December-2022 update Garry McGivern’s monthly update. Well, that’s another month gone by and another year with it. Where did it go? December has been a relatively quiet month. I’ve been out on a couple of rides, but nothing substantial. I’ve had my birthday, got my annual dose of flu, been back to the hospital with my hip and Christmas has come and gone.
December is always a strange month and never a good month for cycling. The days are short, and the weather is inevitably bad. Although the weather at the beginning of December was good. Yes, it was bitterly cold. But once you start cycling, you soon warm up, and I’d take the cold weather over wet and windy weather any day. The same can’t be said for the end of the month. It’s back to being wet and windy.
I’ve been on a couple of rides over the Southdowns, which is always nice. One with friends I’ve not seen for a few months, so it was good to catch up with them. The other ride was on my own, inspired by the first. I keep forgetting how nice the Southdowns are. And I went for a day ride to Brighton on my birthday. I kept thinking about going away somewhere, maybe to France for a few days or just somewhere in the UK for one night. France was never really going to happen. I had too many appointments and couldn’t string enough days together to make it worthwhile. And the idea of going away for the night in the UK just seemed to fade away.
Health
My hip has started to play me up again. I was doing really well and had started walking without a crutch. But one day last month, when I was walking to the pub, I suddenly started getting a lot of pain, which was unusual as I’d been pain-free for a while now. It was pretty ironic, really, as I’d only just received a letter that day from my consultant saying, “with reference to our last meeting, I am pleased with your progress and will not need to see you for another year. Unless, of course, you experience any pain! Initially, I ignored the pain, but when the pain wouldn’t go, and I had to resort to using a crutch again, I decided to contact my consultant. I thought that maybe if I caught it early enough, I could get away with a course of antibiotics rather than have surgery again.
I was fortunate and saw my consultant Mr Wakeling within two weeks of contacting him, and he said I was right to come and see him. He’s not too sure what’s going on (nothing new there, then!), but it could be that one of the muscles that run down the hip may have snapped, which apparently is quite common. After a quick examination, he sent me for an x-ray, which didn’t show anything, which was a good thing. I also had blood tests which showed my infection markers were slightly up. Not quite so good. I’m now waiting to go for a scan to see if that shows up anything. And have also been referred to physio to see if that helps.
Other News
I enjoyed my birthday; I went for a ride to Brighton. And then out for a curry with the family in the evening. The lead-up to Christmas was fun with Indya and the Naughty Elf. Who would be doing something naughty each time Indya came around. Unfortunately, just before Christmas, I came down with flu, which, as we all know, is always worse for men! It might not be exactly flu. I think I might have escaped the worst of it by having a flu jab earlier in the year. But I was/still am feeling pretty rough, with a bad chest. The one good thing is that my ribs are a lot better now. And I can cough pain-free.
Although 2022 hasn’t been the best of years on the cycling front. I’ve still managed to do more miles cycling on my bike than I’ve driven in the car. And if I can just sort out some of my health issues, next year could be a good year for cycling. Happy New Year, everybody. I hope you all have a healthy and prosperous year that is full of cycling.
thank you, Garry, I wish you good cycling experiences also in 2023
Happy New Year to you and your’s Andras. Let’s hope there’s plenty of cycling.