General update

So Ruthie and I took a trip two weekends ago.  Tonight's pretty much the first night I've had a chance to sit down at a computer to catch up on some internetting, including posting to here.  Fortunately, while on the road, I typed as we went.  Unfortunately, I decided I would try to put some more layers to the blog posts - which require a bit more post processing if you will.

This inspiration dawned upon me after spending some time reading a friend's new blog, tomhavegroup.com/road-scholar-blog/ [and her hubby's tomhavegroup.com/sound-vision-2/].  I realised that I'd been reading plenty of other blogs with a bit of additional content other than words and the very random picture.  And then I decided it's about time to try and add that stuff to TFAAB.

So those entries are coming, hopefully starting tonight or tomorrow night.

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In the mean time, a quick update on acupuncture.   We've now gone to three sessions.  Just like when the doctor asks, I find it hard to describe how things are going.  After each session, and generally for the day after, my legs feel incredibly tired.  The first session, I was worn out for two whole days; when my legs feel exhausted, I feel worn down - which is part of the reason I've gone in the first place.  Anyways, it's difficult to say if I feel any improvement that simple R&R wouldn't've done for me and my knee.

Ruthie, on the other hand, apparently wasn't telling the needle guy the right thing on the first session, and flinched really prematurely.  She's corrected this, but she more or less detests the actual needles and the twirling of them to ping the nerves.  And I think she's fairly convinced it's not helping.  Meanwhile, her physio has decided it's time for a more aggressive approach and has started her back on some activity - including a bit of skating last night.  When prompted, she doesn't really claim that her leg is feeling better; perhaps this is due to increased amounts of activity - or perhaps this is due to a really slow healing process.

Generally speaking, though, being injured sucks - especially when it's a lame injury that just won't heal. 

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In other news, March 1 marked the first day of Autumn.  However, while last year it felt like the season changed with the flip of the calendar, this year, summer's holding on strong.  It's been in the mid 30s all week, and it seems to be staying that way.  Apparently February was the driest it's been since the middle of the drought season, and the weather now is very much like what Melbourne experienced during the ten-year drought.  While I'm not excited about drought prospects, I am kinda tickled by the fact that we're more or less experiencing two weather patterns in two different years in the same city.

As the weather currently is, blue skies and hot days, this is exactly the weather we naively thought Melbourne/Australia had every day all year.  Clearly we were wrong, but it's nice to know we're getting a good dose of it any ways.

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Lastly, work has been an interesting world as of late.  Having to deal with not one, but two governments seems to have been unnecessarily tricky the past little bit.  First off, I've added a new term to my diction with this sequestration business in the US.  If the doomsday clock is not delayed with some sort of financial agreement in Congress, it is getting increasingly likely that I will be required to reduce my work to 4 days a week.  As if dealing with one country's fiduciary restrictions wasn't enough, the coffers haven't really been overflowing down here either.  So much so that when a maintenance contract was supposed to be signed back in October for some equipment for which I'm responsible, they said no.  [Thus risking all kinds of serious damage and a massive repair bill by not simply ponying up the money for the maintenance.]  It's now March, and the contract just went through.

Silver lining: 4 days a week will mean more time to play video games and explore the city [hopefully for free] or spend time with friends.  And if I play my cards right, we'll have saved up enough money, taxes won't be terrible to us this year, that I might even be able to use the regular 3-day weekend to our advantage and we can do some paid exploration.

Anyways, that's all I've got for the moment.  Time to spice up the road trip blog and get it ready for posting here.

Cheers
-EP

Road trip!

So I'd totally meant for the next post to be an update on acupuncture [I went, too].  But, as it turns out, it's a slow burn kinda thing and we've got follow up appointments next week anyways.  So more to come on that.

In the mean time, it's Wednesday night, derby practice is over, the laundry is nearly all done, we are semi-packed, and the alarm is set for 4a.  For the first time in a long while, Ruthie and I are going on a trip.  Wooo!

The rough agenda is as follows: Fly to Adelaide first thing Thursday morning, pick up the car, drive to Lake Mungo.  Lake Mungo overnight, then off to Broken Hill.  Two nights in Broken Hill and then back to Adelaide.  One night in Adelaide and then we're back Monday night.

Since I'll be taking the laptop with me, I hope I'll be able to keep up with our journey as it happens instead of trying to remember it two months from now.

-EP

Acupuncture = voodoo?

Way back in December, we were playing kickball on the last night of derby practice.  It just so happened that Ruthie fell and bruised the inside of her kneecap in the process.  After two months’ rest, she finally went to the physio*, who fussed at her for not having come earlier, and ultimately told her she needed sever restriction of movement in the knee combined with some stretches for the muscles around the knee, to heal up.  It’s one of those injuries where there’s not a lot of blood flow in the area, so healing time is significantly increased.  Ignoring the rest order only exacerbates inflammation.  However, the issue quickly presented itself that in order to severely limit movement to the knee, she’d be losing all attempt at cardio [even copious amounts of walking inflame the knee].  Presented with this conundrum, the physio said she could go swimming with a pool buoy, to which she’s begun doing. 

In the mean time, we’ve also begun to seek out alternative methods of treatment.  Australia, or at least Melbourne, presents an interesting opportunity for us in situations like these because there is a really big blend of eastern and western medicine available.  Being friends with some really sporty people helps in that we know some people who have had to recover from injuries in order to keep performing, and it was through one of these friends that we were referred to an acupuncturist, with the recommendation to also look into dry needling.  Now, I’m fairly sceptical, about needles accessing my qi, and changing the flow of my energy.  But, I’m willing to have an open mind.  In fact, I’m actually eager for my mind to be changed, and in particular because both of us really want Ruthie to be able to skate [and thus bout] for the remainder of our time here.

Ruthie’s been tasked with making an appointment, and so we’ll see what happens.

*Physio, short for physiotherapist, which, as far as we can tell, is a physical therapist, but a bit better/more knowledgeable.  For example the physio that we have on our derby team went to school for eight years.  The only thing that would match that in the US is a Doctor of Physical Therapy [to the best of my limited knowledge].

Arms Giving and more

So the other day, Ruthie and I had the opportunity to attend an “Arms Giving” [although I believe he meant Alms Giving] ceremony at a Sri Lankan Buddhist temple.  In our journey to branch out and try new things, I’m rather glad we went.  I truly had no idea what was going on for most of the time [chants were in Sanskrit and the majority of the service was in another language – I’m guessing Tamil?], but it was still very pleasant.  Fortunately, the monk gave the “homily” in English, which was nice to have it explained at my level – even if it was obvious that the kids and maybe an adult or two weren’t so excited at the ELI5 break down.

The drive back from the temple sparked an interesting conversation for Ruthie and me about what to do with respect to our progeny and exposing them to religion.  Both of us were raised Catholic; Ruthie due to a private Catholic education being better than public schools in her area, and me due to a Catholic family.  However, neither one of us is always so fond of mass religion.  Without going into too many details here, it’s safe to say that on a personal level, the act of attending church is what got me to stop going. 

Now, switching religions isn’t necessarily the answer, as attending a service is still participating in an organised religion.  But, going back to the college days, I was rather intrigued by Buddhism and Taoism, which still have their group ceremonies, but aren’t quite as rigid about the best way to practice.

Fast forward to now, and the ceremony we attended was one in remembrance of a co-worker’s father, who passed away five years ago.  While I liked the notion of it, I think Ruthie got a bit more out of the purpose of the ceremony than I did.  Sure there are candles and you can have dedications requested at mass, but it’s different than the Buddhist ceremony we observed. 

So this raised the question of Why not look into it a bit more while we’re here?  After some internetting, we learned that there is way more to it than simply attending a Buddhist mass [picking a tradition alone is a daunting notion].  But even still, there’s a bunch more exposure here than there is in America, so why not?  So perhaps we’ll continue our explorations and try and attend a few more ceremonies/masses/gatherings/meditations and see what happens.

-EP