It's been over three weeks now since I broke my leg. Healing progress is steady, although it seems very slow from my perspective. I don't have a reference point. In reality, I'm probably making better progress than the average person would with a similar injury. I still can't make it through a day without having to put my leg up though. Swelling is a lingering issue, but it is slowly subsiding. I have very little pain left from the surgery and fractures and haven't taken any pain meds in about 10 days now. My next doctor's visit is about three weeks away, when I hopefully can begin physical therapy.
I test fitted both of our cars for potential driving. The Toyota Matrix was a non-starter. There just isn't enough room for the huge AirCast I'm in to press the clutch far enough to disengage it. So I tried the even small Scion xD. Close, but the clutch disengages in the last inch of travel, and it presses down into a hollow in the floorboard. I could not press it in far enough to even start the car, no matter how I tried to angle the cast. I do think a 2" spacer block on the xD clutch pedal will completely remedy this situation. Cathy drove an Isuzu pickup for years with a small wooden block on the gas pedal because she was too short to reach it. My project this week is to figure out a safe way to secure a block to the pedal.
The other day Cathy swung by Starbucks at Exit 6 in Nashua so I could pick up a coffee. I get to work and realize I have no way of carrying it to my desk without losing half of it. The overnight guard was not about to let Cathy carry it in for me. He felt sympathy for me and offered to carry it since my desk is not far from the front entrance on the main floor. That got me thinking.
I have all these bottle cages laying around. Titanium ones even. I found one can easily be mounted on a crutch with no perceptible weight gain, unless you put a full water bottle in it. It works very nicely for a grande Starbucks. No more groveling for someone to carry my caffeine fix in the morning.
11 comments:
Maybe they can give you a Grande in a Venti cup so you have less chance of spilling when you walk?
Starbucks has these nifty little green stoppers to plug the hole for transport. They work quite well, even jostling around on crutches.
Clever, mounting a water bottle cage to your crutch. Why not just bring a thermos in a backpack? Coffee made at home will be better than a Starbucks, if you regularly clean with vinegar.
skogs
Nice little victory there.
If I lived close by, I'd trade cars with you til you heal up enough to work the clutch.
Anyone gonna step up and do this for Doug? C'mon readers, lend a fallen friend a hand....
now that's a dedicated caffeine addict.
I had a large dairy queen blizzard in my bottle cage yesterday. very useful. and tasty.
back in high school, I tweaked my right knee playing football and was in a cast for a while. the only way I could drive was to put my right leg over onto the passengers side and drive entirely with my left leg. it was an automatic, thankfully, but it's very weird to apply the gas and brake with your left foot.
If you spin the crutch around it will be more aero with the cage on the trailing edge of the crutch :)
If I owned an automatic, I'd trade. All I've got is a beat up Subaru Impreza, that has one redeeming characteristic in its manual transmission.
I broke my left ankle last fall (road biking), and also drive a stick shift. What you do is start the car with the parking brake on and and your RIGHT foot on the clutch. Then put it in neutral and switch right foot to break, left on clutch. Take the parking off and drive off into the sunset. I did this with both cast/cast shoe and later with the same boot you have. You will have to lift and lower your whole leg with your quads to shift, rather than flexing ankle.
Disclaimer: I'm pretty sure that driving with a cast/boot on your foot is illegal, or at least very poor judgment. But I got desparate - the MBTA system on crutches sucks.
ps - that method works if your car, like mine, makes you have the clutch depressed all the way to start the engine, but you can shift without it being in quite that far.
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