Wednesday, October 7th, 2020
The day started with me making a quick presentation of the book I have co-authored. Given I was distracted by the imminent doctor appointment and the call dropping twice before it was my turn I hardly performed at my best, starting of with forgetting to introduce myself. I got up to the doctor’s office just in time as they were calling EM and would not see her without a guardian present. The diagnostic process was very thorough and with X-rays and all took well over an hour at the end of which she had been fitted a brace that she should now wear when engaging in any exercise or walking about, and definitely no swimming until the muscle has healed. It appears the ligaments are on the loose side and the muscles need to be strengthened to make up for it and prevent the kneecap from dislocating.
Interestingly Dr. B’s take on the virus situation was that one should not place too much hope on a vaccine as it is not clear yet how long antibodies last. The conversation started with me asking him if loss of taste and smell was a known side effect of a cortisone shot (it is not!) seeing he had treated my rotator cuff tendonitis earlier in the year. He is reasonably certain that I have probably had COVID-19. At the same time, he was not surprised that my antibody test had come back negative. While he is an orthopedic surgeon and not a virologist, he did appear well informed on the subject.
Precautions in the practice were not as tight as at my dentist, but temperatures were taken, and everyone was wearing masks. The entire office was in Halloween mode already. I am not there yet. The weather continues to be beautiful, sunny with temperatures around 22C-25C during the day, which does not feel like autumn, so my wish for an Indian summer has been granted. I might get to the Halloween feel by mid October. At least we have planed to go to a pumpkin patch and a vineyard on the 18th, which is also when our Halloween decorations will go up.
We were done just in time for her to hop onto the Zoom with art teacher and I had to take her to school to pick up all the art work, for her portfolio, which had been left behind when schools shut in March for what we thought would be two weeks. This process took another hour. We then stopped at Staples to pick up a proper desk chair for her – given she is spending 6 hours a day at her desk. By the time we got home it was lunch. Given the morning had already been entirely committed to family stuff, I decided to take the day of and take care of more family business until it was time to head to the pool for my daily swim.
Am noticing that despite two practices a week and daily swimming I am some of the belly flab I had successfully gotten rid of is advancing again, so whatever work out I am doing is not enough. At least none of my clothes have become tight, I just find it unsightly. I shall need to make a plan to do more of the Aikido warm-ups at home; ideally every day. Given my mornings are typically full of calls and my most productive time of the day, I may just have to change the routine and switch news scan for exercise as well as get up earlier.
Beyond the virus spread continuing in the WH and the moron in chiefs inner circle there has been little Corona news today beyond the usual: Sharp increases in the USA continue (42k day on day). European countries are also seeing spikes again. Discussions about the causes (none of which are new or unknown), some of the remedies (wear the f’ing mask and maintain social distancing protocols, wash hands, so nothing revolutionary here either).
Today the world reports 36 million infections of which 7.76 million are attributable to the USA.
There is no end in sight.