Actually, what's taken me so long is my hip – I had hip replacement surgery in March to replace what one of my surgeon's assistants said was “The worst looking I've ever seen.” Well, at least I'm unique. But for the last eight months or so you could have mistaken me for Hugh Laurie with the cane – but without his paycheck.
So early this year I decided to take the plunge and scheduled the surgery for March. They took me in the same morning I was admitted (just like my barbershop, eight operating tables, no waiting). And two and a half hours later – voila! I couldn't walk. Well, besides loading me with stuff that numbed me from the nipples down, thereby rendering me paralyzed, I probably couldn't crawl either.
No big deal. The next day they had me up and walking – I figured that at this pace, what they were saying behind my back was “Let's get his ass outta here as soon as possible and then make him walk home.” To my great relief, I did go home in a car. They only made me walk the five flights down to the main floor and through the lobby – without telling me that I forgot to put on pants.
The only hiccup came on the morning I was supposed to leave. I passed out in the bathroom while I was getting cleaned up and ready to go home. When I came to, I was surrounded by six hotties wearing nurses uniforms with their hands all over me. I thought I had died and woken up in my favorite skin flick, DEBBIE DOES ORTHOPEDICS (in it, Debbie's not only double-jointed, she's artificially double-jointed -- ever see somone having sex while contorted like a pretzel and at the same time making noises like a squeaky door hinge? I have). I assessed the situation and suggested to the ladies “What say we continue with this back at my place?”
Anyway, about the hip itself. During the surgery, when I would have been expected to be fully sedated and asleep, apparently whatever they gave me had all the power of a watered down gin and tonic, and it kept me just enough awake to hear and see what was going on during the surgery. The high point came when I heard the doctor fitting the new titanium hip into place – with a hammer. CLANK! CLANK! CLANK! – and it was in. I thought “My God, they've taken out my old hip and replaced it with a wheel cover from a 1993 Pontiac Grand Am – and he's securing it with a tire iron!” Fortunately, the X-rays proved otherwise.
One question that came up was: What do they do with the top of the thigh bone that they have to remove? Well, I couldn't tell you for sure myself, but based on the fact that the broth they gave me for lunch the next day had a really funny taste, I could venture a guess that might not prove to be too far wrong...
The recovery period lasted three months, and if you'd seen the list of stuff I was restricted from doing during those 90 days, you probably would have said to yourself "Why didn't they just euthanize the poor guy while he was there on the operating table?" Among other things, I couldn't bend my leg at the hip more than 90 degrees, couldn't cross my legs, couldn't drive, and had to use an elevated commode when I when to the bathroom -- and boy, what better way to lose all sense of respect and proper demeanor when you have to hobble into the bathroom, park your walker in front of you, lower yourself down, and pray that this time you don't squeeze something that forces all the internal sutures to explode; and not to to be any more crude about the whole ordeal than you can probably already guess it is, but do you know what it sounds like when one of those babies hits the water from over a foot above sea level? For three months, whenever I had a bowel movement I felt like the pilot of an F-16 dropping cluster bombs on Kabul, Afghanistan. The words “Holy Crap!” took on a whole new meaning for me.
But there are plenty of good things that have come out of it. I can finally walk again – without a cane – and unfortunately, without Hugh Laurie's paycheck, still. On the other hand, I started thinking that with a new hip, a new beginning as it were, perhaps I could start raising my sense of self-esteem a measure or two by comparing myself to others who have had the same procedure done -- like Billy Joel for instance. And once I started to think about it, I realized how eerily similar his life and mine have been:
Billy Joel had a hip replacement; I had a hip replacement...
Billy Joel was once married to a top international supermodel; I had a hip replacement...
For nearly 35 years, Billy Joel has entertained people around the world and sold millions of records and CDs; I had a hip replacement...
Billy Joel lives in a large private estate on Long Island; ...yeah, you got it – hip replacement....
Billy Joel has won six Grammys; .... hip....
Billy Joel once had – you know, come to think of it, Billy Joel had a double hip replacement. I only had one done... so maybe our lives aren't so similar after all...
Well, enough... The only thing I can add is that when you're cooped up recuperating from such an ordeal for as long as I was, your mind starts to come up with some strange things, a few of which I'd like to share with you:
Q: How many members of the Osmond Family does it take to change a light bulb?
A: None – they're so bright and perky that they can light up a room all by themselves!!!Newt Gingrich's take on gay marriage: “I believe that marriage is an institution that should be between a man and a woman.... And a man and another woman... And a man and another woman....”
Q: What do you call a wild west lawman who belongs to a senior citizens' organization?
A: WYATT AARPA philosophical musing:
“I think, therefore I am” – René Descartes
“I drink, therefore I am” – David Hasselhoff
“I stink, therefore I am” – Pepé Le Pew
I really feel sorry for the Dodgers, one of the premier franchises in Major League Baseball. Owner Frank McCourt has probably managed to squeeze more money out of that team than Alyssa Milano....
Hey, I never said they were funny -- I just said they were strange... Thank God I can finally get out of the house now....
