zendadaist - Network

Foot progressToday I had a follow-up appt with the pain physio to see how my foot is getting on ~5weeks after the initial consultation and...

Foot progress

Today I had a follow-up appt with the pain physio to see how my foot is getting on ~5weeks after the initial consultation and set of exercises, manipulations etc.

Good progress has been made in being able to put some weight on the front of the foot. Long way to go still, but definitely better than it was. There's also been good progress on getting the blood circulation back on track. When I'd stand up for a while (e.g. for a long shower), the foot would turn bright red and the toenails would go blue. This happens significantly less now (but still a little).

Less progress on the swelling reduction. A tiny bit but mostly still present. The least improvement is in terms of the pain and sensitivity of the affected area.

So I've been given some new things to try for the pain and swelling, and revised exercises to continue with improving the load-bearing. She's also recommended that next appointment, she does some acupuncture on the foot and lower leg to trick my body into a healing response to see if that gets the swelling down.

I figure it's worth a try, although if the original healing response didn't get rid of the swelling I'm not sure why provoking it again would work...
But maybe while there isn't an actual injury to distract the healing response from dealing with the swelling, it just needs another prod. Or poke, I suppose.

More swimming pool visits as well. Those aren't cheap and they are very time-consuming but they do help (and I like the water).

Google Docs autosave is flaky and often silently revertsSo I've been testing out how reliable the Google Docs autosave is for...

Google Docs autosave is flaky and often silently reverts

So I've been testing out how reliable the Google Docs autosave is for Spreadsheets that are open and in regular use over the course of many days/weeks.

I've been comparing the data integrity to local versions NOT using GDocs. Originally this came about because the GDocs versions of my data kept containing a lot of errors around not having updated entries which I could have sworn up and down I had, in fact, done. The GDocs version is frequently showing older data with numbers that have not been updated and entire entries missing when compared to my local copies.

Occasionally there is a warning in the GDoc that there's a temporary blip in the autosaving, but the missing/reverted entries are occurring far more frequently than this message appears - and anyway once the blip is gone isn't it meant to update the save?

I really don't appreciate GDocs gaslighting me about what I have and have not entered into the sheet, and I am lucky that this was just for personal notes and not as part of my dayjob. (Work is married to M$ rather than Google.)

Pi day! (In USian dating at least.)Merry 3.14 to you all! 🤓#piday

Pi day! (In USian dating at least.)

Merry 3.14 to you all! 🤓
#piday

It's the 4th day in a row I've managed to get myself out of the flat and hobble about outside for a bit. The sudden burst of good...

It's the 4th day in a row I've managed to get myself out of the flat and hobble about outside for a bit. The sudden burst of good weather really helped to overcome the physical gauntlet that is getting me from my flat to the road for the bus or to walk a short distance.

Hopefully tomorrow stays nice as well to stretch this teaser for spring out to a round 5 days, before collapsing back into grey wind and cold rain.

Happy International Womens Day to all women! (Except the fash.)

Happy International Womens Day to all women! (Except the fash.)

Could we just give Firefox to the Vivaldi team?

Could we just give Firefox to the Vivaldi team?

Seems the 9070XT is selling well. Wonder how much of that is scalpers/bots and if the MSRP will hold.I have my eye on picking one up in the...

Seems the 9070XT is selling well. Wonder how much of that is scalpers/bots and if the MSRP will hold.

I have my eye on picking one up in the near future depending on how it all shakes out.

Et tu, Brother?https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2025/03/brother-denies-using-firmware-updates-to-brick-printers-with-third-party-ink/

Et tu, Brother?

https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2025/03/brother-denies-using-firmware-updates-to-brick-printers-with-third-party-ink/

It's pancake day! Time to drown my sorrows in ill-advised quantities of maple syrup.

It's pancake day! Time to drown my sorrows in ill-advised quantities of maple syrup.

US/UKpolI can only hope Europe backs up it's words with actions. Otherwise Ukraine, and Europe itself, is screwed.Beware the Orbans in...

US/UKpol

I can only hope Europe backs up it's words with actions. Otherwise Ukraine, and Europe itself, is screwed.

Beware the Orbans in the midst.

The US is a hostile entity, and the UK is likely to side with it over Europe after failing miserably to be this damnable "bridge". 😑

WaPoWait, people who considered themselves left of centre were still reading the WaPo?Bezos-owned WaPo? The oligarch who's gone full...

WaPo

Wait, people who considered themselves left of centre were still reading the WaPo?

Bezos-owned WaPo? The oligarch who's gone full Trump-ally?

After these last few years wherein they repeatedly partook in normalising every facet of MAGA fascism?

😬

uspolWelp, whatever side of the upcoming war the US and Russia buddy up together on, that side has to lose for the sake of all of our...

uspol

Welp, whatever side of the upcoming war the US and Russia buddy up together on, that side has to lose for the sake of all of our futures on this over-extracted boiling oligarch-befouled planet.

Well, at least the absolute blasting the RTX 5070 Tis are getting for pricing vs the GPU performance is pretty universal.Now if only PC...

Well, at least the absolute blasting the RTX 5070 Tis are getting for pricing vs the GPU performance is pretty universal.

Now if only PC users would stop financially rewarding Nvidia & partners for the pricing bullshit...

New chair saga resolved! (longish)Finally I have my new desk chair built and working, and not a moment too soon because my old one...

New chair saga resolved! (longish)

Finally I have my new desk chair built and working, and not a moment too soon because my old one completely gave up the ghost last night.

The new one arrived thursday but came with two right armrests, both labelled Right Arm and with the instructions telling me to take the Right and the Left armrests specifically. I took a photo of both Right Arm rests with the labels clearly visible and sent it to the email address that showed on their support page. After 24hrs of nothing and their live chat down the entire time (the fact it wasn't LLM-run surprised me tbh) I searched some more and found a different email address - this one actually got me an automated reply and a ticket number.

By then it was friday afternoon so nothing further was going to happen over the weekend. Meanwhile my old chair which had started to break the previous week and had become increasingly painful to use, continued its degredation. I was uncomfortable and annoyed. VERY uncomfortable and annoyed.

This morning I finally get a response. They've changed the chair design and you can actually change up the right arm rest to make it into a left one without too much difficulty, if you know how. The response was a boilerplate with a video attached on how to do it. They apologised for not updating the instructions about it yet. No explanation for why the armrests are labelled Right Arm though if techncially they can be reconfigured to be either Right or Left...

It's the best, if most irritating, resolution possible. Sure beats having to repackage the 20kg thing and get it returned, or wait 3 weeks for a piece to be shipped out. It could all have been avoided if they'd updated the instructions (and removed the Right Arm labels).

It's also comfier than my old chair ever was.

Had my usual grocery delivery. In the space of a month, about half of my regular items are now HALF the size they were at the start of this...

Had my usual grocery delivery. In the space of a month, about half of my regular items are now HALF the size they were at the start of this year. They are not, of course, any cheaper. Greedy bastards and their infinite profit seeking.

Shrinkflation is accelerating.

DECA rant (Star Trek Online stuff)DECA can get fucked. They've DOUBLED the event grind for the #Startrekonline Anniversary...

DECA rant (Star Trek Online stuff)

DECA can get fucked. They've DOUBLED the event grind for the #Startrekonline Anniversary event.

Borticus confirmed that this is intended and not a bug.

Happy 15th anniversary players, now run TWICE as many event TFOs for the reward! Gotta crank up that FOMO, Ooooooor you could just pay us a lot of real money up front for the reward to skip this artificially inflated grind...

The saddest part? So many players are gaslighting themselves into thinking that it's ok really, or they'll just financially reward this behaviour by buying it out. The players are their own worst enemy and the reason comapnies like DECA can get away with this crap.

What a sign of things to come now Cryptic is dead and buried.

What's that? Nvidia's RTX 5090s are bricking and melting power cables as was foretold? Drivers are fucked? Well colour me shocked....

What's that? Nvidia's RTX 5090s are bricking and melting power cables as was foretold? Drivers are fucked? Well colour me shocked. Shocked, I tell you.

Still, shouldn't be much bother for Nvidia to recall and fix the handful of 5090s out there.

1yr anniversary of foot injury (lonnnng, ranty, fuck NHS cuts)It's been about 1 year (+/- a few days) since the puncture injury on my...

1yr anniversary of foot injury (lonnnng, ranty, fuck NHS cuts)

It's been about 1 year (+/- a few days) since the puncture injury on my foot. There is absolutely no trace left of that injury to either sight or touch. Not so much as a dot visible on the skin. The mostly-severed vein regenerated as close to perfectly as can be, and with no scarring. Even the Specialist couldn't find the original injury site at the last followup. That is where the good news ends.

So, why can I still not walk on it?

The short answer: NHS failures.
Not of the clinical staff as such, but of the connective and supporting tissue of the collective whole.

The longer answer: A secondary issue that the injury caused, which is still ongoing because of the glacially slow pace and enormous wait lists of endless referral loops and "not our area/problem/jurisdiction/speciality".

The longer this goes on, the harder the road to recovery is. The longer my foot is stuck with swelling crushing the nerves and blood vessels, the long the osteopenia lingers in my foot bones, unable to properly re-mineralise due to reduced blood flow (not to mention nerve damage from constant pressure).

I need to be seen by a physiotherapist with relevant expertise in soft tissue foot injury and atrophied muscles because of AN ENTIRE YEAR of not being able to walk on it. I need to learn new foot manipulations that can take care of the last of the swelling crushing everything. The original ones the Orthopedic specialist showed me worked well up to a point where they have now tailed off and are no longer generating any further improvement.

Instead, the NHS has just fobbed me off again and again with terrible communicaiton and going round in circles. No one hospital department can even communicate with another, let alone across different parts of the NHS.

I am currently waiting to hear about a Pain Clinic referral which my GP has decided I have to do before she will continue to try to get me referred for Physio. I have been waiting to find out how many months an appointment might take since early December.

I was ORIGINALLY referred for Physio at the end of August by the Orthopedic Specialist I'd begged to be referred to FOR MONTHS AND MONTHS before finally getting on that waiting list to be seen and then him figuring out the issue within 5 minutes.
He expected that that I'd be starting the physio he recommended within a couple of months. Unfortunately, the dept at his hospital kept rejecting the referral and eventually just threw it to my local GP with no further information or follow up. They didn't even fucking TELL ME either - I had to go on a phone chase to figure out why I had heard nothing.

All the while I can't walk on that foot, and have I mentioned that it hurts a shitton? It is SUPPOSED to be able to make a full recovery but this runaround is stopping that. The pain clinic referral is because it still hurts. It still hurts because there is still swelling. There is still swelling because the lymph vessels that would drain it are crushed by the remaining swelling deep inside past the point I can reach.

I am so fucking ANGRY AND TIRED.

I am trying to do things that should in theory help like very controlled short periods of load-bearing - but I don't know how much of the osteopenia has reversed (swelling has gone down a lot but is still there, hence the ongoing pain and nerve issues) because I haven't had an update Xray in a long time. The very last thing I want to do is mess my bones up.
Walking in a swimming pool is great and helps a lot, but I have logistical issues. Namely 2 - 2.5hrs out of my day to spend 30mins in the pool (plus costs) because I have to catch a bus (the average journey time each way is 40-ish mins including waiting time) and I stil have to walk the rest of the way from the stop. All of this means I can't just nip to the pool before/after work or on my lunch break. I went a few times over the Xmas break and I noticed a definite improvement over time and the mood boost was helpful too.

I have an appt with my GP this week. It's for a different purpose but I am still going to be asking wtf is going on with this pain clinic referral so I can get on with the actual work of getting the foot rehabilitated.

Oh and the NHS App doesn't connect to my GP surgery and it also rejects the info my surgery sent me to connect with. So that's another thing I'm trying to resolve but the only member of staff there who knows anything about it is away. My preferred contacts methods are text message and email with phonecall as backup. What's the betting that they've sent all of this stuff to the App instead and completely ignored my comms preferences?

Maybe some other time I'll rant about the procedure fuckup at the end of December and the fact that it's still not in the process of being rescheduled because two hospital depts 1 floor apart won't talk to each other. (I bet there's forms for this also stuck behind the fucking useless app).

Another "interesting" Win11 vs Win10 observation after the latest Win11 update:A launcher for an MMO I sometimes pootle about in...

Another "interesting" Win11 vs Win10 observation after the latest Win11 update:

A launcher for an MMO I sometimes pootle about in is apparently suddenly demanding access to my physical location via GPS etc. Or so Win11 claims. This is news to me because that launcher has not had a patch or update in quite some time (the game client does get regular updates - the last one was earlier this week), and my Win10 machine is NOT requesting this extra data when I fire up the launcher on that.

When I tell Win11 to FOff it's not having my data, the launcher runs as normal and launches the game client as usual. It plays exactly the same as before - nothing is different.

Methinks Win11 is is hiding behind excuses to get me to turn on more data sharing...

I use a heavily configured Firefox and uBlock Origin to be online on 2 devices, one on Win10 the other on Win11. The versions and settings...

I use a heavily configured Firefox and uBlock Origin to be online on 2 devices, one on Win10 the other on Win11. The versions and settings between the browsers and their plugins are identical.

And yet, it seems the Win11 device is being given a lot of shit from websites for it (e.g. Twitch with it's annoying GET TURBO INSTEAD OF ADBLOCK overlay).

The Win10 device does not.
Weird...