Archive: Bugger
Source: Gisoku no Jutsu
Original post date: 20 March, 2007
Hmmm, having another one of those amputee moments today. Was walking around the office minding my own business, when -clunk- the knee on my artificial leg seized up. And I muttered “Bugger” to myself. Because Australians are so eloquent when it comes cursing. Oh yes we are.
Anywho, you’re all probably wondering what the significance of this is? Well, it’s not too much to be worried about in the grand scheme of things probably… but explaining it might be a bit tricky, and once again I think to myself – wow, it’s be nice if I had a picture to show 😛 Actually, that’s a good idea – I did a search on the ‘net ad finally found the company that produces my current knee (which I swear by – it’s a brill piece of kit, perfectly suited for what I do), who are Seattle Systems. Now, hopefully this’ll work – I’ve plonked the image into the pics section, so let’s try and plonk this into my blog post and keep it looking nice:
My knee, in monochrome 😛
Okay, anywho, inside the knee, amongst other scientificy things, is a big-arse spring that helps regulate the thing’s movement. Being a somewhat active amputee, I have a habit of putting these things through their paces, and the tell-tale ‘clunk’ is normally a sign that the spring is starting to either shatter, twist out of shape, or spontaneously combust. Okay, I lied about the spontaneously combust bit. It doesn’t do that. It would be funny if it did that though… actually, it probably wouldn’t be. In fact, it’d probably be a bit shit… and possible slightly humorous, but that’s all 🙂
Anywho, what this translates to in the grand scheme of things is that my knee has now entered into an unreliable phase. Sometimes the knee will just lock up mid-step, which leads to amusing situations (trippping up, without falling over), to situations possible determined to be bad (walking down the stairs, knee locks up, leg misses the step and you tumble onwards and downwards). It also means no karate until I get it fixed up, as its current state isn’t exactly conductive to (a) jumping, (b) running, or (c) kicking. It does, however, mean I can extend my expertise in the art of falling down. It isn’t very useful mind, but it’s always good to observe some positive wherever possible 🙂
So, it’s time to slash the lunch breaks again and head out some time this week to get it fixed. If the knee worsens, I have my spare leg available, so I don’t have to worry about missing work and wasting any sick leave. Plus it means I won’t fall behind on my workload either, which is always handy.
So, unless I post otherwise, I’ll probably have to skip karate again this week. In its place though, I’ll see if I can put in another weights session followed by some cycling to make up for it, and continue stretching in the meantime. I’ll post towards the end of the week to let everyone know what happens!
