Groovymarlin.com

So I go to the orthopedist yesterday, and the technician first uses a fluoroscope to confirm everything is still where it should be (cool! moving x-ray! sci-fi!). Since it is, he says we can change me out to a smaller cast. Yay! So he fires up that vacuum/saw thing to cut the purple monstrosity off, and people, that thing is SO WRONG. Eardrum-piercingly loud, enough vibration to shake loose a few brain cells, and also the vacuum part is useless because I still ended up covered in purple particles.

But the worst part was when it came off.

Yes, my arm was pale and skinny and flaky – I could deal with all that. But it HURT. Hurt like the day I broke it! Hurt like HELL! Because it’s still healing, duh. And that’s when I realized that maybe I won’t just “bounce back” from this injury like I thought I would. Three more weeks in this smaller cast. Then, some as-of-yet unknown amount of time in a removable splint/brace type of device. Then…?

The new cast is hot pink, lets me bend/straighten my elbow, and makes some tasks a bit easier. But it’s much, much tighter than the last cast; has rough edges that irritate my skin; and is so far rather painful. I’m dutifully putting moleskin on the edges that bother me, but I have to admit, the whole thing is really uncomfortable. Kinda makes me want to drink or something to distract myself.

Ouch.

Tomorrow is the BIG DAY! I go to the orthopedist and hopefully get upgraded (or is it downgraded?) from a cast that looks like the one on the right, to one that looks like the shorter one on the left:

(Image adapted from here.)

I’m so excited I might pee my pants. Being able to bend/straighten my arm will make everything so much easier. I’m a little worried about how my arm is going to look. I can tell the skin is really dry because I’m itchy a lot more, and the skin on my exposed fingers is so dry, it’s constantly flaking off – and I can put lotion there! I know the outer layer of my skin is just exfoliating itself but it’s so gross to contemplate on a large scale (like an entire arm). Ew!

Finally got the DVD with copyright release of the costumed photos that got taken of Veronica back in January. This was a complete surprise! I walked in to pick her up from daycare and this dude says “Would you like to look at the proofs and see what you like?” I didn’t even know they were going to take pictures and was stunned that they had actually dressed all the kids in costumes and photographed them on a set. The pictures were mind-numbingly adorable, and I paid a ridiculous sum to get a package, but how could I not?

My wrist is screaming now that I’ve typed all this, so I’m off to take more drugs. But here are a few of the photos (full set here).

What’s a bigger hassle: having a broken arm or dealing with all this snow? How about, “both at the same time?” Ugh.

Typing is a real chore, which is why I haven’t blogged lately. I’m in a lot of pain – it seems worse now than the days right after it happened, but I’m sure that’s because I’m healing. I remember the same deep, non-stop ache when my broken femur was stitching itself back together in 1990. Another week and a half in this giant monstrosity of a cast – then it will be replaced by a smaller model, only to the elbow, for another two weeks. CAN’T COME SOON ENOUGH.

I’m terrified that when they take this cast off, my elbow will be stuck and I won’t be able to straighten my arm! Kind of like what happened to my knee when the cast came off my leg. I have to keep reminding myself that only happened because my knee was also badly injured, and full of adhesions/scar tissue. If my elbow is stiff, thank goodness it will only be temporary.

Office is closed again tomorrow, but so is daycare. Oy vey.

I fell and broke my arm yesterday. On my birthday.

*sigh*

It was stupid how it happened. I was walking down the three stairs between our bathroom/closet area and the bedroom. Still in my pj’s, getting ready to take a shower. Slipped, lost my balance, went airborne. I landed hard on my ass, and would have been sore but OK. But instead, my left arm was flung backwards and struck the edge of the stair at my wrist. I heard the crack and knew it was broken right away.

“Oh shit, some birthday this is gonna be,” I thought.

In agony, I called my insurance company to get approval for a trip to the ER. I was denied. Instead, my hubz had to drive me to our local doctor’s office, where they could only look at it and say, “Yep, that’s broken.” THEN we had to drive 40 miles to a different center where I could get x-rays and see the orthopedist on call. We spent the whole damn day driving and waiting: in traffic, in lobbies, in lines.

I ended up with a purple cast from my palm to above my elbow, and a much-needed scrip for vicoden. One of the bones in my forearm is shattered at the wrist, but if kept very stable, will heal without surgery – hence the giant cast. In three weeks I can hopefully get it removed and replaced with a smaller, forearm-only model. Unfortunately, I’m having to learn how to eat, dress, do my hair/makeup, etc. with one hand, and the wrong hand at that. Writing is out of the question, typing is agonizingly slow, and driving is possible but terrifying.

Let’s not even talk about showering with a garbage bag taped over my arm! Luckily, I found and ordered this, and some of this stuff too. Hilariously, based on those purchases, Amazon decided to show me some other items they think I’d be interested in, including this (slightly NSFW). Um, thanks but no thanks, Amazon.

Where are my drugs?

Groovymarlin (that’s me!) is a Google Reader fanatic! As of right now, I subscribe to about 300 different feeds, and read nearly 500 individual posts per day. I subscribe to a variety of feeds: parenting blogs, humor blogs, daily deals, Jezebel, political stuff, etc.

With that many feeds to look at, not to mention the few more that seem to get added every week, thoughtful maintenance of my subscriptions is a must, otherwise I’d get completely overwhelmed. Here are the main reasons why I unsubscribe from feeds:

1. You post too much quantity with too little quality: your feed has 50+ posts a day, most of which are meaningless or banal. Edit thyself, blogger!

2. You’re full of shit: there was one “mommy blogger” that I completely unsubscribed from recently because I got fed up with how insanely perfect she made her life seem. Listen sister, I’m a mom too, I know that nobody’s life is all perfect and sunshine all the time. You and your perfect wardrobe and your perfect hair and your perfect husband and your perfect kids and your perfect shopping suggestions and your perfect internet-famous friends MAKE ME SICK.

3. You insult your readers: there’s a guy who used to blog quite a bit, and was pretty interesting, but recently he’s eased up on the blogging and done a lot more tweeting instead. Eventually, I unsubscribed from his Twitter feed because it seemed to bring out the mean side in him. What was snarky and amusing on his blogs turned into real vitriol on Twitter. Maybe because of the lack of context? Whatever, he just seemed to hate on everyone and everything, and I couldn’t take it anymore.

4. Your feed is full of garbage: you have nary a thoughtful, original post in a week’s time. Instead, your [insert hobby or interest here] blog merely reproduces every stupid press release and promotional blurb you receive. Or worse, you steal ideas and content from other, more talented writers. For shame, blogger.

5. You decided to be annoying: by only publishing a headline, and forcing me to click through to read EVERY WORD OF ACTUAL CONTENT, in a desperate ploy for blog traffic. Sorry, page hit whore, not gonna happen.

Sounds bitchy? You’ll live.

So I’m guessing that my blogging will be pretty light (ha ha, when isn’t it?) over the next few days as we celebrate Christmas 2009, or what I will always remember as the BARBIE PINK GLAMOUR CAMPER HOLOCAUST OF 2009. However, since the company I work for wisely shuts down completely between Christmas and New Year’s, I will have some down time next week and maybe, just maybe, I’ll write some blog posts! Won’t that be fun? And bitchy as hell, I promise!