A Christmas post

Christmas as a T-Rex.

I would never be likely to dress up as one.  I’m more the sort who would wear something simple to a costume party, and have never dressed up for Halloween.

So why Christmas as a T-Rex?

Mbini, a fellow blogger from the old days on South African blogs where we made such great friends; was bemoaning the loss of that time. I suggested we (the old bloggers) each do a Christmas post. I started a Christmas story – it was panning out as somewhat more than my usual 500-odd words, when Rex-iness really struck.

Christmas morning I woke, in pain – all over. Ok that is a slight exaggeration; internals and those sorts of bits seemed fine, hips, knees and feet and the bits in between all seemed functioning as normal.

Note to self – all those signs leading up to it should have been taken a LOT more seriously.

But starting with my right hand curled up like a T-Rex claw and agony if it touched anything or tried to move it; then on to my left hand which obviously wanted to tell me that I (like a T-Rex) don’t really have a functioning opposable digit decided my thumb was a serious non-starter for anything but pain.

But the deciding factor was when I sort of rolled out of bed, stood on my feet and realized that both shoulders had frozen up.

Painfully slow access to my cell phone and a whatsapp message to inform my hostess for Christmas Day that I would be unable to make it there. After all how can a T-Rex drive when she can’t reach the steering wheel?

If you have never had a frozen shoulder and want to try it I suggest you tape your arms to your sides just above the elbows. Then insert barbed needles into the outside muscles of the upper arms, so that almost any movement makes you extremely aware of the presence of these alien objects with every little twitch.  Stick pins into the joints. And if you are a really talented torturer make sure almost every position carries some way to annoy these bits with stabs of pain that make you shriek and swear.

For 3 days I lived as a T-Rex. Extremely bad tempered, short arms that could reach almost nothing, hands that behaved like painful claws.  Slowly the pain and anti-inflammatory meds seemed to help a bit. I guess my liver and kidneys are owed a major holiday at a spa when this is over. Food before drugs like that is supposed to be a must but when you can only open the fridge with MUCH use of words I could only hope the neighbours couldn’t hear and then discover that only what is at the front of the first shelf is accessible, well then the T-Rex levels of aggressiveness just bubble up.

Ha ha – little Christmas T-Rex didn’t have much choice on the one fridge shelf I could reach.

Then I slowly over the days and nights became a sort of second-rate T-Rex with one arm able to reach further into the fridge and finally into the microwave.

Access online was interesting as I was extremely bored. Heavy books couldn’t be held, but my laptop could be booted at the far side of the bed, and as it has a touchscreen I could scroll around using those silly left-hand fingers, do some likes and even post the card I had prepared the day previously. My phone could be used (a bit like a technophobe prodding with a single finger) so I could communicate with family and bore them silly with some of the juicy details.

A massage (The physios are all off somewhere partying on the beach and not caring a jot about poor little T-Rexes) then a visit to the doc today. She kindly provided pain and anti-inflammation jabs into my worst shoulder. I was almost feeling kindly towards her when she announced she needed to take blood for tests.  After what seemed like two hours she finally had enough blood in those tubes to do all the décor and make-up for a major zombie movie. Then she helped me on with the only piece of clothing I could get on to me with locked shoulders, and giving me a prescription for DRUGS set me free.

Of course the only downside to real DRUGS that help with this is the fact that one cannot have alcohol while taking them. So now I have to work out if the few drops of alcohol in my favourite summer drink of soda and bitters really does count as alcohol in this sense.

Today as I finally managed to get an arm to reach high enough to open the lock of the door to the garden I went for a little T-Rex stroll. Oh my, but the lawn has grown (and the weeds in it). It’s almost enough of a jungle to hide a whole herd of dinosaurs. maybe having second thoughts about that T-Rex costume to see if I can scare anyone in the complex partying for new year.

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