Category: Pandemic

1 September 2020

Ants in my pants! Or at least invading my house.  Two or three times a year, there doesn’t seem to be any rhyme or reason, I get an infestation of ants.  What some people call sugar ants.  Over the years, I’ve tried four different myrmecids (ant killers) and none have proved effective.  Not even those sworn to by other people who use them.  I get the most attraction of ants to the poison with Terro Ant Killer.  It’s a syrupy concoction they love.  In theory, the workers supposedly take it back to the queen and it kills the queen.  Good luck with that.  I think they love the stuff and just keep coming back for more.

E. O. Wilson is considered by many to be the world’s foremost authority on ants.  At a cocktail  party  one night, the hostess introduced him to a rather rich patron.  When she found out his credentials, she stated she had an ant problem and what should she do?  He said “study them.”  Not quite the response she was hoping for.  

I seem to have at least two species in my kitchen.  Actually, in my house.  The little buggers don’t restrict themselves to the kitchen.  I’ve been sitting on the sofa in the living room and have them crawl across my shoulder.  I’ve found them in the bedroom, crawling across my computer screen, and even around the medicine cabinet.  There is one “normal” size sugar ant and then there is the really tiny, tiny, tiny ant that you think your eyes are playing tricks on you when you look at the kitchen counter and you think the pattern is moving on you.

I’ve traced several major trails throughout the kitchen and dining room.  In the photos, you see arrows showing the major flow of traffic but, of course, they go both ways along those trails.

One of the things I find floating in the pool every day is dead honey bees.  I suspect they dip down to get some water, miscalculate and crash land in the water and drown.  I’ve gotten in the habit of picking the bees out of the water and placing them on the pool deck near the edge of the pool.  I swim my laps and in between laps, I keep an eye on the dead bee.  I’m amazed at how quickly at least two species of ants find the bee.  As I swim and rest between laps, I keep checking on the bee and before you know it, the bee is aswarm (appropriate term for bees) with ants pulling and tugging, seemingly in no apparent pattern.  The ants even climb on the body, wings and antennae when others are trying to move the bee.

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A bit of digression here.  One year at Boy Scout camp, our troop entered the rowboat race.  None of us had really rowed before.  We put the requisite 6 Boy Scouts in the boat and each had a canoe paddle – not an oar.  We came in last.  There was absolutely no coordination with the paddles and in essence we stayed in the same location and basically did circles in the water instead of a straight line.  By the way, I did eventually earn the rowing merit badge.

My point for the digression is, as the ants begin tugging at the corpse, the bee seems to be like us in the rowboat.  All the ants are pulling in different directions and for a while, the bee simply rotates in place.  

However, by the time I have finished my swim, some ant takes charge (not really) and they all begin to pull and push in one direction.  Pretty soon the bee, which dwarfs the ants, begins to inch in one direction.  By the time I get out of the pool and do a fresh water wash off of chlorine, the bee is now headed to the nest at a pretty fast clip.  I’ve seen them move a bee 10 feet in quite a short time.  What’s really interesting is the direction.  My ants seem to always head west, down my patio, towards the tool shed and garbage cans on the west wall.  

Now you might assume I must be totally bored to be watching ants cart off a carcass.  Well, we are in the middle of a pandemic, for god’s sake!  However, I would be lying to you if I didn’t tell you it’s fascinating to watch them.  

Speaking of the pandemic, Florida had 1,885 new cases with 68 new deaths and total of 631,040 cases since the onset of the pandemic.  Broward had 171 new cases and 1 new death with a total of 71,121 cases since the onset. Yes, the infection rate is going down but is still too high.

When I last checked Ole Miss’ site for cases, they had 199 cases with 191 of those as students, 7 staff, and 1 faculty.  Campus program had 3 and on-campus housing had 11.  

Today’s totals re 290 confirmed cases, 280 of those student, 9 staff, and still only 1 faculty.  Campus programs has 4 and student housing has 16.  From these data I conclude the faculty are staying home and only doing zoom! I’m not sure Ole Miss should be hosting students on campus.

This is the second day in a row I’ve done my yoga and swimming.  I didn’t do my walk this morning because I had a blood draw at 7:30 am.  This after 3 hours of sleep.  I waked at 2:30 am, read for a while and finally got out of bed around 4:30 am.  The worst part was my blood draw was fasting and I couldn’t even have my morning coffee.  

Stay tuned and stay safe!

31 August 2020

Two days in a row of early morning back pain and testicular pain after getting out of bed. Why in the morning I don’t know. Usually, by noon or early afternoon, it moderates to the point I don’t think about it. Still on the sulfa drug. Wasn’t it Bette Davis who said “Get ready for a bumpy ride?”

No show on the construction team (father and son). However, late this afternoon I got a call from the Citizens representative who wants to stop in Wednesday and see what the progress is. He also said everything has been ordered and confirmed it would be 6-8 weeks before the upper cabinets are installed.

I decided today to not wait on the construction guys. I did my 2 mile walk and then did yoga stretches and swam laps in the pool. That’s the first time I’ve done that since construction began in the kitchen. I felt loss at not being able to do that. Good thing I went ahead since they didn’t show.

When I did swim my laps, I was pleased to note my right arm was not giving me any problems. Every so often, I over do things with my arm and it reminds me I had surgery on it. Mostly, it seems to be where the tendon meets the biceps muscle towards the elbow. It’s not extreme pain – just enough to let you know you over did it. I suspect I’ll be feeling effects of this for another year but today was great with the workout I did in the pool.

I’m beginning to worry about my palm trees. First the coconut palm in front died and now the huge Bismarckia is looking a little ill. It that thing dies, it’ll cost a fortune to have it removed. It’s a beautiful palm and provides a great deal of shade. The fronds are huge! I would estimate they are around 8-10 feet in length and quite heavy. If one were to fall and hit you, it would be curtains.

Although the state of Florida reports decreases in the number of Covid cases, the number of new cases keeps going. For 31 August, Florida reported 621,586 cases of the virus with 2, 583 of those as new. There are now 11,263 total deaths in the state of Florida.

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For Broward, the number of cases is 70,950 with 186 new cases and 1,183 dead from the virus. The idea Trump floated that only 9,000 people have died from the virus is ludicrous. Yes, there are many underlying causes for the virus such as diabetes and heart disease and obesity. Sometimes these are entered on death certificates instead of Covid yet it was the virus that actually killed them.

It reminds me of the AIDS epidemic, particularly in the early stages where parents were so ashamed their child died of AIDS they asked the doctor to list the cause of death as something different. There really is no way to tell the number of people who died with AIDS in the United States because of false death certificates.

The same can be said for the number of deaths in the Great San Francisco Earthquake of 1906. It’s suggested that the number of recorded deaths may be only a fraction of the real number.

What’s the old saying? There are three types of lies: lies, damned lies, and statistics. I worry that we are turning out generations of young people that no idea how to question what they read or see on the internet. Today, any asshole can have an opinion and publish it on the web. I tried my best to explain that some sources are not reputable and some are and some fall somewhere in between. I admit I wasn’t taught how to discern this in my schooling but somewhere along the line, I figured it out before I went to college.

I remember writing a college paper in history on Pago Pago in Samoa. The professor was irate I had written Pango Pango. I was stunned that I got a C on the paper and that was basically the only criticism. The reason I wrote Pango Pango is (1) that’s how the Samoans pronounce it and (2) that was how most of the journals I used as reference spelled it. I had used very reputable journals. The only problem, my paper was an historical paper and I used very old references where the spelling was Pango Pango. Liver and learn!

It was like that all through my college experience. I remember in graduate school one of my buddies dissertations was returned to him because he used the term “ascertained.” His major professor returned it to him and said only God can ascertain.

Stay tuned and stay safe!

29 August 2020

Yesterday, I was barely able to stand up erect for most of the morning. I dreaded waking this morning and experiencing the same. Wonder of wonders, I got up with very little back pain and was able to stand erect first thing. I don’t know if it was the medication kicking in or if it was something else. Let’s just say I’m very grateful!

I still did not do a complete walk this morning but it was more from stopping and talking to neighbors along the way. I got into two long conversations at different points along my walk and decided it was getting too hot and turned for home.

It’s been a fairly quiet Saturday. I cleaned the pool filter, adjusted chemicals to the pool, and then began my housecleaning and washing. I really don’t do much cleaning except vacuum the floor, do light dusting, clean the bathroom, and today I mopped the new wood floor. I typically do more than that on Saturdays but really, there is no need to get too involved with it until they finish construction in the kitchen. There’s dust everywhere – walls, books, shelves, and me. I could do a deep cleaning now but I would have to redo it in 6-8 weeks when the upper cabinets come in. As you might guess, the construction crew, scheduled for yesterday morning, never showed up.

For those of you who have Acorn TV, let me recommend Dr. Foster. It was recommended to me by Stephen, my cousin-in-law and I enjoyed the series. There are two seasons. Dr. Foster is a physician in a town out from London and you get lots of drama, sexual tension, and emotional roller coaster rides with this one. Try it out.

The Sun-Sentinel reported this morning that the number of cases in Florida continues to drop (but then a web site reported that the number of cases increased from yesterday). It’s gotten to where you cannot trust the data provided by the state, CDC Atlanta nor the FDA. How did we get to this point?

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In any case, in Florida, according to The Sun-Sentinel there are 615,806 cases as of today, 3,815 are new cases and 10,957 people have died from the virus. In Broward, there are 70,513 cases, with 366 new and 1, 175 dead. From what I learned on the telly, Mississippi has been relieved of its top spot in the country for per capita cases. Iowa now claims that dubious distinction. However, Mississippi is still number 2.

If you and I are friends on Facebook, you know that I have posted several photos of me during my days in the Coast Guard. That was at the urging of one of my shipmates. There are about 4 of us who maintain contact via Facebook. That got me to thinking about some of the other photos I have from my family. We are a well documented family with photos going back to the early 40’s. Cameras were still pretty rare back then – at least in Mississippi.

One particular photo caught my attention. It shows some people walking, and the tall figure in the photo is in military uniform and the other people are obviously not in military uniform. I didn’t think anything of it until I turned it over and read on the back, in my handwriting, that it was my Dad with Syngman Rhee, President of Korea. He was stationed in Korea during the Korean War and was a major with the Corps of Engineers. I can assure you I would not have put that on the back of the photo unless Dad specifically told me that was what the photo was.

I remember many years ago finding most of his WWII photos and Korean War photos and asking him to identify them for me. He never liked talking about either war but when prodded by me, he would talk. I didn’t do that too much because I quickly learned he often had nightmares after any of those conversations. It wasn’t fair to him.

Stay tuned and stay safe!

28 August 2020

Sorry for the lack of posts for the past two days. I haven’t been feeling up to par. It’s amazing how back pain can affect your whole well being. This morning, I didn’t even attempt my walk. It was all I could do to stand up semi-upright. As the day wore on, its better but not to the point I’ll be doing much today.

The doctor’s office called with the results of the urinalysis and everything was clear. That probably means my original diagnosis of prostatitis was correct. Again, I’m available for consultations. For a price.

Yesterday, the supervisor for the project came to the house and investigated why my dishwasher didn’t seem to drain. I always do better when I have 24 hours to analyze a problem. I slept on it and had a eureka moment. I pulled out the installation instructions from my filing cabinet and noticed it said there was a metal “knock out” blocking the intake from the garbage disposal. I figured I had either purchased a lemon dishwasher or since the construction guy installed the disposal first, he didn’t know to check for the knock out. Luckily, the supervisor found the knock out had not been removed and so no drainage was possible. It was a quick fix!

He also said the construction people would be out this morning to put on the drawer and cabinet pulls, change out the power cord on the dishwasher (another story) and to replace some baseboard in the kitchen. I’m still waiting as of 1:23 pm.

The power cord has been a nightmare. It was not included when I purchased the dishwasher and there was no mention on Lowes’ web site that I needed to purchase that separately. I was post haste sent to Lowes to purchase a power cord. When they went to plug in the dishwasher, the design on the cord is such that the head of the plug hangs down. When it did that, it blocked the plug for the disposal. The receptacle is hard wired specifically for the dish washer to be on the top and the disposal on the bottom. If you try to reverse the plugs, then the dishwasher would only turn on when you flipped the disposal switch and the disposal would never shut off.

We found a temporary solution by putting a 2 prong to 3 prong adaptor to the dishwasher plug. That allowed for the dishwasher plug to project past the disposal plug. That’s not the best solution. The adaptor is not grounded and you really don’t want to be running an electrical appliance that is not grounded.

I did run a load of dishes last night and everything worked well. It drained the dishwasher into the disposal and then down the sink. Hopefully, the construction guys can correct the system by attaching my new power cord that looks like a normal 3 prong plug. If they show up. At least the supervisor told me the new upper cabinets had been ordered. Now, for another 6-8 weeks to pass.

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The palm tree out front finally dropped the rest of the fronds in one big package. It only took me a short time with my electric chain saw to dispatch the mess and place in garden waste bin.

As far as the pandemic goes, Broward went from 69, 303 cases three days ago to 70, 147 today. Deaths went from 1,132 three days ago to 1, 195. The state of Florida has reported over 70,000 cases with over 11,000 deaths. Unfortunately, Mississippi still leads the nation in number of cases and deaths per capita.

At the University of Mississippi, they report a daily total of 199 cases with 191 of those as students, 7 staff and 1 faculty member. Of those totals, 3 are from campus programs and 11 are from student housing. However, there is no where in their report that there are 199 cases at Ole Miss from the onset of the virus or is 199 cases is the daily total and there are several hundred cases since the onset.

In my opinion, the real problem, scientifically, with this pandemic is no standardization of data. Mississippi reports it differently than Florida and both report it differently from several national reporting sites.

This is not over yet!

Stay tuned and stay safe!

Ah! Kitchen cabinets. The original cabinets probably dated to when the house was built, 1957. They were solid wood and painted white, and dated. In 2001, I decided to replace the cabinets and remodel the kitchen. A good friend, Rob Nathans, came up with the design and went with me to Home Depot for the final design.

I selected Kitchen Maid cabinets in natural maple. Back then, the purchase and installation price was $8,075. The cabinets worked wonderfully, looked great, and seemed to resist wear and tear – except for the pull out garbage bin. I’ve replaced the bin pull out three times.

Robert of Baxter Restoration went to Home Depot to see if they still had a record of my purchase. They did not. He then called Kitchen Maid and yes, they had the original order and measurements on file! He ordered a brand new set of lower cabinets.

It was a six to eight week delay because the cabinets were custom made. They arrived on 17 August. Robert wanted to come take a look at them. Boy were we surprised!

Apparently maple is notorious for changing color as it ages. At first, Robert and I thought Kitchen Maid had sent the wrong cabinets. That is, until we opened the inside of the cabinet and realized the piece of wood on the left matched the inside of the old cabinets. I can’t believe they discolored so much.

Baxter Restoration worked for three days tearing out the old cabinets and putting in the new ones (again cooling the city of Fort Lauderdale with my A/C). Tearing them out was a problem because of the design of the kitchen. Rob designed it in such a way that there was one table/counter top in one large piece for the western lower cabinets. Then there is the problem of the sink and plumbing for the eastern lower cabinets.

The plumbing was also problematic. It had been worked on numerous times and it had attachments for both the water for the refrigerator and water for the dishwasher.

In any case, they were able to get it all removed and install the new cabinets.

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If you look at the last photo, you’ll see one of the doors does not close all the way. Kitchen Maid miss-measured that one door. The good news is all the new cabinets come with soft close doors and drawers. The bad news is they did not include pull outs for the cabinets. That was a specific design request in the original cabinets. Rob insisted I get those. It allowed you to pull out a shelf so you could access anything in the back of the shelf. I told Robert (of Baxter) I insisted they correct that.

So, what are my choices for the color differential for the upper and lower cabinets. The company could try to refinish the uppers to look like the lowers. They could also stain the lowers to look like the uppers. Neither seems to be a good idea. The team putting in the cabinets told me they were really painters. They said they would have a very hard time refinishing the darker uppers to match the lighter lowers. Another problem with that is the discoloration penetrates into the wood and they would have to sand down too much material to get to the natural wood.

The other problem is matching the lowers to the uppers. They would have to sand down the varnish on perfectly new cabinets and attempt to match the stain. My contact with Citizens called yesterday and informed me that neither option was ideal and Citizens has decided to replace the upper cabinets to match the lower cabinets!

The one good thing that has happened with this whole mess is that all the cabinets will now be replaced. Of course, that means another 6 to 8 weeks while the uppers are built. Then I have to go through the tear out and re-installation of the new uppers. However, I can live with that.

Right now, I have kitchen materials scattered through the living room, utility room and my computer/bedroom. When I cook, I have to wander through three rooms to get what I need – utensils, spices, etc. I can live this way a little longer as long as they complete the job eventually – say Christmas?

I also insist on pull out shelves for the lower cabinets. Citizens has agreed. I have to admit Citizens has bent over backwards to try to make this as painless as possible. The Citizens representative checks in with me every two weeks (and often more frequently when the need arises). I wonder what my new rates will be come December?

My real concern is all these people in my house during a pandemic. They are good about masks and when stuff is delivered to the house, those people also wear masks. A new dishwasher came today to replace the old one and they were in and out quickly, but I keep getting exposed to more and more people. Even Baxter has had different people come out so it is not always the same team. I just keep my fingers crossed.

The saga continues!

Have you ever tried to wash dishes with a huge bandage from your upper arm to your fingers? Trust me, it doesn’t work. Thank goodness for dishwashers. Because of the surgery and lack of range of motion, I started to use the dishwasher more frequently. A lot more frequently. As in two and three times a day. It’s not that I dirty that many dishes but I really couldn’t do a very good job washing the few I had with one hand.

What I did not know was my dishwasher was malfunctioning. The water pump had failed and when the dishwasher emptied the water, it was not going into the drain but directly onto the floor behind the dishwasher. Think of doing that three times a day.

One day, I was walking from the bedroom to the kitchen and I noticed what looked like a dirty spot on my bamboo flooring. I got out a mop and tried to scrub it off and didn’t work. Later, I noticed that spot get larger and then it was to the point that it went from my bathroom all the way through the living room, to the entrance to the kitchen.

I later realized I had been pumping water up to three times a day for a month directly onto the floor which seeped from the kitchen into the living room. I called my plumbing company, Kyle Plumbing, and they sent someone out and they said it was a leak but didn’t look as though it was active. He didn’t have a moisture meter, so he couldn’t detect if there was any real moisture.

I then called another plumber that advertised they had the infrared device that could detect moisture as well as a moisture meter. They came out and said there was definitely moisture under the bamboo. He couldn’t find a leak so he called a buddy of his that was a public adjuster. He immediately came over and they pulled out the dishwasher and there was a huge area of mold and mildew and water behind the dishwasher.

My insurance company is Citizens. I had heard horror stories and several people suggested I needed a public adjuster. I called a public adjuster. I filed with Citizens and they coordinated with the public adjuster. Both the public adjuster and Citizens showed up. It was a little tense and I could tell there was an adversarial relationship going on between the two.

John Moore of Citizens was very, very thorough. He later sent a report to my public adjuster and eventually, I got to see the report. He estimated the damage at $24,000 and included complete replacement of the floor and replacement of all the lower cabinets in the kitchen. He also recommended refinishing all the upper cabinets to match the new lower cabinets. Citizens also would replace any damaged wall board up to two feet high both in the kitchen and the living room.

On one of my morning walks, I met two friends, both who had worked for insurance companies before they retired. They recommended I not use a public adjuster. They suggested a lawyer friend to call to determine if I could get out of my contract. She later informed me that it didn’t look possible.

I finally got the original report from the public adjuster and then I got the public adjusters report. They estimated the damages at $64k. They wanted me to sign with a notary that I agreed that was the true damages. I refused.

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My alternative was to pay 20% of the $24k to end the relationship with the public adjuster. Ouch! That was $4800 out of my savings account. What has happened is South Florida seems to be the capital for insurance fraud in the U.S. As a consequence, Citizens rewrote their policies to pretty much require you work through them and not public adjusters. If I didn’t use Citizens’ contractors, all Citizens would reimburse was $10k minus my deductible of $2500. If I used Citizens and their contractors, they would pay for the entire renovation minus my deductible of $2500. I chose Citizens and I’m glad I did.

Baxter Restoration was designated as my contractor for the job. They immediately sent someone out to start removing the floor. It was pretty nasty!

Baxter took about two days to remove all the flooring. It was quite a feat since they had to move furniture around and then replace the furniture in its original position. They also provided dehumidifiers and filters to remove water and mold spores.

As luck would have it, my flooring was of very good quality and was still available. Of course, it’s not as simple as that. When Robert of Baxter Restoration went to Home Depot (where I bought the flooring) he found out that Home Depot no longer carried it. (A piece of my flooring had to be sent off for independent analysis as to the quality.) Robert wasn’t one to give up. He called the company who manufactured the flooring. He was in luck. The last stock they had (it had been discontinued) had been returned. Robert purchased the entire remaining stock for me.

It took about four days to lay the new floor. Again with the moving of furniture. The original floor, and the replacement, are a floating floor. Only the bamboo strips are glued together. There is no nailing or gluing of the strip to the floor.

When the contractor got to the junction of the bamboo floor to the kitchen tile and the bamboo floor to the bathroom tile, there was an uneven transition. It was less pronounced in the kitchen tile and more pronounced in the bathroom. I thought that strange because there was a one to one match with the original floor. Later, I checked an old piece of the original bamboo flooring with the new flooring. The new flooring is 1/8 inch thicker than the older flooring. More for my money I guess.

I really felt sorry for the installers. They had to wear face masks. Honestly, they were pretty good about it. I only had to remind them once or twice. What they were not good at was closing doors behind themselves. I think my air condition cooled greater Fort Lauderdale by 3 degrees during the installation!

Now it is on to the kitchen cabinets! See next post.

For better or worse, I’m a creature of habit. On Fridays, for example, I rake leaves in the side yard, clean the pool filter, add chemicals to the pool, and then clean the pool. On Saturdays, I wash clothes and clean house. On Sundays, I mow the lawn.

It was lawn mowing day on 29 March that my routine was significantly changed and not just because of Covid-19. While mowing the east side of the lawn I knocked over a concrete bench. It was one of three scattered in the yard along with a round concrete picnic table – you know the type – typical 50’s Florida with the broken mismatched tile inlays on the table and benches.

I figured I could lift the bench back atop the supports. I had done that many, many times in the past because of hurricane prep. What I didn’t take into account was an event three weeks prior in readjusting the garage door. In pulling the garage door up as far as it would go, I got a severe, sharp pain in my right arm. But hey, that was three weeks ago. It hadn’t bothered me since last week.

I got the concrete bench about hip level and had only a few more inches to go when a searing pain in my right arm forced me to drop the bench. The pain drove me to my knees. It was the most intense pain I had experienced.

Monday, 31 March, I called my GP for an appointment. He was not accepting in-office appointments but when I described my situation, he said “Let’s cut to the chase. I have a friend I went to medical school with at Holy Cross Orthopedic. He’s not accepting in-office appointments either but I can get his office to schedule you a teleconference.”

Sure enough, his office called me later that day and I had my teleconference with Dr. Gosthe. He asked me to make a muscle with my right arm and immediately said I had torn my right biceps tendon. He indicated that if I were not very active, no surgery was required but if I were the least bit active he recommended surgery. I opted for surgery. I thought it would be him but he said no. He is a knee surgeon. He said he would get me an appointment with a colleague who did arms.

On 6 April, I met Dr. Wodicka at Holy Cross Orthopedic and he confirmed Dr. Gosthe’s diagnosis and scheduled pre-op clearances: MRI, X-ray, no Covid-19 symptoms, and approval from my GP. As I left the complex and headed to the jeep, thinking of my future, my phone rang. It was Dr. Wodicka’s nurse asking if I could do the MRI right that moment. I got in the jeep and drove to the opposite end of the building for the MRI. Since this was in the beginning of the pandemic, Holy Cross Orthopedic and Holy Cross Hospital were only doing emergency surgeries. The place was deserted and I waltzed right in, had the MRI and waltzed right back out. All told, the office visit and the MRI took about 2 hours.

On the 8th, Dr. Dunhill, my GP (also associated with Holy Cross) had me in for an x-ray. He then approved the surgery and on 9 April, I went back to the same complex as the MRI and had my surgery. So from injury to surgery only took a total of 11 days!

In getting prepped for surgery, the nurse went through a check list of questions. One question was had I ever had anesthesia before. I told her yes – at least four times for colonoscopies. She giggled and said this would be a little different. I wondered about that.

Next the anesthesiologist came and said she would was going to give me something through my cannula to relax me before she gave me the anesthesia. I said sure thing and the next thing I remember I waked up post-op. Later, the nurse gave me an extra large hospital scrub top. They had bound my arm up to the point it wouldn’t allow me to put on the shirt I wore to the hospital. I still have it and wear it still.

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I received the usual information about post-surgery things to check for and how not to get the bandage wet. My follow up appointment with Dr. Wodicka was scheduled for 16 April. I was, surprisingly, able to sleep if I slept on my left side with my arm elevated on a pillow.

Back to Holy Cross Orthopedic on the 16th and the nurse began to cut away the bandage.

Dr. Wodicka’s nurse provided me with a sling and Dr. Wodicka said to use it mostly when out and about but it wasn’t necessary to wear all the time. He mentioned that during surgery he had a difficult time reaching up my arm to grab the tendon and biceps and pull it back down into position.

Once he finally pulled the tendon and biceps back down from my shoulder region, he pushed the tendon through a hole he drilled in my ulna and attached the tendon to a button so the tendon could not pull back through. I saw the x-ray and it really did look like a large coat button!

There was no physical therapy required. He said he wanted to see me in six weeks.

After six weeks, he wanted to see me again six weeks later. After my last visit, I asked if he needed to see me again and he said no. To be honest, other than a little numbness around the right ulna where he said he had to move a nerve around, the surgery seems to be pretty much a success. I do have a twinge every so often to remind me I had surgery, but it is about 90% back to normal.

It was the first six weeks after surgery that all hell broke loose. See the next blog.