It turns out that the injury to my meniscus was a false alarm and I actually only have some degeneration of the cartilage due to a fairly common muscular imbalance causing mis-alignment of my kneecap. An MRI (paid for privately to avoid the 5-month waiting list - horray for 2-tiered medical) showed the damage, which is somewhat fixable through rehab exercises rather than surgery. I can't repair the cartilage as such, since once it's gone it's gone for good, but I can at least halt it from progressing further and make my kneecap track properly in its groove. Yay!

I'm thrilled that I won't have to have my knee cut up but in a way I'm sad because it means I'm going to have to do the work myself to get it better. Stupid work! My symptoms are still much closer to that of a torn meniscus - pain location, functional problems - but everyone knows that machines don't lie.

Or do they..?