How many books can you carry with one hand?

If I had both hands, I would have everything moved out of the garage and put away by now.  I had the energy and motivation to do half of it yesterday!  (Oh gee it's good to be off the drugs!) As it was, there are two sets of empty shelves in the guest room which are not quite filled now, but getting close, and I walked miles carrying five books at a time in a hand basket out of the garage and into the guest room.  I'm going nuts here! 

I also found my Gray's Anatomy and looked up wrist joint under skelatal and ligaments.  Today, I'm gonna study the nerves and bloodvessels.  Knowledge is power, and even being able to name that knob at the side of my wrist (the subcutaneous presentation of the ulna) takes thing out of the scarey and puts them into the manageable.  Besides, I love saying words like metacarpal and synovial. 

Anyhow, the hospital sent me what was clearly a computer motivated pamphlet about taking care of your frail old female bones and how to protect yourself from falling, and it thoroughly pissed me off.  So now, if anyone asks how I broke it, I'm gonna say, "Skateboard on the half-pipe."  Bet the skateboard punks don't get pamphlets about being careful to sit down while you get dressed, and how you should install safety rails by the toilet to prevent accidents.  But there's probably some computer program that reads my chart, adds up female plus over 60, plus broken wrist, and automatically generates the osteoporosis packet.  Nothing like a good snit to get a lot of work done. 

And I slept really well last night.  No more drug-induced, hyper-reality, super sensually saturated dreams that leave me exhausted.  Just rest and rest and blessed rest.  Oh, I do love to sleep.

Today, I am going to walk a mile to the bank. Yay me!  And if a Starbucks chai break should happen midway, well hooray for that, too.

It's Wednesday!

And this photo of a statue is the only one I can get to upload.  It's at the Mt. St. Helen's Visitor Center, depicting the back-breaking labor of the early gold-miners in the area.

I have better keesters of genuine live males, and as near as I can figure, Blogger won't let me load them.  It couldm't be sumting that I'm doing wrong, coulld it?

We did not go to Venice beach when we were in the neighborhood, so I'll never know how the asswatching is there, though I've heard good reports.  Wonder if plastic surgery is ever used to enhance? 

Have you gotten any good photos lately?

post-walkies

Before

and after.  I just couldn't manage it all one-handed.  And if this is still too much, I will  have more whacked off.

Oh gee it WAS purty, wasn't it?  Oh well - it grows.

Of all thethings I've lost,

I think I missed my mind the most.  It has taken me a week to figure how to load this picture,  even though it isn't a very good one.  The hand to the right, miscolored and limp, is two weeks past breakage.  See where they had to cut off my wedding ring?  And how about that green tinge of fading bruise across the back?  It will be  10 days before I get to see my tender flesh again, and then there'll be scars and incisions and stuff.  Do you want advance notice when that gets posyed?

It's so grand to be firing on all cylinders again.  My brain is my favorite toy and it's SO nice to have it returned to action!  One handed typing is a PITA but I'm building muscles every day!

And, since I can leave the house with reasonable confidence that I will find my way back, I am taking myself out for a walk.  Yeah, it's raining.  So?  Walkies!!

This is stupid

I was standing in  a lovely meadow having a violent argument with a tall blonde woman over whether Mary wore that blue chiffon thing to the party or if she had on that white lace tent.  And I finally concluded, "You're a cow and I  never liked you and it's stupid for you to be standing here arguing with me because you're in EGYPT!  Or - or -maybe  I'm in Egypt. Be that as it may, it's idiotic for you to keep on arguing with me!" 

And I'm not even sure I was dreaming. 

Really, the pain is prefrrable to the Oxycodone.

Snivel

This is hurty and I want to quit nw.
My surgeon was Dr. Schweitzer.
I'm supposed to take 2 oxycodone every four hours.  I'm taking one every2 hours, figuring I'm getting the sam milligrams, but with less rise and fall.
They used a breathing tube an me and my neck and shulders are sooo stiff.
On the other hand (heh heh)  it's a sunny day and the kitties are being very kind to me.

a gorgeous day

Some pictures from the trip to Mt. St Helens.  This is the Toutle river valley which 30 years ago was a wasteland of mud and ash.  There are now vigorous forests of red alder and doug fir just a couple years from harvest.







This has been a long, cold spring, and there was stil snow at the Johnson Ridge Observatory.  The day before summer starts.  The So.Cal lads needed their picture taken with snow in June.

Handsome  - eh?

Today, we drove down the Columbia River Gorge.  It's scenic in crappy weather, but today was stunning.

 See the buikding on the promotory to the right here?  It looks sort of like a grey cherry on the cupcake?

 Here it is close up.  This is the Vista Huse at Crown Point, built nearly 100 years ago. 

Here are my three handsome escorts again.

 Then we drove down off the rim of the Gorge and began enjoying waterfalls. 

And more waterfalls.  This is Bridal Veil Falls.  We took the trail down 1/3 of a mile to view it.  Somehoe, the easy stroll down became a punishment march about 50 miles long on the way up.  Subjective time and distance is so unpredictable.

I like this shot I caught of the brothers.

We went to Bonneville dam and took the test to become junior rangers in the construction corps.   We counted fish climbing the ladders, and we went to the hatchery and saw the sturgeon.  Photos do not do them justice.  The look like some plated escapee from the Paleolithic, and the big ones at the hatchery were about 8 feet long!

When we got back I had a follow-up visit at the fracture clinic.  I am giving myself flowers here to cheer myself up.  Looks like I have to have surgery after all.  Thursday I get a plate and screws in my wrist. Oh sigh.  At least it's my left hand, I'm not pregnant, and no one is shooting at me.  Life could  be a hell of a lot worse.

God, it's good to be home!

 It's been quite a while since I've been to a highschool graduation.  This one was held in a covered equestrian pavilion, open to the breezes.  There were only 200 or so graduates in this highschool.  The most important one is under the mortarboard centered under the balloon arch.  I got a shot of the back of his head as they were processing in.  The school had armed security guards who spent most of their time asking people not to stand in front of the people sitting in the bleachers, even if they DID get better pictures of their kids that way.

Here is a profile of the man of the hour at a party held in his honor at a restaurant.  The happy face at the bottom of the photo belongs to his mom.  There are also a couple sisters, an uncle, and at a table by themselves, a slew of young nieces and nephews of his.  Lessee, my nephew's nephew is related to me how?  A second cousin twice removed?

Here is the father of the graduate with the youngest niece of the graduate.  The little cherub has grandpa firmly twined round her finger.

It was an education to me to watch life's rich pagent at this graduation.  Some families really dressed up, with pappa, grandpa, and all the uncles in suits, and nice dresses on all the ladies.  Other families looked like they had just come from a photo session for the people of WalMart.  White is lovely for summer.  Colored panties show through white skin-tight capris.  And, as DH remarked, it's nice to see that the plastic surgeons in So.Cal are still doing a booming business.  Real women don't have coconuts right under their collarbones.

We spent most of the rest of the weekend at a dead  run.  If we weren't spending time with family, we were on the way to or from spending time with family.  And occasionally we returned to our hotel room to fall down and sleep.  But it was a good trip, and all the visiting was quite enjoyable.

On Sunday we were joined by Father of the graduate and the graduate, (henceforth to be refered to as FotG, and G) and flew back up to Portland.  Again, the security people wanded my cast, and this time, they also scanned it. Hey, the have the little x-ray thingy.  They may as well use it. FotG has pins and plates and got a careful pat-down, but the TSA people were very polite and professional, and by the time DH and G had gotten their shoes on, we were done. I never felt my privacy invaded in the least.

The flight was awesome.  Clear and smooth.  And OMG it's good to be home!   The cats are pissed at us and will not forgive us till a few meals have been delivered.  And our guests keep remarking on how green it is.

the sound of one hand washing

So we got up dark and early on Wednesday and drove to the airport.They ran a bomb detector over my cast ,  gave me a very discrete pat down, and then we got on the plane for LA to watch the family Eagle Scout graduate from high school. The airline temporarily misplaced our suitcase.  The  rental car place turned out to be down a narrow alley (it only looked scarey from the back.  Very spiffy in front.)  We got a bit lost on the way to the hotel, but figured everything out in time.  And everywhere I had to use the restroom, I had to struggle through the whole process one-handed.  Thank /god for elastic waist trousers.  I would leave everything with DH and go stand in the line (Ladies' rooms always have a line.) And when I was done, I got to go through the process of washing one hand, using that very same hand.  By that time, DH, though heroically patient, would be wondering if I had been mugged.

No time to blog.  More detail, and phots later

It's a cast of experts

Today I went to the cast and fracture clinic for the next step in the process.  The nice young doctor showed me my x-rays, explained in a bit more detail what had happened, and remarked on the good fit of my splint.  I told him it was Adrian's last cast and he was so impressed that he decided to leave it in place for seven more days.  Then I go in for x-rays and cast replacement.

It was an amusing afternoon.  When I arrived, the receptionist remarked on my name and the song that features it. ("Roxanne - you don't have to put on the red light.") "But you've probably heard that already," she remarked, and had the grace to look a bit chagrined.  I said, "If I had a dollar for every man who has screamed that song at me, I could buy a limo and run over the bastards."  She found that very amusing.

Then as I was leaving, the doc told me a joke.
Q. What is a double blind study?
A Two osteopaths trying to read an EKG.

My last day at work, I hadn't managed to pull together a lunch, so when the young man sharing my shift decided to go for coffee, I gave him all the money in my wallet, which was $3, and asked him to get me something for lunch.

"What are you in the mood for?" he asked.

"Hot sex on a waterbed, but just get me a sandwich or something."  I told him. 

He just about blushed to death.  When he came back (with a Cliff bar and an apple) I apologized for being completely out of line and he told me he thought it was hysterical. Good lad!

All my knitting will be done internally

Yes, it was a simple, clean break requiring no surgery or or extra treatment.  Judi is right - it's a sugar tong cast, though I rather like the sound of sugar tongue . . .  The drugs are little and mild because I'm a pansyass.  A Tylenol 3 with codeine tips me straight into unconsciousness.  The doc offered Vicodin but DH figured I'd sleep 24/7 with big drugs.  We have major furniture moved in thanks to MJ's son and husband who helped.  I did useful stuff like stay the hell out of the way.  Now trying to find the boxes I packed the desk contents.  Wednesday, we fly off to LA for four days.  Keeping the cast dry is easy in the bath tub.  And DH is getting very deft at fastening my bra for me.  I'm learning how to do many things one-handed.  Thank God my dominant hand is uninjured!

"Yes I fell, but I meant to do that!"

Hugs and love and great round gratitude to all for your good wishes, prayers and healing vibes.  It helps!

Adrian's last cast

Adrian is not a fisherman.  We are not talking about fly casting here.  Nor is Adrian a theatre producer or director.  Adrian is a fit, trim 60 plus fellow with shiny grey hair and a slight bald spot, and with sparkling Norwegian blue eyes.  He is  a med tech working in the splint and cast department of the local hospital.  Or rather I should say, he was.  Yesterday was his last day at work.  And at 4:45, just before he was ready to leave, one of the triage doctors sent in his last patient.

Yup.  I broke my left wrist.  It's a distal radius fracture and I have what I think is called a sugar tongue cast to prevent rotating my wrist. 


DH and I were moving furniture back into the house.  I was backing up with my end of a piece of the bed, and missed my footing at the edge of the porch.  I fell backward and threw out my left hand to break my fall.  I heard the break and wouldn't believe it.  DH let me sit, getting my breath back while he continued moving our beds into the house.  My wrist didn't actually hurt all that much, but every time I looked at it or moved it, I wanted to throw up.  After about 20 minutes, I asked to be taken to the hospital.

So, after someone gets my hospital ID card and checks it against my driver's license, and asks me to tell them my address which is consistent with all the paperwork the have in front of them, Why do the repeatedly ask my birthday?  The only thing I can figure is that I am too fucking old to be moving furniture.

Anyhow, I was in pain and knew I would not be able to complete the move.  I made a significant mistake.  I could not imagine how DH could possibly move the rest of the bed in unaided, so I called a friend (MJ) with teen sons and begged help.  This mortally offended DH.  OK.  Cancell the distress call.  Apologize to MJ.  Apologize to DH.  If he says he can do it unaided, then I trust him. (while praying he won't throw out his back or overstress hip or shoulder.)  He did it!  We got beds in and up, and then he moved several other sizable pieces of furniture as well. (So there!)  I had to have him help me undress and cover my cast so I could take a bath.  Then I took the Tylenol 3 with codeine, and went to bed.  Today, his shoulder is giving him trouble, but he did, by God, get the bed set up and some chairs brought in.

Today is Knitting at Tamara's house.  I can drive, but I can't knit.  I can't knit?  NO.  I won't think about that.  I'll figure something out.  I won't consider the possibility of 6 weeks without knitting.  NO!

Ass-watch Wednesday

 

Otis elevator maintenance man.  Please insert all obvious puns about getting up in the world, getting the shaft, etc.  He was pretty darn scenic for a silverside.(gray temples)

My Publisher just told me that we have sold enough copies of Sanna, Sorceress Apprentice to make it worth our while to put out Sanna and the Dragons!  Woohoo!  Thank you, thank you, you darling friends!!  Now I have to hammer down on the rewrite.  I have over 500 exclamation points in the book and they will accept no more than 100.  But - but - I LOVE my excalamation points!  How can I excise 400 of them?  Agony!!!

Well, ya gotta do what ya gottta do.  sigh.

Life in the Mariot Residence Inn continues.  The kitties are getting used to the new place.  Every day I rejoice in the comfort and beauty of our suite.  There are trees all over and even though it's right next to the train tracks and the freeway, there is no noise or stink.  I'll get photos today.  Today, by the by, is going to be sunny!  Woohooo! 

I'm working a 9 hour day today.  Then Friday will be five hours and I will pack my traps and drift away.  I've been making more really stupid mistakes lately, and I came to the conclusion that I was doing more harm than good.  So I will be leaving the work force a few years early.  Maybe I'll find something else.  Maybe I'll just work harder on the writing.  Maybe a comet will hit the earth tonight.  Life is uncertain.  Eat desert first.

I have loved the job in the testing center, and taken a lot of pride in good service and being able to make things easier for folks with test anxiety.  It's great fun to see all the young people and watch their progress through the years, but really, it's time I moved on.  I don't know who they will get to take GED tests to the jail, though.  Everyone else is so nervous about the thought.  We shall see.

Sleep is good

DH and I walked over to the nearby grocery store to pick up some supplies for his lunches.  This is a fascinating neighborhood, quite gentrified, vibrant, and a bit quirky.  Huge old homes turned into multiple apartments, lots and lots of neat restaurants, boutiques and specialty shops, Huge, wel-established trees shading the narrow side streets and cherished gardens or exquisitely landscapped public green spaces.  It was a dry, cloudy afternoon and we strolled and chatted in quite leisurely fashion.  We took the food back to the room, rested for a few minutes, then drove to the Broadway Grill and Brewery where we had a delicious meal.  He had the reuben sandwich, and I had a grilled shrimp Caesar salad.  I found the Pinochle Ale  a bit too bitter, but I managed to force it down anyhow. :)

Then back to the room.  The kitties came out from under the beds and joined us on the big bed upstairs for a little tv watching, then we went quite early to sleep.  Oh, sleep is good.  The kitties were much less nervous.  The big bed upstairs was a much better fit.  And we slept and slept and slept without interruption untill the alarm went off at 4:45 this morning.  It felt so good!

Today is a day off for me, so I will be writing.  It should be a productive day.

disrelocations

I was wrong about the name of the place we're staying.  It's the Mariot Residency Inn, and yes, they let us have the kitties with us.  The kitties hate it.  Ben and Pepper traveled together in one carrier and refused to come out for three hours.  DH got a great picture of these two resentful fur faces glaring out at him.  Candy slunk under the bed and is still there.  I hope she slipped out during the night to use the box.  Otherwise, she's gonna explode.  Fly heard the sound of food when we came home with burgers, and greed overcame anxiety.  There's a nice little kitchenette in the place, but we were just too pooped to think about cooking.

DH spent most of the evening playing with his new I-Phone.  I went early to bed.  As soon as he came to bed and turned out the lights, nervous kitties oozed up onto the bed with us.  Why do they all want to sleep on me?  One between my knees, one wrapped around my head, one on my chest, and one tucked against my side made it well-nigh impossible to roll over.  It WAS nice and warm, though.  This morning, after DH left, Ben got to feeling much bolder and explored.  There is a two bedroom unit with a double bed downstairs (where we slept to keep the kitties company) and a king bed in the loft bedroom upstairs.  I heard Ben exclaiming excitedly from upstairs and looked up to see him peering down from the halfwall wayyy above my head.  Wish I could have grabbed my camera in time.  He was much amazed. (Our house is a ranch with 9 ft ceilings.  He has never had a chance to be taller than me before.  Stairs were quite wonderful to him as well.)

As for the knitting, I finished a scarf done in silk and rayon.

And I am using the end of the silk and rayon yarn, along with a strand of fingering weight alpacca to knit a gray hat for a re-found niece.  When Mom passed away, the bank got in touch with three of my nieces I haven't heard from in years.  It's nice to start getting reacquainted.

And then there is an enormous bag of odds and bobs that are waiting to be transformed into hats for the orphans.  I have a LOT of writing to work on, though, so the knitting will mostly languish.

I'll be enjoying complementary breakfasts for the next four mornings.  They offer steam-table scrambled eggs and various interesting variations on the bacon and potatoes themes.  There are boiled eggs available, and you can make your own waffles. I went for the granola with yogurt.  Yum!! Tomorrow, I may go crazy and add strawberry jam.

DH has to be at work about the time the breakfast bar opens, so no freebies for him.  I might grab an orange or a banana for him, though.

We spent an interesting 20 minutes last night comparing bruises.  I have more, but he has a huge red and black contusion across the top of his wrist where his watchband damaged him, so he has the best one of the bunch.  I am lucky enough to have found a man who is willing to let his inner 6 year old out to play with my inner six year old.  Surely I am among the most fortunate of women!

oh, check this out!

God bless Rose!  http://poetrose24.blogspot.com/2011/06/i-present-to-you-roxanna-matthews.html

Staycation

Moved furniture into the pod all day yesterday. So wonderful to have a man who knows how to do this! ( I'm SOO flabby! Need to do something to build up the knee muscles and the core.) Today, we pack out the bed and the TV, and move to the Embassy Suite for a week while the floors get refinished. Last night, I slept like I had been shot and stuffed!  DH is still asleep at 9AM

He got a new phone last night - an I-Phone.  He is so happy with it!  He was sitting up in bed last night, playing with it, and chuckling with delight.  A phone, camera, computer and flashlight all in one.  Ah - Mazing!!  How wonderful to have lived long enough to see this!

yayyy!

The book signing was a success!  In the first place, Melissa of Make One is a jewel of the first water, and made the whole event delightful.  In the second place, the weather was warm and glorious, and people were out and just walking around.  In the third place, Many, many of my friends stopped by, said hi, and several even bought books, which is love and support above and beyond the call of duty!!  And I even sold books to people who don't even know me!!  It was fun beyond my wildest dreams.

Moreover, Melissa has four sons at home, so the cookies I brought in will not go to waste. (I bought them from Costco.  People get hinkey about home-made cookies at a public event.)

Today, DH and I will be moving furniture into the POD and preparing to move ourselves to the Embassy Suites with the kitties for a week while the floors are refinished.  If we ere going on vacation, I would have packed a well-co-ordinated wardrobe at least a week ago with shoes and accessories selected and organized for easy access.  Tomorrow we'll be away from home for a week, and I haven't the faintest idea of what I'll wear.  Organizing the furniture - shoving just any clothes just any old way into a suitcase.  Don't be surprised if you see me wearing one navy shoe and one black shoe this week.  That will be exactly what I packed.

satyr's dance

What to knit at the book signing?  I have finished my "portable" knitting project - a triangle scarf knit from Dave Daniels' wonderful hand dyed and handspun yarn, Satyr's Dance.  The colors aren't accurate her,but even approximately, you can see how glorious it is!  Just the thing to zing up a basic black.

And I owe you guys!  I sold twenty books on line. Book number two, Sanna and the Dragons, is a lock!  Wahoo!  We hope to bring it out in July.

But what to knit at the book signing?  The old paperbacks I am selling off have the pattern for the self-heating mittens.  Maybe I should go with them.  In red, black and grey.  Sophisticated and classy.  /yeah - I'll go for it.

Reading and signing

On Friday, June 3, from 4 till 8,  I will be at

Make One  (a wonderful yarn store)
10558 SE Main ST
Milwaukie, Or

Reading and autographing  my first book, Sanna, Sorceress Apprentice. 

I am so excited I could just squeee!!