Living Life In A Wheelchair

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May 2022 Newsletter Edition

The month of May has been interesting. My time has been spent between health care appointments, working on my projects and recovering from a few instances where my right knee cap dislocated. I tentatively think things are going in the right direction in my life. I have been feeling bursts of pain from my left knee. After enduring the demise of both my hip joints and having them replaced this doesn't surprise me too much.

The specialist doctor who performed my regenerative medicine treatment had me be seen by a bracing specialist. With how my right knee joint has continued to dislocate with the bracing in place, the unsuccessful regenerative medicine treatment, now using omega 3 & chondroitin sulfate and the various steps I took to avoid surgery before now he is referring me back to an orthopaedic surgeon to assess if I am a candidate for knee surgery now. I am at pace with this. I was keen to avoid knee surgery. I've exhausted all the non surgical options. It is time to cut my losses and move forward. I figure I have about 40 minutes total use of my right knee joint during the day time. Exceeding this causes ⅓ cup of inflammation to form around my right knee joint and causes debilitating pain for 3 to 5 days. It has been extremely helpful working out what my limits currently are. I am starting to work out how to structure my days without triggering this.

As the weather requiring the use of a window air conditioner came to an end in 2021 my window air conditioner appeared to be worn out. It was screeching pretty bad. It wasn't really usable. When we got into May 2022 my home was reaching the point where it is uncomfortable for me. The window air conditioner I pre-ordered isn't scheduled to arrive until June 15th. I asked my friend who is a mechanic if he would be open to taking the cover off my window air conditioner to see if a piece broke off the fan inside the window air conditioner or if some Manitoba maple keys had come lodged inside. Amazingly cleaning it out restored it to service. I am still going to proceed with the window air conditioner I pre-ordered. I will use this in my home. This is an upgraded model. It is twice as powerful as the model I have been using. I am going to use the older window air conditioner model in the shed. This will provide air conditioning when I am working to create picture frames for my laser engraver. Otherwise the heat in the shed is debilitating. In the end this will work out better than I had originally planned.

I've made some progress cleaning and organizing in the shed. I had hoped to do more during May. After giving myself time to rest and while taking care of all my medical appointments I just ran out of time. I am starting to think I should be trying to do 10 minutes in there each day. I expect I would begin to notice progress after a week. I figure there is about 3 weeks work needed at the pace I am able to work. There is still a lot of organizing that remains after we put my stuff in boxes following the break and enter that occurred in spring 2021. However it is do-able. If I simply can't manage then I will ask for help to finish this.

I've made some decent progress creating my table saw picture frame sled. I am pleased with progress. Two steps remain: Cutting the end step that will hold wood cut on one side in the process of being a picture frame and attaching this to the table saw. The hold up is getting one more toggle clamp. This should arrive mid June. I have it ordered. This toggle clamp will be going on the end stop. The other 4 toggle clamps are to hold the wood as the cuts are made. This is so I won't have to bend or twist in ways that cause pain in my legs.

While waiting for the toggle clamp I've focused on the other key item I am needing to create for my laser engraver setup: A vent hood. This is to get the toxins created from the laser running out of the air I breathe. I was able to sand the vent hood down. I didn't find this difficult. I was able to do so while remaining seated. This hasn't been hard on my legs. I was enjoyable. This isn't something I could do continually. But for a specific project and taking regular breaks I was able to get through this. I had initially wanted to stain the vent hood. The process of staining is just too much for my legs. I am going to research what other nice finish I could do on the vent hood. I would like the vent hood to look nice while I stream as the laser is running. It is worth the trouble of "plan A" not panning out.

I purchased my first tablet about 5 years ago. The battery is done. I purchased a replacement tablet in May. The replacement tablet was just ever so slightly more expensive than the tablet it is replacing. What has amazed me is just how far technology has come in 5 years. I am amazed at the speed increase at a similar price point. This is proving very helpful. I had originally purchased the tablet for social media posts for my youTube videos. I now use the tablet for much more than this. It was worth replacing it.