Oops, I did it again

No, I'm not a fan of modern music, nor of pop music. I did go through the ole top 40 phase when I was in my early early teens. Thankfully I grew out of it. However, it sure is a good title for this post.

If you're looking for something funny today from Yours Truly (that'd be me), then I can type to you right now to tell you this is not going to be one of my more funny ones cus I's isn't in no mood ta be a laughin'! Besides, it hurts too much to laugh...

How's abouts that for a bit of foreshadowing? Hey, if I do that 3 more times it'll be fourshadowing! Ha Ha! I crack me up. Ok, I take it back, this one might be a little bit funny as(s) the latest round of painkillers kick in... ahhhhh...

Before I tell you all what's going on, let me give you a tomato(e) update. For you newbies, we've got 3 wonderful tomato(e) plants growing in pots this season and we're hoping to get 80 to 100 pounds of fresh, organic tomatoes throughout this season.

Here's the current numbers:

Total weight of tomatoes harvested: 795 grams (1 and 3/4 pounds)
Total number of tomatoes harvested: 6
Number of tomatoes currently on vines: 67
Number of tomatoes currently ripening on vines:4

Growing right next to the tomatoes is a big hanging basket of basil. Tomatoes and basil make good companion plants: they each keep the other very healthy. When you grow basil, you can keep it bushing and producing leaves all season long: whenever one of them looks like it's going to try to flower, just snip that one off an inch or so below the flowering part (that way you'll have fresh leaves that evening, and the stem that's left has plenty of leaves). The snipped stem will then split off in two new stems and you'll soon end up with a huge bushy hanging basket of basil for 6 months. How's that for a gardening tip?

Next Topic:

Did you know that I used to be (am still kinda am) very phsically active and an athlete in 6 different sports? I did a lot of other sports, but only competed in 6 throughout the years. Oh, I count xc running and marathon running as one sport, btw.

A quick condensed recount of various athletic endeavours I have done over the last 40 years:

Got 2nd in a xc ski race a week after the leg cast came off

I've run a marathon (all on trails)

I've done an ultramarathon through mountains

Ridden over 200 miles on a road bike in 13 hours solo and unsupported

Done the same on a mountain bike but in 20 hours

Was a State Epee Fencing Champion and runner up in Foil and Sabre

Taught at a University PE Dept for 8 years

Did 20 snowboard runs at Skiland in one day; before it opened for the season so I hiked up the whole thing each run

Bowled 22 strikes in a row when I was 16

All of those things took an uncounted number of hours, days, weeks, months, and years practicing. You kinda get the idea: I was in damned good shape. And that's not to mention the freight tossing around either.

Now for the other side of the coin...

I've broken a leg

I've torn knee cartilege

Broken an arm

Broken a hand

Broken many fingers

Evulsion fractures on both ankles

Cracked ribs

Concussions

Too many bruises to count

Broken foot (twice)

Too many twisted ankles to count

Broken toes

Left face on pavement when I was five

A hunk of rebar decided to try and jam itself into my knee when I was 10

Hit by a car (twice)

Hit by a motorcycle

Pulled too many muscles to count


Now, all of those resulted in fairly superficial injuries which have all healed up nicely, no worries.

HOWEVER... I do have a wee bit of a problem with my back, and, quite frankly, I'm SHOCKED at what I was able to do athletically with a back like mine.

Here's the lowdown on my back:

My left pelvis is 12 mm lower than my right

My spine curves off to the left after it leaves my pelvis

Shortly after my spine leaves the pelvis it consists of 4 compressed vertebrae in a row

My spine then starts to curve to the right, resulting in my right shoulder being lower than the left (but I'm getting better with that)

When my spine becomes my neck, it encounters 2 neck vertebrae in a row that are TWISTED wrongly by about 10 degrees


So what happens when I do something stupid with my back? Say, like lift something heavy the wrong way... Well it's been so long since I've done that I can't say! See, lifting properly is such a second nature to me that I don't even have to think about it. The last time I had to move the Clan Household I did like 13 runs in a freight truck over 10 days or so and didn't have a single problem with my back! In fact, a lot of my strength returned then.

So what did I do yesterday morning that has me whinging and whining about my back? Here's what I did:

I had just fed the local parrots (up to 18 in the morning and 10 in the evening!!!) and I was filling a watering container for starting the mornings' watering of juicy tomato(e) plants, grape vines, and other goodies. I leaned slightly over to turn on the outside water spigot. While I was leaned over I coughed to clear some mucus from my lungs... INSTANT shooting pain down both sides of my lumbar regions where the comressed vertebrae are! OUCH!

Oh the embarrasment! I had to tell my wife (she'd have seen me hobbling around anyways) what happened. Personally I'm kinda glad it didn't happen by lifting wrong. But leaned over and coughing?????????? Go back and read through all that athletic stuff I did! I'm supposed to be tougher than that, gah!

Fortunately, I have everything I need to treat it and I know exactly what to do for it when it's like this. Also, my chiro has my back nice and loose so things click back into place easily... Lots of ice, liquid muscle relaxants, lots of anti-inflammatories, lots of muscle relaxants, laying in the proper positions, more liquid muscle relaxants, move around so things don't tighten up, lots more ice, even more liquid muscle relaxants etc etc etc

I'm sure you all realiz(s)e there are some things you CAN'T do when your back is like this, there are some things you CAN do but hurt like hell, and one or two things you HAVE to do no matter how excrutiatingly painful they are...

Can you think of something you HAVE to do but is so painful you'd rather die??? Can you? Let me give you a hint: as soon as my back is better I'm installing a bidet so next time I hurt my back I won't be afraid to go number 2.

Giggle, giggle...

Hello again dear readers, without whom I'd just be a voice shouting alone in the woods --ummm, I'm kinda close to that anyways... But since I like the woods and shouting and getting away from people I guess that's no bad thing, eh?

Hey! We got some more rain yesterday afternoon and last night. Amazing! The official amount in town was a whole whopping 1.4 mm (about 1/16th of an inch) but I think in our area of the hills we had FOUR times that --I get excited over a quarter inch of rain now, wee-hoo.

It was also a great show of thunder and lightning. Unfortunately we are in for a very bad fire season cus the lightning strikes were (at one point) 1000 per hour and they touched off 60 bushfires. CFS was ready though (country fire service) and the strikes were taken care of quickly. CFS wasn't able to do much burning off this winter (not much rain so it was too liable to set things alight) so the fuel load is pretty high this fire season.

That's my quota for current affairs today --whoops, wait a sec: The Ashes start tomorrow morning... GO POMMIE BASTARDS!!! GO BARMY ARMY!!!

Now that's it... oh, wait, one more: GO ALL-BLACKS!!!!!!!!!

Now that I've thoroughly confused you US folks... onto Story Time with Unkie dave.

This occurred shortly after the previous post of "day in the life of dave". It involves fencing.

Oh, before I start I need to tell you something. I have a quirky sense of humour, I'm very very good at puns, and one-liners seem to spring into my head at the precise right moment. Actually, most thoughts seem to spring unbidden into my head and then they are gone again.

Ok, back to the story which hasn't started yet:

This happened the first time I went to the US Nationals. Uh, the sport was fencing (in case you hadn't guessed). I'd actually qualified several times in the preceding years, but this was the first time I had both the money and the time to go. I usually had lots of time but was generally short on the money.

Anywho, I'd qualified for six events fairly easily at the Alaskan qualifiers --I won't bore you with the details cus I'm sure you aren't interested. The year previous I had won the AK State Champs in epee (yes, I can proudly say that I'm a State Champion in a sport), and was 2nd in both foil and sabre; so qualifying next year was easy (any time I couldn't come in the top six in a major tourney in AK meant I was having a really really really bad day).

The trip down to the lower 48 took 14 hours (including transit time and plane transfers). I got to the hotel late at night when everyone else in the room was crashed.

Oh, yes; the Hotel... There were 4 of us staying in a room with two double beds and the hotel had a special for us fencers so it was only like $20 a night each (actually, they wanted $80 a night and didn't care how many were there). I knew one person in the room (woman, former fencing student of mine), but the other two I was clueless about (two blokes from the east coast, friends of hers).

The 3 of them arrived the day before I did and had been fencing earlier in the day, they also had to be up early for an 8 am event, whereas mine didn't start till 2 pm so I didn't care how late at night it was when I got to the hotel.

I was expected, no worries. The night staff checked me in (again, I was expected) and I collected my key. Now, the plan was that MaryAnne and another bloke would split one bed (double bed, no worries), and me and the other bloke would split the other (double bed, no worries).

Something you need to know about fencers: they travel with lots and lots of equipment and at night it's usually strewn all over the place so it's dry for the next day (I'll talk about the smell some other time).

I get to the room, open door and notice the three of them are sound asleep; 2 in one bed, 1 in another. There's fencing bags and duffel bags all over the floor of the tiny hotel room. Fortunately, I can see in the dark so I found an unused corner to silently put my stuff, undressed to my skivvies, and crawled into the open spot in the bed with only one person in it. I didn't wake anyone!

Remember: I was expected!

I fell asleep instantly (massive jet lag and all) and when I awoke in the morning the room was empty and a few fencing bags were gone. Ok, cool, they made their start time.

I amble down to the hotel restaurant and eat everything in sight (I'm good at that) and head to the venue at 1000 am to check it out. The convention centre was only a 15 min walk from the hotel, but since I didn't know the city yet I took one of the free shuttles the USFA had organised.

When I walked into to main fencing area I was astounded by how many people were there. GREAT! 48 copper fencing strips, all had overhead scoring lights, elevated strips for the finals, very, very cool.

I found MaryAnne and her friends, she was also with all the other Alaskan fencers there (even though she had been gone for two years we still considered her one of us). People were warming up (or cooling down), checking weapons, stretching out, taking strategy, and BSing.

MaryAnne started to introduce me to the two guys who we had the hotel room with (they three of them were friends) but I recognised the guy I split the bed with and went up to him before MaryAnne could introduce us.

I put out my hand to him, smiled all friendly-like, and said loudly, "Hi, I'm dave. I'm the guy you slept with last night."

His jaw dropped a mile... silence descended all around our little group... then, after a moment or two, everyone started laughing and laughing and laughing.

I swear to you, I had not even thought of saying anything like that, it just blurted out.

One of my best moments!


Food time (I think this is my favorite part).

What we are having for dinner tonight:

Yeah, yeah, yeah sure... roast chook and rice don't sound special... Well, read on:

The chook is roasting in a basting sauce of pineapple juice, brown sugar, coconut and tarragon. There's also pineapple chunks on and in the bird.

The jasmine rice is cooking with the following additions: wild rice, peas, pineapple chunks, pineapple juice, bacon, turmeric, and oregano.

I'll be making a sauce/gravy out of the pan juices from the chook to serve over the chicken and the rice.

See??!!??! Isn't that easy? And tasty!

by for now, off to check on the rice...