Broken Leg Pictures

We saw the orthopedic surgeon on Monday, and my fibula indeed is broken, though not in the place anyone would have guessed. The doctor thinks that what happened is that my ankle got twisted, thus ripping up some ligaments (which is where the swelling and bruising is from), and putting strain on the bone to which they were attached (the fibula). This stress was enough to actually cause the bone to break about 3/4 of the way up, as indicated in the x-ray below.

I'm still in a lot of pain, but Jenny's taking great care of me and Chipson (who has bloody diarrhea from Giardia - yuck). She is truly a saint, and I would be much more of a vegetable without her. With her help, I've even been able to work from home for a few days now. I still have to utilize crutches for a month, and then be on a walking boot for a month thereafter. And then it's on to physical therapy to help me get my strength and flexibility back (not that I had any to begin with).

And now, drum roll please, here are the pictures of the inside and outside of my leg:

The Crate Escape

Remember how we said we were going to start crate training Chipson? That training method is apparently intended for dogs that are not possessed by other-worldly demons.

We feel that we've done a good job in getting her to consider the crate to be a good place. We give her treats when she goes in it on her own, let her have bones and chew toys in there, and give her plenty of praise when she's in it. However, the first few times we left her in the crate when we left the house, she would inexplicably escape like a little Houdini-dog, and would naturally go do what she does best - pee on the carpet. Short of her growing opposable thumbs temporarily to manipulate the latch, we will never know how she figured out how to open the gate.

Our next step in confining her was to use Jenny's bike lock to keep the crate closed. This worked great probably twice. Then we had to leave her there for five hours during my visit to the emergency room. This did not sit well with the devil dog.

Realizing that the doctors were going to win the waiting game, we decided a good idea would be to have Danny and Derek go over to the house to at least let her out to pee. We figured that she might be scared to have people besides me and Jenny in the house, but that with proper incentives (treats), that she would get over her fear and make new friends. Danny and Derek will testify that we were wrong. Despite ten minutes of attempted persuasion, Chipson would not leave the safety of her crate to feel the warm embrace of Derek and Danny. Instead, she barked and snapped ferociously until those invaders left her territory. Were it not for her lack of speech, I'm sure she had quite the story to tell us later about how she repelled their attack.

By the time we got home from the hospital, we had been away for over five hours. As Jenny started unlocking the door, we heard Chipson's characteristic anticipation-whimper coming from downstairs, which meant she had miraculously escaped once again from her Alcatraz on the second floor. At the scene of the Crate Escape, we found that she had chewed through one of the wooden bars to get out once Danny and Derek had left. This meant that, at 1am, Jenny not only had to help her hobbling husband up the stairs, but then had to return to the scene of the crime to clean up the disaster that Hurricane Chipson left behind.

We (by "we," I mean "Jenny," since husbands on Vicodin can't use tools) have since tried nailing the bar back into place, but the ingenuity of mere mortals is no match for Chipson's wizardry. Lesson learned - don't fence her in.

Oh Snap!

Since I started getting old, I have turned to soccer as a new favorite sport. It's a great workout, pretty low-impact for my now 26-year-old body, and a lot of fun. It's even better because it's something that I can do with Jenny in a co-rec league.

Much to my dismay, however, our league is littered with people who mistake the word "co-rec" for "World Cup Final - MMA Style." These are typically guys who didn't make it beyond high school soccer, and now are living out their dream/frustration by slamming goals in D-leagues against people who have little-to-no experience.

I'm no good at soccer footwork, especially against these guys, but my relative size at least allows me to hold my own and maintain positioning against a lot of them. I take great joy in heading away a ball that otherwise would have been headed into our goal by a shorter opponent. I also take great joy in letting said opponent know that, although he can run circles around me, he won't be pushing me around.

...which brings me to last Tuesday. We were nearing the end of a game that we were losing 1-0. As our team started pushing forward more and more to try and even the score, their team ended up having occasional odd-man scoring opportunities against us in the open field. On one play in particular, I was the lone defender against a guy that was running right up the middle looking for a cross from his teammate that was running along the sideline. At first, he was a few steps ahead, but my long legs quickly negated that advantage as I again positioned myself to be the first one to have a chance at any high ball. Maybe he didn't see me in front of him. Maybe it all happened too fast for him to slow down or change direction. Maybe I got between a competitive jerk and his goal:

At any rate, he ran right through me, and we fell together pretty hard. The initial impact was kind of like being tackled as part of a dog pile touchdown celebration - not so bad. Somewhere as our jumbled mess fell back down to earth, though, my right leg got caught between him and the field, and I heard a loud, bone-chilling "SNAP!" The immediate sharp pain was the worst I ever felt, and let me know in no uncertain terms that my leg was broken before the rest of me hit the ground. I yelled uncontrollably at the top of my lungs, and immediately regretted it as I heard Jenny's very concerned reaction. I wanted to tell her that I would live, but I couldn't help it, so I just kept screaming out in pain.

I was initially convinced that I had suffered the exact same injury in the exact same place that Steve Zakuani had a few months earlier for the Sounders:

As adrenaline and a state of shock set in, the pain subsided somewhat, thus allowing me to survey they damage as my teammates gathered around. It didn't take long to realize that my leg had not been snapped like a twig, but more like my ankle had been twisted like a rag. Friends started asking me if they should call 9-1-1 and get an ambulance to pick me up. At first, I didn't care...I was in so much pain, I just wanted the same treatment a horse gets when it breaks its leg.

After taking a moment to gather my thoughts, I thought it would be best to have Jenny drive me to the ER, as opposed to paying an ambulance $500 for the same ride. We probably arrived close to 9pm, and didn't get out until after midnight due to the waiting game that doctors like to play. You know: 1) Welcome to the hospital! Your leg looks like it was put on backwards, but we'll be with you in just a moment. 2) Please fill out this insurance form so that your insurance can pay for your injuries, as well as those of people who can't afford health insurance. Then we'll be right with you. 3) Thanks for waiting, now we'll check your vital signs. Ok, looks like your heart is still beating. That's fantastic. The doctor will be right with you. 4) Ok, let's take some x-rays because we don't really believe your leg is broken. The doctor is going to have a look at these images, and will be with you in just a moment. 5) Looks like your leg is likely broken. Here's half of a baby aspirin. As soon as the doctor is available, he will see you and give you something better for the pain, assuming you don't pass out first. 6) Ok, our doctor is not competent enough to analyze the x-rays fully, so we're going to have a radiologist have a look so that we can also charge your insurance a little bit more. Then the doctor will be right with you. 7) Yep, you weren't lying - your leg is definitely broken. Here's some Percocet. Night night. We'll just put you in a cast and you'll be on your way.....blah, blah, blah, you get the idea.

Anyway, I'm now waiting to see an orthopedic surgeon on Monday who will have a closer look (after a great deal of waiting in his office, I'm sure), and determine next steps, which may include surgery. In the last 48 hours, my appreciation for Jenny in my life has grown immensely. I would have been nothing more than a depressed vegetable if it weren't for her taking care of me and enabling me to do things I wouldn't be able to on my own. I was even able to put in a full day of work at home thanks to her help today. I hope to be able to serve her half as well someday when she needs me most.

PS: I may have exaggerated the other guy's intentions a bit for the story. I don't hold any grudge against him. Besides, I still stopped him from scoring. If that's not taking one for the team, then I don't know what is.

At 9-months old

A friend of mine (Mallory Grover) does this adorable thing on her blog where she talks about each kid and says at 9-months old, Tacey likes... and Tacey dislikes... etc. Since Chipson is the rotten apple of my eye, I thought I would do the same thing with a bit of elaboration.

At 9-months old, Chipson likes:
- Dead things (she would be an asset to Bones)
- Consuming wood (Morgan thinks it is for her fiber intake)
- Swallowing rubber toys (she has the most colorful poop in the land)
- Ripping the face off of toys (the first ten minutes of the life of any toy, is the last ten minutes it has a face)
- Touching both Morgan and I at the same time (if we are sleeping, this usually results in Morgan and I laying vertically on the edges of the bed, while Chipson is stretched as long as possible horizontally between us, touching...well...pushing us both.
- Whining (our dog is the most vocal dog you can imagine)
- Little Kids
- Butterscotch cookies (unfortunately for Morgan, they are his favorite too, and they surprisingly eat them at the same speed)
- Flowers (when we walk down a path of flowers, Chipson bites the head off of every flower, and leaves it on the path)
- Salad (she is a wannabe vegetarian)
- Digging

At 9-months old, Chipson does NOT like:
- Alone time (please let the torn up molding, door and drywall be testament to this fact)
- Confinement (she has figured out how to unlock the crate door, which has forced us to lock the door with my bike u-lock, and even that seems questionably secure)
-Shrimp (for an animal that eats every dead crab leg on the beach, this is an enigma)
- Any adult besides Morgan and I
- Big dogs, lots of dogs, and the dog park in general (it's hilarious, her affinity for whining, becomes clear)
- Jogging (on occasion I try to force Chipson to run with me, and she has learned the secret to making us stop. As we are jogging along briskly, she will suddenly lie down, completely halting the forward momentum, and bringing my shoulder to a near-breaking point)
- Staying on her bed through the whole night (every night we go to sleep and she is safely curled up at our feet; every morning we wake up with her stretched between us.)