Pieces of Eight, Squawk.

This is really dreadful, isn't it. I haven't even looked at the Blog for ages and when I do, another two months have gone by without a posting. I'm fortunate in that so few people read this that they probably won't notice.

Don't have an excuse either, not really. I could say I've been too busy, but let's face it, being too busy is usually just a cop out for "I couldn't be bothered." I did look at the blog once or twice and think,"What can I write about?" then when nothing came to mind I did something else instead.

I think that I now have an extended period of time when the range of things that I can do has been vastly reduced, so the Blog may keep my Sanity together.

A week last Friday, Good Friday here in the UK, I did something remarkably silly that is going to have repercussions for several months.

We, Pat and I, had decided to redecorate the little front bedroom. Theoretically it is my study, but to be honest that is a misnomer. I call it the "Pigsty" which tells you a lot about how tidy I am. To decorate it, we have to remove all the books, hundreds and hundreds of books, and the bookcases, the computer and ADSL Router, The Filing Cabinets and so on. A huge job in itself. By tea time, most of the books were gone and I decided to take one of the fold away Oak Bookcases down and put it in the garage, out of the way. Pat told me not to be stupid and just put it in our bedroom, but I, (the man, you see, ((You know where this is going don't you!))) knew best.

I got down most of the staircase, but three steps from the bottom I felt my foot slide off the front of the step. I don't think I thought about anything, just reacted. I assume that I pushed the bookcase away from my now falling body to stop it falling on me, and instead I fell on the bookcase. When I stopped falling, and screaming (It seemed like a good idea to scream because something hurt badly) I decided first that I'd broken my leg, then I decided that my knee felt odd, so I thought that I'd dislocated my knee.

My wonderful wife grabbed the phone and dialled 999 for an ambulance. Meanwhile, I had rolled over and had sat up against the staircase - I told you, I'm a man, I'm stupid. However, I hadn't hit my head or my back and, rather curiously, nothing seemed to be hurting. My knee was aching but I thought that might be a twist or a sprain. The ambulance was there in less that 10 minutes and by that time I was already thinking that I was a fraud. My leg did'nt really hurt.

The paramedics got me sitting on the step, then they got me standing with all my weight on my right leg, the one that I hadn't hurt, then one of them said, "OK, let's try putting some weight on the other leg and see how bad it is. Dutifully, I put some weight onto my left leg and I went down like a sack of potatoes. There was no strength in my leg at all. Oooooooooooooops!

So I'll now cut the long story short. Off to Hospital in the back of an ambulance. Four hours in an assessment bay while various doctors came and prodded me at intervals. A very nice young Doctor called Nick, who looked old enough to be one of my pupils, told me that he thought I'd "broken" my Quadriceps Tendon and that was quite bad. He suggested an operation and said, "Would you like us to operate on you and put it right?" Now what would you say? I thought it was a bit of a no brainer but I asked what would be the result if I refused an operation. He smiled at me, "You wouldn't walk again!" See what I mean, at least he said it with a smile.

So I was admitted to Orthopaedics. I had an operation the following afternoon. They fitted me with a proper plaster cast three days later and sent me home after just six days in hospital.

The Consultant Surgeon, another very nice man, tells me that this is going to take time, lots of time. So I will be in plaster from my ankle to my naughty bits fot eight weeks. Oh yes, it turned out that I have not bust my Quadriceps Tendon, but "partly torn my Patellar Tendon", so it could actually have been worse, there is an awful lot of power in that Quadriceps Muscle and I rather think that you let that go at your peril.

Philip, the Vicar at my Church, popped in to the hospital on the day after my operation. Lovely to see him. In the course of our conversation he said, "Of course, you do realise that this is His way of telling you that you need to take a rest." This, of course, could well be right, but, why didn't He just send me a postcard.

Like I say, I hope that I'm going to have a lot of time to keep the Blog up to date in the next eight weeks or so. However, with a pot Leg on I cannot see me going very far at all! But we'll see. I might write a bit more this afternoon! See you then!