A major scare . . .

Last Thursday, I woke up with a pain in my right knee.  By Thursday evening, this had grown progressively worst, so that I was unable to walk without some sort of support.  On Friday I was reduced to hobbling about using a walking pole for support.  Driving was just about impossible as, in the first instance, I am having great difficulty getting in and out of the car (10 minutes to get out of the car and into the house on one occasion) and in the second instance, I have trouble pressing the brake pedal!

Saturday and Sunday were spent with the leg immobilised and a bag of sweetcorn on the knee.  Yet I had suffered no obvious trauma to cause the problem in the first place.  Also the knee wasn't swollen at all, though very sore when I put pressure on it. 

At one point I actually began to wonder if I had done some serious long-term damage to it, one implication being that my preferred style of fishing - roving on rivers - might no longer be possible.  This is quite a shock at my age - 49. 

Then a little brightness.  One of my wife's clients is a former doctor (now a psychologist).  I took advantage of her being round to ask her about the knee and she rather surprised me by concluding after a few questions that I probably had "viral arthritis".  Some viruses can apparently cause imflamation of joints which produces the symptoms of arthritis. Its not real arthritis, just something that looks exactly like it. 

Now I think about it, I have had a bit of a bug in the last week, the main symptom of which is a dry cough.  In theory, as I fight the virus, the knee will get better with no lasting damage at all.  In fact, there is a good chance that I will just wake up one morning and it will be better.

So from thinking that I might be facing weeks of physiotherapy and the possibility of not walking properly again, and so no more fishing, I may only have a few more days of trouble. 

But I have no plans to fish this week - ironic as conditions are now the best they have been all season.  Maybe I can go on Sunday or Monday next week.  Then, later next week, Wife and I depart to France for our main holiday. 

So really I might not fish again until the last week of August, four weeks away.

It has to be said, this season is really not going to plan at all!