Woz: Dancing with the Stars Update

On Mar 11, 2009, at 4:27 AM PST, Steve Wozniak wrote:

I went to the doctor today.
I snagged some of the latex gloves that always hang around hospitals. It's like taking soap home from a hotel. I used to get lots of these gloves and let the kids in my computer classes turn them into great water balloons. So call it a habit to get these when I see them. That sounds better than calling it a sickness like kleptomania.
I also hid an empty water bottle under my arms under my shirt under my sweater at one point. When 2 clinic officials came in Karina pretended to be working on my foot and then she bent it and I squeezed my arms and you heard an incredibly loud crackling sound. We did this on 2 female clinic staff members and they were shocked with mouths open for ages. When we did it on the doctor he didn't fall for it though.
At first I explained to the doctor that I had foot pain. After some discussion he spoke of the likelihood and danger of a fracture. I told him that I thought it was a good possibility. An X-ray looked good but it doesn't show early fractures in a bone. So we then did an MRI. It was a lucky day that I was able to get an MRI right away there in this Cedar-Sinai clinic.
The doctor treats a lot of athletes with sports injuries. He explained to me how dancing can fracture bones because of the incredible pressures put on them. But for a long time I was just waiting.
Finally the doctor came in and we went over the MRI. I got very serious at this point because I could tell that he was worried. My dance partner, Karina, pointed out that all the white on this MRI was bad and an indication of fluids. My doctor called another doctor who must have pulled the MRI up on his own screen and they concurred about something. The fact that my doctor wasn't talking to me made me more and more worried.
This doctor was very familiar with the DWTS show and knew how to address the camera and speak good sound bytes for possible airing on TV. He explained to me that I had a fracture and that he had only had a ten percent expectation of this. He expected something simpler, like a pulled muscle or tendonitis.
The doctor explained that he would tell me that I should stay off of the foot. I was desperate to keep anything absolute from being on the 'tape' so I kept coming around to degrees of badness of such fractures. The doctor admitted that some are worse than others. He said that in a case like mine, similar to a pro sports athlete, where it was very important to continue for a livelihood, that it might be possible, with risk, to continue.
I told the doctor how much I wanted to be on Dancing because I really loved being a part of such a good and important thing. He understood and we reached a compromise. I would wear a removable cast except during practice and I would halt everything if I got acute pain. The doctor said that if he were in my shoes, he would also continue with the dancing but watch the foot. My partner Karina was very concerned. We have become very close, especially since we are opposing others about which dance was the best. But Karina did say that were it her foot, she would go on. For her it is a profession.
I did go down for a little practice after leaving the clinic in the cast. Practice was short but went well. Karina wanted me to drive in cars and not use the Segway. After first opposing this, I came around. I have seen a lot of things to know that I can trust her. I'm glad that I have largely switched to car travel now.
Tomorrow we have a larger practice.
There is much much more to tell but I'm out of time. I had so much email, literally by the hundreds, that it's very late and I have to get up early for some show video stuff. Plus I have to practice. The other dancers got all of today for practice but I was at the clinic. Fortunately, I love my next dance, for Monday night.
I have to say to all of you that I will post what I can here. But how much I have time to post will depend on how many of you avoid filling my email boxes and phoning me and the like. I know you are all incredible supporters, but I may run out of time to even read my email. I have already cut out all reading of news.
On another note, the show set a record with 23 million viewers. I hope that the producers decide that it was largely due to my presence. I also hope that they find incredible numbers from the viewers. This is things like how many people watch You Tube clips of my performance, and how many voted for me by phone or internet. I have some worries about the internet voting. A friend told me that his gmail account had been used by someone else to vote, with an obviously computer generated name, like PCP1011011, that sort of thing. I have no idea who they were voting for but I hope it wasn't me. This is fairly disgusting.
But I assure all of you that I believe that I have the best strongest most dedicated and passionate fan base of any of the celebrity dancers this season, and that your efforts on my behalf will be duly noted and recorded. I believe that you will bring me many times more votes than anyone else. It may even be huge.
I promise to make the next dance wild and fast and all-over and crazy and fun, just like the first one. If the judges are out of sync with what the viewers like to see, so be it. The show can always get new judges.
Please keep supporting me. It is always very important.
to all my friends,
Woz
more HERE