Recovery

I've been asleep for so long. Every once in awhile the nice US Marine medic (Eddie) comes in to give me orange juice and more of that wonderful painkiller. He's very handsome, but taken since I did ask. He has a wife and two children in Oklahoma City who are homeless from foreclosure on their only home by a very nasty bank (disclosure: The bank in question handles my wealth management fund so we can't exactly dis them). 

I'm "sympa" with Eddie because he's missing not just his toes, but his entire left leg as well. He's fitted with a prosthetic leg that seems to me very natural, although he complained about something called "phantom pain" or itching sensations in the missing limb. I asked him if I would have "phantom itchy toes" and he said I ought to follow-up with my NHS doctor when arriving in London. 

The staff at the hospital has been very generous and they would like to get me up and standing for exercise etc., but each time we go for recess another bomb or rocket goes off. There is the constant noise of a riot outside of our compound. It makes Brixton seem tame. 

But air-lift is on the way. We've consulted the embassy and it looks as if they are still open. There is the possibility of transit out of here and home. 

Luv u,
Viv

Diversion

Hello everyone, Viv again, recovering from a six-hour layover at JFK and re-booked to something called the BA "red-eye" flight.

Once seated, and stretching my legs, two very large people took seats directly in the aisle ahead of me. The husband came back from the loo and jumped over his wife to gain access to his mid-row seat.

Low and behold, the entire seat assembly came crashing down on my already-injured left foot. I was immediately evacuated to the nearest medical facility. Thank goodness it was before take-off or we would have been screaming in agony all the way, competing with the crying toddlers (AARP booked me "coach").

Since I'm in possession of a FAX message from US State Dept. with Hillary's signature advising me to leave the United States as quickly as possible I showed it to TSA and was immediately directed to DHS. I booked another flight at no cost. It was a US military aircraft, very noisy and not very comfortable, but was so looking forward to returning to London and quite relieved. The soldiers had a much better stock of whiskey and mixers than did BA and open bar was all the rage. They also had something more powerful for pain. The first time without that terrible throbbing in my foot for several days.

I must say it was the best party I've attended since my ill-fated trip to NYC. A more than adequate sound system. Service members were dancing in the aisle! One young man tried to pick me up to "rock-out" but my "peek-a-boo" toes exposed by the hideous leg cast were of a greenish complexion and he had reservations, to say the least.

Then next morning after a satisfying night's sleep and perhaps the first in many days, I awoke. But we were not at Heathrow. We were not anywhere near London. We were in Central Asia, in a place called Bagram, staffed by the same wonderful US Army and Marines who were so diligent in their attendance to me the previous evening.

Viv was hauled-off on another gurney to yet another medical clinic. "You know you are going to lose your toes, is that correct?"

"Can they grow back with stem cell treatments" I asked?

"It's your choice, Ms. Vyvanse. Toes, or the entire foot. I have to operate immediately."

Well, guess what. I'm someplace in Afghanistan, a place where we tried 30 years ago to market rubber & safety-pin burkas until we met armed resistance from the Taliban. And all the toes on my left foot have vanished. Well, I haven't had time to examine my foot yet but I'll leave it to your imagination. Perhaps the "pinky" survived the cull. But I'm grateful I'm in the Bagram clinic instead of Roosevelt Hospital in NYC. They aren't so stingy with the pain meds.

Kiss Kiss, Hug Hug & Dilaudid forever!

Vivienne

Fashion Week gone terribly wrong

Oh, heavens. I was so excited to travel back to NYC to cover the "Mercedes-Benz" Fashion Week 2012 and interview all the great talent presenting "Spring 2013."

Things took a turn for the worse when I discovered an abandoned HD-CAM videotape lying about outside the Lincoln Center plaza. The label read "Oglivy" and "Sui" on the cover so I knew it had to be important. Must get it to my AARP readers immediately. Some passer-by mentioned that it fell from the bag of the bicycle-messenger who was injured in a hit-run accident. Then the NYC police arrived, and in my haste to procure the video, didn't notice that the lights had changed on Ninth Avenue and I was almost crushed to death by something they call the "M11."

Wasn't really crushed but my foot did suffer an inglorious injury. Also crushed was the video. (Anna Sui, I'm sorry we couldn't deliver.) Now then to Roosevelt Hospital Center to see if my left foot was still attached. They really took notice when I made my gurney entrance wearing Lacroix.

The foot is still there but it had undergone many revisions over the two days spent. It is in a hideous fiberglass and Kevlar cast.

I faxed the Roosevelt Hospital ER discharge papers to my contact at AARP. They were the most unsympathetic little shits I've ever encountered. No advance on car fare and no increase in per-diem. Nada. Furthermore came a text-message from someone named "Debby." Debby advised my contract with AARP had been breached because of failure to fulfill obligation as a correspondent for Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week.

I hobbled back to my little room at the Milford Plaza in Midtown, wondering, "What could possibly happen next, Viv?" Perhaps as a side-effect of the prescription-strength ibuprofen that Roosevelt gave me (in a plastic baggie, although with my name on it) or the intense throbbing pain --- that evening I gave into the desire to visit the hotel's "cube" refrigerator to investigate what liquor might be stored there.

I ought to have known. Nothing but "Mountain Dew" and other fizzy-drinks. As much in pain as I suffered struggled down to the lobby and asked the concierge for the location of the nearest public house.

This is all I can possibly remember. I don't know how a respectable entrepreneur, with over 50 years of bleeding-edge fashion design, might be destined to end up in an industrial trash bin. In addition, with some still-borne wrapped in a moldy rug thrown in for good measure.

This is my last trip to the US, thank you very much. I've been personally invited by the Dept. of Homeland Security to leave the territorial United States immediately and I'm now in a public car making my way to JFK airport. I'm going to miss my flight, and the little baggie of ibuprofen is just about emptied.

But please don't give up hope. Once back home in St. John's Wood I'll be posting more. I adore you all.

Sincerely,
Viv