Trials and tribulations (long one - sorry)

I’m back in the wheelchair this week after getting an infection in my stump. It started on Thursday morning with a stabbing pain in the top of my shin when I put my leg on. I’d been trying a different arrangement for my socks, in an attempt to improve the fit, but as soon as I put weight on my leg, I got the pain.

I took my leg off and re-arranged my socks back to how they’d been over the previous few weeks, and thought no more of it. I knew it was going to be a busy day, and I needed to leave the leg on as our cleaner, Linda, was coming; then I was expecting delivery of our new dishwasher (they could only say that they were coming between 12 and 4pm) and I needed to be up and about for that; and finally I was waiting for our local appliance repair guy to come and fit it.

While the repair guy was still struggling to get the cabinet door to fit on the dishwasher front (Hoover don’t give very good instructions – glad I wasn’t trying to do it!), Denise arrived home from her trip to Germany. Once we were alone, we went for a walk, and later on, went out for a pizza and to go to the pictures.

All this time my leg felt slightly uncomfortable, but when we got home, and I took the prosthetic off, it was very very tight and my leg was very sore. There was a bright red swelling on my shin, just under my kneecap (I tried to take a photo, but the redness didn’t really show up – which is why there’s no photo posted here), which was very tender to the touch.

I assumed that it would go down in a day or so, but by Sunday evening, it was still very hot and tender, and I was worried about getting an infection on the bone again, so I phoned the Astley Ainslie hospital for advice yesterday (Sunday), but they said I needed a referral from my GP to see the specialist at the hospital.

So I’ve just got back from the GP, who prescribed me a course of anti-biotics – my old friend co-amoxyclav again, which I was popping nearly all the time I was in hospital. My GP didn’t think I needed to see the specialists at the Astley Ainslie hospital, as he thought it was just an infection in the skin, which suited me: saved a trip into Edinburgh – but I’m going to be keeping a weather eye on it, and if there’s no sign of improvement in the next couple of days or, I will be back to the doctor again. It’s bad enough having lost my foot and ankle to infection, I don’t want to be losing any more of my leg.

That’s enough of that. The film we went to see was Vantage Point starring Dennis Quaid. If you’ve seen the trailers you’ll know that the premise is that the US President is assassinated while attending a rally prior to an anti-terrorism summit in Spain, and the film reveals more about what happened by seeing the event from a number of different viewpoints. This is all then pulled together, and we have the obligatory car chase – with Opel Astras, no less. I won’t reveal anything in case you want to go and see it, but honestly, I’d wait and see it on telly if I was you. Seeing it on the big screen doesn’t really add anything to the experience. It was nice to have a night out, but this wasn’t the best film I’ve seen by a long shot. I’ll bet that it’s based on a short story or something, and I’d guess that the written version is a lot better. There were a number of Hollywood stars in the cast (Forrest Whittaker, Sigourney Weaver, Matthew Fox, William Hurt, and your favourite South American Dictator’s namesake and mine, Eduardo Noriega), but those parts could have been played by anyone, really.

I was able to enjoy watching all the motor-racing that was on telly this weekend, while Denise went to Edinburgh to run in the World 5k. She stayed on to watch all the cross-country stars in the World Cross Country events in Holyrood park, while I watched the MotoGP race. James Toseland, the best (only?) brit on the grid, was unlucky to come only 6th, after having been duffed up by Loris Capirossi on the last corner. You don’t get any more experienced on a GP bike than Capirossi, so at least Toseland can take comfort from being beaten by a wilier opponent. JT started 8th on the grid, which wasn’t bad considering he was suffering from bronchitis, but lost out at the start, dropping to 10th. He’d fought his way (literally – there are other bikes in the workshops with Toseland’s bike’s yellow and blue paint down the sides of their fairings) up to 5th, and was fighting them off nearly all of the rest of the race, right until the last corner; which is pretty good going considering he was ill. Dani Pedrosa didn’t do bad to win, either, considering he was riding with an injured hand. Didn’t stop him wrassling that Honda all around the circuit for 30 laps, or whatever it was. It’s also very encouraging to see me old favourite Valentino Rossi coming in second from the second row of the grid.

Due South to Moffat

I'm still looking for work, but there's not a lot around just now. Suits me. I'm nearly ready, but I could do with just a little more time to work on my stamina. My mood is a lot better (ask Denise about that!), and I'm back to having a positive outlook; as I had when I was in hospital. The support around me then made it a lot easier to be positive, and the progress was much greater - going from not walking at all to walking - even if only slowly and with the aid of sticks - is a huge jump. I still have great support around me from friends and family, but it is not the crucible that the hospital was. Nowadays, the improvements are smaller, and it's harder to recognise them for what they are. Sometimes I needed that pointed out to me, by Denise, and my friends.

We had a really nice drive down to Moffat, in the Borders, today. This is my favourite drive, because the scenery is stupendous. There are no photos here, because there are not many places to stop to take them. Some time ago I posted a photo of the Devil's beeftub, which is on this route. Today, there was a bit of snow about, and the hills were dusted with it. Superb, and I never even had to fight my way through Easter traffic over the Forth Road Bridge! The Highlands are beautiful, don't get me wrong, but sometimes it's a lot easier to head south.

Back to work?

Suddenly, I'm getting on better with my leg. I guess my own leg and the prosthetic extension have decided that they're stuck with each other, so they might as well get along. I was getting quite a lot of pain yesterday, probably following the exercise I did at the gym on Sunday. But it's calmed down now, and it's such a relief that, generally, it's getting easier. We walked up to our favourite local restaurant at the other end of the village, and I was fine. I suddenly realised I was walking at nearly my pre-accident pace - none of the slow, frustrating plodding. So, speed is up, but range/stamina isn't. Apparently you're supposed to concentrate on one or the other, and, being the impatient person I am, I went for speed ;-)

I am seriously thinking about going back to work in about a month, if there's anything going. I've contacted Steven, the guy I was working for at RBS when I had my accident, so see if I can go back, but I've also been contacted by another consultancy I worked for a few years ago, and they are also looking to see if they can find anything for me.

This is all good stuff, but it's also slightly terrifying. I've not worked for a year, and have got out of the habit - I have a lot of time to myself, and have not, so far, minded that. I see nothing wrong in wanting to watch a couple of films in the afternoon, then have a bit of a nap, and then play computer games. I'm happy doing that. When I'm not, I'll know I'm really ready to go back to work. At the moment, I'm just getting a little unsettled, and feeling guilty that I'm not back after a whole year. But when you think I actually had my amputation at the end of July, that will only be 9 months if I go back in April, and some people don't get back to work for a couple of years.

Anyhow, as I've joined the gym now (yes, really) I'm hoping to build up my stamina, and get myself back interested in the world outside the house, so it sort of feels right that I'm putting out feelers for getting back to work. I have to admit to being unsure whether I'm doing the right thing. I sort of set a year from my accident almost at random, and I'm feeling pressure on myself to stand by that. I don't know how much my condition is going to improve if I go on as I am. Should I wait, do more excercise, and be sure I'm up to it, or should I go back to work and hope that any potential employer will be sympathetic when I run out of steam, or am suffering from pain and needing to take my leg off for a couple of hours? It's hard. I could go on as I am for months and months, getting leg pain, and falling asleep in the afternoon. If I just go on waiting for that to improve, I may never get back to work. Got to do something, then. Yes? No? Oh, good grief, I just don't know.

Graeme's Living Room Concert

What a great way to spend a Saturday afternoon! My pal Graeme invited us over to his place to be part of a small audience in one of his occasional Living Room Suite concerts. This involved about 30 people crammed into his living room to watch two rising-star singer/songwriters give their all with just a piano and a guitar to perform with, while Graeme recorded the whole thing for his radio show.

First we had the highly acclaimed Kim Edgar (www.kimedgar.com), who has recently returned from the USA, and whose new album, Butterflies and Broken Glass, is an absolute delight. It's rather nice to hear the songs as she would have played them to herself as she was writing them, without the full orchestration that appears on the album version, and then to go to the CD and hear the full article. Although many of the songs could be described as being less then cheerful, she is a charming, funny lady, and well worth seeing live - although I doubt you'd find a venue as intimate as Graeme and Gillian's front room: we were less than two metres away from Kim as she performed!

After some fabulous food, provided at the interval by Gillian, we were back for the second half with Alex Cornish, another class act whose music has been used in several films, and who has produced his own album, Until the Traffic Stops, after being messed around by the record companies to the point where he gave up on them, and did it himself. Alex is an entertaining guy, as well as a talented singer and songwriter. Again, it's interesting to hear the music stripped of all the studio layering and orchestration. You can find out more about him at www.myspace.com/alexcornish, or www.alexcornish.com.

Needless to say, we bought the albums :-)

Graeme will edit these recordings and they'll be played on his show on Leith FM (98.8 MHz in Edinburgh, or via the Internet at http://www.leithfm.co.uk/) on either the first or third Thursday in April, between 10am and noon.

Third Leg (it's not cricket), and Rock 'n' Roll

Leg
In my New York posting, I opened with “Since I got my last new leg, I've not been inclined to do anything much except watch telly”, which may not have made a lot of sense. The fact is, I was not getting on very well with my latest leg, but now I think I have finally found a comfortable combination for the socks that I wear between it and my stump. It’s taken a while! I have thick and thin socks, and some that I have cut the ‘toes’ out of to form a ring, and these I place where there is an area that has shrunk more than the rest, to keep the whole thing nice and tight and comfy.

This is my third prosthetic leg, or Leg No. 3, as I like to refer to it, at the risk of sounding a bit like Kryten, the domestic robot from Red Dwarf, with his cupboard full of spare heads and hands, etc. I was wearing four or five thick socks with Leg No. 2, which fairly effectively stopped me bending my knee by more than a little, so I was really looking forward to getting my new leg back at the beginning of February. For some reason, I didn’t get on so well with the new one, it being fiddly to get the sock padding right. As soon as I took possession of it, about eight or ten days after having been measured up for it, I realised that my stump had changed shape in the intervening time: it was more than frustrating. I couldn't walk very far without getting sore and very tired (hence just vegging in front of the telly), and it was this that has got me down in the dumps. I knew I had the New York trip ahead of me, which I knew would involve a lot of walking, the prospect of which was, quite frankly, appalling. As it turned out, it was no more than a little tiring and uncomfortable, but it was worth the discomfort.

Guitar
Yesterday I had a good old ‘sesh’ on the guitar. I bought a little four channel mixer box the other day, which was a lot better than my previous one, in that it is powered so that one channel doesn’t overwhelm the others. I set this up with my guitar in one channel, and my keyboard and iPod in two of the others, all output to my Peavey amp. I started off with just using the rhythms from the keyboard, then added in some of the melodies to play along with, and moved on to hitting Shuffle on the iPod and attempting to play along with whatever turned up. It was noisy. Very noisy. Not all of it was good, but I ended up playing for about four hours, only interrupted by near starvation, and frantic knocking on the window - which was surprising, as I was up in the loft room - and a voice calling my name. ‘Mr Tracey! Mr Tracey! It’s the roofer!’, he called. No shit, I thought, a roofer, knocking at my second storey window. And here’s me thinking it was the postman. I shut everything down to go and meet the guy, chuckling to myself.

I was using the Gibson SG that Denise bought me for my 50th birthday, and, I have to say, it is a fantastic instrument to play, and it’s barely run in yet! The action is so light that even after all that playing, my fingers weren’t sore (I’ve lost the hard pads I had when I used to play all the time as a yoof), but just tingled slightly. I think the skin’s hardening again, as I have had more time to play over the last ten months.

New Nazareth Album
I’ve just ordered the new Nazareth album The Newz that’s due out at the end of this month. It’s the band’s 40th anniversary in the business, and their epic world tour is underway as I write. This is one of the hard rock bands that I keep coming back to, due to the band’s song-writing talents, and to Dan McCafferty’s unique (despite attempts – I say attempts at imitation) vocal style, which sets the band apart from the others. I’m a guitarist, so that’s the thing I normally listen for in a band, but it was always the voice which, to me, defined Nazareth – not that there was anything wrong with Manny Charlton’s guitar work.

Manny Charlton moved on a long time ago – although he has reportedly formed a band billing itself as ‘Nazareth featuring Manny Charlton’, probably also thinking about the 40th anniversary. I think I’d be disappointed if I went to a show or bought an album with that billing that didn’t have McCafferty’s voice in the line-up.

I’ve heard a few of the tracks from the new album on Leith FM. DJ Graeme Scott has connections with the band, and produced an excellent interview, including a sprinkling of tracks from the album (there’s your plug, G), which I think is still available from the forum on the band’s official website (http://www.nazarethdirect.co.uk/). From that, I can tell you that this is not a last hurrah for sentiment’s sake from a band that started out in 1968, but a real, proper Nazareth album that’ll sit alongside the best. There’s even an epic ballad for when you’re feeling romantic, in Enough Love. I should also say that Nazareth are far from being Dan McCafferty on his tod! The father-and-son rhythm section of Pete (bass) and Lee (drums) Agnew drives the sound, keeping your head bobbing and yer toes tappin’; and Jimmy Murrison’s excellent guitar work has my fingers twitching a la air guitar, and my head humming. I’m really looking forward to that Amazon parcel dropping through the door. I think I'm cheering up again. Hooray!

(Album cover image courtesy of the Nazareth official website. See links above and right)