Had the knee aspiration today…otherwise known as a needle in the knee. 

The clinic/ bureau is in Juan Les Pins…excellent parking underneath but super expensive. Many wealthy people store their super super cars there and they detail cars there too. There was a whole fleet of Ferrari’s under red covers. I like to see the fancy cars so don’t have a problem parking there. They were actually having a sale of sorts…parking marked down! I had never seen that before. It was cheaper than the street!

I hobbled to the clinic. It was filled with all kinds of people with all kinds of limb maladies, old and young. I check in and the receptionist explains….you have to go around to the pharmacy to get the things the doctor needs! I hate when that happens. It’s always when you least expect it. She kept saying it is near Pam Pam…at the cross. What????? I know JLP pretty well…I set off in the direction she told me…5 blocks later, after asking 2 people…I see Pam Pam…I do know Pam Pam…hello! It is a Hawaiian Cocktail club. …How did I forget about that? It has Polynesian dancers, scantily clad, with towering fruit salad headdresses…( seems like a macro aggression…are women still allowed to dance like that? ) 

                        https://youtu.be/0DvHa3fvr1M

Anyway…I was rightfully annoyed at this turn of events but I have experienced it before. If you get an MRI with contrast, you have to go to the pharmacy to get the ink!!! 

I hobble back to the clinic and get sent to the tiny waiting room. There was only 1 seat left. I will refrain from describing the group except for the woman and her daughter that came in after me…she really looked like the queen and had a face mask on so her features were unseen…Her hair and clothes looked just like Queen Elizabeth! …Her heavy metal frame dropped on the marble floor and pulled me out of my imagination…so loud.

They called me in. I was very fearful and experiencing a bit of panic. The nurse was super nice…she helped me get comfortable…The Doctor breezes in…the nurse assured me he speaks English, she did not. I asked him if he spoke English…he tells me “a Little”…I know that to mean, a very little. I had written out the history in French…he took it and read it…I had a million questions.

I asked him if he was going to give me a local of Lidocaine….No! …ok…He scans my knee and tells me it is full of blood! What?

He jammed me up with Lidocaine ( didn’t you say no?) …that hurt a little but then, the rest was cake. ..maybe a little shocking Cake…He had to pull out 5 vials of fluid. He didn’t have enough vials…He said no wonder your knee ( which he pronounced knee like K'n ee) was not working. 

He tells me it was in there for a long time. …old blood, bad blood!

So he removed all of the blood, cleaned it out and put in time released cortisone.

I had a million questions but he seemed rushed. I think he is a big fish in this bureau…he’s got very little time for you.

I didn’t have a problem with speaking French but I did have questions…no follow up, no compression…4 days of taking it easy…it should not return as it was an injury..

So now I have a lighter knee that is adjusting to life without blood interfering with its functions. Lucky!

On the way to the pharmacy,  I did see a cute little French bull dog that had grabbed on to his father’s baguette and would not let go. The man pulled the dog right off the ground by the other end of the baguette…the dog was not letting it go!