The Good, The Bad, and the Ugly

The Good: This was old home weekend for me. Through a weird quirk of fate, I got to spend parts of the weekend with three girlfriends of mine from high school. Now, I live about 2 hours or so from the place I grew up, so I don't get this pleasure often. One is Karen, whom I haven't seen in about 17 years. Her eldest son is apparently quite a violinist, and was auditioning at a college a half hour south of us. We arranged to have dinner Friday with the second GF, Gabriele. Gabe lives locally, but we rarely see one another, both busy with family and work. Karen's sons who were along with us were impressed that there were no awkward lags, from reminiscing about It's Academic (a high school quiz program; Karen, a third member and I made the semi-finals) to catching up on all our families.

Saturday we decided on the spur of the moment to get the best burger around at Five Guys, and called our best buds Witt and Gary to come along. They'd eaten, but invited us to drop by afterward. We had a lovely time; we always do.

Sunday evening, Gabe, the DH and I got to see the third GF, Debbie, whom again I haven't seen in about 17 years. She sings with the National Christian Choir, a very talented group who came to perform in a local church. We didn't have much time together, but it was very meaningful to us. Deb and I grew very close our senior year, and the bond remains.

The Bad: I've been having some trouble with my left shoulder for about a year now. I think I initially hurt it lifting something too heavy (probably my purse!) with my arm hyper extended over the front seat to the back. It would feel better, then I would do something to it again. Eventually the pain was a low-grade hum that would occasionally shriek horrifically when I did some odd move, like try to shrug on a jacket. Unfortunately, I tolerate pain too well, so I tend to ignore it. Yes, I know it's dumb. My GP initially thought I'd just strained a muscle, suggested two naproxen sodium twice daily to help. Didn't. So he recommended I see the orthopaedic surgeon he would use himself, and I finally did today.

The Ugly: I have what they've diagnosed as a frozen left shoulder. To fix that, I would have to go under and have it manipulated. But in addition, there is a calcification on the shoulder bone that if left untreated will injure my rotator cuff, already weakened by the fact my shoulder is frozen. So I could put off having that done, but I'd rather have one anesthesia and one incredible amount of pain (insert whimpering here) than do it twice. I will then require, if I understood correctly, about a year's worth of rehab/exercise to try to improve and recover full function. AND if I don't treat the other shoulder with care, I could end up with similar issues there too.

Anyway, surgery will be at some time on the 12th, outpatient. Keep some happy thought for me okay?

And let the first be, "Good drugs!"