kmkat and her kneedles

I want to be elected! and stuff.

Yes, it is campaign time here in Polk County. I am running for my fourth two-year term on the county board of supervisors. This is not something that I talk about much here on the blog, but it is consuming all my time right now -- defining my position(s) for local newspapers, doing literature drops, recruiting volunteers, making phone calls, delivering lawn signs. A *local* group has pumped a lot of money into this election, and it has generated more interest than is usually evident in county board elections.

And that is enough on that topic.

 

* * * * *

Anyway.

Smokey continues to improve. The broken ribs are not troubling him nearly as much now, just the occasional [severe] twinge to remind him of what he has been through.

Earlier this week he had a followup appointment with the ortho doc who was going to do the knee replacement. I probably made the appointment for him before the surgery and never thought to cancel it. But the doc gave him a cortisone injection in each knee to help with the pain until -- someday! -- he can have the surgery. 

The really cool thing was that the doc took him around to see all the people in the surgery wing who had helped keep him alive. It's a quarter mile walk from the clinic to the OR, so Smokey rode in a wheel chair.

The ortho doc is the  the one in the suit. (He is also the one that pushed the wheel chair.) His physician's assistant is at left rear (she is the one who advised me to avoid gluten) (she is also the one that started CPR on Smoke). 

Gentlerman in scrubs is an anesthesiologist. The one in the blue hat is Jodie, who said she felt Smokey's ribs break during CPR. No problem, Jodie! Thanks for doing such a good job!

The doc wanted to do this because the OR staff seldom get to see such a good outcome after a code. Everyone was delighted to meet Smokey, alive and talking.

This is Jean, who had the difficult job of telling me that Smokey's heart had stopped but been restarted, and who stayed with me the entire time until Younger Son arrived to drive me to Minneapolis. I remember the mustachioed man in glasses from the OR but, sadly, I never knew his name or his role.

The doc and PA asked me to send them the photos and for Smokey to write up something about his experience. Doc wants to present it to his board, which always likes to hear success stories.

I am so grateful to all these people. Without their skill and dedication I would be a widow.

* * * * *

More news on the medical front: Elder Son found out today that he will be doing his family medicine residency in Sioux Falls, SD. While he might have preferred Duluth -- closer to home, colder weather -- Sioux Falls has some definite advantages, too -- much higher volume obstetric practice, better scheduling for night shifts, cheaper housing market, and a psychologist on staff who trains family practice docs on psychological counseling, since they are often the ones who prescribe psych meds. Residency will start sometime in June.

ES is very excited to A, buy a house, and 2, get a dog. Not necessarily in that order...

* * * * *

One more thing. In case you were wondering, it snowed again today. Great big frickin' flakes, added maybe another inch to the six-foot mounds we have already.

 

 

Update 4. And stuff.

This is why Smokey's sternum and ribs are sore. Link shows the Lucas chest compression system, a device that can do chest compressions at a precise rate and pressure and eliminate the exhausting part of CPR. Smokey seems to have at least one cracked rib, maybe as many as three going by the number of times something clicks! in his chest.. Every time he complains about his rib/sternum pain, he follows it up with, But I am glad to be alive.

Funny story #1: Last Sunday Younger Son made pancakes for breakfast. This has become a tradition since he started visiting every weekend. He makes the pancakes, Smokey or I cook bacon, we all feast. This got even better for me when Smoke discovered gluten-free Bisquick in the supermarket.

Anyway, last Sunday while the bacon was cooking I melted butter, nuked the bottle of maple syrup, got out the orange juice and milk, set the table. When it was my turn to eat, I doused my short stack with melted butter and maple syrup, at which point Smokey asked, "Why are you putting teriyaki sauce on your pancakes?" Yup, I had grabbed the wrong bottle out of the fridge door.

For the record, gluten-free Bisquick pancakes doused with melted butter and teriyaki sauce are not bad at all.

Funny story #2: Smokey has liked this song*, Barton Hollow by The Civil Wars, for a couple years. Ever since he learned that he was dead for eight minutes, he has been singing the first line: I'm a dead man walkin'. Yes, we do have a slightly warped sense of humor here.

Funny story #3: Younger Son was with me in the hospital for the first two days, until Elder Son flew in. He did a great job of keeping me distracted from too much worry, to the point where, near the end of the second day he confessed he was running out of things to talk about. Did I tell you about the weird customer I helped on the phone last week descended to Let me show you what I carry in my wallet. When he told me what he had been doing it was further distracting -- we laughed heartily.

Not-so-funny story: That building in East Harlem blew up while Elder Son was here. The building where he lived during his last year of undergrad at NYU is about 1" from the lower left corner of this graphic, on 116th Street on the other side of Park Avenue. He could see the Metro North line from his window.

That young man has at least as many lives as a cat. He was held up at knife point in Durban, South Africa; has survived two potentially serious car accidents -- one a T-bone on his side, the other a rear-ender that totaled his car -- with little or no injury; and lived through the remnants of a hurricane in Chiapas, Mexico. Now a building a block from his former residence has blown up. What next, a meteorite will bounce off his head on the only day in his life that he was wearing a motorcycle helmet?

Life has calmed down here. Smokey won't go back to work until cleared by the cardiologist; he is waiting to get an appointment. In the meantime I am working diligently on my campaign for a fourth term on our county board. A little over two weeks until the election -- on April Fool's Day [appropriately?] -- and I have a lot of work to do. Anyone want to come to n.w. Wisconsin for a delightful vacation to help out ;-)

* I tried to embed the YouTube video into the post, but the SHARE information that used to appear below the video is no longer there. It flashes momentarily, then disappears. Anyone else have this problem? Did I unwittingly mess up my YouTube settings? Help!

Edited to add: After discussing this with Erika (thanks, Erika! Great to finally talk to you!), we figured out the problem was my browser (Chrome). Safari displays the YouTube page correctly, allowing me to share the video:

Yee-haw!

Smokey is being discharged this afternoon!

Update 3.

photo credit: alonso.romero via photopin cc

Yes, we are all smiling. Smokey is improving hourly, so much so that Younger Son went back to work today and only stopped in at the hospital during his lunch break, and Elder Son and I drove back to Wisconsin for an overnight to see the dogs and check the mail and for me to get some more clean clothes :-)

Thank you all for your good thoughts and wishes and emails. It all helped me in ways I don't even understand myself. For those of you who reminded me to take care of myself, I am. Without even consciously thinking about it, my self-care plan was to keep to my normal sleep schedule. No sleeping in a chair next to Smokey's hospital bed for days at a time. ES kept giving me a hard time about how late I would get to the hospital in the morning -- 10:00 is apparently late in the medical world -- but I refused to set an alarm for myself. I suck at sleep deprivation. So with at least eight hours every night I am maintaining just fine :-)

Smokey was moved from the ICU to a stepdown bed this afternoon. The latter is a bed in a unit with a higher patient-to-nurse ratio than the ICU but lower than a regular unit; a kind of transition unit. Unlike the first couple days when he had more tubes and wires coming out of him than I could count, he now has two IVs that are not attached to anything, used when the nurse(s) need to give him an injection; a nasal cannula giving him some extra oxygen; a finger oximeter to measure his oxygen saturation; and a heart monitor in the pocket of his gown that is connected to leads stuck to his chest. (I knew you wanted all the gory details.) His mental state is nearly normal -- kind of like if he were just really tired. Which he probably is. 

He went for his first walk today, with the physical therapist. He also had his first sort-of-solid food -- cream of mushroom soup, vanilla pudding, orange sherbet, some crackers. His major complaint is that his sternum and ribs are extremely sore from the CPR. That makes it painful to move in bed or to transition from lying down to sitting on the edge of the bed or vice versa. Opioids make him nauseous, but the medical staff has found the exact right balance of pain medication and anti-nausea drugs so he is (relatively) comfortable.

If his vital signs continue to move toward stability as they have been doing he may come home this weekend. ES has booked a flight back to NYC on Saturday, but paid the extra $20 for cancellation insurance just in case. 

Again, thank you all. I cannot begin to say how much you have helped.

 

 

Update 2.

We are somewhere in this building. I have never seen this view because, unlike it looks in the photo, it is completely surrounded by other buildings, many much taller. 

Things are progressing pretty much as well as we could hope.

This morning Smokey is warm, breathing on his own, and more or less awake. They took out the breathing tube this morning, which I am sure made him very happy. He of course remembers nothing; the last thing he remembers is being either in the waiting room or in the prep room. He will be in the hospital for perhaps another 3-5 days, will get out

Both sons are here, which is great. Andrew (Elder Son) stayed with Smokey in the hospital overnight while Matthew (Younger Son) and I went to our own beds. Andrew texted me just as I parked the car in the hospital ramp this morning: Get here quick. He's telling the nurse why it is a good thing not to retire. I texted back: Coming as fast as I can. Stuff something in his mouth. As you might be able to guess, the sense of humor is strong in this family*.

I went shopping for clean underwear and socks last night so I feel presentable today.

Thank you all for your good wishes and emails and good thoughts. It really helps me.

 

* Later Smokey was talking about being dead for eight minutes. He is quite fascinated with the idea of having been briefly deceased. He recalled the Monty Python sketch: "Bring out your dead!" "I'm not quite dead." "Oh, go on, old man" etc., etc. LIke I said, the sense of humor comes through.

Update.

Smokey and I went to the ~50-bed regional hospital at oh-dark-30 this morning, expecting to have his right knee transformed into a bionic one. Tonight, he is heavily sedated in the ICU at the University of MN hospital because he coded in the OR while the surgeon was scrubbing in.

Note to everyone: if you are going to have a cardiac event, pick a time when you are surrounded by medical professionals in a good hospital.

He was revived and transported to Minneapolis. The medical protocol for someone who has been revived like this is to chill them to bring their cord temp down to 33 C degrees (91F) for 12-24 hours; this minimizes or prevents possible brain damage (I learned A LOT about medicine today) and to keep them well-sedated during this time to keep them comfortable. Tomorrow they will warm him up and wake him up and assess his condition.

The second reason to bring him to the U hospital (which is part of the same group as the original hospital) was because the U has a heart catheterization lab. Between the time he arrived at the U and we (Younger Son and I) got to talk to a doctor there, the cath lad had done an angiogram, found his coronary arteries to be 70-90% blocked, and put in four stents to widen them.

Prognosis is hopeful because he was revived so quickly and his vitals are good.

Younger Son was with me all day, Elder Son is flying in tomorrow. We will know more tomorrow. (It may be weird to post about this, but I feel like you are my friends. And friends are good to have at a time like this. )

Sunday stuff on Thursday because Thursday is the new Sunday. Or something.

1. Wine :: cooler.
2. Cooperate :: -tion.
3. Dropped :: like a hot potato.
4. Painter :: drip cloth.
5. Binger :: drunkard.
6. Knot :: -worthy.
7. Collar :: button.
8. Barefoot :: in the Park.
9. Town :: -house.
10. House :: in town.

* * * * *

Progress continues smoothly on the baby sweater. I coerced En Esch into modeling it last weekend.

Clearly, En was entirely bored with my knitting and picture-taking.
I told him to shut up and model or I would cut off the cat food supply.

 

He reluctantly and sullenly complied.

It is, of course, much further along now. I am done with the body and nearly done with the sleeves. Still need to find the perfect button. And perhaps a better model.

* * * * *

Smokey's knee replacement surgery that was scheduled for last Monday was rescheduled for March 3 because he had a URI that was not fully cleared up. I emailed the boys to let them know the status, which prompted the following email exchange.

Elder Son, the almost-doctor: Good.  You don't want infected hardware. (He went on about how Smokey has several of the risk factors for post-surgical infection.)

Younger Son: I can provide my fridge for secure storage, if need be.

Elder Son: I also volunteer [Younger Son's] fridge.

* * * * *

Last weekend we participated in the first Trivia Night at a local coffee house.

It was surprisingly well-attended. All the tables were filled. I cannot tell you
how many events of one kind or another that I have attended here in Polk Count where,
counting me, there were fewer people than you have fingers.

 

My team was poised and alert and ready with answers.

 

Example of a question in the presidential trivia category: Which president was featured on the $500 bill from 1928 to 1934? (Click and drag to see the answer.)McKinley. Smokey knew that one.

Musical trivia: What two-person French musical group had a hit in 2013 with Random Access Memories? Daft Punk. Younger Son knew that one.

Science and nature trivia: What bird is this? (audio of a bird song) Cardinal. I knew that one.

Sports trivia: What year was the first SuperBowl and who was the quarterback of the winning team? 1966 and Bart Starr. Smokey knew the quarterback but was off by one year.

Events in 2013: Name the musician who died in 2013 and opened Woodstock with a two-hour set. Richie Havens. Smokey had to think about it for awhile, but he knew that one, too.

It was a lot of fun. We were ahead most of the night but ended up in second place.

Wait 'til next time!

 

It's two-fer Friday.

There is just way too much happening not to post today. None of it is earth-shaking, but hey, that's what blogs are for, right? Minutiae?

photo credit: j.edward ferguson via photopin cc

Thing 1. Smokey was scheduled for knee replacement surgery this coming Monday. But pre-op physical doc decided he needed a stress test first, and that appointment got screwed up. As a friend said upon hearing the news, "That's what [you guys] do, right? Reschedule surgeries?" 

Surgery will be later in February. Now to reschedule the stress test. Good news is I can attend Library Legislative Day in Madison, which I had previously had to bow out of. Bad news is Smokey has to endure more days of pain.

 

One of Smokey's vans, untouched since last summer (bad brakes).

Thing 2. Our driveway has not been plowed out properly this winter AT ALL because Da Yeep was laid up. My all-wheel-drive car has allowed us to get in and out while Smokey and Younger Son and Kiera The Teenage Helper worked on the Da Yeep. Younger and Elder Sons have both partially cleared it with our smaller snowblower at various times, but we have had a lot of snow since then.

Wednesday night I had to go to a meeting. The ruts where we drive are packed solid, but apparently I got off a little too much to one side into the soft snow. Car was jammed against a tree. By driving back and forth ~5 feet at a time (exactly as YS had last Sunday when he got my car stuck in another spot in the driveway), eventually I was able to get the car out and continue to my meeting. I dreaded seeing what I had done to the passenger side door.

On the way my side view mirror on the passenger side suddenly started flapping in the breeze and flew off. I went back but couldn't find it in the dark. Happily, it was only the actual reflective mirror; the enclosure is almost perfectly intact.

Also happily, there is NO damage to the passenger door at all. The only casualty was the mirror and a tiny sapling that got broken off; the real tree, a pine ~6" in diameter, is unhurt.

 

Thing 3. After my meeting I went to knit at a friend's house. Called Smokey to tell him about getting stuck. He and Younger Son had pretty much gotten Da Yeep, our plowing vehicle, back to working order last weekend. He did the last little thing(s) and went out to plow so I would be able to drive in safely. 

The snow in the ruts was so hard he had to make multiple passes, shaving off a little each time with the plow blade. On the third pass he got stuck. Or one of the back wheels fell off, we're not sure. (Seriously.)

Da Yeep was stuck at the entrance to our driveway. I left my car on the lane and waded through the snow to the house when I got home. I cannot tell you how glad I was for my Nantucket Bagg, which converts from a tote bag to a backpack in about 2 seconds. It is so much easier to balance with empty hands.

 

photo credit: Anonymous9000 via photopin cc

Thing 4. The next day (yesterday) Smokey went for the aforementioned stress test. I went along for the opportunity to knit in the car and in the waiting room and, more importantly, to have lunch at our local Indian restaurant. We both had to walk the ~300 yards uphill through the snow to where my car was parked at the lane, not an easy task.

Much frustration re: stress test (=irony), but a lovely lunch nevertheless. New iPhone came in handy. Called Lennie The Super Mechanic to send a tow truck to retrieve Da Yeep and bring it to his shop. Came home, parked my car in the lane again, and waded through the snow -- downhill this time, whew! -- back to the house.

Tow truck came a few hours later and loaded up Da Yeep. After they were gone I rashly decided to drive my car down to the house so Smokey would not have to walk up the hill again. 

Guess what: I got stuck. Different place, other side of the driveway, bah humbug. Once again converted tote bag to backpack and stuggled down the hill, losing one brand-new fingerless mitt in the process.

Thing 4a. Today I emailed several friends who live nearby, asking for recommendation for a reliable snow plower. Got three so far -- yay, friends! Smokey has the list and numbers, will call.

Okay, that enough whining. Time for something fun!

Thing 5. I was on Twitter this morning and saw this.

Clicked over to Instagram and saw this:

The stars aligned! I have been on a yarn fast since 1/1/13 (bought exactly ONE skein of laceweight since then; was trying to make it to April so I could truly say I had not bought yarn for a year) but this was too good to pass up.

• Cotton/merino blend: pure wool is too warm for me >90% of the time.
• Red: I have been lamenting the lack of a red sweater in my wardrobe.
• Aran weight, #9 needles: a sweater should go relatively fast, even at my speed.
• And the price? Fabulous.

Comments on Ravelry seem to indicate that the yarn is splitty and may be closer to DK or worsted weight, but I can deal with that. Cara emailed me that she mailed the yarn today. Whee!