The Fourth is Out of Control

I was going to link to local news articles about the insane fireworks yesterday, but there are none. Apparently the local newspaper doesn't think that the deployment of heavy-duty arsenal in residential neighborhoods during a dangerous drought is worth covering.


Of course there's always been some illegal fireworks in the city.We even indulged in it ourselves years ago--a few sparklers, some of those ashen snakes, some low-flying things with colorful names, and of course Roman candles and those smaller cones and pillars, even one or two whistling petes. But over time we stopped even the small stuff, as, along with most of the rest of California, we became more aware of the seriousness of the safety concerns (fire and personal safety both).

What's happened with fireworks is what's happened with everything else. Most of the population has, with some regret, turned away from them because, while they are pretty and thrilling, they aren't worth the damage: and the die-hards have turned to the heavy stuff. And they seem to have no sense at all.

I wondered at times whether there wasn't something I should be doing to protect my house from the missiles exploding overhead. Soak it down, maybe, the way we used to soak our roofs when there was a grassfire across the street? (we had a gendered division of labor--men and older teen boys up on the hill with soaked blankets trying to smother the flames, while women and children soaked the housetops with hoses. Of course we called the fire department, but they were a ways away and we couldn't wait for them) But all I did was try to not hear the sound and try to sleep. Almost as loud as the fireworks, it seemed, were the drunken voices of the people setting them off. And the occasional neighbor begging them to knock it off.

Another difference between old-time fireworks and today: families bought enough fireworks to last an hour or two tops. We had enough for maybe half an hour, ourselves. These yahoos were at it for days, and last night in particular--well, when I checked the time it was three in the morning and they were still going off.

This sounds like cane-shaking, but no, really, I don't harass my neighbors over their behavior. I never got around to saying anything to the skunkweed boys even when their fumes were collecting in my room and making me ill (I meant to, but I wasn't about to say anything until I got the wording right: I wanted my complaint to be friendly, effective, and specific--not "don't smoke your damned terrible dope" but "it's a problem for me when you hotbox the neighborhood") and I rarely say anything about noise (that is, twice in thirty years), and when I do, it's "please tone it down a wee bit so I can sleep," not "cease your hideous cacophony." Kids play in the street and I cheer them on. My notes to the cars sprawling in front of my house politely point out that there are two parking places there and it would be appreciated if they parked in one of them at a time.

No, this is not me being an intolerant old lady. This is prodigious amounts of dangerous fireworks being set off by drunks in my neighborhood and apparently no police reaction at all. It may be that they're all over at the beach, engaged in hand-to-hand combat with the louts who bring arsenal there. I don't know. Maybe next year I can be somewhere else for the Fourth.

On another front, the air is so moist this morning we must call it precipitation: I won't be watering the garden today!

One piece at a time

It's standard to do one total knee replacement at a time. The given reason is that there's a significantly higher danger of dying on the operating table (though it is still very very tiny).  The fact that this is a teensy weensy chance leads some surgeons to be willing to do both knees at once. If you're having a uni-compartmental repair, you're more likely to have an offer of doing both knees at once than if you're having total knee replacement. I'm not so sanguine about that: my one friend who had uni-compartment simultaneous knee repairs had one of them go bad and had to get a total on that knee. I don't even know what uni-compartmental repairs are meant to be for--I didn't investigate thoroughly because my knees were so far beyond anything like that. One of my friends, last I heard, was opting for both knees, done at Stanford (the hotshot regional hospital in Palo Alto), because she didn't think she could commit to doing intensive rehabilitation two times.

Welp. I've got to say I was already in favor of ggetting one knee done at a time because I had an instinct it would be easier to do rehab with one good leg, and now I have to add that almost three weeks after the first one I am sure of it. From the beginning, when I was first in the hospital and my operated leg was still feeling the effects of the block, I could use my "good" leg to manipulate the operated one and get into and out of bed. And now I can use my "good" leg to move the operated leg around beyond where it's ready to go, in "passive" straightening and flexion exercises. It's quite exciting when you hook the "good" heel around the lower leg and pull that knee closer than you could get otherwise.

The result! Today, after a one-hour walk with the neighbor, I was able to mount my front stairs with regular steps, not just half-steps. I can't wait to show the physical therapist tomorrow. Now all I have to do is to stop being so tired all the time so I can get my bike set up for stationary.

The walk was to the duck preserve, and if I'd been normal, it would have been a thirty minute walk, so not bad. Lots and lots of teenaged ducks today, including one small odd breed with juvie feathers trying to fly. It was really cute, rearing up out of the water and beating its little wings so fast but not rising an inch.