As part of my recuperation, I need to do physical therapy – I have lost sensation in my right foot, indicating that while I might not be in the same level of pain now, it’s still out there, waiting for me. Periodically it strikes with a vengeance.

I was volunteered to be the liaison for the youth committee within my religious organization. It has seemingly morphed into more. I had anticipated a one hour meeting, which ending up running 2.5 hours long. Everyone seemed very interested and committed, which shocks me to no end.

First problem: I miss volunteering, and second: I feel like I owe it to these kids / young adults.

In turn, I have even less free time than normal.

Finally, I’m likely doing nights at the hospital to make my hours. I am not looking forward to this. It’s going to be hard, hard work. Maybe someday I will look back on this and laugh. Maybe.

Or not.

From Indexed, by Jessica Hagy (filed in my reader as a daily read).

There were times I feel like I was so caustic to people that I care about that it was embarrassing. I’m trying (and continue to try) to not be so cynical or sarcastic. I definitely don’t want to be the guy at the intersection. So far, it’s been alright. I actually have something that resembles a social life across different life spheres.

I feel like the age of 30 was the single worst year of my life (actually, the first day of 30 was a pretty good indicator of how that year was going to go, looking back on it) and so, for the age of 31, I try to ensure that every single day is better than last year’s equivalent. So far, so good.

By doing this at two wavelengths, the values are correlated.

Afterwards, I realized the answer was draw blood and see if the abg value matches. Hopefully there’s extra credit?

…yay!

Anyway, Wednesday morning I woke up with back pain. This isn’t atypical (which should’ve been a warning bell, of course) and I did what I usually do, which is stretch and try to deal with the pain. When I got in the shower, all hell broke loose. Something popped and suddenly the dull pain wasn’t so dull. I managed to get dressed and help get the children dressed and as we headed downstairs the walking did a number on my back.

The last thing I managed to do (with GREAT DIFFICULTY) was get from the kitchen table to the counter (by pushing myself across the floor with a stool) to make Nora’s PB&J for school. After that, it’s really all a blur.

So, it turns out I had either a ruptured or bulging disc (probably the latter) and it was triggering sciatica. The pain that really crushed me wasn’t the sciatica, it was whatever my back was doing. It was intolerable. I had to be carried out of the house on my dad’s and wife’s shoulders, and when the PA had me lift my leg, I was clinging to the bed for dear life trying to deal with the nauseating pain.

Some observations:

1. Percocet is nasty. How anyone develops an oxycodone habit is beyond me. It did nothing but give me unpleasant sleep and crazy dreams. I stopped taking it as quickly as possible.

2. There are no medals awarded for toughing out pain. At least, I’m certainly not expecting one in the mail. In hindsight, my chronic pain was interfering with my daily life. That *should* have been a warning sign (of course) but wasn’t.

3. The title is what my sister relayed to me which only my neanderthalic brain could understand, so I’m going to make the call to do physical therapy tomorrow. Unreal, at least for me.

I’ve never gone this long doing absolutely nothing. And in doing so, my back has not hurt at all. Both experiences are rather new. So hopefully, someday, I can get back to doing stuff without the pain.

I’m only 31. I’m not sure why I have to deal with this now and not when I’m older like most normal people (the true eggshell plaintiff, as Lisa would say) but you only get one life and I have to make the most of it.

But it does concern me for all these fancy plans for weight lifting and running that I had to put on hiatus.

IN ANY EVENT, I am fine at the moment, thanks everyone for asking. And yes, Lisa is a saint for doing all the heavy lifting around the house. But I must say that I’ve been extremely jealous of her (and everyone in existence really) who’s been moving around pain free for the last few days. I want that.

With the panel’s opacity turned on, it’s a pleasant looking desktop to be greeted by.

To be fair, it’s more like I hate the government of Baltimore. I think I’m going to troll them hard today. What’s the worst they can do, delay my application? They’ve been sitting on it for 70 days!

On Sunday, I decided to re-arrange our bedroom – by myself. So I moved the bed, frame, dresser, and all the other furniture all while watching Isaac. Then we weeded in the afternoon for many hours.

As it turns out, that’s too much for me in my old age and I reaggravated every single injury I had in the last month: ankle, hip, back, quads – everything. All lower body. By Monday night I was thinking of buying vicodin online to ease the pain – I was taking 4 asprin at once and it only made the pain slightly manageable, but it didn’t make it go away.

Tuesday I wised up and grabbed a back brace, and wore ace bandages all over, and Thursday Lisa purchased a moist heat pad – all of which seems to have resolved my pain to a point where I can manage it without medication or wrapping myself up. We will see in the morning.

The long and short is that my food weakness is pain. I remember this now when we were prepping for the arrival of Nora – I would wake up every morning in severe pain which would bring me to tears, and then I’d eat. I’m not an emotional eater, but I do eat – a lot – when I’m in pain.

I haven’t gotten an official weight number yet but today was the first day I felt mentally ready to tackle dieting again. This is a minor setback but it’s good to be cognizant of this behavior. It’s better to just rest (which I did on Wednesday night, by sleeping 12 hours) than to simply eat. It does nothing for anyone.

—

The Wire’s depiction of Baltimore is spot on. After many hours of dealing with Baltimore’s beauracracy, I’ve determined that the only type of business is that can possibly flourish in that city is the illegal kind.

Anecdote: I was already exasperated by having been there for a solid hour with no progress in my application, so when they finally came out and indicated that I needed to pay $150 instead of $50, I pitched a fit. I essentially stated “yeah, no. It’s $50, and here’s the check.” The guy simply said “oh, ok” and walked off. Was a government official trying to shake me down for another $100?

Yeah, the Wire. It all makes so much sense now.

—

I like my Lubuntu, but I’m not sure how I feel about 64-bit. Specifically, random stuff doesn’t work. It makes sense that it doesn’t work, but it’s still annoying.

It runs so nicely otherwise, though.

I guess I don’t have much of a choice. I do want to experiment with KDE4 w/ 64bit, but it also seems rather dangerous to mess with a good working thing. However, that’s never stopped me before, right?

I ended up losing eight pounds, which is right on track for healthy loss. 8.5 would’ve been a stretch, so I’m happy with the result. With any luck, I will be past my goal by next weekend.

I look smaller, but not significantly different I don’t think. This is by virtue of doing cardio exclusively, and even then it was on the exercise bike. By doing this, most of the loss is in my legs (though I did end up losing everywhere, just slowly).

I believe I’ll need to consider doing super set weight training, so that’ll be my next goal. I plan to DIY a foam roller and stick to a better sleep plan.

—

I did something symbolic a few days ago, and it’s part of that question about being ‘older’ a few weeks ago. I stowed my video game collection out of sight, and have started a list of games I’m just going to donate since they’re worthless in the general market (and it’d be better if someone else found enjoyment with them, obviously). Today reminds me that everything that’s happened in the past is a memory and nothing more – and games I finished two or three years ago have no bearing on me as a person other than to have precluded me from painting a painting, drawing a drawing, learning an instrument or losing weight faster.

I wish I had come upon this realization in college. Again, solely a memory.

—

Every paragraph except this one started with an I. Typically, I try to avoid that. But it’s my birthday, so nyah.