August 27, 2006:  Back again, not a whole lot to report.  Lisa has been studying just about every waking minute, well, other than the ones she has to spend taking care of me I guess.  I'm able to do more for myself each day and my strength is starting to come back slowly.  I've been walking around the house a lot and trying to go out with Lisa when she runs errands, the doctor said that the more I use my leg the faster it will heal.  When we went to my last blood test appointment I was able to bend my leg enough to sit in the front seat of the truck, I know it doesn't sound like much but it's a pretty big improvement.  Yesterday Lisa drove me out to check out a hobby shop that isn't too far from our house and pick up a couple of small parts for the truck that I've been messing with since I got broken.  The shop was real nice, like a smaller version of Dan's back in Rochester.  I picked up some parts to re-work the steering linkage on my truck, that kept me busy for most of the afternoon while Lisa was studying.  The weather cleared up and it's been in the high 70's and low 80's all weekend so finding little things to keep my mind off what I'm missing by not being outside is a big deal.  As I start to feel better the fact that I'm kind of stuck in the house gets to me a little more, hopefully it will only be for a little longer.  Lisa has been reminding me all weekend that it's only been 2 weeks since my surgery, to be honest it feels like a lot longer than that.  I haven't been sleeping all that well these last few days but as soon as I get a handle on that I will feel a lot better.  I'm going to try sleeping in the bedroom again in a few days and I'm hoping that by the time Dave gets here on Wednesday things will be a bit closer to normal.  Speaking of Dave visiting, it looks like the weather might end up being less than perfect for us, hopefully it's too early to tell.  Later. 

August 24, 2006:  I just found this statistic online, I've always thought I had bad luck but maybe I've had it backwards the whole time, maybe I really am lucky!  Well, you get the idea.

"Between 220,000 and 250,000 proximal femoral (hip) fractures occur in the United States each year; 90% of these fractures occur in patients older than 50 years."

August 23, 2006:  Hey again, all is good here.  I had my appointment on Tuesday and the doctor said I am making good progress.  He took some new x-rays and showed us exactly where I broke it and exactly what the metal in my leg looks like, it's crazy to be honest, like 8" long.  It turns out that I basically broke the ball right off the end of my femur, so when I was sitting in the woods waiting for help and could feel my body moving in relation to my leg but couldn't actually make my leg move the ball was just rotating in my hip socket, fun.  He did a repair called an O.R.I.F or Open Reduction Internal Fixation and with trusty Google image search I found this x-ray.  It's the opposite hip but you get an idea what the metal looks like, mine is exactly like this one.  I should have copies of my own x-rays after my appointment in a few weeks.  He told me I could start putting more weight on it and it should start getting better by the day.  I am able to lift it but not very high because my quad has basically just quit, I need to do exercises to strengthen it back up again.  The rest of it looked good and he was able to take out the stitches too, now I have this funny tape on it that will fall off on its own in about a week.  On the way home we had to stop at Target to pick up a prescription and Lisa got me some Legos to play with as kind of a joke, I thought it was funny, I'll be putting it on my desk at work when I go back.  Speaking of work, I will most likely be going back the Monday after Labor Day but we'll see, it all depends on if I can drive by then or not.  I feel like I will be able to drive, especially because I'm driving the Ridgeline and not the Element.  I'll probably give it a try next week when my brother gets here, I may try to pick him up at the airport so Lisa won't lose a few hours of study time.  I'm hoping I'll be in good enough shape to hang out with Dave and do a few fun things while he's here, we'll see how the next week goes I guess, he'll be landing a week from today.  Well, things are moving along here, have a good week. 

August 19, 2006:  Well, a couple more days have passed and I'm actually starting to feel good again, at least thinking about feeling good anyway.  I've been using the crutches instead of the walker for the most part.  Lisa has been taking non stop care of me since we got back, including taking me to my two appointments to have my blood checked.  It appears that everything is going alright, I still have a ton of swelling in my thigh but I have an appointment with the surgeon on Tuesday morning so I should have a better prognosis then and I'm hoping to have copies of my X-rays too!  Ben isn't going to make the trip out after all but my brother may be replacing him for a few days near labor day weekend to get me out of Lisa's hair while she studies for her first test.  She was able to schedule that today for while my brother will be here, she's going to get back into her books this weekend.  As the days pass I am eating a lot better and starting to feel like I can do more for myself.  When the pain pills run out the pain doesn't seem to be as bad as it's been.  I did a lot of moving around today and even made my own sandwich for lunch, that's a bigger deal than it sounds, trust me.  Basically up until today Lisa has done everything for me so it feels great to not make her work quite so hard, even if it's only for a few minutes.  She still had to carry the sandwich into the living room for me, tough to carry anything when you're walking with crutches.  My nose is still kind of messed up so I may set up and appointment with a specialist next week, it's pretty straight but doesn't feel quite right, hopefully it isn't anything severe.  Anyway, I'll try to have more updates for you soon, enjoy your week. 

August 16, 2006:  I'll give you all the quick version of the story, mostly because I've told the long verion about 1500 times since the weekend and I've had about enough of it.  I went mountain biking with my friend Kyle at a park called Big Finn Hill in Kirkland on Friday after work.  At about 7pm I came up over a down tree that was well worn into the trail and dropped a pedal on the log, this sent me falling to the left.  When it was all over I had broken my nose on a nub of a branch that was sticking out of that log and couldn't move my leg, well, I could feel it moving but Kyle couldn't see it moving so we figured there was a problem.  Fire/rescue got me out of the woods and to the hospital in about and hour and they took some x-rays of my left hip thinking it was dislocated or something.  Turns out the femur was broken clean through about 2 inches below the ball of the hip joint, something 31 year old guys normally don't do I'm told.  The doctor came in and did emergency surgery at midnight Friday and I went home yesterday.  He added a titanium plate, 4 short screws into the femur itself, and a long one right up into the ball.  I'm on a ton of pain and other pills and should be back up in there in 2 long months.  I'm out of work for at least 3 weeks they say and won't be able to drive myself to work for another 3 after that.  Lisa has been taking amazing care of me but needs to get back to her studying so she can take her test soon.  Her brother Ben is on break from his school so he might come out to visit and help out for a few days.  I'm starting to get better, I just can't be left alone when I need to move around, if I fell it would be scary.  Anyway, that's about it, I'm sure there was something else important to tell you before last weekend, if so it isn't very important anymore, have a great week!. 

August 8, 2006:  Hey again, not a whole lot to report on our front, more of the same really.  Lisa is getting into studying and totally ready to hear back about when she can take her test.  The WA state board is waiting for, of course, the MA state board to send some paperwork their way, big surprise.  Hopefully we'll hear something back this week.  We had to bail out on going to Mike and Jane's wedding, which totally stinks but not knowing when Lisa will be expected to take that test we really can't plan much into the future.  She actually had two interviews last week for two Target stores in the area, we have our fingers crossed for one of them, much closer to where we want to buy a house, we should find out in a week or so which one she will be at.  I've been doing some more mountain biking and it feels good, I can't wait for Lisa to be done with this test stuff so she can join me, the riding is really good here and I want to share that with her.  The black berries in our yard are all ripe and we've been picking tons of them.  Here is a bowl that I picked tonight after work, I would pick a few for the bowl, then pick a few for Isis, she loves the things but still won't eat them off the branch.  This weekend will be more of the same for us, I'm going to try to do some biking and maybe even some wheeling too.  The weather has been awesome and I hear we are about to have another great weekend, enjoy the rest of the summer, it's going quick.