Slow healing this time~

Medical Update

I had my first check up with the surgeon today. Our hospital "imports" specialists. I was so doped I had no idea of what he looked like, but he had a good German name -- Karlstad. Charlie's comment had been that he didn't look old enough to be out of school yet.

I was impressed when I read a little bio they had about him: Harvard University and graduated from The Johns Hopkins School of Medicine in 1997. After completing his orthopaedic surgery residency at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester . . . (then came the kicker) . . . "he received fellowship training in 'hand and micro vascular' surgery at the UCLA Medical Center in Los Angeles."

Today's X-rays showed that everything is in place but due to some soft bone around the breaks they are healing very slowly. I knew it was healing a lot differently than my previous one and has been more uncomfortable. I have been avoiding pain medication, but will take some plain Advil tonight and continue to develop my arm muscles using the walker for a while longer.

I have been "house bound" but next week I am going to get out my trusty wheelchair to go out for a little R&R in the form of grocery shopping (certainly don't need much) and lunch out. The time has been going by quickly so I'm in no big rush.

I took it easy the rest of the day. I did get out on the deck and watered the plants and filled the fountain again, making sure to put my weight on my arms instead of my legs. Slept some around the middle of the day. and I am now very sleepy. It is 7 p.m., and I could be asleep in seconds, I hope I can stay awake long enough to drink my gin. Sandy took my heavy radio back to my bedroom and I am going to try to sleep in a bed again, tonight. I will miss turning on the computer to read your Blog, Suzy, at about 3 a.m., when I wake up briefly.

Since last week when I finally got rid of almost 1,000 e-mails, mostly FL, I have been keeping up with them. I am going to make a real effort to continue to.

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I was able to come up with this file folder today (in a drawer in my closet) so will copy it so I don't have to hunt for things until I can get around better.

1.1.87 Donnerstag 70.5 Kg

Time for a new start. Our 7th happy New Year's Day in Europe and our 3rd in Saalfelden. As usual, it began with the church bells and fireworks at mid-night. It was clear so we could see them from all sides. There are not big organized displays. Many were roman candles, bright light and items, with a bunch of star bursts in between. The people in back directly on the street below seem to favor spacing theirs out with large firecrackers. Luckily, most people have a metal or tile roof and with snow on them, so there is no danger of fire since they sometimes land and explode on them.

We had our usual New Year's morning, beginning with Champagne followed by crab on toasted French bread. The expensive canned Chatka crab is an adequate substitute for the frozen snow crab we had in West Virginia, but of course, not up to the California fresh crab we used to enjoy.

We still have snow, thanks to the 3 to 4 feet (3 meters plus) already on the ground, but with temperatures above freezing and some rain we will need more cold and snow soon to keep a good base on the ground.

We had a call from Rosie last night about what she had been depositing of our medical checks -- I guess she had recently received our Christmas card and letter with a question about some of the deposits. Toni is in California for the Rose Parade, then going to SF and on to see the "'Redwoods,' whatever they are," as Rosie says.

The "W's" called us about mid-morning to invite us over this afternoon about 16.00 for Kaffee and Kuchen. I carried on the entire conversation with him in German. Of course, it was a simple one, but I am really going to get going on the language bit again.

In the morning I worked on getting the weather records up to date and only made it thru August. Put my first 4 files to work -- the mountain people and include the Fendrichs with them as I write to them about every time I write to Rosie. It will be a joy to be able to see the headings of the files at a glance even tho it is going to take a lot of work to get it all done. This year I am going to sneak up on it instead of taking everything out at once and having piles and piles to cope with. Started cleaning out drawers yesterday and took the stuff out of my former desk in DoD's Buro. [One of my Christmas presents that year was so called "File Folders." The local office supply store, very with it otherwise, had no idea of what they were. I had to settle for heavy stock cut to size that I had to fold and staple pieces of stock to for the labels. I was forever getting snagged by the staples. I still have a drawer with them in my current office.]

Decided to have tacos and beans for "dinner" at 15.00 as the sweets in late afternoon killed much interest in a real meal later. We had the usual overload of sweets with tea, all excellent, then we had a huge glass of a very, light sparkling white wine with snack squares of bread, cold cuts on cheese on picks stuck in a cute plastic mushroom. My German was very rusty, but by the time we left, I was doing a little better. My, how I need more practice and book learning! Saw a couple more rolls of their movies which is always interesting and gives my German a bit of a rest.

Arrived back home about 10.30. Had no interest in having martinis or eating anything further. A good start for cutting back food and drink for the New Year. Just read and went to bed to continue reading there until after 21.00.