Avery's third full day of at home recovery started with sleeping in. I woke up around 9:00, made some coffee and sat out on the porch for a little while. I came in to mix some yogurt, granola and fresh raspberries for breakfast and I found Avery to be awake. A little later, Sarah got up. By about 10:30 we'd all had something to eat and we figured today would be a good day for Avery to get a little pedicure action.
The Casa Blanca Salon is right down the street from Avery's dad's apartment building. We left around 11:45 to see if they were open. They were closed. They were also closed on Sunday. We moved on. Our next stop was on State Street, but they wanted to charge $40 per person. We moved on. We hiked up State Street to Washington and headed into downtown crossing. Just after the Old South Meeting House we found a salon. Sarah ran up the two flights to check out the prices. She returned with the news of pedicure - $23, pedicure and manicure combo - $33. We headed upstairs.
Avery and Sarah started their pedicures and I sat and watched and worked on the Globe Sunday Crossword puzzle. I have never had a pedicure and I can't say it has always been a dream of mine, but I did take a good look at my feet today and realized they were in need of some work. The whole summer of wearing sandals and going barefoot around the house had dried out my feet and they looked downright scary. I realized though this summer, since I was extra sensitive about showing my feet in sandals, that no matter where I went I would always see people with feet that were dirtier, nails that were yellower, and toenails that were longer than my own. It gave me a little bit of comfort knowing that no matter how bad my feet look, there's always someone who's feet look worse.
The procedure (what else would it be called?) started with a long soaking of my feet. In the picture I have my feet and ankles soaking in a hot bath of water with bubble jets massasing in between and around my toes.
The woman who sat at my feet first trimmed and filed the nails. Then she oiled the cuticles and pushed them down. I'm not sure how much of this is health related and how much is cosmetic. All I know is that she was using tools that I hadn't seen since the last time I went to my dentists office. That metal thing they use for plaque, the pedicurists have the same thing to get gunk out from under your toe nails. She moved on to using a hard stone brush to wipe away all the fragments of my foot (yucky skin) and then moisturized from my toes to my knees. My feet felt good immediately following the work. They felt softer and looked much cleaner.
While I was having work done on my feet, Avery and Sarah had moved on to the manicure stations. Upon completion and payment for our little bit of post-op spoil Avery adventure, we headed to Chacarero for Chilean lunch. Post lunch, Avery, Sarah and I walked through the financial district to Avery's dad's apartment. It was a busy couple of hours, but worth the walk.
Avery has moved to another room! Tuesday night, Avery's roommate stayed up most of the night screaming and yelling. On Wednesday afternoon when I got to the hospital, Avery hadn't slept very much since the surgery (24 hours before). We requested some type of room resolution. The wonderful nurses of White 12 searched around and found Avery a room with a window, not too far away. Around 5pm we moved to the new location.