Stuck on the couch with a laptop? Tired of your trackpad? ‘\
I have a little Kensington optical mouse I bought for travelling. It’s tiny (and so cute!), but it works really well on the couch cushion! So, I’m no longer bound by my clumsy fat fingers. I have true computing mobility again!!\
It’s the little things… like mice.
Category: Kevin
Gore Gore Gore
And I’m not talking about the 2000 election. Yeah, I’m totally over it by now. This is my favorite picture of my poor ankle. That incision is impressive, isn’t it? It’s three times longer than my ACL scar. It’s longer than Jen’s caesarian scar (she said I should post that bit of info).\
I’m stuck on the couch for at least another week, foot elevated the whole time, no doing anything except stuff I can do on the couch while drugged up (hence the tag experiments from last night). I wonder what I’ll do tonight when I can’t sleep any more, I’m uncomfortable and I’ve watched all the DVD’s in the house…
First Post-Op Appointment
I went to see Dr. Wilson this morning for my first post-op appointment. I took pictures. Warning, they’re pretty cool (cool = gross).
Home
We’re home, I have a big splint/bandage combination on my leg, and I’m high… high as a kite.\
Dr. Wilson says everything went well, but I forgot to ask him if I could keep the bone. Stupid oxycontin.\
I don’t expect to do much for the next couple weeks except watch movies, take a lot of pain pills followed by lots of naps and try not to get bored. I don’t have a lot of experience writing code while on painkillers, but I might try it…\
Oh, and this was announced today on the microformats list if you’re into that sort of thing. It was a lot of fun coming up with it, and I can’t tell you what product we’re building that drove its creation, but it may be the coolest thing I’ve ever worked on at AOL.\
More details when I’m less high.
Writing About Myself Is Hard
You’d think that having a blog would have prepared me for this moment. For SxSW, I have to write a short and long bio… about me. You would think that someone who talks as much as I do would be able to come up with a paragraph describing myself. But, every time I start, I get self-conscious about writing about myself in the third person and it goes all Bob Goulet on me. Here’s what I’ve got so far:
Kevin Lawver is a passionate lover of web standards (which his wife oddly doesn’t mind). He french kisses his CSS and makes sure all his tags are closed so the neighbors don’t gossip. Kevin (that’s me) loves writing valid semantic markup by candlelight, and desperately wishes that Barry White had written a love song about CSS3 Selectors. But, Kevin realizes that it’ll probably be country music that brings us our first song about CSS – and it will unfortunately probably be about adjacent siblings. Kevin longs for the day when all browsers hold hands in harmony and web developers, management and designers all understand and love standards and understand their benefits. Kevin would also really like a cookie.
What do you think? Too much?
Completely irrational but…
I feel responsible for Kevin’s broken ankle.
The End Of The Line
I have a second opinion that’s just like the first. I’ve spent three months in either a boot or a cast, which haven’t make the pain stop.\
I get my ankle opened up, and the pesky extra bone removed, next Friday at high noon. I would say I’m looking forward to it, but I’m really not. It means at least 3 weeks on crutches, possibly longer, and a very long recovery (“it’s worse than an ACL”, says Dr. Wilson).\
The one small consolation is that we stuck with the conservative option until it was clear it wouldn’t work. My doctor comes highly recommended (even by the guy who gave the second opinion).\
My other source of comfort is that my wife is awesome. She’s handled my various horrific injuries with grace, support and love. She’s just the best.
The Whole Busted Up Ankle Story
I told you how it happened a while ago. Now, I’ll tell you what I did. I just found this great explanation of what an accessory navicular is. I’ve got one of those, and my little stumble in India moved mine around where it’s not supposed to be. I’ve got illustrations for you too:
A Normal Accessory Navicular:
My Accessory Navicular:
If you’re not sure what you’re looking at. The toes are right above the picture. The left side is the instep. What this all means is that I’m in a good deal of pain because this little “extra” bone is now screwing up the whole rest of my foot by moving the large tendon that controls the arch. That’s causing the arch to collapse, which is making other bones go where they don’t belong.\
We’ve been trying the “rest” bit of the treatment plan for a while now (three months and counting), and I’m just about done (finished, finito, finis, kaput) with it. This cast sucks. And, if I have surgery (wait, not if, when…), I’ll be in a cast for six more weeks. Merry fother-mucking Christmas.
I’ve done this before with my right knee (twice) and my left ankle (left). I’m not sure why this time is worse. It just is. It’s probably worse because it was such a stupid nothing injury. It’s worse because I didn’t think it was anything when I did it, and it’s turned out to be something.
Six Weeks in a Cast
At least it’s blue. If this doesn’t work, it’s surgery. I’m hoping the blue cast does the job.
Kevin is super!
On Friday, Kevin sent me roses to thank me for all of my work and support during his broken ankle angst and to say sorry for all of the hassle it has caused. Isn’t that sweet? He is the one with the broken foot so he is the one that should be getting flowers. But he was thinking of me instead. He is so thoughtful. Swoon. We had some mushy kissy time after that. We are such the perfect couple. I don’t mean we are perfect people, just that we are perfect for each other.