TGIF

Had another session of physical therapy yesterday. I highly recommend this to everyone. This time I had 'heat', then massage, then someone stretching my limbs and back, and then more electrodes and ice. All quite lovely. Unfortunately the day went severely downhill from there. We had two long meetings to address the Dean's charge for us to come up with a strategic plan. The first one went ok, but the second had various participants (moi included) behaving quite badly. Some post meeting emails were circulated - fortunately I had the restraint not to join in that continuation of the awfulness. It is the usual conundrum of trying to figure out what to support, who to hire and so on when people really don't agree.
So, I am glad it is Friday evening. I am reading a mystery novel and listening to the din downstairs that is Catherine's 14th birthday party. They started out with a photo scavenger hunt which involved roaming the neighborhood in groups with digital cameras and a list of "must get shots". We have had pizza and ice cream cake and many of the girls will stay the night. The conversation seems focused on who will win American Idol next week and other super important questions.

The ageing body

I've come to the realization that I am an inveterate consumer of health care. Don't know whether this is a by-product of living in the good old USA and thinking, by golly, I better get some care, 40 million people don't, or just a natural result of ageing. The body falling apart and hence requiring more intervention... Those following my health (fascinating topic) will know I had the MRI a couple of weeks ago. It showed (always good that it shows something consistent with the pain) that I have disc degeneration... yikes... disc protrusion... OMG... and Schmorl's nodes... WTF?
All of this is in the thoracic region (at T-11 and T-12 for you in the know). Today I had my first physical therapy appointment with a lovely man called Tyler who clucked and agreed that I couldn't go on in my condition and we needed to get me sorted out. This involved today just learning some exercises and having electrodes and an ice pad applied to my back for 15 minutes. Next time I get to do more exercises and try out "traction". The whole PT practice is a jolly place full of people hooked up to various bits of equipment or doing odd things in the gym. There was one guy repetitively throwing a ball at a small trampoline. I thought repetitive motion was bad for you, but apparently in some cases it is the cure.

American Idol

We are a household of Idol fanatics. Last night we got down to the final four. I am rooting for David Cook who is just dreamy. Check out his version of Michael Jackson's Billie Jean:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QpX-kndqHnE

swimming

So today I tried swimming. That is supposed to be the least taxing form of exercise. It was better than hiking that's for sure. After Sam got home from school, we went to the Apple store where I played dumb about the complete lack of life in his ipod. Of course, I was fully aware that he had jumped into the swimming pool with it in his pocket while in Mexico. I love Apple -- they gave us a new one for free, even though they opened it up and could tell that it had "been completely submerged in water".

MRI

So, after continued back pain which I trace to the header off the inner tube in February, my doctor ordered up an MRI. I went in this afternoon. I had heard from others who have had them that it is 1) bad if you are claustrophobic, and 2) incredibly loud. It was indeed both, but I fell asleep during it... which I think attests to my end of term fatigue. No results yet, but having had to lie supine for half an hour, my back was really sore! Then I added a four mile hike during Sam's soccer game, and the last mile wasn't pretty. I was hobbling along muttering profanity. Came home, had dinner, Zoe (dog 1) knocked my wine glass over onto the carpet, Sadie (dog 2) vomited profusely after Ryan fed her a strawberry. Fortunately she had the good sense to go to a tiled area for this, and because the strawberry was so prominently displayed, Ryan had to clean it up. How was everyone else's day?

Ryan and Kaia

This is Ryan and his girlfriend Kaia at movie night -- student shorts were screened. They are currently in the dog house for trying to scive off school. Ryan impersonated her dad with the old "dentist appointment" story. The school, used to such shenanigans, called the real dad and the cat was out of the bag....

party

Friday night we had our departmental end of the year party and celebrated the retirement of three of our colleagues. I took some pictures and this was the only good one. The limes went into pomegranate martinis which were mighty tasty.