The long and arduous process to have my knee surgery, (both knees need to be replaced, but I’m hoping to do one at a time. There are far too many stairs to be negotiated in this house for me to be completely incapable of traversing them) has officially begun.
Last week I had the first, of probably what will be many, x-rays. (of my knees) The technician was kind enough to let me see the interior condition of my poor beleaguered joints.
The last time I had the opportunity to so was back in 2009-ish, when I had that 16-hour soft-tissue transplant surgery to replace the original cut-n-paste skin transplant that was all that had separated the inside of my knee from the outside. (the original accident happened back last century … coming up on forty years now. Funnily enough though, I still remember so much of it so clearly. It’s amazing the bits and bobs of memory we retain, eh?)
Way back then, (2009-ish) my knees were pretty dodgy, and fourteen years later, they were even dodgier. The time had come, (the Walrus said) to set those poor old long-suffering joints out to pasture and import a pair of new-and-improved ones.
I know quite a few people who have gone through to this process, (waves to Derrick) with varying degrees of success, and having done quite a bit of research over the years, I know what to expect, but still … I found myself wide awake that evening until the wee small hours pondering my mortality yet again. (the last time I had such a mighty ponder was in 2013 when I jousted with, and won against, thyroid cancer) It seems that only very late at night, when the world is at its most still and quiet, the veil between the ‘here’, and the ‘elsewhere’, seperate enough for us to witness some Truths.
By 4am I’d had enough of that, and after a mellowing pot of tea, and toast, I came to the conclusion that the answer to it all is almost always 42. I put my empty teapot and cup away, and went back to sleep.
-oOo-
In other news, I’m deleting some posts from my blog, not because I want to, but because these five posts in particular, are getting, on average, 50 to 100 spam hits per day, and I’m heartily sick of deleting gazillions of the nasty little buggers every week. (some robot, digital or humanoid, probably sold the URL’s to some other robot who sold them to another one, ad nauseum) WordPress is very adept at catching them before they go live but they still clog up the innards of my blog
I’ll take them out of action at the end of the week, (Sunday-ish) so, If you’ve a mind to, you can have a re-read before they only exist in my external drive archives.
Here are the links, for your reading and entertainment pleasure … just click on the title and away you’ll go.
6 Things I Learned Writing And Editing A Novel In Six Months
… why these were chosen I’ll never know. Perhaps the answer here, is 42 as well.
-oOo-
The snowdrifts are steadily getting higher. Some I can’t see over the top of now, and true to my word in my previous post I’m not posting a snow video … however, here’s a bit of a shot of a pheasant lass, who just happens to be standing on some snow whilst she contemplates the remnants of the crab-apples still bravely attached to their parent tree for her morning tea …
… although now that I look closer, she could be a grouse lass, not that I’ve had much to do with either bird though. (I wonder if 42 could actually refer to a species, if so I may have accidentally filmed a new and rare species of ‘grousant’ … ah, we owe so much to Douglas)
Oh well, have some clouds, very high, very cold, and moving along at a brisk clip. (because they’re the harbingers of another snow-storm, naturally!)
Widdershins Worlds 
I’m having the same problems with spam, and now have a regular ‘delete this post’ moment to try to distract the bot.
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Some great suggestions in the comments as alternatives to the ‘nuclear method’, I contemplated. 😀
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You may, if you wish, copy the post content, give it a new title, edit if necessary, and repost – and voila, clean slate.
Or not.
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Excellent suggestion. 😀 … I suspect my brain had that information tucked away somewhere, but was probably overshadowed by my frustration. 🙂
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Good luck with the knees, and strengthen the legs and knees before the operation if you can, as much as you can, so that recovery is easier. (Advice from a friend – not me.) You deserve to be able to walk!
If I am ever well again (healing and surviving hospitals, anesthesia, and PT is highly non-trivial, and I hate it taking so much out of me), I MAY consider getting my back repaired so I can walk. Now, just not possible. And I’d have to be VERY sure of the doctor. But I can’t walk more than a few steps, and can’t climb a couple steps or stand for even 30 secs without the pain starting, so would at least consider it IF I got better.
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It’s a bit of a catch-22 sometimes. I can’t work out as much as I need to some days because my knees hurt, and my knees hurt because I’m not working out as I need to … le sigh.
I’ve reached the stage too, where standing still for any length of time is crippling.
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I’d even give the reposts the same title, but with ‘Edited 2023’ or something at the end, unless you think that would be a troll-attractor.
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you liked the hitch hikers guide to the Universe! Their computer came up with that answer,42 after calculating for millions of years.
Good luck with the knees and remember to keep them well oiled!
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Heh 😀 … passers-by do tend to give me the side-eye as I squeak along. 😀
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Good luck with your knees. My mom had it done a few years back – one knee only. It seems working now, but her road to recovery was not an easy one.
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Thanks, Olga 😀 … I’m not looking forward to the ‘recovery’, bit at all, but the scales have finally tipped in favour of surgery.
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Whatever you do please use a Magic Marker pen to mark out both left and right, and also front and rear. You don’t want those knees bending the wrong way… 🙂
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I plan to write on one knee, ‘Not this one’, with a big arrow pointing to my other knee … and draw one of those dotted-lines-and-scissors symbols on the knee in question, also with the words, ‘This one’, in very big letters. This might be enough … we shall see. 😀
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I hope your surgery goes well and that the recovery is ok. How strange to have certain posts targeted by spammers. Good luck with eliminating them. The reposting the article with a new title idea might work.
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Thanks … I’m rolling my eyes at myself for forgetting these very simple spammy work-arounds. 😀
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Knee replacement has improved by leaps and bounds, so hoping for the best for you, Widds… I wonder why the answer to everything has to be 42?
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If you read “The Hitch-hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy” by Douglas Adams, all will be revealed.
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💕
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What Nellifant said. 😀
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It’s such a robust number, I think. 😀
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I am still wiping up the coffee on my laptop and screen after my belly-laugh at the images that the phrase ‘knee replacement has improved by leaps and bounds’ conjured up! Thank’ee most kindly, over tall buildings and lazy dogs. 🙂
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😀
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You know how much I feel for you over your knees, Widders. I hope all goes well.
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Like most countries, Covid has pretty much crushed our already ailing health care system, so I’m expecting quite a wait between each step, but cancellations do happen, so finters crossed.
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As a PT who has treated hundreds of patients pre and post-total knee replacement, I could give you a bit of advice if you’d like it, but I notice a broad trend of unsolicited advice tending to inundate anyone who posts health-related things. You have my email if needed. 🙂
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Will do. 🙂 … thanks for that. 🙂
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Good luck with your surgery. I hope you have a speedy and uneventful recovery.
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Thanks. 🙂 … wouldn’t that be wonderful! 😀
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You can close comments on individual posts. Of course that will block legit comments too, but older posts don’t usually get many of those. I’ve done this for spam-magnets on my blog.
You can also do a setting that automatically closes comments on posts after a specific time, e.g. 120 days.
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D’oh! … of course I can! Someone give me a smack … don’t know where my brain went. 😀
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It’s probably frozen. Not used to the PG winter. 🙂
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Hee, hee, hee 😀 … very likely! 😀
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How do you close comments on individual posts?
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You go to All Posts and click on the 3 dots on the right by the post you want to close comments on. Click on Edit. In the editing sidebar, scroll down to Discussion and click on it. Then uncheck the Allow comments box.
(This is if you’re using the block editor; I haven’t used the Classic editor for a while so can’t remember how things are laid out there.)
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Thanks Audrey. 🙂
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Such wisdom in that little book, 42 included. Fingers crossed for your knees. Love the videos, as usual.
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Thanks, 🙂 … and you’re welcome. 😀
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You could cover the errant posts in your towel; then those bugblaster spammers won’t know they’re there…
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A friend of mine, who is mid-60s now, had one knee replaced a few years ago. She limped around for maybe a month…and now she’s back on her bike and everything else. Here’s thinking the same for you! (except twice, lol) 🙂
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I’ve probably, and realistically, got at least a year to build up all the appropriate strengths (that I have sadly let fall to the wayside of late) and lose enough weight to get the most out of the new knees when they do turn up – both of which will be good for me in the meantime anyway. 🙂
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Best of luck with the knee ops. When do you go for the first one, or is that still dependent on more tests? Oh and I…like the ‘grouse’ video. 😉
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Sorry it’s been a while, Meeks … the visit was just to my GP (well not really ‘my’GP, just one of the Dr’s at a walk-in clinic we’ve found up here – what with Covid burning through healthcare workers of all stripes and our healthcare system in complete tatters, finding a GP of one’s own is nigh to impossible – interesting times again) to get the ball rolling. I expect an ‘invitation’ to visit an ortho surgeon sometime this year, maybe.
Glad you like the video – she was a cheery little spirit, I thought. 🙂
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-sigh- ‘healthcare system in complete tatters,’ seems to be happening everywhere, including here. I hope you get your appointment soon so you can get the op. over and done with. Keep us posted.
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Me sometimes wake up in the night and drink a warm chocolate milk or chamomile tea to calm my anxiety. There was a period, some years ago, when I wrote all my tales always in the night. 😁 So you’re a writer. Are you on Wattpad? Me I’m from Italy 😅 🏳🌈
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Nope, not on Wattpad. 🙂
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