I went to a cooking class tonight at Sur La Table with my friends Beth and Jen. We had a blast, helped by the endless supply of wine mind you. They waited until after we had cut up most of the veggies but then the wine started to flow and didn't stop until we had finished eating. Originally when I was offered my first glass I said no because I had just started antibiotics for my sinus infection and I'm pretty sure you are not suppose to drink while taking antibiotics (though why I am not sure), but a few min later when I saw the wine bottle going around I changed my mind, and now after I think 4 glasses of wine and full of yummy food I am feeling fine! And I realize this is my second Wednesday in a row to get tipsy, but this is not normal for me, I rarely drink, usually. Anyway, we made great food.... we made maple roasted brussel sprouts (I never ever thought I would like brussel sprouts, but oh my God, they were sooo good!), truffle herbed mashed potatoes (I am convinced that once you have truffle mashed potatoes you will never be able to go back to regular mashed potatoes again, it's like paradise melted in your mouth), creamed corn gratin with fried onion rings and bacon (I assumed that this would be the dish I liked best, but I was shocked to find that I liked the brussel sprouts better!!!), and honey balsamic roasted root vegetables (I never thought I would eat things like rutabaga and turnips, but with this recipe they were yummy).
We were told we could share the recipes so if you want any of them let me know.

And of course part of the fun was shopping in the store. I think kitchen gadgets are my favorite things to shop for. I love the cookware, bakeware, and ooh the kitchen electronics! And when you take a class at Sur La table you are given a 15% off coupon. Tonight I got a potato ricer and a knife.

So I'm taking the max home and my friend Brian calls me, he tells me that he just got some new sleeping pills (like me he is a chronic insomniac) and he was going to take them right now, I asked him where he was and he said he was in his car on the way home! I told him to put the sleeping pills down and wait to take them until he got home. I can't get over how often he doesn't think things through. I mean he had never taken these pills and so had no idea how quickly they would take effect and honestly NO one should take sleeping pills until they are in for the night, that should be a no brainer!



Tomorrow morning I have my pre op apt with my surgeon. I might have mentioned it before but he wants to do something called an osteotomy instead of a knee replacement because he feels I am too young for a knee replacement. I have since been doing research, and have found that osteotomys only last 3 to 7 years, most don't last more then 5 years and after they fail a knee replacement has to be done, also the recovery time for an osteotomy is 8 weeks, and is much more painful then a knee replacement because of it involves cutting the bone. Also once an astronomy is done it makes doing a knee replacement a more complicated procedure. And lastly, even once the procedure is done some people still continue to suffer from arthritis pain!

Then I did research on these new knee replacements made specifically for women and the new minimally invasive knee replacement surgery that doesn't involve cutting any tendons and therefore has a shorted and less painful recovery time then a traditional knee replacement surgery. And guess what, my surgeon is one of 3 in Portland who is trained in this knew procedure. But his reason for not doing a knee replacement was that knee replacements only last 10 years and doing an astronomy will give me maybe 5 years before I need the knee replacement. However I found tons of research that shows that 85% of knee replacements last 15 to 20 years and for crying out loud I would hope that in 10 years someone will have invented a better knee replacement anyway! So armed with all of this research I am going to try and convince my surgeon to let me get the knee replacement instead of the osteotomy, wish me luck!