Knee Feeling Keen

Pained on Wednesday, drained on Thursday. I couldn't have picked a better time to get sick. I was able to see the doctor, have a blood test, and start a monthlong course of antibiotics all within 3 hours, and since the kids are out of school and I'm not seeing students (who are all on vaca), I could sleep till 9 or 10 every morning. And voila! I'm feeling almost like new. I actually ran when the phone rang yesterday and took the stairs two-at-a-time today. My knee still locks up a bit, but moving it slowly and avoiding weird sitting positions basically keeps me feeling good.

Part of my convalescence has also involved doing normal things. Since Lyme (which I'm assuming this is) has symptoms that include irritability, it's been important to avoid sulking or doing lots of nothing. We put up shelves yesterday (ok, I helped Shirra put them up), I broke up some ice (well, actually that was mostly a total failure, but at least I got out), and I took Fiona to a friend's house and ended up having a lovely chat with the folks. Then today, we took a trip to the village to check out a restaurant in Water Street Market. The food was fine, and we had a good time thanks to a Mad Libs-style app that I downloaded for my iPhone.

Fireman No More

I resigned from the fire department. I was upset about having to do so, but the minuses easily outweighed the pluses.




I joined the department in December of 2006, so I resigned almost exactly 3 years after joining. In the interim, I answered over 550 calls and helped deal with a few house fires, a handful of car accidents, two cats-in-trees, and many many false alarms at the university (and a few elsewhere). Since joining, I also started collecting items related to fire fighting, including patches of local departments as well as many different kinds of antiques (old helmets, extinguishers, pins, and even artwork). All of that's going to eBay now, with the exception of my own badge (#952, on the right side of the photo). I think I have a few hundred dollars worth of stuff - maybe close to $1000.




I loved belonging to our department. I loved helping our community, and my favorite part of it was during Fire Prevention Week, when we visit all of the local schools and day-cares to teach the kids about fire safety and to introduce the little ones to a fire fighter in gear. I also liked being known as a fireman, which carries a certain panache that made me feel proud.

I wish I could have been more helpful to the department. I had trouble remembering where some important items were on the trucks, and only in recent months did I begin to feel like I knew where most of it was. Most likely this was due to my schedule: Because I could almost never be in New Paltz during Monday night training sessions, it took me much longer to learn my way around the trucks. In addition, I didn't get to practice the skills necessary to put out fires or extricate drivers, so most of what I did on a scene was the sort of grunt work that anyone could do. Occasionally I was of some value to the NPFD, but I wish I could have been even more helpful, even more often.

My first full year, I answered about 250 calls. Last year, the number was about 170. The final tally for '09 was 130. A large part of the decline came from my decision not to rush to the calls that came in from SUNY New Paltz. That boy called wolf far too often for my tastes. It didn't help that we live nearly 4 miles (and almost 10 minutes) from our fire house.

I fully support our fire department and hope that they get the funding for the upgraded fire house that's in the works. Maybe if my schedule (and a few other things) change, I can return, but for the next few years, I would count that out.

LYME?

All of a sudden two days ago, my right knee was swollen and painful to move. Initially I was hopping around, but within one day it went from annoying to almost debilitating. To my delight, my orthopedic surgeon (who'd helped with my left knee some months ago) had time to see me today. He immediately notified me that he would be draining the fluid (and that there was a lot of it) and that I might need a cortisone shot.

The weird thing about the onset of this pain and swelling was that there was no obvious cause: no painful fall, no bad twist, no overexertion. It made no sense. Then the doc mentioned that when kids come in with my symptoms, it's usually Lyme disease. I looked it up on Wikipedia, and sure enough, everything fit. The disease can come on suddenly and produces the painful swelling as well as a few symptoms I could also attest to, namely fatigue and mild irritability. Then I remembered that about six weeks ago, I was bitten by a deer tick.

We decided that the chance that I have Lyme is pretty high. Because of that, and because cortisone and Lyme don't usually mix, the only treatment for today was the fluid drainage. The syringe is huge, as is the needle, but they barely hurt going in, and the swelling and pain were mostly gone by the time they came out.

After seeing Maeve at school for a little pre-winter-break party, I went for a blood test and picked up my pills. I'll know the results of the test pretty soon, and in the meantime, just to be on the safe side, I'm on amoxicillin 4 times a day (for a month). Then I came home and took another nap.

Cheewawa is Down, but not for the Full 10-Count

My beloved smart car nearly died last Thursday. I had just dropped Fiona off at the middle school and was on my way back home when the car suddenly lurched. The car behaved normally for a few more turns and then repeated its lurching, shifting between 1st and 2nd gear fairly violently. I turned the car off and on as a possible 'fix' to the problem: no luck; in fact, it got worse. I quickly considered where I could park the car without hindering traffic and where a tow truck could easily pick up the car. Eventually, thanks to the slope of the hill, the car glided into a parking lot and I pushed it into a spot.

Several frustrating phone calls later, I had discovered that my extended warranty company only covers towage up to $300 (better than the $100 that an earlier operator had told me). Still, because the car had to be towed nearly 90 miles, the charge would be over $500, leaving me responsible for the overage. When I called the tow company themselves, the dispatcher suggested Triple-A, since they have a very good policy for towing. Sure enough, the entire trip into and back from NYC was covered, with me responsible only for about $10 in tolls.

More frustrating, tho, was to discover only yesterday that the extended warranty somehow doesn't cover the problem with my car, which resided in something connected to the transmission called the switch plate. This is a piece of metal that was found to be too weak in the 2008 smart cars (like mine) and was, in the 2009 models, replaced. In other words, this is a known problem. It's a rare one, tho, and since I drive like a granny, the problem points not to my driving style but to the defect in the mechanism.

The good news is that the manager of smart center Manhattan is on my side. He was stunned that I was being forced to pay for the repair of a part that should not have broken and which is just a few steps above being recalled. He phoned the company and got them to shoulder a third of the cost, or about $300. I pick up the car later today. I hope it lasts at least another 65,000 miles before any other major repairs.

The Plowman Cometh

We got a call at 7 am: AJ, our plowman, was experiencing a delay. Apparently there was something wrong with his truck.

Since school had been canceled for the day, this wasn't a big issue. Eventually he'd come to our rescue, and until then, we could hang out at home with some hot chocolate and a dog who loves snow. Emmett and Maeve went sledding and found other fun things to do outside. Fiona got an extra two hours of sleep. On the minus side:

1. Jack doesn't actually like the snow. He's ok with it, but unlike one of his old friends, he doesn't dig himself into a tunnel or galavant about in the fluffy white stuff. He just lies down in it long enough to get wet. Then he comes back in and gets everything else wet. And when he goes for a walk, he'll get everything wetter still.
2. I needed to be in Manhattan by noon. This meant leaving around 9:45 just to leave myself some extra time. By 9:00, we hadn't seen or heard from AJ, so I gave him a call. His truck was back in action (phew) and he'd be by as soon as he could.

Sure enough, he arrived just after I'd dug out my little Cheewawa from its surrounding snow. Shirra and I also spent a half hour cleaning out some of the shed's overhang so that I have my cosy little place to park the tiny car. When AJ arrived, I hopped into the Smart and drove (carefully!) down the road behind him. It was lucky that he had to leave, too, because I got stuck just before our road merges with Rte 32, and he pushed me out of trouble.

I made it to Manhattan with no time to spare, parked in a spot only a Smart can fit into, and called the day a success. Now I just have to hope that the road doesn't freeze over by the time I get home tonight.