Thumb, School, Room
Thumb
Had my appointment at the Bone and Joint center this morning.
They took a look at my thumb with the cool xray machine. It's all digital, so you step on the pedal and the screen updates. The PA took maybe 2 images, then the doc did about 8 in rapid succession as he moved my thumb around, just to watch it move. Almost like the cartoon style xray screens where you dance behind the screen and the people up front see the dancing skeleton.
The second coolest thing about the machine is that you just push a button and it prints the image right there. No film, developing, or light boxes on the wall. I brought my printout home. (Wanna see?) Interestingly, the comparison xray shows a weird bone spur on my left thumb. *shrug*
The xray showed no bone damage, but a little separation in the joint. They put me in a custom fit splint to keep the thumb still and give the ligament a chance to heal. The process was pretty cool. The Physical Therapist traced interesting bits of my hand on a paper towel, then transferred that to a sheet of plastic. She then cut the plastic out, heated it in a special bath, trimmed it, and wrapped it around my hand. Once the fit was good she affixed sticky back velcro to hold it on. No plaster, no S, M, L, XL. Custom fabrication while you wait. Cool.
So anyway I've got 4 more weeks in the splint to see if everything will heal as it is. Not sure what the next step would be if that doesn't work. Surgery maybe. They can use my old scar as a dotted line to cut on.
--
School
Tomorrow starts TA training, and then more all next week. I was going to spend 4 or 5 days hanging in Portland starting on saturday, but realized I need to be back monday at 9 am. Bother.
I hope school isn't too hard. I hope I didn't forget how to do school over the last 8 years (hell, I hope I've gotten better at it!). I hope the other kids and teachers like me. I hope my students like me. I hope they don't all think I'm too much of a freak with my mohawk and spots and funny splint. I hope it doesn't rain all year. I hope I get an office and my office mate is cool. I hope I can actually teach the damn class I'm teaching in 2 weeks. I hope my profs are cool and my classes don't suck. I hope I don't oversleep and get there late and seem like a fool and everyone points and laughs.
I'm sure it'll be fine.
--
Room
So I'm moving into a different room in my same house. There are very few things in life I dislike more than moving. But the new room has some advantages in terms of space: it's a smaller main room but has 2 huge closets. I'm putting my clothes, dresser, etc, in one closet, and my desk, paperwork, geek stuff in the other. The goal is to leave myself a relatively restful and uncluttered "living" space in the middle for bed, books, music, and art.
The other reasons to move are to give myself a new context at this interesting juncture of life, and to provide a good opportunity to purge my possessions. At this moment my old room, partially moved out of, looks roughly like the Carolina coast will when hurricane Isabel is done having her way with it. It's more than a little overwhelming, and I'm more than a little paralyzed by it. But it is progressing. I'm sorting and shredding, throwing out and putting away. This is long overdue, and is as necessary as it is painful. I'm quite looking forward to the end result, much like brick wall therapy (because it feels so good when you stop...)
My new and improved room will be on display when I have that birthday party, sometime around the end of this month. Tell me how fabulous it is.
Had my appointment at the Bone and Joint center this morning.
They took a look at my thumb with the cool xray machine. It's all digital, so you step on the pedal and the screen updates. The PA took maybe 2 images, then the doc did about 8 in rapid succession as he moved my thumb around, just to watch it move. Almost like the cartoon style xray screens where you dance behind the screen and the people up front see the dancing skeleton.
The second coolest thing about the machine is that you just push a button and it prints the image right there. No film, developing, or light boxes on the wall. I brought my printout home. (Wanna see?) Interestingly, the comparison xray shows a weird bone spur on my left thumb. *shrug*
The xray showed no bone damage, but a little separation in the joint. They put me in a custom fit splint to keep the thumb still and give the ligament a chance to heal. The process was pretty cool. The Physical Therapist traced interesting bits of my hand on a paper towel, then transferred that to a sheet of plastic. She then cut the plastic out, heated it in a special bath, trimmed it, and wrapped it around my hand. Once the fit was good she affixed sticky back velcro to hold it on. No plaster, no S, M, L, XL. Custom fabrication while you wait. Cool.
So anyway I've got 4 more weeks in the splint to see if everything will heal as it is. Not sure what the next step would be if that doesn't work. Surgery maybe. They can use my old scar as a dotted line to cut on.
--
School
Tomorrow starts TA training, and then more all next week. I was going to spend 4 or 5 days hanging in Portland starting on saturday, but realized I need to be back monday at 9 am. Bother.
I hope school isn't too hard. I hope I didn't forget how to do school over the last 8 years (hell, I hope I've gotten better at it!). I hope the other kids and teachers like me. I hope my students like me. I hope they don't all think I'm too much of a freak with my mohawk and spots and funny splint. I hope it doesn't rain all year. I hope I get an office and my office mate is cool. I hope I can actually teach the damn class I'm teaching in 2 weeks. I hope my profs are cool and my classes don't suck. I hope I don't oversleep and get there late and seem like a fool and everyone points and laughs.
I'm sure it'll be fine.
--
Room
So I'm moving into a different room in my same house. There are very few things in life I dislike more than moving. But the new room has some advantages in terms of space: it's a smaller main room but has 2 huge closets. I'm putting my clothes, dresser, etc, in one closet, and my desk, paperwork, geek stuff in the other. The goal is to leave myself a relatively restful and uncluttered "living" space in the middle for bed, books, music, and art.
The other reasons to move are to give myself a new context at this interesting juncture of life, and to provide a good opportunity to purge my possessions. At this moment my old room, partially moved out of, looks roughly like the Carolina coast will when hurricane Isabel is done having her way with it. It's more than a little overwhelming, and I'm more than a little paralyzed by it. But it is progressing. I'm sorting and shredding, throwing out and putting away. This is long overdue, and is as necessary as it is painful. I'm quite looking forward to the end result, much like brick wall therapy (because it feels so good when you stop...)
My new and improved room will be on display when I have that birthday party, sometime around the end of this month. Tell me how fabulous it is.