and Jo's been out to Cults for lunch. Tonight, I've got a Bank dinner at the Marcliffe to attend - as long as it stays calm and Jo feels confident in taking me there and picking me up. We've had some snowy, sleety flurries today, but they haven't really come to much - I suspect the main danger will be ice. Here's what it looks like outside just now - just before 4 pm:

Tuesday breakthrough

So far, so good. I managed the night on just one Tramadol and I took just one again this morning and still managed all my exercises OK. I didn't even need a chaperone when I walked to the shops to get my paper this morning.

The big test was the exercise bike and my first attempt this morning was moderately successful - I was able to get a full turn, although it was a bit staccato with a decided stop at the top, plus a definite move of the right hip. This afternoon, I tried again:

It's still not right, but I decided to risk taking a short video to show you where I'm at:

Not great, I know - but definitely a step forward!

Monday - week 5 begins

Yes, it's 4 weeks today since I got out of hospital - and still the progress is very slow. I was struggling a bit last night before I went to bed - my leg seemed to be unusually sensitive. Nonetheless, I decided to cut back on the meds a bit again today - just one Tramadol this morning, plus 2 Paracetamol, and hopefully the same again tonight, but nothing in between.

I coped with all the usual exercises today but was disappointed to again fail on the static bike - I had really hoped I would be able to do it properly today.

I've done my usual morning stroll down to the shops. Same again tomorrow probably, although Luca will be over in the afternoon again. On Wednesday, I'm heading in to the office for a couple of hours around lunchtime. What an exciting life I lead.

Sunday story

Full dose of meds first thing this morning, then breakfast and exercises, followed by massages, including some new ones around the collar bone and groin, designed to help drain my lymphatic system to help the excess fluid on my knee to move on - as instructed by Lucy to Jo.

While all this was going on, I was able to watch the final round of the Australian Open golf from Sydney. The Sunday Times had to be collected so I wandered down the village again and came back past the golf club, where a few of my pals were playing.

I got back to the house just in time. No sooner had I sat down then Luca appeared. Gary was doing a cross country 10K at Strachan and so he dropped Luca off, then headed for race registration. Ross was next to show his face - he'd come round to see the Thistle - Aberdeen match (we lost).

So it's been all go. Prompted by Gary, I did manage a few minutes downstairs with the exercise bike. I was (just) able to complete 4 or 5 very slow revolutions this time, so I guess that has to go down as mild progress. Hopefully better again tomorrow.

No major plans for this week - I will go in to the office once, but not sure when yet - will need to find out when Jo's available. I do have physio on Thursday morning and I've also got a dinner with the bank at the Marcliffe on Thursday evening.

That's all for today. Must try and get some photos on the next post, to help liven up this dry prose.