Silly season

Three and a half weeks ago poor Fred nearly came to a nasty end. He probably lost sight of Peter in the park and must have thought he'd gone home so decided to go home himself across Nicholson St. Not surprisingly he was hit by a car and badly fractured his pelvis. In fact, Xrays showed that the left side of his pelvis was completely separated from his spine and pushed towards his head and that his tail was broken just below the base of the spine. The surgeon painted a gloomy picture including major surgery to screw his pelvis back together and even if successful, the distinct possibility of incontinence and the loss of his tail. However, he was encouraged by some positive signs when he stuck a pin into Fred at certain spots and Fred complained loudly. We gave the OK for the surgeon to go ahead and do his best for Fred. Surgery went well and we visited Fred shortly afterwards. Rosie pointed to the Xray showing the screw holding Fred's left pelvis onto his spine.

Barney seemed oblivious to Fred's absence and enjoyed a run back from ballet with Sophie.

After a few days in intensive care during which Rosie and I visited daily and sometimes Sophie too (Jessye was studying hard for rapidly approaching exams), Fred was moved to the "ward" where Rosie and I continued to visit him every night, hand-feeding him and giving lots of TLC which must have helped his recovery.

While Jo and Ian went to Vietnam for a holiday, Eleanor was in charge of their dog, Tess, so brought Tess over to introduce her. This was the day Fred was allowed to come home after a week in hospital. Thankfully, everything seemed to be working, even his tail which now wags rather idiosyncratically to the right. His back legs were hobbled to avoid doing the splits and he was to be kept in a playpen while not being supervised. Apparently it takes six weeks for the bones to grow strong and during that time we don't want him to have any accidents which might pull his screw out of place. Rosie hopped in to keep him company now and then.

We went over to the Charalambous home for dinner and Chris was not too impressed that Jessye's taller than him now.

The week after Jessye's exams (her first real taste of having to revise a year's work) she, Sophie and their chauffeurs were heavily involved in the end of year ballet/jazz/tap production. We all went the first night and as always were very impressed by the poise and polish.

The next day Jessye finished school for the year two and half weeks ahead of the other two hence the big beam. That night I took Rosie and Greer to the second and final ballet show and snuck backstage to take some pics.




After two very late nights poor Sophie had to haul herself out of bed and get all dolled up for the Australian Girls' Choir concert in Hamer Hall (the big concert hall where the MSO plays). I had to work all that day and Rosie had Joey's birthday party to attend so Peter and Jessye went along to give moral support. She was a very tired wee thing by the end of that stretch.

On Monday, December 11th the MSO had it's 100th birthday and we played Beethoven's 9th Symphony to celebrate. I took my camera onstage and managed to get one shot of the audience after the streamers had been hurled. In the 3rd row from the front of my picture on the aisle you might see Geoffrey Rush, the actor, who lives in Camberwell and was the guest speaker - he gave a wonderfully original and inspiring speech. There was a NZ contigent at the after-party (Willem was in the chorus) and my cousin Russell and Barb came along too.

And then for something completely different in the way of musical performance...... yesterday I volunteered to help walk the Grade 3, 4, 5 and 6 ensembles to an old people's home where they had been invited to perform. Sophie plays her cello in the Grade 3 one and there's an additional motley crew of a couple of violins, a guitar, xylophones and various drums. The teachers do a good job of cobbling something together out of it all.

This morning Rosie and I went to MLC to collect her new laptop and have some cursory instruction for a few minutes. She's pretty pleased with herself.

We had another Occupational Therapy session at the hospital on Thursday which was very useful. All the input we're getting now helps to give ideas about how to keep Rosie using that right side even though her instinct is to do everything with the more capable left side. Rosie loves playing games and the rest of us can never do it enough for her liking so the OT lady, Kathy, suggested a couple of specific games and also just any we might already have as tools to get her using her right hand more - so much better than always having to rely on exercises which she gets bored and frustrated with because of the dryness. Pilates is continuing to develop her strength and posture well and the orthotic device for her right leg is helping too. Her heel hurts sometimes with it on (I suspect it's not used to having weight put on it in the right-angle position) so we're just working up to it gradually but she's managing a few hours in it most days. The CAT scan Rosie had in October showed that the AVM seems to have gone. Wirginia wants to confirm that with the most accurate test, the angiogram, around April next year. They don't do the angiogram very often because it's invasive and requires a general anaesthetic. Rosie had one when she first went to hospital in Feb 2005. The disability on her right side is probably because of the massive changes in blood flow though the brain that have been necessitated by the removal (relatively quickly) of the AVM. Wirginia is still hopeful that there will be improvement over time as Rosie's brain adjusts. My reading leads me to think that it's very important for Rosie to make demands of her right side all the time so that her brain knows it's expected to work all those bits still and will hopefully learn and practise how. I'm forever reminding her to be conscious of how she's walking and doing things and to use her right hand when she'd rather use her left. Most of the time she understands why I'm harping on about it and is happy to pay attention to it but sometimes the poor thing is just tired and gets a bit grumpy. She enjoyed her session with Vicki Anderson, head of Psychology at Children's Hospital. Vicki spent an hour and a bit with Rosie doing all sorts of puzzles and assessments and came out saying we had a very smart girl which of course we already knew. We've got a followup appointment with Vicki on the day we come back from our NZ holiday- an hour and a half after the plane lands so here's hoping there's no delay - when she'll go over the results of her tests with us - should be very interesting. We're all looking forward to our NZ trip, 21st - 31st December in Auckland then 31st - Jan 7 in Whitianga followed by a couple more days in Auckland then back to Melbourne on Jan 9th. A very joyous Christmas and Happy New Year to all our loyal readers.