I’ve been a bit quiet on here although enjoying everyone else’s builds and Porschelife on DDK as usual. I thought I’d post a catch up on our own Porsche lives. I say our - Trish and I both drive the cars.
Bit of a re-cap first. In 2020 I posted on the arrival of the new to me 71 911t - bought through Williams Crawford, but it was in fact a recent restoration by Matthew TangerineT (on here).
I loved it immediately - a really lovely and exciting drive with a ‘S’ cammed 2.2 engine. I remember KS asking me what Trish thought of it to drive - and I’m afraid to say I didn’t and couldn’t answer it at the time.
To cut a very long and painful story short (well quite short) - Trish could hardly walk at the time, let alone drive, as she needed a critical hip replacement, but like countless thousands of others she of course couldn’t have it as no hospitals were doing them because of the Covid restrictions.
To help her get by we bought a mobility scooter (together with the obligatory furry dice), for her to get around the new garden, and later on to go to plant events - so she could at least still try and follow her first love - gardening.
After months and months of this pain, as things began to open up a little, we realised that to get anything done we’d have to go privately for the first time in our lives. In the end we managed to find a surgeon who’d do it , and eventually she went for the pre-op checks. But a couple of days later she was told that there was a problem. The anaesthetist had seen the results and said the op couldn’t go ahead because of her ‘heart condition’.
This was a bolt from the blue. Trish had no idea that she had advanced heart disease. We struggled to get the necessary further tests, but over the intervening months it became clear that she urgently needed a triple heart bypass and something called a mitral valve repair.
The chances of getting one inside the NHS were nil.
So once again we decided to try and go privately, blessing the fact that we could at least still afford to, and she eventually went alone to Liverpool heart hospital, to have it done. I wasn’t able to visit and give support at all. Number 10 partied and trollied booze into Downing Street but we couldn’t even get to give support to our wives, not even in full PPE. If I’d known about the parties at the time I’d have been livid. Trish was not in the same danger as many others of course, but I have a special sympathy now for all those thousands of people who couldn’t support their loved ones through Covid hospitalisation, and worse still - death - in those awful times.
Trish came through though, and came back following a semi successful operation but then had to recuperate for several months before she could even begin to think about getting her painful, still totally debilitating, hip fixed. Consequently the 71 911t remained undriven by her. I’ll pause here to gather breath and put in a car pic in a vain attempt to maintain interest. Sorry it’s all got so medical, cars coming again soon.
