Kurt Minutes (I.E. Cosmic Hiccups)

One interesting thing that I’ve noticed about growing older is that you become acutely aware of the existence of various unexplainable phenomena, things that only reveal themselves to you after years of assorted life experiences and careful observation. A good example of this is the existence of the gremlins that keep stealing my car keys and leaving them in random places where I’ll never think to look for them, such as in my dishwasher or on the roof.

Another of these natural phenomena – one in which intrigues me greatly – exists on a much grander scale, involving the very concept of space and time itself. In addition, it’s something that I’ve become quite familiar with over the duration of my professional career. In fact, it’s even been deemed “Kurt Minutes” at my current place of employment, undoubtedly because I was the person who first brought it to everybody’s attention. To briefly summarize, Kurt Minutes is when, mysteriously defying all of the laws of physics, the very fabric of time itself – yes I said time! – is somehow bent, warped, and twisted to the point where it begins to temporarily operate on a completely foreign scale, one that’s uncharted by all forms of conventional measurement.

For example, I may contact a coworker and ask if they have five minutes to go over something with me. They’ll agree, and – cognizant that time is indeed money – I’ll succinctly and clearly articulate my point and gather the necessary feedback within the allotted 300 seconds. However, if Kurt Minutes has somehow gone into effect, these 300 seconds will have mysteriously morphed into some other elapsion of time, perhaps thirty minutes, perhaps even forty-five!! Eventually, the universe will snap back to its normal state of being, and my coworker – having obviously been affected by the very rules of nature bending before their eyes – will come out of it listless, groggy, and barely articulate, to the point where they’ll only be able to say such nonsensical things as “Do you even know what a minute is?” or “Next time I'll bring a pillow!” or “You did it again! I really should kick you in the head!”

Interestingly enough, I long ago determined that I have either developed – or have always been inherently blessed with – an immunity to the aftereffects of Kurt Minutes. This means that while I can experience it like anybody else, I never feel tired or drained once time snaps back to its proper state of being. It’s truly quite fascinating, and I suppose that in the interest of science, I should probably donate a sample of my DNA to whatever university or large research conglomerate is currently studying this phenomenon, as it might prove crucial in helping to synthesize some sort of vaccine.

On a semi-amusing note, Kurt Minutes has now become sort of an inside joke with everybody I work with. Now, while I personally find this cavalier attitude to be a bit strange, I suppose it’s just a natural reaction to them being faced with something completely out of their realm of comprehension. In fact, this carefree outlook has gotten to the point where if I ask somebody for a few minutes of their time, they’ll quite often smirk and reply, “Kurt Minutes or real minutes?” This always makes for a good chuckle, and I admire their wit and candor in the face of the unknown.

Now, you may be wondering why the continual threat of Kurt Minutes hasn’t completely freaked out all of my coworkers to the point of them seeking out new forms of employment. It’s a great question, and my answer to you is as elegant as it is simple: You see, although you may not realize it, Kurt Minutes is most likely a universal phenomenon, and so it probably isn’t something that only occurs to my coworkers and I at our shared place of employment. In fact, I’m quite certain they’ve all seen it manifest itself many times outside of their daily jobs, which means that quitting would do absolutely nothing to spare them from its effects. (And, before you ask, I have considered inquiring about it with a select few of them. However, I’ve never followed through, mainly because I make it a strict policy to never question any of them about their home lives, just in case one of them turns out to be, for example, a serial killer.)

What does support my theory, however, is the fact that Kurt Minutes has occasionally happened to me outside of work, manifesting itself in a very similar way: I’ll explain something to a friend, but the short five minutes I'll take to do so is then somehow twisted and bent into a full hour or more, leaving my friend in a rather frazzled and disheveled state, to the point where it almost seems they’re regretting the various life decisions they’ve made that have led them up to that very moment! Yes, that’s how disorientating and powerful Kurt Minutes can be!!!

Now, at the risk of sounding braggadocious, I have to say that I’m completely unafraid of the fact that time and space occasionally goes through these – for lack of better words – cosmic hiccups. This is mainly because in all of my time experiencing Kurt Minutes, it’s never gotten any worse, nor has it become any more prevalent. In short, it seems to be mired in a stable sort of instability, and I’ve long ago grown used to dealing with it. Plus, my immunity to its aftereffects – whether developed or inherent – makes putting up with it quite easy, as aside from the loss of time, I never come out of it any worse for wear.

Not everybody, however, shares in my immunity, and I realize that’s quite unfortunate. However, it’s still very manageable, and if this is the first you’re hearing about Kurt Minutes, I urge you not to worry about it. It’s just something we all have to live with. Plus, to be blunt, there are much more important things we should all be focusing our energies on; for example, trying to figure out how to catch those darn gremlins that move around our car keys. Those little buggers are sneaky!!

You Play The Mando-what??

Not that long ago, I decided to take the plunge and buy a mandolin. Besides having an itchy online-shopping trigger finger, my main reason for doing so was because I’d long since peaked at the “Excruciatingly Boring” stage of guitar playing, and instead of wanting to put in the blood, sweat, and tears needed to actually get any better, I was hoping I might somehow be a virtuoso at a different instrument. (Hey, don’t judge! It’s the American dream of laziness! Heck, if the mandolin doesn’t work out, I just might purchase a trombone and see what happens!)

Now, some of you might be asking, “Just what in the heck is a mandolin?” Well, that’s a very good question, and my answer is that it’s a small, stringed instrument in the lute family that’s usually associated with bluegrass music and which looks like something you’d give to a child because a guitar is too big for them. (“There, there, Timmy, why don’t you try this one out? It’s just your size!!”) And if that isn’t a good enough description for you, I recommend you do an image search, at which point you’ll probably say, “Oh yeah, I’ve seen people play those things before, standing way in the back of the band! Who makes them, anyway? Fisher-Price?”

Dispute its diminutive stature, however, don’t sleep on the mandolin. It may be small, but Ricky “Highway 40 Blues” Skaggs plays one, along with Marty “A Bunch of Good Songs You Never Remember Off the Top of Your Head” Stuart. Heck, even Waylon “I’m Cooler Than You No Matter Who You Are” Jennings was known to pull one out on occasion, most notably on an episode of the “Dukes of Hazzard.” (It’s a great scene, by the way. Besides the mandolin magically appearing and disappearing on his person throughout the song, he’s standing by himself on the stage, yet somehow being backed by an entire band. My current theory is that they're up on the roof. Check it out!)

Now, what makes the mandolin interesting is that it has, and I’m quoting Wikipedia here, “four courses of doubled metal strings tuned in unison, thus giving it a total of eight strings.” In other words, it’s sort of like a four-stringed instrument, except each string is really two strings tuned exactly the same and set super-close to one-another. So, in order to sound a note, you have to mash down on two strings at once. This, in turn, will quickly bludgeon your fingers into a painful mush, which is the exact state they’ll remain in for the first several decades of you playing the instrument. After that, however, you’ll probably develop helpful calluses to make things easier, just in time for the arthritis to set in.

Another interesting thing about the mandolin is that since it’s so short, the strings produce a higher pitch than a guitar, which results in it being much easier to be terrible at than it’s six-stringed cousin. In short, when you screw up on the mandolin, everybody hears it, including possibly most of the next county. (This holds true even if you’re playing with 14 acoustic guitars, a drum set, and that one annoying guy who thinks he’s all that on the electric guitar.)

Still, the mandolin is cool, and for good reason. First off, since it’s so small, it’s incredibly portable, and you can easily just toss it into your car if you’re heading off to a jam. (Just ask any upright bass player how handy that would be!) Sometimes, admittedly, it does get lost between the seats along with your phone, but the tradeoff for its portability still makes it worth it. Second, Steve Earle wrote “Copperhead Road” on a mandolin, so that automatically makes it a cool instrument. Heck, now that I think of it, I really don’t need to present any more arguments as to its inherent coolness; the Steve Earle fact alone pretty much seals the deal.

Moving along, the reason I decided to write this essay isn’t so I could talk up the fact that I have – and can awkwardly strum – a mandolin. Instead, it’s so you can become more aware of the instrument and start to recognize it while watching and listening to music. In my humble opinion, it’s quite underappreciated in the grand scale of things, and I think it deserves a little more respect.

Anyway, that concludes today’s lesson on the mandolin. However, join me next week when we’ll continue with our series “Instruments I’m Horrible At Playing.” I’ll be doing a deep dive into that time in sixth-grade when I had to try and learn to play the {shudder} recorder, cumulating in my first ever solo performance, a truly memorable rendition of “Friends Are Neat.” You won’t want to miss it!

Duck Tales

Every once in a while I remember that social constructs demand a person of my age to act both mature and responsible while navigating the various twists and turns of life. Now, while I truly believe this to be mostly nonsense and tomfoolery, I can never escape the nagging doubt that if everybody were to just act how they wanted to all the time – and not how society expected them to – the world would quickly fall into chaos. (See: The government)

So, it was with this in mind that I decided to do something society would be proud of and check up on my outdoor air conditioning unit, which had just spent the long winter buried in the unforgiving snow. "Best to scope things out now and make sure everything is in working order," I maturely said to myself, "before the hot weather sets in. After all, it is the responsible thing to do."

Now, I’ll fully admit that the extent of my "check-up" was always going to be fairly limited, mainly because my best answer to the question, "How does an A/C unit work, anyway?" has always been, "I dunno, magic?" In fact, the entire operation was going to be completely binary: Either the A/C unit would still be sitting there, in which case I’d consider the check-up to be a rousing success, or it would have disappeared completely, which would not only have been baffling, but also quite amusing. I mean, who’d steal an A/C unit over the course of the winter, anyway?

Armed with a concrete plan of action, I stepped out the back door with a look of determination showing on my mature and responsible face. In fact, I’m pretty sure I even had my sleeves rolled up, just so the A/C unit – should it still be there – would know right off the bat that I meant business. Happily enough, I found my quarry squatting contentedly where I’d left it months before, apparently no worse for wear. A smug look of accomplishment spread across my mature and responsible face. "Well, mark that one off the ol’ TODO list! One up, one down! Heck, maybe I should go and check to make sure I still have an attic!"

It was then that a monster usually associated with the worst of nightmares exploded from out of nowhere and charged me, its razor sharp fangs glinting as it prepared to tear the flesh from my bones. As my eyes widened and my jaw dropped, I had but one thought: "Oh s–"

Wait! Wait! Hold it! Upon re-reading the last paragraph, I realize that I’m embellishing a bit here, purely for dramatic effect. However, since the bond between a writer and a reader is a sacred thing, I feel that I have no option but to be completely honest in my recollections. So, let me try that again:

It was at this point that a startled duck that had built its nest several feet from the A/C unit exploded into flight from out of the weeds. Not expecting anything of the sort, I was taken a bit off-guard, judging by both how high I jumped and screamed. Over the next several moments my life flashed before my eyes, all while various colorful words tumbled out of my mouth at an extraordinary rate. However, once my heart had returned to beating at a semi-normal rate, I collected myself enough to take a peek at the nest. Sure enough, in contained seven or eight eggs, and I was instantly overwhelmed with a feeling of guilt. Hoping that I hadn’t driven the mother away forever, I scurried back inside, wondering what I’d do should she never return. This led me to briefly want to write a heartfelt country music song in the vein of Cats in the Cradle, but I quickly brushed the notion aside. This was serious!! Those eggs might soon be depending on me!!!

I didn’t dare go anywhere near the nest for the rest of the day, and I instead spent my time alternating between stressing out and researching how to be a surrogate duck parent online. The next morning, hopeful that I hadn’t created a broken home, I quietly slid the patio door open and crept back outside, making sure to keep my distance while also making no noise whatsoever. I was like a ghost, a shadow in the night, my presence unknown to the entire world!!!!

Slipping through the early morning stillness, my every move discrete and calculating, I was soon able to determine that the mother had thankfully returned! However, just as I was breathing a sigh of relief, she somehow detected me and exploded from the nest yet again!! With my ears burning red, I fled back inside, my mind racing. The mother obviously had senses that far exceeded that of a normal duck! I was going to need a lot of camouflage, and that meant finding an Army surplus store, fast!!

It was then that I was reminded of the popular saying, “Work smarter, not harder.” Realizing that I was dealing with a duck of superior intellect, I came to the conclusion that trying to directly monitor the situation at ground level – regardless of how much camouflage or subterfuge I used – was never going to work. So, I began to search for an alternate solution, and soon I hit upon it.

Not long after, I was upstairs looking out the window located just behind the desk where I worked. Sure enough, if I leaned out far enough, my waist on the sill and my hands holding tightly onto the frame, I could just barely make out the nest below. Success! I now had an easy way to observe the situation as it unfolded, all while not disrupting the delicate balance of nature! (Providing, of course, that I didn't fall out of the stupid window.) Plus, I now had something to distract me while I worked, which is something that can never be understated!

This all happened about a day or so ago, and ever since then I’ve been keeping tabs on the situation from my bird’s eye view. Happily, I can report that so far the eggs have seemed safe and sound. However, I’ve yet to see the mother again, which is mildly concerning. Still, I’m hopeful that she’s just been off doing whatever it is that mother ducks do, and I’ll not be forced to take over the parenting duties. Heck, maybe she even found that Army surplus store and has been hiding there all along!

Have A Nice Trip!

My first mistake was trying to be healthy, and my last was trying not to be awkward in front of others. In between were several months of relative calm, followed by a few intense moments of sheer panic, during which time my pumping adrenaline served only to make matters much, much worse.

But I’m getting ahead of myself. Like all good stories, we have to start at the beginning.

It was mid-February, and I had been noticing a substantial increase in my abdominal circumference, not to mention a substantial decrease in the number of garments I owned that didn’t cut off my circulation. Now, while certainly a disappointing turn of events, this was by no means something new; no, this was standard winter stuff, and so I already had a strategy in place to address it.

Flipping open my laptop, I was soon signed up for a half-marathon that was to take place in May. You see, committing to a public race had always been a pretty foolproof way for me to kick the winter doldrums and get active again. After all, the last thing I needed was to waddle through 13.1 miles of sheer agony while worrying about such things as severe thigh chafing.

Feeling satisfied with myself, I closed my laptop knowing that I’d taken a first step in the right direction, and from that point on I was forced to get out and run several times a week, regardless of the weather. While it wasn’t necessarily a health-and-fitness silver bullet, I was soon trending in the right direction, by which I mean I could now run more than two miles straight without having to collapse into the bushes to catch my breath.

Fast-forward to late April, where I found my training plan telling me to run 10 miles. Unfortunately, my schedule was tight that day, and so I decided to simply use the 3.2 mile loop near my house. While I’m not a huge fan of running the same loop multiple times over, it was the most efficient method for the time I had available; I’d just run the 0.3 miles for my house to the trail, do the loop 3 times, and I’d basically be at 10! Also, I’d be able to take advantage of the loop by planting a water bottle in the bushes, allowing me to hydrate every 3.2 miles. Deciding on the “Go Big or Go Home” philosophy, I grabbed a liter-sized, flimsy plastic bottle, filled it with water, and got ready to go.

As soon as I stepped outside, I realized I had an issue to contend with: running from my house to the loop with the bulky water bottle. Now, any rational person would have just walked the 0.3 miles to the loop and started there, but I am far from a rational person. Instead, I am intensely stubborn – usually for no good reason whatsoever – and since I’d already made up my mind to run from my house to the loop, that’s what I was going to do!! So, tucking the water bottle under my arm like a football, I was on my way.

Immediately, I began to feel like an idiot. The water in the bottle was sloshing back and forth loudly, and I quickly began to wonder what any passerby would think if they saw me. (“Where’s he going? The Sahara?”) I was now jogging on the sidewalk, and looking ahead, I saw a man walking towards me, probably about a quarter-mile away. Irrationally, I began to try and figure out a way around running past him. Maybe he was almost home from a walk and would soon turn off into one of the nearby houses! Or maybe a vicious dog would materialize out of the blue and begin to chase him in the opposite direction! Or maybe my best option would be to stop and casually pretend to water some random flowers until he’d passed!

It was at this point that my brain gave up completely on monitoring my immediate surroundings, which was why I never noticed that the square of sidewalk in front of me was set much higher than the one I was currently on, leaving a protruding ledge directly in my path. As a result, my toe ran squarely into it, and I suddenly found myself stumbling forward.

In retrospect, I should have accepted defeat immediately and just gotten it over with, using whatever balance I had left to launch myself on an angle into the nearby grass, where I could have enjoyed a relatively comfortable – albeit still embarrassing – landing on a soft surface. However, my brain instead went on red alert and issued the following command: “PINWHEEL YOUR ARMS AROUND FRANTICALLY IN A HIGHLY NOTICEABLE MANNER!!!!!! MAYBE YOU CAN REGAIN YOUR BALANCE!!!! GO GO GO GO GO!!!!!!”

And so I began to pinwheel my arms.

Frantically.

Jettisoning all non-essential equipment, the bottle of water went flying, and somehow I was able to stay on my feet for a few long, loping steps, desperately trying to pull out of my nosedive. During this time I was bent over at the waist, all while my arms were looping around in giant spirals that screamed, “Hey, everybody! Look over here!! I’m about to comically fall over!!!” Very flattering stuff.

Eventually, my momentum got the better of me, and suddenly I found myself horizontal with the sidewalk. For a long moment I simply hung there in mid-air, contemplating the many mistakes I’d made to get into this situation. Then, choosing against using my face as my primary stopping mechanism, I shot my arms out and used the palms of my hands to skid to an uneven stop on the sidewalk.

Have a nice trip. See you next fall.

Immediately, I was back up on my feet, pretending that nothing had happened. (“What are you looking at? My legs have always bent this way!!”) Casually, I picked up the water bottle from the grass, which was somehow still intact. Then, without even inspecting the damage I’d incurred, I went back to jogging, my ears burning red and the bottle again tucked under my arm. When I passed the man I’d seen earlier, I made sure not to make any eye contact, and he was nice enough to keep whatever mirth he was feeling to himself, although I’m quite certain at some point later on he laughed himself silly.

It wasn’t until I’d arrived at the 3.2 mile loop that I actually took stock of the situation. Luckily, it wasn’t bad. Besides a couple of skinned palms, there was no real damage except that to my pride, and I was even able to complete the 10 miles without further incident.

Now, after hearing all of this, you may find yourself asking: Why on earth would you tell such an embarrassing story? Why not just pretend it never happened, along with potentially forgoing all public interaction for several weeks, or at least until your ears finally stopped glowing red?

Well, I believe there’s an important lesson to be learned here. You see, I think we all-too-often care more than we should about how we’re perceived by others, and doing so can lead from something as innocuous as feeling awkward about carrying a bulky water bottle as you run to you suddenly hanging horizontal in mid-air, trying to pick out a landing spot that will hurt the least. Personally, it’s been an eye-opener for me, to the point where I’ve since made a resolution that I firmly intend to keep, one that I believe will lead to me enjoying a much more fulfilling life: No more trying to be healthy!!! It leads to nothing but trouble!

Now, if you excuse me, I have a pizza on the way. Ain’t nobody gonna fall down eating that!

Splat! Part 5

When I stepped into the orthopedics clinic, it was sort of a big deal. The last time I’d been there, I’d arrived unglamorously in a wheelchair (“Vroom! Vroom!”), and now I was proudly walking up to the receptionist like a champ, albeit a bit stiffly and sorely. Still, I felt a little like I was back in college, waiting for a big exam to be handed back so I could see my grade. Would I pass my MRI? Or would I flunk out of Healing 101 and learn that my knee was a proverbial ticking timebomb?

After doing the requisite amount of people-watching in the waiting room, I was shuttled into a small examination room and immediately abandoned. As I amused myself by looking blankly at the wall, I kept imagining an automated voice saying, “Your expected wait time is anywhere from 1 to 8 billion minutes.” Eventually, I realized that the walls of the room were quite thin, and I could hear everything that was being said out in the hallway. Shifting my waiting strategy, I began to listen for any interesting tidbits that might pertain to me, perhaps even give me a hint as to if I was going to be receiving good or bad news:

Possible Bad News: “I’ll be there in a minute. I just gotta duck in here and tell this poor sucker we’re going to have to amputate.”

Possible Bad News: “Boy, I sure hope this guy has one heck of an insurance plan!”

Possible Good News: “I love my job! Not only do I get to tell this gentleman he’s going to be healthier than ever, I also get to provide him with the secret formula for hair regrowth!”

Eventually, my doctor came into the room. After some cursory introductions, he sat down at a computer and pulled up what he said were my MRI results. To a layperson such as myself, this appeared to be a 3-D model of something that vaguely resembled a cabbage, which could easily be rotated and viewed on the screen at just about any conceivable angle. Not that I had any proof that it was actually my knee, mind you. I mean, it’s not like your parts are labeled or anything. It could have just as easily been a 3-D representation of a koala’s hamstring and I’d have had no clue. (Assuming, of course, that koalas have hamstrings.)

“Now take a look here,” the doctor said, and I leaned in close to the screen and squinted knowledgably, much like I do at work when somebody is explaining something and I don’t have the foggiest idea as to what’s going on. “You see this here,” he said, pointing to a random spot on the koala hamstring.

“Yup,” I said confidently.

“You see how it’s white?”

“I sure do!” True to his word, the random spot on the screen was indeed white! Now we were getting somewhere!

“Yeah, that shouldn’t be that color at all. That’s where your kneecap bounced off.”

So, as it turns out, at some point during that fateful night I actually dislocated my knee! Luckily, the freewheeling party responsible for this jailbreak, my crazy, ol’ kneecap, had been smart enough to relocate itself back soon after seeing there was nothing fun for it to do in its new premises. Now, while a dislocation wasn’t ideal, I was happy to learn that nothing had been torn. Plus, the dislocation helped to explain a lot, such as why walking around hadn’t been much of an option for several days, and I began to feel better about all of the self-imposed drama I’d heaped on myself. Two sprains and a dislocation!! Now that was something to talk about:

Annoying Guy Trying to Show Off: “I had a pretty bad hamstring pull once. It hurt like heck, but I still managed to finish the game."

Me: “Ankle sprain, knee sprain, kneecap dislocation, which affected both my right and left legs! I couldn't even walk! Read ‘em and weep, buddy!”

Sure, it wouldn’t hold much water with the Torn ACL or Ruptured Achilles clubs, but there would still be occasions where it’d prove useful.

Anyway, after asking a few useless questions, just to make the doctor think I was somewhat intelligent, I was told that everything would hopefully heal on its own. Until then, I’d be provided with a knee brace to help and stabilize things. With that said, the doctor disappeared out into the mist, on his way to rotate cabbages with his next patient.

The brace I was given was the equivalent of getting Coke-bottle glasses for your vision, to the point where it easily could have been mistaken from some sort of medieval torture device. It was large, cumbersome, and had random straps sticking out all over the place. I’m pretty sure I visibly flinched when I saw it for the first time, and my mind quickly went into overdrive: “Put him in the knee brace,” I could hear some ancient king sneering. “NOOOOOOOO!!!!” the prisoner would yell. “Anything but the knee brace!”

But it worked. Once I managed to pull it on, fasten all 47 straps, and get used to my left leg now weighing 30 pounds more than my right, I realized it really did help to support my knee, and that I could now walk more confidently than before! Elated at this discovery, I power-strode out of the clinic, knowing it was just a matter of time before things would all heal up and everything would be back to normal. Sure, the brace would make it so I wouldn’t be wearing leggings anytime soon, but that was just something I’d have to live with.

And that, finally, might be the end of the story.

Splat! Part 4

As I walked into the hospital for my MRI, my stress levels were hitting new heights. I was going to be jammed into a machine that would invasively scan my knee and discover that it now had the same basic structural integrity as a bowl of chocolate pudding! Never mind that I was moving around pretty well and feeling better each and every day. My brain had no room for cold, hard facts such as that, especially when there was stressing out to do!

Once I was situated in the waiting room, I had to fill out a form that asked all kinds of scary metal-related questions, such as if I had any pins, rods, or screws floating around in my body from surgery, if I had any artificial joints, or even if I listened to heavy metal music on the radio. I quickly got the vibe that MRI machines and metal don’t mix, to the point where said machine might explode dramatically if I left even a single stray coin in my pants. This was pretty stressful and distracting, to the point where as I filled out the form, I couldn’t even remember if I had a pacemaker or not. (My answer: “Mayyyybbbeeeeee???”)

Eventually, after I’d signed my life away, I was called from the waiting room and made to deposit all my valuables into a locker. I assumed this was because it would then be much easier for them to wipe my identity from the face of the earth if the procedure were to go awry and the machine reduced me into a steaming pile of goo. I was then brought over to the MRI machine itself, which is basically a gigantic tube that the technician jams you into, laughing maniacally the entire time. Just kidding, they don’t laugh at all. Instead, they simply ask you to lie down, then pile a bunch of weights onto you, making sure there’s no chance of you ever escaping. When you’re fully immobile, they then suck you into the machine and quickly sprint behind a wall roughly 10 feet thick, for the purpose of protecting themselves from the mysterious rays the giant tube is about to bombard your body with.

Lucky for me, since they were scanning just my knee, I didn’t have to go all the way into the Tube of Horrors and deal with claustrophobia. Instead, I was only sucked in to about my waist. They had also given me headphones, so I could listen to music while the machine growled, grunted, and basically sounded as if somebody was running a load of rocks through a dryer. One of the questions on the form I had filled out was what kind of music I wanted to listen to, and I had confidently answered “country.” As I was strapped in, however, I realized that I may have made a terrible mistake. Maybe it would be a bunch of modern weenie-pop country, which I hate! Maybe I’d spend a half hour listening to Thomas Rhett and Sam Hunt, at which point turning into a steaming pile of goo might be a reasonable alternative.

As it turns out, the process went pretty well. The machine was definitely loud, basically drowning out the music from my headphones. Still, I did manage to pick out some Chris Stapleton and Darius Rucker, so it was by no means torture. (There was one Luke Bryan song that came on, and it was touch and go there for a while, but I managed to persevere.) As the machine grunted and groaned, I imagined the mysterious MRI rays shooting deep into my knee, to the point where I honestly could have sworn I felt it tingling and getting hot, which then made me picture a Hot Pocket being left too long in the microwave and exploding. (Sorry for the imagery, but that’s honestly what was on my mind!)

After about 25 minutes on clunking and banging, the machine finally went silent and I was unceremoniously spit out. The technician ambled casually out of his bunker and removed the hundreds of pounds of weights covering my body, leaving me free to go. I was disappointed to learn I wouldn’t be able to see any of the results that day, and instead would have to wait until my follow-up appointment at the orthopedics clinic in about a week, which would be more than enough time to raise my stress levels to even greater heights. But that’s another story.

Splat! Part 3

It was Thursday morning, and I awoke in my trusty-but-now-hated chair to the prospect of working from home for an entire day. Since this seemed like an awfully daunting task, I decided to put it off for a while and instead make coffee. Of course, this was much easier said than done. (Believe me, I first tried saying, “coffee, make thyself and then delivery thyself to me!” but it didn’t work.) Getting out of my chair, crutching over to the kitchen, and making a pot turned out to be an endeavor in itself, but I then realized I had to somehow carry my full cup back to my chair with both of my arms occupied by crutch duty.

My solution was less than elegant. I won’t go into any details, but I will say that it employed two stools as portable islands and took so much time that when I finally arrived at my chair, the coffee had grown cold. Sigh.

Luckily, working from home on my laptop turned out to be not nearly as bad as I thought, mainly because I was able to accomplish useful things, which was the exact opposite of life at home on crutches. Still, it was just my job, so when quitting time rolled around, I was ready to call it a day. I’d been sitting in my chair for basically nine straight hours, and it was time for a break in the monotony!! I happily closed my laptop with a satisfying 'click.' I could now do anything I wanted!! Of course, since I could still barely move around, “anything” basically meant sitting around in the same chair with my legs elevated for another six or so hours before it would be time to fall asleep in that very same chair!! Hooray!!! I mean, sigh.

I also worked from home on Friday, and as I logged off that afternoon, I swore to myself I’d make it into the office on Monday, even if I had to have my chair – with me strapped into it wearing a crash helmet – airlifted there. Luckily, I was seeing a bit of progress in terms of my mobility, as my crutching around was getting somewhat easier. My ultimate goal was to be walking by Monday, but I realized that might be overly-ambitious.

The first day of the weekend went well – I learned how to use the vacuum cleaner while on crutches – and by Sunday morning I discovered I could now move around with just a single crutch! This happily meant that carrying massive amounts of comfort food from my kitchen to my chair had just gotten exponentially easier. I celebrated by venturing out into the real world to restock at a grocery store. Predictably, I stressed out about looking foolish while hobbling around in public, not to mention falling over and having an entire display of canned goods topple down on top of me. Luckily, everything went well, and that night I was even able to sleep in my bed upstairs! (For the record, I did have to fight back the urge to light my chair on fire, as a sort of both a spiritual cleansing and a symbolic gesture of moving forward.)

I went into work on Monday with my single crutch, where I discovered that my helpful co-workers had been busy. Surrounding my desk was a living room chair, a walker – complete with the much-dreaded tennis balls – and a lamp. I could now recreate my Work From La-Z Boy experience of the previous week! Oh, and our team mascot – a plastic skeleton named Mr. Chill ‘n’ Bones – was also sitting in the living room chair with his feet up, complete with a neck brace and bandages on his left knee and right ankle. How thoughtful and caring! Showing that I was a good sport, I threw the walker across the room and said a few choice words, such as “I”, “hate”, “you”, and “all,” and then settled into my office chair to get to work. As the day progressed, however, I began to feel bad for being annoyed at the prank, and eventually I began to appreciate the thought and humor put into it, to the point of switching on the lamp and stopping in my attempts to swipe at people with my crutch as they walked by.

On Tuesday I again came into the office on one crutch, but I soon discovered I could hobble around without it, which was a major victory. (I’ve never been more proud of walking without assistance to the restroom.) On Wednesday I didn’t even bring the crutch in, and on Thursday it felt like things were finally getting back to normal. While still far from being healed, it felt like real progress was being made! I hadn’t realized how much I enjoyed going to work and interacting with my co-workers, and it really helped to lift my spirits and return a sense of normalcy to my life. Of course, it was on that same Thursday when it was announced that we would all be working from home indefinitely because of stupid COVID-19. Sigh.

Oh, and I also had my MRI scheduled for Friday, which was really beginning to stress me out. But that’s another story.