James Lind

Nikki left for Grande Prairie, Alberta on November 22nd. It hasn’t even been a week and I miss her. It’s a pretty big adjustment for her too; but she’s trying her best, and next week I think her and her partner are in charge of things in the house! She’s a very organized young lady, so I think she’ll do very well at that! I wish her all the best, and if anyone wants to send her an email please do! I’m not sure if and/or when she’ll get to check her email; but always nice to have something in the INBOX besides spam!

Barney and Clyde and I miss my Nikki

I got to meet Leo the Royal Bank of Canada mascot! It was a thrilling day for me as you can tell. I was fortunate enough to have my camera along so that I could get a picture! Imagine my joy when i had the opportunity to have my picture taken WITH Leo! Wooot!
Somedays everything lines up right in the universe! Raaaaawr…

So you think it’s terrible that we got more snow? How about my friend Beth? Listen to how her day went! It’s a little long; but a good read!

So it was about 2 ‘o clock.  I’d been helping to paint the “backdrop” for the set of our play. (And I was going up to do my lines when it was time, still in my painting smock).  But I was on a little break from lines for the time being, I’d just practiced the song I’m singing with two other girls and I was ready to devote myself to the painting again.   We had a designated “painting room” for this very large project, and big jars of paint, dishes of mixed colors, and paintbrushes etc. were scattered all around the floor.  Of course I had to watch my steps very carefully so as not to fall.  Then as I was standing pretty much still I felt my right leg lock up.  This was normal for me however.  But something was different this time, it was in a lot (LOOOOT) more pain than usual, and I couldn’t move the leg at all (I was trying to “undo” it).  Then I just couldn’t keep my balance and I fell backwards onto the ground.  Then the other three girls (Karin, Sky and Jesse) who were with me rushed over to me and asked if I was alright.  I wasn’t.  After a minute or so I must have realized that the source of my pain was my right knee, so I pulled my skirt up over it to check it out… and well…dang.  The middle of your knee that jets out, that was completely sunken in and just.. gone.  It jetted out over on the side of my knee, an d everything was just totally misshapen and really disturbing.  The girls were amazing, they worked on keeping me calm and assuring me that everything would be fine.  The pain was getting really intense though, and after a few minutes I realized that when I fell I knocked over big jugs of paint and was now lying in a pool of the stuff.  While Karin worked on cleaning the paint as much as she possibly could, Jesse told me that my kneecap had popped out and that she’d had it happen to her before.  She said I needed to straighten out my leg (it’d bent over a paint jar) so that it’d pop back in, and that it’d hurt but feel a lot better afterwards.  I refused.  I was scared.  I wanted a doctor or something.  Soon my drama teacher found out what had happened and after checking my knee out she didn’t think it looked good.  She left to call an ambulance, and meanwhile the girls gave me some pain meds.  Hannah had joined them and they were so wonderful, stroking me and trying to keep me from moving (which hurt more than I can say).  But my natural tremor gets a lot worse when I’m nervous and I was shaking vigorously.  Another teacher came and they all propped my back up so that I didn’t have to keep holding myself up.  My drama teacher returned and said she called my dad who said not to call an ambulance, and that he’d be there to take me to the hospital (he’s had this happen to both of his knees).  After about 15 more long minutes he arrived.  He hadn’t realized my knee hadn’t popped back in place, so then they DID call an ambulance.  While we waited we all talked about what had happened.  They said I was amazing, that I was still smiling and joking (though occasionally I couldn’t keep my sobs and yelps in).. and Jesse said she was screaming when it happened to her.  Then the ambulance got there, and three people brought one of those stretcher beds in with a box of equipment.  I told the guy I wanted pain meds and gave me an IV in my arm to get them in.  I can’t remember what the med was but it started with a “V” (I’ll look it up later).  They had to give me two doses before it cut down the pain enough for them to continue with the procedure.  They tied my legs together, lowered the stretcher, and about 4 people lifted me onto it.  Then they rolled me out to the ambulance and loaded me in.  I was a lot more comfortable by then.  The ambulance was cool.  They kept taking my blood pressure and the guy asked me a lot of questions and took down the information.  My dad followed us to the hospital, and they quickly got me in and started to wheel me down to one of the rooms.  The pain was tolerable, but then I started getting spasms in my knee so I was screaming all the way down the halls.  They took me to the kids’ side (which was nice), but I felt bad about screaming in front of little kids.  Finally they got me in the room and the spasms started to calm.  They asked a lot of questions I’d answered previously and gave me a big dose of morphine.  It started to help, but then the spasms came back and I was yelling out again.  They said they’d need to give me some muscle relaxant thing but my dad would have to sign this paper for me to be able to get it.  He played around like “Hmmm… should I..?” while I screamed to sign the fricking thing.  Finally he did and I got the drug.  Mmmm, much better.  Then one of the doctors started poking at my knee and without warning quickly popped my knee back in.  It still hurt a lot, and I can’t imagine what it would have been like if I weren’t so drugged.  They said there’s a 30% it’ll be fractured at the same time, so they took me down to get X-rays.  The X-ray lady moved my leg in some uncomfortable positions and asked me questions like if there is any chance I’m pregnant.  Then they wheeled me back over to my room and waited.  The doctor came back and said from first look there doesn’t seem to be complications, but they’ll let me know a more final answer in a week.  Also in a week, an ortho-something person will check with me an d eventually we’ll have to do some physical therapy.  I probably won’t be able to walk for about 4 weeks, but it’s hard to know exactly how long it’ll take.  I have to take lots of pain meds and ice my knee a lot now.  I tried using crutches there but I just couldn’t do it.  My grandparents will be here in about an hour to bring a couple of wheel chairs over.  We put a bed in the kitchen and eventually my dad will probably move my computer up here too, but for now I’m on his laptop.  We’ve been having a lot of trouble because he can’t lift all of my weight.  Trying to get in the house was awful, and a chair broke from under me in the process… ow.  So yeah, that’s my story.  Had trouble sleeping, since I can’t move my leg at all. 
-Bethany

So when you’re out shoveling your sidewalk today, just remember,
things could always be worse…

Well, actually I hope it doesn’t! But it did start out great for Nikki! She took her driver’s road test on Thursday morning and scored a perfect test…zero points deducted! I’m so proud of her! She worked very hard at practicing and it paid off.
So we can only hope that November does NOT start out with a bang…at least in the car driving department!
Congratulations Slick!