Still Limpin'

The only news I have to report is an update on my catbite injury.  Unfortunately it got much worse than it was at last report, which if I'm not mistaken was December 15th. Today is January 10th, and all I can say is:  Ya me fastidié de toda esta pinche situación. 

After that first visit to the doc and two oral antibiotics prescribed, I got the tetanus shot, a bonus flu shot, and tended closely to my wound.  What I did not tend to properly, as usual, was slowing down on my daily chores.  Instead of lying in the hammock, foot up, reading or resting, as prescribed by the doctora, I was washing marathon amounts of clothes or working on the day my housekeeper is here since we're still in a learning process.   My leg became all inflamed and infected and hurt like a mofo.  I continued with the hot compresses and made myself lie around doing nothing but trying to heal.

On the second visit to the doctor, the wound was upgraded to cellulitis. I was prescribed six antibiotic injections and more of an oral antibiotic.  Here in Mexico, they send you away with syringes and ampules and you're on your own for shots.  After two injections a day for three days, admistered quite tenderly by Pablo, I went back for another consultation.  By that time (I hate to gross you out, but)  it was a golf ball size pus ball.  The doctora sent us away with new instructions for the care of the wound.....evidently I had overdone it with the hot compresses....I thought I had to draw all that infection out.  So off with gauze and a drier approach to the healing process.....and five additional STRONGER antibiotic injections. 

Remember that Christmas and New Year were passing by as I was painfully trying to walk from the bedroom to the kitchen, or to the frikkin tree to turn on the lights, Merry Flippin Christmas.  By the time the holidays were around the pain was so intense, although the wound was definitely making great strides in healing, finally, I practically slept through all the holidays.  I didn't call my family or spend time with anyone.  I was the Christmas Grinch.  We made the best of it at home, we drank a bit of Sidra and had a few gifts for each other and received a fantastic care package with wrapped presents from my brother Jay and wife Cherie.  Another bonus was not spending Christmas alone, as our tenant returned abruptly from Christmas 2010 Plan A....moving along to Plan B and making the most of it.  I had managed to roast a big turkey a couple days before Christmas, so we all finally got to enjoy a decent turkey fix.

After the five days of injections passed, we dutifully returned to the doctora, where she saw progress but not enough, and away we went with five more ampules and syringes.  We finished those yesterday.  My foot is finally looking pretty good, but not great, and in my heart I know treatment is not finished.  But what is finished is my skinny little ass.  It is so full of holes I can barely sit down.  I can sit up better than I can lay down, there are two huge bruised areas from the injections that hurt as bad as the lower leg, which is still throbbing a little bit on occasion, like every time I walk too much on it. 

If the infection felt like it was honestly almost gone, and there was no more leg pain, and my ass didn't hurt so much to sit, stand, walk or lie down, then the frustration of being both brain dead and physically messed up may not bother me so much. I think it's knowing this nightmare still goes on is the part that is getting to my spirit.  You can see why I haven't blogged, I mean who wanted to hear all this crap!??  I just thought I would update on the situation since I've been so absent from my normal tale telling. 

I'm going back to the doctor but not today.  This year's holiday nightmare is not quite over yet....but getting there.  I've had a lot of time to introspect on what I may have done (this time) to create myself such bad karma......but the beauty of also being brain dead during an injury like this is also not coming up with an answer and writing it off as something else.  A lesson in proper care of one's cat, for example.

Happy New Year

Before too much time passes, I'd like to comment on the fireworks presentations in Mérida on New Year's Eve.  We stayed home, mostly because of my lingering leg injury. With a slow hobble and Pablo's assistance we made it up to the rooftop around midnight.  There were so many fireworks exploding the whole scene was reminiscent of NYE in Hawaii or a night out in Iraq. The streets and air were so full of smoke, visibility was about ten feet. The explosive loud noise occasionally disturbed my ear drums. 

We could see big colorful globes emanating from churches and other organized exhibits from our vantage point.  The  neighbors all around us had bottle rockets and m80s or cherry bombs and smokemakers.  We have escaped most NYEs in the city...one year we drove off to Palenque and ended up in Guatemala. . Another NYE we went with one of my absolute and best friends to Akumal - snorkeled before breakfast, and enjoyed seafood dinners on the beach.  Last year we treated outselves to a terrific Argentine steak house in Mérida.  This year we grilled T-bones and sauteed mushrooms with onions at home.  Pablo enjoyed some Sidra (typical holiday cider) and with all my current meds and antibiotics I allowed myself Coca Cola. There was no avoiding the smoke, and that is what most reminded me of Hawaii on New Year's Eve.  After the milennium,  folks in Oahu finally put the cabash on the free for all purchase of fireworks in the state.
Until 2000 we could legally buy as many rolls of 5,000 or 10,000 and maybe even 50,000 firecrackers.  Loud and long displays of jetsam flying around our 100 year old coffee shack.  NYE was mostly a nervewracker for me, so I drank my way through it, and at the end of the night I was the one lighting all the fountains in the driveway with the kids.

This photo is from 1996-97 with the guys working out the details.

1997-98

1997-1998.

The explosion, this one shot on the milennium.

Da smoke.

Da morning after.