navigation
good reads
internet stuff
- evolt is the best web community out there.
- listen to joel. he knows.
- Cluetrain Manifesto
- A List Apart
- Ask Tog
- Making a Commercial Case for Adopting Web Standards
08/19/2003 Archived Entry: "Calamity Tara"
So I'm catching up... I've had a fairly eventful couple of weeks.
I woke up the morning after I returned from the UK to an empty fridge (of course). Craving my daily dose of Cheerios and my morning cup of tea, I decided to walk to the grocery store on the corner. On my way back, carrying the groceries, I ran for the traffic light (it seems to take at least 5 minutes to change). I tripped and fell.
I ended up with a knee and palm scraped up and embedded with gravel. My knee was swelling and I had a very sore wrist. A kind man helped me home with my groceries. I cleaned out as much of the gravel as I could and lay on the couch with an ice pack on my knee and another on my wrist. My knee started to improve, but my wrist just seemed to hurt more and more. Sabrina, who is oh so sensible, told me I had to go to the doctor.
I made an appointment and traipsed down to Mt. Sinai Hospital. Went through the SARS screening process. And finally saw a doctor who poked and prodded at various parts of my hand and wrist until she hit the spot that made me scream in agony. "You may have a fractured scaphoid." she said, "You'll have to have x-rays and get a scaphoid splint. If it's fractured you'll have to come back tomorrow for a cast. The ER sells the splints but you may also be able to get one at a pharmacy". I got my x-rays and left the main part of the hospital, walked around the building, into the ER, going through the whole SARS screening thing once again - only this time I had to wear a mask. 
I plonked myself down at the triage nurse's desk and explained that all I wanted was to buy a scaphoid splint. "Oh no", she says "you'll have to register into the ER and wait for a doctor to see you before you can get one of those" BLAH! Not another 5 hours of waiting around! So I called a bunch of pharmacies - none of them had the right kind of splint - and then resigned myself to a lengthy wait. I was sure that my wrist was just sprained. After about 3 hours a doctor finally dropped in, poked my wrist so that I screamed in agony again, called up my x-rays on the computer and declared my wrist fractured. He then proceeded to slap on the worst cast I've ever seen.
When I finally went back for a proper cast at the fracture clinic both doctors marvelled at how awful the cast was. It was about 3 inches too short, it had crumbled at my thumb (I'd had to tape my thumb so that it was properly immobilized) the edges were all rough and I was starting to get nasty eczema from the plaster rubbing against my fingers. Not good. But now I have a fabulous baby blue fibreglass cast that is much lighter and nicer on my skin. I'm still typing with one and a half hands though.
I got some lovely flowers from my Mom and Dad and some other lovely flowers from Dunstan.
I'm slowly recovering. I can't really use my right hand (luckily I'm left handed). My knee got infected, but it's almost better now. I'm a lot less irritated by my injuries then I was in the first week. The doctors said I'll have to wear a cast for at least another 6 weeks, but more likely another 3 months. If the bone doesn't heal properly by then, I'll have to have surgery - but I'm trying not to think of that. Apparently there's a risk I'll get arthritis in my wrist, which would suck. I'll never run for another traffic light again.
PS. To rudy. Sorry, I didn't come up with a better story about how it got broken. I'm terrible at lying and I can't tell a fake story without laughing. I thought about using your "swinging on the chandeliers" story... but it's not very plausible. I have had about 5 people tell me I should kick my husband next time instead of punching him. That seems to be the most popular theory of how I broke my wrist :-)
Okay my arm is tired. I'll write up my account of Blackout 2003 later this afternoon.