Tuesday, May 23, 2023. (Court Day #597)

Early yesterday morning, I had my pre-op for my knee surgery, which will be taking place on Friday next week. I met with a physicians assistant and she went over what to expect. Since the same doctor had done my shoulder surgery, she explained that the process will be similar so I should know already what to expect. Briefly, the doctor came in and showed me the meniscus tear from the MRI that I had done on the same day that they scanned my shoulder a couple of years ago. The tear was extremely obvious in the image he shared. He had never showed it to me in such an obvious fashion before. My knee is feeling worse than when I had that MRI done so I suspect the tear is now more significant. The doctor explained that if there is arthritis or damage to the cartilage, there isn’t anything that he can do about that, but he can clean up the meniscus. Given that my right knee makes a clunking noise when I go from kneeling to standing up, there needs to be some work done.

Today, I got a call from the local pharmacy explaining that they do not have the pain-management medication which was prescribed for me. The reason why the physicians assistant had selected that particular pharmacy was because the other one was out of stock. I guess I’ll just have to have something else prescribed for me.

Skypark

I arrived at Skypark about 6:45 p.m. and seven of the courts were set up. It was a bit chilly.

There was a group of new players who were using one of the empty tennis courts to play pickleball in a slipshod fashion. Since I was waiting to get into a game, Mark Dettle suggested that I get out one of the portable nets and set it up so those players could play on a true court instead. When I suggested it to those players, they were pleased and they helped me set up the net. I explained the double bounce rule, the non-volley zone, and a couple pieces of strategy, then left them to play. They smiled and said thank you. There was Nick, Aaron, and a fellow named Chris, and also a young woman whose name I forget. Later on, I noticed that they’d moved over to one of the permanent courts without all the extra lines.

Play?

I was playing reasonably well tonight and most of the games are not particularly challenging. I spent the night playing mostly with 3.0 players. The best game of the night was towards the end. I played with Casey against Tim H. and Dan Dewey. That was a fun and challenging one. Tim was playing extremely well.

The last two games of the night were with Chef Mark (the Spanish speaker) and myself against Mackenzie (the UCSC student), and a fellow named Nico, who I never seen before. The first game I was played right-handed and Mark and I had a very lopsided win. We played again and this time I played left-handed. I’d been a while since I played a left-handed game, so it was fairly balanced. (I get rusty when I don’t use my left hand for a while!) When the lights clicked off shortly after 9:30 p.m., the score was tied at 8-8.

Various Injuries

I forgot my knee brace on Sunday, but I remembered it tonight. It does seem to help.

My right wrist continues to hurt and my left knee is bothering me as well. Hopefully, when I have my right knee surgery, my left knee will also get better from the break from play.

Number of days on a court: 597
Number of total hours: 2,630.5
Number of paid coaching hours: 2

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