The Split Rail Fence Of Adages & Affirmations

Aching Painful Sore Back Emergency

   The past eight days have been some of the most painful of my entire life. Worse pain than any abcessed tooth or broken/fractured bone or migraine headache.

   My back went out. 

   At first all I felt was a slight discomfort in the lower left side of my back when I removed a less than 20 pound box from a shoulder-height shelf and turned/twisted to load it onto a cart. 

   There was something ominous about how my back tweaked as I placed the relatively light box down though. It was one of those "uh-oh" moments when one knows one has screwed something up worse than it appears.

   For the first few days after the tweaking I felt only slight discomfort, but on the fourth day the pain ramped up suddenly and severely.

   Have you ever spent a night trying desperately to find a comfortable position in your bed to sleep? Constantly adjusting and shifting your torso and legs to get at least a minute or two of comfort, all of which is painful? Yeah, it was that level of hell. 

   I felt like a carnival contortionist trying to fit into a suitcase that kept getting smaller and smaller, all while some idiot outside the box was sticking knives into the shrinking space.

   After downing 800mg of Ibuprofen and putting an ice pack on the spot where the imaginary knives were lancing into my lower back (about two inches to the left of my spine, right between the erector spinae and gluteus maximus), I was finally able to get a little sleep).

   The intense pain returned within a few short minutes of my wakening however so I started texting people I know who have suffered back injuries and endured intense back pain in order to get their advice on what to do.

   CMM, who was rear-ended by a truck while driving along I-70 almost 20 years ago and has had to contend with persistent back pain ever since.

   BWB, who has had a dodgy back for most of his adult life and has managed to work in an industry that requires heavy lifting nevertheless.

  JER, who injured his back while serving in the U.S. Army and is now on full disability.

   All three of them gave great advice that included most of what you see in the pic above (the only piece of advice not shown is the cannabis - I'm just not a cannabis guy).

   And of course I was told, "Get thee to a Doctor".

   So, I did.

   I made a beeline to a little clinic not to far from my house. I was able to be seen by a Physician Assistant after a short wait.

   After a little gentle poking and prodding of my lower back to determine where the soreness was centralized (see above) I underwent a few quick tests.  First was the straight leg test while I was sitting in a chair, than the straight leg test while I was lying prone on the exam table. 

   The sitting straight leg test was just me lifting my left leg slowly and repeatedly, which I was able to do with no discomfort to my leg though I did feel discomfort in my lower back.

   The straight leg test while I was laying down on the exam table involved the PA lifting my left leg slowly and asking if I was feeling any pain as she raised my leg until it was at a 90 degree angle to the rest of me. I felt pain in my lower back but nothing in my leg, which she said was a good sign.

   Then she did what she said was a text for possible nerve injury, which she called the femoral nerve test. It was simply having me turn onto to my big belly and then she lifted my left leg while it was bent at the knee. She asked if I was feeling any pain in my thigh and I told her I didn't, which she said was another good sign.

   Good signs while I was suffering from some pretty damn debilitating lower back pain. Oh yay.

   Long story short, soft tissue strain was the diagnoses, and I was prescribed a 5% lidocaine patch (I had no idea PA's could write prescriptions but apparently they can).

   I was also told to lose some weight - at least 60 if not 75 pounds. I am a large human, have been since I was small (which, at any time for whatever age I was, I never was - my waist was a 36 when I was in the 6th grade and I was what people labeled "husky" back then).

   I have been as heavy as 335 (pounds, not kilos) since I left high school all those decades ago, and I currently run 285 (well, not run, 'cause, you know, I'm fat).

   Being descended from generations of coal miners and others who made their livings lifting heavy stuff kinda sucks when it comes to losing weight. I am genetically pre-disposed to being a larger than average human.

   I have, however, managed to lose weight when it was necessary, primarily through rigorously adopting Bill Phillips Body For Life fitness system.

   So it looks like I'm going to be undertaking that 84 day challenge once again (though going lightly on the exercise part). I apologize in advance for the grouchiness that will develop concurrently.

   

Worst Plot Summary Ever

    For your reading pleasure...this is the plot summary for the 1993 television movie Percy & Thunder that was directed by Ivan Dixon, as seen on the Wikipedia page for the film.

Percy (James Earl Jones) and Thunder (Courtney B. Vance) have been with themselves around the past so they are finding it. Percy and Thunder meets with Leatherhead (Mick E. Jones) a corrupt boss and VFW Refree (Ron Shipp) are having a fight against Percy and Thunder to commit it. Percy takes Thunder and Leatherhead and VFW Refree to let Percy know he has to track down an Assassin and then Percy finds the assassins outside and then fights and kills them and tells Leatherhead assignment is done. Percy and Thunder tells Leatherhead and VFW Refree to see them later. Percy goes to find Promoter (Mike Finneran) to know he is bored and then knows the answers and then can use it anytime. Percy and Promoter take a road trip down the road and then they view what's on the road. Percy and Promoter find the helicopter and then all the targets arrive and then Percy knocks out all the targets and then returns to Promoter. Percy tells Promoter that it's good to spend time with itself to know when it's time for it.

   That is verbatim. 

   There may be a couple of reasons that this plot summary is, well, gibberish. English may not be the first language of the writer (maybe the writer's first language is Gaelic, or Urdu, or maybe Vulcan, and whatever software they used for the translation to English was a bit dodgy). Or maybe it was written by a completely whacked-out AI program (ChatGPT?).

   It's not possible that this was the pitch used to sell the project to the studio, is it? No way, inconceivable. Not even the most coked-out producer in all of Hollywood would have bit on this one.

   Of course, a producer once listened to the pitch for C.H.U.D. and that movie got made, so I could be wrong.

   

.

Spay Today...Is A Lie. Spay By Appointment Is The Truth

    

   The sign stated boldly, SPAY TODAY!

   The cat, being female and almost 8 months old, was scooped up when I got home and taken to the place with that big, bold sign without delay.

   The clinician who greeted me politely informed me that "Spay Today" was simply the name of the veterinary clinic.

   You cannot get a cat spayed today at the clinic, but you can certainly make an appointment to have her spayed...in April.

   Gotta change the name of the place to SPAY BY APPOINTMENT.

Sculpture Seen While Walking The Dr. Tom Jones Trail Around Windsor Lake, Part 5

                                              Cold Moon by Sandy Friedman, $11,600.00

   Sandy Friedman began working in ceramics and then added steel sculptures to his oeuvre. His work has been added to both private and public collections throughout the southwest and internationally in collections and galleries in many countries such as Canada, France & Spain.

   The sculpture above is part of his Cold Moon series and is available for $11,600.00

A Few From The Irish On Saint Patrick's Day

    A pompous English tourist entered an Irish pub in Dublin one afternoon and was promptly offered a pint of Guinness by the barman.

   Without hesitation he declined the libation and exclaimed, "I'm an Englishman good sir - born and bred in England, I proudly live as an Englishman, by the grace of god I hope to die as an Englishman, and I demand a proper English Gin and Tonic!"

   A wee Irishman on a barstool nearby looks over at him and comments, "Have ye nay ambition in ye at all, then?'

   The tipplers of County Kildare

Say it's more than pink elephants they fear

There's red rabbits, purple bats

Chartreuse rodents and magenta cats

 That jump from their whiskey and beer

   A tired old Irish pensioner visiting London was getting ready for bed in his hostel room when a beautiful young English lass in a nearly transparent negligee walked through the door. 

   Looking at the frail elderly man she blushed and exclaimed, "Pardon me sir, I've entered the wrong room!"

   "Aye", sighed the venerable gent, "and thirty years too late as well."

There once was a young lass from Blarney

Whose knowledge of French was simply "Oui oui"

To this very day

Men's glasses are raised

To honor her memory in Paree

   Stout Mrs O'Leary was on trial for domestic abuse. The Prosecutor had her on the stand and, indicating her bandaged up husband sitting forlornly at the counsel's table, stated loudly "Do you you expect this court to believe that a physical wreck such as your husband was able to give you a black eye?"

   Mrs O'Leary looked over at the jury and replied, "He wasn't a physical wreck when he gave it to me."

Sculpture Seen While Walking The Dr Tom Jones Trail Around Windsor Lake, Part 4

Whispers of Spring, Charlotte Zink, $10,000.00

   Louisiana native Charlotte Zink made her way to Colorado in the late 1980's. As a student at CU Boulder she developed her artistic talents and abilities to an extraordinary degree and, with the able assistance of her husband Ben, has created a large number of wonderful sculptures that can be seen in the permanent collections of municipalities throughout the state.  

   The piece shown above is entitled Whispers of Spring and is available for $10,000.00.