Jaime wants to reboot. Actually, I think she just desperately wants to look amazing for The Ball in two weeks. I can't see how eating nothing but pulverized produce for a week is going to help attain that objective, but I m not 16. At 16 literally anything is possible. The real question isn't why Jaime is juicing, but why DrC and I plan to join her.
I confess that we come late to this fashionable new trend. As soon as I started researching the subject, it became clear that as far as health fads go, we are probably the last people in the world to the table. Maybe this was super hot while we were on Mexico or in the middle of the Pacific with no bandwidth. Regardless, we are complete novices to the notion of the Juice Reboot. Babes in the vegan woods.
Of course, normally we don't do stuff like this. DrC is both a qualified doctor of Western style medicine and a skeptic... Some would say a cynic,actually. We dont go much for hokkum, snake oil, or homeopathy. We are more the ibuprofen, fish oil, and water types. We never went Atkins and my South Beach phase never made it past the third day. DrC's first considered medical action regarding my health nearly 25 years ago was to force-feed me beef to address my anemia. And when I say force fed, I mean it, complete with two inch thick fillets, crumbled bleu, Ceasar salad with fresh garlic croutons, and a really fine Cabernet. He is a truly horrible beast.
So why a more than a little bit trendy fad diet? Maybe just because.
Because we want to eat less meat for health, environmental, and economic reasons.
Because we need to cut down on the caffeine and wine.
Because we have been eating way too much bread and processed food during the last year.
Because Jaime wants to and we are just that awesome at parenting.
Or maybe because DrC had trouble buttoning his top jeans button this weekend for the first time in his entire life.
So this week we embark on a 5 day Reboot. Actually, this week we prep. We need to scope our local, fresh produce, get a decent juicer, make meal plans, go shopping. We pinky promised to start reducing the processed, the white, and the booze. Jaime is pulling down recipes, DrC nutritional info, and me the meal plan recommendations.
The official juice-only days start Monday. I think I will blog it end to end. Reboots have been blogged a million times by people all over the world, so I will add precisely nothing to the conversation. There is, however, something delightfully naughty about allowing myself for the first time to consider blogging what I had for lunch. The slow slide into rut-dom over the last year has been depressing emotionally and creatively. Maybe a steady diet of nasty tasting smoothies will inspire me.
It's also possible it will just make me gassy.
Showing posts with label health. Show all posts
Showing posts with label health. Show all posts
Monday, September 24, 2012
Monday, January 02, 2012
Elephantine Musings
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| The Girls Contemplate Our New Home Uploaded by toastfloats |
Now, however, I want to work. Okay, world? I want to work. I work hard. I'm good at what I do. Let me work.
Except not for the last two months while I sorted our immigration paperwork, got DrC all spiffied up and off to work himself, and scrapped nearly 8 months of indescribably icky goo off our bodies and out of the boat.
And not this month while my Mommy is in town.
And apparently not next month while I have a good chunk of my face reassembled.
It turns out that the little bump on my nose which initially appeared like the world's most persistent and slow forming zit is actually not a zit at all. It's a zebra case of a tumor which is going to just keep growing until I either cut it off or I can't see past it and run my car off a cliff. The medical definition of a zebra is a disease or condition that is so uncommon that a doctor only learns of it because medical schools engage in a form institutionalized hazing which in any other context would be declared a felony. Any given zebra only shows up in the average medical practice once or twice in a doctor's entire career, if that. Such cases are shared with colleagues over a slice at lunch or at the annual Christmas party after a few drinks. Professors make presentations about zebras, others make a living doing research on them and publishing the results in esoteric journals.
This zebra tumor has -- as is usual in such cases -- an unpronounceable, unspellable name which I promptly forgot but which DrC rattles off with élan whenever the topic arises. It apparently has been there for years and years… maybe even since childhood! … just waiting till the perfect moment when lack of ready cash, a high deductible insurance plan, and extraordinarily pent up demand to get back to work combine to make this the worst possible moment to erupt into sight. Now that it's growing, however, the thing is on a roll. Depending on my mood, the girls either refer to me as The Two Nosed Witch or Rudolph, the Double-Nosed Reindeer. It just gets bigger from here. Fortunately, there is just about zero chance it means death to Toast unless I am foolish enough to allow it to grow so large as to block my ability to eat.
Unfortunately, getting rid of it is fraught with all sorts of horribleness. It'll be expensive. It'll leave a really nasty scar. And, I am not shitting you, I am going to spend three weeks with an "elephant trunk made out of skin" stuck gobsmack in the middle of my face. Explaining how this works may require a diagram. The idea is the plastics doc cuts a strip of my forehead, backs it with a chunk of belly fat, then without detaching it, twists it over and down and attaches it to my nose where the dermatologist has left a great gaping hole after cutting out the tumor. Then we let the thing sit there for nearly a month while the skin grafts together after which we "trim the tusk off". You're damn right you are going to trim that off.
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| Climbing Out Uploaded by toastfloats |
Tonight, I'm glib about this, able to tell jokes and contemplate the whole thing with some degree of distance and equanimity. I have to be honest, however. After leaving the plastics consult, I just sat down for awhile and cried. I don't want to do this. It's expensive, painful, and scary. I have no real hope I'll look like Nicole Kidman after my surgery is complete. I'll probably look like someone who has been through a far worse experience like a car crash or the collapse of a building in an earthquake. It'll take a long time to heal and might require several additional surgeries before I don't look like someone grafted a piece of my ass on to my face. I had a real zit on the other side of my nose this morning which almost sent me into hysterics. I want to be brave and strong and reasonable, but my inner me appears to just want to scream and jump up and down and bitch about the unfairness of it all. Fairness, of course, has nothing to do with it. Our own troubles touch us more profoundly than the most terrible trials of others, because they are our own. That doesn't make my trouble less to me, the thought does help me with the reasonableness of it all. It's a benign tumor. While I can't see how it could possibly make me stronger, it isn't going to kill me. I am not a great beauty to begin with and this isn't going to make me less so.
Getting down to brass tacks, what I really need is some work to do for the month of February that does not involve seeing people. Reasonable or not, I don't think I can shake hands with a client and keep a straight face when my face isn't.
Wednesday, December 15, 2010
Back in Back
It is possible that we have found someone who knows what is wrong with my back. Those who have followed me through the years no doubt remember that periodically I am stricken by horrible back spasms. These can leave me incapacitated for days, even weeks. Muscle relaxants have little effect. When the pain is extreme and refuses to succumb to quantities of wine and pills which would otherwise stop an elephant, DrC puts me on steroidals until the whole things stops hurting.
Solution 1: Two whole sheets of abdominal/core strengthening exercises prescribed at minimum of three times daily.
Then I fell off the boat in 2008. It's a good story, funny at the time when I thought the long term injury was to my pride. How wrong I was. In landing on the swim ladder, I probably jammed the top end of the thigh bone into the big round disk bit of the pelvis. There are a lot of big words the PT and DrC were throwing around. I just watched her play with her plastic spine and hip model where the joint meets. It made perfect sense. The nerves all run through there. It's not a back problem per se, it's a joint problem. Yeah, sure, there is probably a weakness in one of those lower disks, but the real problem – the problem that isn't healing – is the damage in that leg-pelvis area.
Problem 2: Injury of some sort causing pinched nerves and pain in hip joint.
Solution 2: Stretches to loosen the surrounding muscles and reduce the overall inflammation.
So that was nearly six weeks ago. The first few days of the stretch-strengthen routines were hellish. Things got so much worse. But tonight, for the first time, the entire set of movements and exercises felt good. Sure there was still stretchy hurt and a few of the old style twinges, but as I sit here and type, I do not feel the constant dull pinching pain down lower back, through the butt and along the leg. It's a huge difference and a huge relief. I'm optimist for the first time that this might work. Someday, I might be without these discomforts and feel like I own me again.
I think still would have preferred the pins over all this … eewww... exercise.
Now, I'm going to take some time to natter like an old woman about what's wrong with me. I promise I'll do something more interesting in my next article. You can go if you want.
A few months ago, the way in which I experienced the pain changed. Like a frog being slowly boiled, it took me a very long time to realize that I was becoming progressively less mobile. Small spasms in the back were gradually replaced by soreness first in the buttocks on the right side, then a sciatica-like pain radiating down the outside of the right thigh, then a gradual spreading of aches and pains to the entire back, neck, shoulders and down both legs. By the time DrC got back from a trip to the States to noodle with other doctors, I was grim, upset, and on the edge of tears almost constantly.
Now let me just say right up front that marrying a doctor is really probably the unhealthiest thing I could have ever done. Tailors' children have no clothes. Cobblers' children have no shoes. Contractors' families live with torn apart kitchens, and doctors' wives get not the slightest bit of sympathy ever. For the most part, we're also not allowed to succumb in the throws of chronic pain to trips to palliative and reassuring folks like acupuncturists, homeopaths, or chiropractors. It's all so science-y with DrC. Never mind a really great experience I had back in my college days with an acupuncturist in Berkeley, now everything has to be done Right.
Life is a compromise. Despite my strong desire to have pins, crystals, voodoo chants and chicken blood, or any other damn thing that would make the pain stop, DrC insisted that we go about this rationally. We tried an MRI with no enlightenment. A muscular problem in DrC's mind implied the need for a muscular expert. Since we have no medical insurance to speak of, we decided to start with the optometrists of the muscular-skeletal world: physio-therapy.
So off I trooped to Pukekohe Physio, doctor husband in tow to see if we could figure out why I couldn't actually troop any more. Gimpy me limped in. Again, it would lovely to and say I walked out a changed woman. Perhaps that actually would have happened if DrC had let me go to the medium on the same block. But no. Instead, I limped back out with a sheet full of exercises and a really promising explanation of what might have happened to get me to the state I am in.
As usual, it's all Jaime's fault.
No seriously. It starts with the first baby.... and the third. We'll let Aeron share the blame. I was supremely lazy after having children, and never actually took my body back from the butchers that sliced me in half. The muscles along my abdomen can't be called muscles any longer. In fact, I'm not sure what you would call this nerveless, flaccid, floppy goo. My big TIP to preggers and post-preggers women is to do ab-work non-stop for years after you make babies. If I'd done that, I'd probably be in a lot better state with respect to my back. Basically, no matter how careful I am to bend the knees and pick things up with my core, I'm actually always always always just using my back muscles.
Problem 1: No abdominal muscles puts huge strain on the back.
A few months ago, the way in which I experienced the pain changed. Like a frog being slowly boiled, it took me a very long time to realize that I was becoming progressively less mobile. Small spasms in the back were gradually replaced by soreness first in the buttocks on the right side, then a sciatica-like pain radiating down the outside of the right thigh, then a gradual spreading of aches and pains to the entire back, neck, shoulders and down both legs. By the time DrC got back from a trip to the States to noodle with other doctors, I was grim, upset, and on the edge of tears almost constantly.
Now let me just say right up front that marrying a doctor is really probably the unhealthiest thing I could have ever done. Tailors' children have no clothes. Cobblers' children have no shoes. Contractors' families live with torn apart kitchens, and doctors' wives get not the slightest bit of sympathy ever. For the most part, we're also not allowed to succumb in the throws of chronic pain to trips to palliative and reassuring folks like acupuncturists, homeopaths, or chiropractors. It's all so science-y with DrC. Never mind a really great experience I had back in my college days with an acupuncturist in Berkeley, now everything has to be done Right.
Life is a compromise. Despite my strong desire to have pins, crystals, voodoo chants and chicken blood, or any other damn thing that would make the pain stop, DrC insisted that we go about this rationally. We tried an MRI with no enlightenment. A muscular problem in DrC's mind implied the need for a muscular expert. Since we have no medical insurance to speak of, we decided to start with the optometrists of the muscular-skeletal world: physio-therapy.
So off I trooped to Pukekohe Physio, doctor husband in tow to see if we could figure out why I couldn't actually troop any more. Gimpy me limped in. Again, it would lovely to
As usual, it's all Jaime's fault.
No seriously. It starts with the first baby.... and the third. We'll let Aeron share the blame. I was supremely lazy after having children, and never actually took my body back from the butchers that sliced me in half. The muscles along my abdomen can't be called muscles any longer. In fact, I'm not sure what you would call this nerveless, flaccid, floppy goo. My big TIP to preggers and post-preggers women is to do ab-work non-stop for years after you make babies. If I'd done that, I'd probably be in a lot better state with respect to my back. Basically, no matter how careful I am to bend the knees and pick things up with my core, I'm actually always always always just using my back muscles.
Problem 1: No abdominal muscles puts huge strain on the back.
Solution 1: Two whole sheets of abdominal/core strengthening exercises prescribed at minimum of three times daily.
Then I fell off the boat in 2008. It's a good story, funny at the time when I thought the long term injury was to my pride. How wrong I was. In landing on the swim ladder, I probably jammed the top end of the thigh bone into the big round disk bit of the pelvis. There are a lot of big words the PT and DrC were throwing around. I just watched her play with her plastic spine and hip model where the joint meets. It made perfect sense. The nerves all run through there. It's not a back problem per se, it's a joint problem. Yeah, sure, there is probably a weakness in one of those lower disks, but the real problem – the problem that isn't healing – is the damage in that leg-pelvis area.
Problem 2: Injury of some sort causing pinched nerves and pain in hip joint.
Solution 2: Stretches to loosen the surrounding muscles and reduce the overall inflammation.
So that was nearly six weeks ago. The first few days of the stretch-strengthen routines were hellish. Things got so much worse. But tonight, for the first time, the entire set of movements and exercises felt good. Sure there was still stretchy hurt and a few of the old style twinges, but as I sit here and type, I do not feel the constant dull pinching pain down lower back, through the butt and along the leg. It's a huge difference and a huge relief. I'm optimist for the first time that this might work. Someday, I might be without these discomforts and feel like I own me again.
I think still would have preferred the pins over all this … eewww... exercise.
Friday, October 22, 2010
Packing It On
As much as I'd rather talk about provisioning and packing the boat, first we must detour into the wonder which is my weight. For those not interested in female whinging about modern standards of beauty and the horrors of Kiwi pies, stop here. I'll see you next week.
For those still with me, history is in order.
First, I got fat. Babies do that to a woman unless she has either made a pact with the devil, is seriously self-obsessed bordering on anorexic, or both. Real women get fat. The "baby will eat it off you" breastfeeding myth is delusional. What happens is that if you are a normal, living, breathing human being, this phrase simply justifies the wholesale consumption of peanut butter laden Ritz crackers, malted chocolate milk shakes, and weekly trips to the nearest cheesesteak vendor.
Then, I got skinny. Well, not precisely skinny, but I did manage to shed 20 pounds in 20 months while cruising. I have a lot of theories about this phenomena, some of which involve power boat wakes and the alignment of stars. I calculate that if I stayed on the boat another decade or so I would have eventually physiologically regressed to my salad days when I was sexy, skinny, and slutty. (Honesty compels me to admit that I was not particularly sexy and so slutty was challenging at best.) But my heart was in the right place! and so was my butt, both boobs and the roll in the middle. In fact, there was no roll in the middle going by the title waist or any less dignified sobriquet such as jelly roll, love handle, tummy, or baby bump.
Screw the baby bump.
Then, I moved to New Zealand and got fat. God damn Kiwis make miraculous bread. They fry absolutely everything that isn't nailed down and a few things that are. They drink like fishes, and, similar to hobbits, they indulge in both a morning AND afternoon tea as well as elevenses and the midnight trip to the dairy for crisps and lollies. If it isn't fried, they wrap it in incredibly tasty puffed pastry and bake it. This country welcomes chefs from around the globe who dish up dim sum and curries, pad thai, sushi, crepes, bratwurst, tapas, and pho. The only two types of cuisine you can not find in Auckland are Italian and Mexican. For some reason, Italian and Mexican food is all crap... mostly because the Kiwis can not grow a decent tomato and so simply eliminate them from the menu. Need I remind you that tomato is one of the trifecta (tomato/onion/garlic) at the root of all good Italian and Mexican cooking?
They fry hot dogs. What the hell? When sausages are not deep fried, they are split open and liberally frosted with cheesy mashed potatoes. The entire country is a coronary waiting to happen. It is a sad fact that New Zealanders are as fat as Americans and Mexicans. The islanders living here are in the worst state as it's not clear their metabolism was ever designed for a carbohydrate rich environment. I have met wonderfully friendly people who are literally square. I've never seen anything quite like it, people as wide as they are tall.
Cruisers aren't meant to return to land. In six months I've gained 12 pounds. In case you are doing the math, that's two steps forward for one step back. Such progress! Never mind cleaning out the lockers and reducing the rummage on the boat; I'll drop Don Quixote down an inch on her water line all by myself. On the down side, I won't be able to wedge myself into my wet suit. On the up side, we can use me as a fender.
Of course, the solution to this problem is a diet, because that always works, right? Right!? A diet. Ugh. I got into this place, because walking down the street in Pukekohe is like navigating a mine field laced with glazed, chocolate covered fat clusters sprinkled with deep-fried, marinated lamb crumbles. The smell of baking bread, frying meat, seasoned this and spicy that is impossible. Those clever bastards pipe the kitchen exhaust out to the sidewalk, lace it with some ABBA or Billy Joel, and just wait for nature to take over.
I filled my backpack full of carrots and celery last week. This didn't do a bit of good. The bottom of the bag looked like a compost heap by the end of the week. I am certain I gained two pounds in protest of the indignity of carrying it. The solution may be to stop carrying my wallet. If I don't have any money, I can't buy anything baked, fried, glazed or marinated.
But really, the solution is to get back on the boat and sail as far from the bakehouses of New Zealand as I can remove myself.
For those still with me, history is in order.
First, I got fat. Babies do that to a woman unless she has either made a pact with the devil, is seriously self-obsessed bordering on anorexic, or both. Real women get fat. The "baby will eat it off you" breastfeeding myth is delusional. What happens is that if you are a normal, living, breathing human being, this phrase simply justifies the wholesale consumption of peanut butter laden Ritz crackers, malted chocolate milk shakes, and weekly trips to the nearest cheesesteak vendor.
Then, I got skinny. Well, not precisely skinny, but I did manage to shed 20 pounds in 20 months while cruising. I have a lot of theories about this phenomena, some of which involve power boat wakes and the alignment of stars. I calculate that if I stayed on the boat another decade or so I would have eventually physiologically regressed to my salad days when I was sexy, skinny, and slutty. (Honesty compels me to admit that I was not particularly sexy and so slutty was challenging at best.) But my heart was in the right place! and so was my butt, both boobs and the roll in the middle. In fact, there was no roll in the middle going by the title waist or any less dignified sobriquet such as jelly roll, love handle, tummy, or baby bump.
Screw the baby bump.
Then, I moved to New Zealand and got fat. God damn Kiwis make miraculous bread. They fry absolutely everything that isn't nailed down and a few things that are. They drink like fishes, and, similar to hobbits, they indulge in both a morning AND afternoon tea as well as elevenses and the midnight trip to the dairy for crisps and lollies. If it isn't fried, they wrap it in incredibly tasty puffed pastry and bake it. This country welcomes chefs from around the globe who dish up dim sum and curries, pad thai, sushi, crepes, bratwurst, tapas, and pho. The only two types of cuisine you can not find in Auckland are Italian and Mexican. For some reason, Italian and Mexican food is all crap... mostly because the Kiwis can not grow a decent tomato and so simply eliminate them from the menu. Need I remind you that tomato is one of the trifecta (tomato/onion/garlic) at the root of all good Italian and Mexican cooking?
They fry hot dogs. What the hell? When sausages are not deep fried, they are split open and liberally frosted with cheesy mashed potatoes. The entire country is a coronary waiting to happen. It is a sad fact that New Zealanders are as fat as Americans and Mexicans. The islanders living here are in the worst state as it's not clear their metabolism was ever designed for a carbohydrate rich environment. I have met wonderfully friendly people who are literally square. I've never seen anything quite like it, people as wide as they are tall.
Cruisers aren't meant to return to land. In six months I've gained 12 pounds. In case you are doing the math, that's two steps forward for one step back. Such progress! Never mind cleaning out the lockers and reducing the rummage on the boat; I'll drop Don Quixote down an inch on her water line all by myself. On the down side, I won't be able to wedge myself into my wet suit. On the up side, we can use me as a fender.
Of course, the solution to this problem is a diet, because that always works, right? Right!? A diet. Ugh. I got into this place, because walking down the street in Pukekohe is like navigating a mine field laced with glazed, chocolate covered fat clusters sprinkled with deep-fried, marinated lamb crumbles. The smell of baking bread, frying meat, seasoned this and spicy that is impossible. Those clever bastards pipe the kitchen exhaust out to the sidewalk, lace it with some ABBA or Billy Joel, and just wait for nature to take over.
I filled my backpack full of carrots and celery last week. This didn't do a bit of good. The bottom of the bag looked like a compost heap by the end of the week. I am certain I gained two pounds in protest of the indignity of carrying it. The solution may be to stop carrying my wallet. If I don't have any money, I can't buy anything baked, fried, glazed or marinated.
But really, the solution is to get back on the boat and sail as far from the bakehouses of New Zealand as I can remove myself.
Monday, October 18, 2010
Right Between the Eyes
Contrary to popular belief, cruising is hard work. It is not, however, the same kind of hard work as living on land. Land is tedious, frankly, and we are all heartily sick of it. No number of beautiful train rides through stunningly green spring pasture and meadow can make up for the fact that this train is taking me to a grey and blue cubicle on the tenth floor of a downtown office building. I think the worst part of working in cubby-land again is the lighting. Flourescent lighting is a complete menace. To those of us who are sensitive to the flickering, it's like being immersed in a spinning, dizzying white walled hell. As I stare at the monitor trying to make sense of the words in front of me, I recognize the incipient signs of an ocular migraine.
Unless you have had the dubious pleasure of experiencing an ocular migraine, it's hard to overstate how much it hurts. The first sign of the headache is a glittering, glazing effect. It's like the world is coming in to your eyes in chunks that your brain decides to randomly rearrange and send into constant motion. It's nauseating and disturbing, but this isn't the bad part. The next phase is when the motion becomes so extreme that you literally can not see what you are doing through the ever-shifting cascade of random images. Yet still we are not done. Now the world begins in one corner of your eye to be overlaid with sharply delianiated chevrons and stripes. These too are in motion, zig zagging across the field of view in ever growing, mesmerizing patterns.
Now... NOW... the headache hits. Up to this point, it's merely been a parade of increasingly nauseating, unpleasant visual auras and disturbances -- distracting and delibitating but not particularly painful. When the pain does make it's presence known, however, it is like someone is putting your head in a 360 degree vice and tightening rapidly. The pain is punishing, the neck and upper back clench in sympathy, and the body just shuts down.
I have found two cures for migraine -- neither of which are practical in a downtown office building. The first involves an incredibly hot bath or shower at the first onset of symptoms. DrC tells me this dilates the blood vessels in the neck and brain, the increased blood flow stemming the progress of the headache. I stand in the shower with the water just short of scalding and let it flow from the top of my head down the back and over my shoulders until my skin turns bright red and I feel like collapsing in an overheated puddle. Then I take a handful of iburpofin and lie down for awhile until my skin is no longer hot to the touch. This works. What also works is to simply skip the shower, take the ibuprofin, cover the eyes so absolutely no light gets in, and sleep until the episode is over.
I am very fortunate. My migraines generally only last for two or three hours. They leave me tired, cranky and bitchy but essentially unscathed. Online, you can read horror stories of migraines lasting days, weeks, even chronic. No joke, but if that were me I'd seriously be talking to the hemlock crowd. It's very hard to imagine the drain of constant, intense chronic pain. At minimum and regardless of the choices I would make in that situation, I empathize with the limits of their choices.
Here in the grey soul-less corporate world there is no escaping the worst of this headache. I can't lie down in a dark place, I can't take a hot shower, I can't escape the flourescent lights which are a known trigger. The commute home is nearly two hours -- by which time I will have endured both the peak and the valley of this particular episode. There's nothing to do but to get a large cup of water, turn on some Vangelis, and pretend to work. I'll make it up to them when I get home. For now, I'm just going to dream of a sunny beach on Hiva Oa.
Unless you have had the dubious pleasure of experiencing an ocular migraine, it's hard to overstate how much it hurts. The first sign of the headache is a glittering, glazing effect. It's like the world is coming in to your eyes in chunks that your brain decides to randomly rearrange and send into constant motion. It's nauseating and disturbing, but this isn't the bad part. The next phase is when the motion becomes so extreme that you literally can not see what you are doing through the ever-shifting cascade of random images. Yet still we are not done. Now the world begins in one corner of your eye to be overlaid with sharply delianiated chevrons and stripes. These too are in motion, zig zagging across the field of view in ever growing, mesmerizing patterns.
Now... NOW... the headache hits. Up to this point, it's merely been a parade of increasingly nauseating, unpleasant visual auras and disturbances -- distracting and delibitating but not particularly painful. When the pain does make it's presence known, however, it is like someone is putting your head in a 360 degree vice and tightening rapidly. The pain is punishing, the neck and upper back clench in sympathy, and the body just shuts down.
I have found two cures for migraine -- neither of which are practical in a downtown office building. The first involves an incredibly hot bath or shower at the first onset of symptoms. DrC tells me this dilates the blood vessels in the neck and brain, the increased blood flow stemming the progress of the headache. I stand in the shower with the water just short of scalding and let it flow from the top of my head down the back and over my shoulders until my skin turns bright red and I feel like collapsing in an overheated puddle. Then I take a handful of iburpofin and lie down for awhile until my skin is no longer hot to the touch. This works. What also works is to simply skip the shower, take the ibuprofin, cover the eyes so absolutely no light gets in, and sleep until the episode is over.
I am very fortunate. My migraines generally only last for two or three hours. They leave me tired, cranky and bitchy but essentially unscathed. Online, you can read horror stories of migraines lasting days, weeks, even chronic. No joke, but if that were me I'd seriously be talking to the hemlock crowd. It's very hard to imagine the drain of constant, intense chronic pain. At minimum and regardless of the choices I would make in that situation, I empathize with the limits of their choices.
Here in the grey soul-less corporate world there is no escaping the worst of this headache. I can't lie down in a dark place, I can't take a hot shower, I can't escape the flourescent lights which are a known trigger. The commute home is nearly two hours -- by which time I will have endured both the peak and the valley of this particular episode. There's nothing to do but to get a large cup of water, turn on some Vangelis, and pretend to work. I'll make it up to them when I get home. For now, I'm just going to dream of a sunny beach on Hiva Oa.
Saturday, August 08, 2009
What I Did At School Today
[Editor's Note: Written while we were still in Rosalia.]
I didn't know that the cold could make you sleepy. Well, okay... we've all read the books or seen the movies where extreme cold makes people fall asleep. But this isn't extreme. I'm in the single air conditioned room accessible to the crew of Don Quixote at the Singlar Marina in Santa Rosalia. It's only 22C in here which is actually rather warm when you get right to it.
The girls and I worked hard all morning cleaning and purging and organizing, then moved to the Cool Room for a few hours of school. Whereupon, the three of us promptly fell asleep.
Not literally. We keep nudging one another to preserve a semblance of awareness. But there is something about finally escaping the unrelenting heat and humidity for even a few minutes that shuts the body down. Cold. We spent 20 consecutive hours growing weaker, more dehydrated, and more tired, then when we moved into this ice box, our bodies seem to have taken it as permission to finally relax and fall asleep.
I want the kids to complete some schoolwork. I want to correct that schoolwork. I want to write you a nice article about everything we are doing. I have ambitions to get the pictures on the hard drive organized, start learning how to record podcasts, update the map, pull down some Geocache sites.
*yawn* Um... update iGTD. Uh... *blink* write a letter to DrC and Jaime... … um... zzz .zzzzzzzz z
I didn't know that the cold could make you sleepy. Well, okay... we've all read the books or seen the movies where extreme cold makes people fall asleep. But this isn't extreme. I'm in the single air conditioned room accessible to the crew of Don Quixote at the Singlar Marina in Santa Rosalia. It's only 22C in here which is actually rather warm when you get right to it.
The girls and I worked hard all morning cleaning and purging and organizing, then moved to the Cool Room for a few hours of school. Whereupon, the three of us promptly fell asleep.
Not literally. We keep nudging one another to preserve a semblance of awareness. But there is something about finally escaping the unrelenting heat and humidity for even a few minutes that shuts the body down. Cold. We spent 20 consecutive hours growing weaker, more dehydrated, and more tired, then when we moved into this ice box, our bodies seem to have taken it as permission to finally relax and fall asleep.
I want the kids to complete some schoolwork. I want to correct that schoolwork. I want to write you a nice article about everything we are doing. I have ambitions to get the pictures on the hard drive organized, start learning how to record podcasts, update the map, pull down some Geocache sites.
*yawn* Um... update iGTD. Uh... *blink* write a letter to DrC and Jaime... … um... zzz .zzzzzzzz z
Sunday, July 05, 2009
Dipped In Snot
I stand posed in the salon, feet braced wide, arms outstretched for balance. Waiting.
The girls are delighted. With an explosion I sneeze, rocking back on my heels. Mera shouts, “One!”
This is not good. This is so not good. I practically hyperventilate as the next one builds. The girls urge me on, “Come on Mom... you can do it!”
Wait for it. Wait for it.... “Aaachooooo!!” followed immediately by a chorus of, “Two!”
Oddly, three, four and five come blasting out in quick staccato succession. “Choo choo choo” like a train getting going, small and sharp. “Three! Four!! Five!!!” Aeron calls, peeling with laughter and glee.
But then it stops. It's like that last bit of co co ca choo did the trick and abruptly my nose stops itching, my eyes stop watering, and I can breathe. I take a deep breath and smile. My happiness is Aeron's grief, however. Five is not impressive. It doesn't even come close to the record.
The record was achieved the day before in a half hour of unmitigated misery. Aeron and Mera are still arguing whether or not it was one long procession of 22 sneezes or actually – as Mera argues – three separate batches. The problem is one of definition. How long is Mommy allowed to breathe and recover between sneezes for the sneeze to count as part of a series? Like skipping rocks, my sneezes are now a children's game to delight and amuse. Like any children's game, the game is not sufficiently amusing unless it also generates endless bickering over the rules.
Dante truly lacked sufficient imagination, because surely this must be another heretofore undescribed circle of hell. My head is stuffy, nose and eyes running, face itchy, eyes red. And at the same time, it is 88 degrees this morning, 72% humidity, and a fog bank is rolling in through the harbor. I'd like to say it's beautiful, but my sweat is sweating and I feel like I've been dipped in snot.
DrC diagnosed the malady as Hay Fever. Of course, there is no hay for at least 750 miles. Besides, I'm not allergic to hay. I'm allergic to sheep, oak trees and grass. There are no sheep, oak trees or grass within 750 miles either. So it's not fair. I stomp my feet twice and tell you it is not fair. Make it stop. Make it stop yesterday.
The girls watch me closely. Their internal clock is apparently still ticking. I'm not out of The Zone in which another sneeze would accrue to the prior series. I glare across the salon at my spawn, not in a particularly accommodating mode. They ate all the yogurt and granola leaving me nothing but corn flakes and a limp banana for breakfast. This eagerness to see me suffer is simply adding insult to injury. To hell with my kids.
And as if the thought blew in on a karmic wind, I'm suddenly gripped by fate, muscles abruptly tense, a shudder blasting through my body, “AAAAAchoooooy!”
The girls are delighted. With an explosion I sneeze, rocking back on my heels. Mera shouts, “One!”
This is not good. This is so not good. I practically hyperventilate as the next one builds. The girls urge me on, “Come on Mom... you can do it!”
Wait for it. Wait for it.... “Aaachooooo!!” followed immediately by a chorus of, “Two!”
Oddly, three, four and five come blasting out in quick staccato succession. “Choo choo choo” like a train getting going, small and sharp. “Three! Four!! Five!!!” Aeron calls, peeling with laughter and glee.
But then it stops. It's like that last bit of co co ca choo did the trick and abruptly my nose stops itching, my eyes stop watering, and I can breathe. I take a deep breath and smile. My happiness is Aeron's grief, however. Five is not impressive. It doesn't even come close to the record.
The record was achieved the day before in a half hour of unmitigated misery. Aeron and Mera are still arguing whether or not it was one long procession of 22 sneezes or actually – as Mera argues – three separate batches. The problem is one of definition. How long is Mommy allowed to breathe and recover between sneezes for the sneeze to count as part of a series? Like skipping rocks, my sneezes are now a children's game to delight and amuse. Like any children's game, the game is not sufficiently amusing unless it also generates endless bickering over the rules.
Dante truly lacked sufficient imagination, because surely this must be another heretofore undescribed circle of hell. My head is stuffy, nose and eyes running, face itchy, eyes red. And at the same time, it is 88 degrees this morning, 72% humidity, and a fog bank is rolling in through the harbor. I'd like to say it's beautiful, but my sweat is sweating and I feel like I've been dipped in snot.
DrC diagnosed the malady as Hay Fever. Of course, there is no hay for at least 750 miles. Besides, I'm not allergic to hay. I'm allergic to sheep, oak trees and grass. There are no sheep, oak trees or grass within 750 miles either. So it's not fair. I stomp my feet twice and tell you it is not fair. Make it stop. Make it stop yesterday.
The girls watch me closely. Their internal clock is apparently still ticking. I'm not out of The Zone in which another sneeze would accrue to the prior series. I glare across the salon at my spawn, not in a particularly accommodating mode. They ate all the yogurt and granola leaving me nothing but corn flakes and a limp banana for breakfast. This eagerness to see me suffer is simply adding insult to injury. To hell with my kids.
And as if the thought blew in on a karmic wind, I'm suddenly gripped by fate, muscles abruptly tense, a shudder blasting through my body, “AAAAAchoooooy!”
Tuesday, February 10, 2009
Still Here!
I haven't completely broken down and fallen off, though it sometimes feels like it. Thank you to everyone who has sent comments, emails and support. However, all those well wishes are falling on deaf and dumb muscles, bones and nerves which are NOT cooperating. Sorry 'bout that.
DrC arrived back on the boat on February 4 to find us almost as dirty, unprovisioned, and ill equipped to continue as when he had left. All the work we'd done in the first two weeks dissolved during the last few days when I couldn't move. The girls were extremely happy to see their father. I couldn't actually see him through the haze of muscle relaxants.
A few days ago, DrC completely gave up on the idea of my back healing without stronger intervention and stuck me on steroids. These are not very good for you but they do a damn fine job on fixing your back. Things started looking up, I started moving around, and I actually was able to complete a session of mild, modified pilates.
Then the head cold hit. As head colds go, this one is pretty tame. Slight post nasal drip, itchy eyes, slight headache. Mera blew through it in three days, Aeron just got started. The problem is the itchy nose makes me sneeze. And every time I sneeze, my back seizes up. I'll feel great when I wake up from a nap or in the morning, I'll work through the first three or four sneezes with bracing and heavy breathing, and then >pop< a sneeze blasts through the system and throws us back to square one on the back.
Then there are my clients. They apparently finally remembered that I was planning on hanging around Zihua for a few weeks and promised to work. One of them just released a code base to me that I've been waiting for since mid-September. Happy day, I love the work, but between the muscle relaxants and now the anti-histamines, I'm about as functional as a frat boy on the third day of pledge week. As Aeron so brightly put it, "Every time we give Mom a pill, we end up stuck in Zihua another day."
So here we sit in paradise with the barnacles growing a foot deep on the hulls. Everyone else is starting to drift north or prepare for the puddle jump. Our departure is gated on my retaining sufficient brain cells for 40 hours in a row to finish my contract. Then we'll start heading north ourselves... hopefully before the weather starts to heat up or our anchor becomes a permanent addition to the floor of Zihua Bay.
DrC arrived back on the boat on February 4 to find us almost as dirty, unprovisioned, and ill equipped to continue as when he had left. All the work we'd done in the first two weeks dissolved during the last few days when I couldn't move. The girls were extremely happy to see their father. I couldn't actually see him through the haze of muscle relaxants.
A few days ago, DrC completely gave up on the idea of my back healing without stronger intervention and stuck me on steroids. These are not very good for you but they do a damn fine job on fixing your back. Things started looking up, I started moving around, and I actually was able to complete a session of mild, modified pilates.
Then the head cold hit. As head colds go, this one is pretty tame. Slight post nasal drip, itchy eyes, slight headache. Mera blew through it in three days, Aeron just got started. The problem is the itchy nose makes me sneeze. And every time I sneeze, my back seizes up. I'll feel great when I wake up from a nap or in the morning, I'll work through the first three or four sneezes with bracing and heavy breathing, and then >pop< a sneeze blasts through the system and throws us back to square one on the back.
Then there are my clients. They apparently finally remembered that I was planning on hanging around Zihua for a few weeks and promised to work. One of them just released a code base to me that I've been waiting for since mid-September. Happy day, I love the work, but between the muscle relaxants and now the anti-histamines, I'm about as functional as a frat boy on the third day of pledge week. As Aeron so brightly put it, "Every time we give Mom a pill, we end up stuck in Zihua another day."
So here we sit in paradise with the barnacles growing a foot deep on the hulls. Everyone else is starting to drift north or prepare for the puddle jump. Our departure is gated on my retaining sufficient brain cells for 40 hours in a row to finish my contract. Then we'll start heading north ourselves... hopefully before the weather starts to heat up or our anchor becomes a permanent addition to the floor of Zihua Bay.
Monday, February 02, 2009
Incapacitated in Paradise
My worst nightmare what-if scenarios regarding cruising on a sailboat with three children, a cat and the Apocalyptic Horsemen was never a big storm, sinking, or sharks. Crocodiles on the dock eating my cat was a concern, but it didn't really turn me off. I scoffed at the notion of pirates, and I'm afraid I somewhat openly sneer at those afraid to drink the water or eat the food. Oddly, my worst nightmare involved sending DrC to Seattle and then having my back go out.
Ain't life funny?
Here we are in paradise, the girls are healthy and happy, the boat is clean for the first time in months, we're well stocked on food and water, and we've made great friends in Zihuatanejo. We're working madly on SailFest and the girls are rotating turns at the morning cruisers net. We spend our days on school and chores, errands, palapa sits, swimming, kayaking, and trips to the local bars and restaurants. The weather is absolutely perfect.
I, however, can't move.
In one of my very first posts -- over two years ago now -- I describe a moment during which I lose all dignity and slide like a greased pig down the icy transom into the frigid waters of the Puget Sound. The article was amusing, the situation fraught with danger and lessons for myself, my children and my readers. What I failed to mention was that during the process, I badly injured my back. I think it's like an ankle or knee injury. A small bit of key tissue in the lower spinal cord ripped away from the bone. With time and a great deal of drugs, it gradually heals and stops hurting and I can function normally. However, the injured area is never the same. And like a turned ankle, you can just walk along and suddenly you're back to square one with the ankle. For years.
This is my back. I have been fine for months. Oh yeah, I bitch about the bed. I think our next attempt to fix the bed, by the way, is to buy a mattress. There's got to be something useful about our catamaran using standard queen size beds for the aft cabins. No, this isn't a problem with the bed. Somewhere, somehow I managed to "turn the ankle" of my lower back during the past week. Now I'm immobilized.
The pain is phenomenal in ways that only someone experienced with back pain can relate to. You're either a back pain virgin, or you've popped your back pain cherry and know precisely what I'm talking about. The worst part of a back injury, in my opinion, is that your body attempts to prevent the spasms by clenching all the muscles around the injured area. So instead of having a nice, localized bit of pain, you end up hurting from the mid back all the way down to your knees.
I'm on a really spectacular pharmacopoeia of drugs. DrC knew this would happen and stocked up. Between the muscle relaxers and the ibuprofen, I'm barely present. I've tried walking and swimming, stretching and pilates, and really the only thing that is helping is more drugs. To that end, the "dinghy boy" here in Zihua -- Nathaniel is 56 and one of the nicest men you'll meet -- turned me on to a topical analgesic which is doing wonders. You can literally buy anything over the counter in Mexico. For all I know this stuff is made of ground turtle flippers and cocaine. It works pretty well so I'm not going to pull out the Spanish-English dictionary.
There is no help but to simply ride it out. The girls are stepping up to the plate, feeding themselves, keeping the boat straightened, not falling overboard and drowning like rats. However, I'm not getting anything substantive done. My Zihua list is at a standstill; My clients must think I've fallen off the planet. In fact, the latest dose of muscle relaxer is taking effect, and I'm about to collapse into bed again.
DrC comes home in three days. I think I might rent a room when he gets here. Something just for me with endless hot showers, an air conditioner, and a nice firm bed. Maybe room service. Thanks to the kindness of Beach Access, Sky, and Precious Metal, we'll be okay till the big guy arrives. I think.
Nothing like facing down your worst nightmore.
Ain't life funny?
Here we are in paradise, the girls are healthy and happy, the boat is clean for the first time in months, we're well stocked on food and water, and we've made great friends in Zihuatanejo. We're working madly on SailFest and the girls are rotating turns at the morning cruisers net. We spend our days on school and chores, errands, palapa sits, swimming, kayaking, and trips to the local bars and restaurants. The weather is absolutely perfect.
I, however, can't move.
In one of my very first posts -- over two years ago now -- I describe a moment during which I lose all dignity and slide like a greased pig down the icy transom into the frigid waters of the Puget Sound. The article was amusing, the situation fraught with danger and lessons for myself, my children and my readers. What I failed to mention was that during the process, I badly injured my back. I think it's like an ankle or knee injury. A small bit of key tissue in the lower spinal cord ripped away from the bone. With time and a great deal of drugs, it gradually heals and stops hurting and I can function normally. However, the injured area is never the same. And like a turned ankle, you can just walk along and suddenly you're back to square one with the ankle. For years.
This is my back. I have been fine for months. Oh yeah, I bitch about the bed. I think our next attempt to fix the bed, by the way, is to buy a mattress. There's got to be something useful about our catamaran using standard queen size beds for the aft cabins. No, this isn't a problem with the bed. Somewhere, somehow I managed to "turn the ankle" of my lower back during the past week. Now I'm immobilized.
The pain is phenomenal in ways that only someone experienced with back pain can relate to. You're either a back pain virgin, or you've popped your back pain cherry and know precisely what I'm talking about. The worst part of a back injury, in my opinion, is that your body attempts to prevent the spasms by clenching all the muscles around the injured area. So instead of having a nice, localized bit of pain, you end up hurting from the mid back all the way down to your knees.
I'm on a really spectacular pharmacopoeia of drugs. DrC knew this would happen and stocked up. Between the muscle relaxers and the ibuprofen, I'm barely present. I've tried walking and swimming, stretching and pilates, and really the only thing that is helping is more drugs. To that end, the "dinghy boy" here in Zihua -- Nathaniel is 56 and one of the nicest men you'll meet -- turned me on to a topical analgesic which is doing wonders. You can literally buy anything over the counter in Mexico. For all I know this stuff is made of ground turtle flippers and cocaine. It works pretty well so I'm not going to pull out the Spanish-English dictionary.
There is no help but to simply ride it out. The girls are stepping up to the plate, feeding themselves, keeping the boat straightened, not falling overboard and drowning like rats. However, I'm not getting anything substantive done. My Zihua list is at a standstill; My clients must think I've fallen off the planet. In fact, the latest dose of muscle relaxer is taking effect, and I'm about to collapse into bed again.
DrC comes home in three days. I think I might rent a room when he gets here. Something just for me with endless hot showers, an air conditioner, and a nice firm bed. Maybe room service. Thanks to the kindness of Beach Access, Sky, and Precious Metal, we'll be okay till the big guy arrives. I think.
Nothing like facing down your worst nightmore.
Thursday, September 25, 2008
TechTip - Mal de Mer
Readers asked me to provide more detail about our Counter Sea Sickness Offensive, also known as Operation Ocean Ack. First off... I am not a doctor. I do not play a doctor on T.V. I do not even own a T.V. Do not take anything I say as medical advice. More importantly, do not even think about suing me if you decide to try any of these medications. This is just what is working on s/v Don Quixote.Short Answer - We use a combination of first level homeopathic remedies and pretty powerful anti-nausea drugs to beat back mal de mer.
Long Story - Sea sickness hits everyone eventually. As with so many salty issues of nautical accomplishment, there are those who have done it, those to whom it will happen soon, and those who lie. This truism holds for everything from running aground to spending 24 hours vomiting in the head. Some day, you will meet a sea condition that will take you down. It doesn’t have to be big sea, choppy sea, or windy sea. It just has to be the sea with your name on it.
Let's start with the most important bit about sea sickness. Once you get sick, it is damn near impossible to stop throwing up. So with every fiber of your being, you need to prevent yourself from getting sick in the first place. And of course, it really appears that all the best 'remedies' for sea sickness start with the recommendation, "Take the day before you go to sea." Gee thanks. So in addition to everything else you must contend with prior to departure, you need to make sure you drug the entire crew.
Because there is an escalating scale to how much you need to intervene to address sea sickness, it is challenging to figure out where you should start your intervention. We like to begin with a highly advanced, pharmaceutical approach and then gently taper back until the boat is running on ginger snaps and Top Ramen. With experience, you’ll know at what point on the escalation path you need select with each crew member.
Open Air Cures - The simplest cure for queasiness is visibility and fresh air. Stop what you’re doing, look up, look around, go out into the cockpit. Take the helm. Put on some really bouncy music that makes you want to dance. Dance on the deck while you stare around. Alternatively, just go to sleep.
Food - Some foods that settled the tummy are ginger snaps, ginger ale, saltines, and graham crackers. My girls also do well pretzels. Think bland, dry, and gentle. Top Ramen and macaroni and cheese are good for hot foods. Stick to non-caffeinated, low sugar, and low acid beverages.
Berkeley Ideas - There are many, many natural and homeopathic methods to stave off sea sickness. I have had a great deal of success with acupressure bands. There are those that swear by the press-on acupressure dots. Papaya enzyme is good as an antacid. You might also try other homeopathic or natureopathic supplements. I haven’t tried any other than papaya so I can’t speak to their efficacy.
Meclizine HCl - DrGeorge recommends an over the counter anti-emetic called meclizine. Look it up. It's good stuff. It doesn't make you drowsy, which is key. You can take 25 mg twice a day starting the day before, and it does a really good job of keeping the beast at bay. DrC and I took it throughout our passage, and neither of us experienced a moment of sea induced queasiness. I did have that one hour of wanting to toss my cookies in sheer unadulterated terror, but I don't think that counts.
More Meds - Crew that have never been sick are recalcitrant and will not take their meclizine in advance. You'd think the stuff was nasty like that grape antibiotic we feed our kids. It's just a small blue pill, for gods sake. But crew will balk and then proceed to get violently ill. At which point you have to go all macho captain on them and law down the medical law. People who do not get better within about 24 hours can actually start doing themselves some pretty serious harm.
Even at this juncture, you have several options. You can try dramamine crushed under the tongue, the meclizine they should have been taking all along, or a club to the head. But if the boat is really rocking and you've got a true sicky aboard, these measures might be too little too late. The problem is that nothing is staying down your boat's victim. Now you need to start getting really personal.
Suppositories - When there is no other way to get meds into a crew member, we intervene with a suppository dose of prochlorperazine 25 mg. It's available by prescription only so you'd need to get this from a doctor in advance. You can probably get some by taking an emergency medicine course and getting the prescription from the instructor. It's very good to have aboard and should only be taken when you simply can't get the crew member to stop vomiting and start sucking down fluids.
Points Beyond - After that, the problem goes beyond my ability to even speculate what you should do. Dehydration can kill so this isn't just an unpleasant problem. Land is your best bet, but if not land you can look at evacuation off the boat, enemas, and other more serious interventions. Fortunately, we have not as yet made it to this step and are unlikely to do so in the near future. Coastal cruising at least ensures that you can generally drop a really sick crew member on to a rock within 48 hours of any location.
Now someone please give me a cure for land sickness.
Monday, June 09, 2008
Battle of the Bulge
They say cruisers lose about twenty pounds of land lubber fat when they leave the shore. God, I sure hope so. I could stand to lose at least one, possibly two, cruiser loads. I’m not seeing it happen. Yet. Ever the optimist, I’ll point out that we cut the lines less than a month ago. Losing weight any faster than a pound per week is not healthy in any case, no matter how much I’d like to do so.
I have a new reason to lose weight, however. Boat trim.
Our boat is fat. Don Quixote has a weight problem. All cats have a weight problem. Cruising cats have a particularly unhealthy obsession with their weight. To stay safe, speedy, and strong, a cat should stay well above her water line and balance fore and aft, hull to hull. We know of cruising cats who raise their water line. This is a form of letting out your belt buckle by stretching thin, worn, cotton tank top over crucial parts such as your belly roll and butt cheeks. Yeah, you can do it. But as I tell my children repeatedly, “Just because you can, doesn’t mean you should.”
Yet for all our fine words, Don Quixote lists in an obvious and distressing fashion to the forward starboard side. This is tantamount to trying to run uphill with your right leg bent and a backpack perched precariously over your right ear. Her starboard bow is at or just a hair below the water line. In contrast, she’s got her left ass cheek flying up in the air on the port side nearly 3 inches above the water line.
Easy problem to fix, neh? Just move everything in the forward starboard bow locker (a.k.a. kid’s rumpus room) to somewhere under Mera and Aeron in the aft port cabin. Not so fast. First, the idiots who designed and built this boat decided to put the only water tank and the anchor rode on the starboard side. We have 250 of heavy gauge chain up there. When they say heavy gauge, that means it weighs a metric buttload per foot. Moving either item is basically a feat of extreme nautical engineering and not something we can easily undertake at the moment physically or financially.
Another problem is the holding tanks. We’re currently only using the starboard tank -- which of course is up near the bow. Dumb dumb dumb. So next time we’re at anchor for a few days, guess who gets to tear apart and fix the port holding tank. Time to pee only on the left.
More weight? The office, shower, and pantry are on the starboard side. We’ve been using those spaces to store all sorts of crucial, need-to-get-your-hands-on-in-a-hurry items as well as all kinds of useless crap. Also, most of the galley supplies somehow ended up starboard of mid-line. It’s feels as if in a vain effort to recover from the excessively liberal left-leaning, politically correct mind set of our home port, our crew decided to put all our eggs in the Right basket.
In a fit of parental homeschoolyness, I thought it would be a great math lesson for Mera and Aeron to conduct an inventory. This consisted first of pulling everything we own out of the salon seats and pantry cupboards and spreading it all over hell’s breakfast. Then, they wrote all the items down and counted them. At this point, I pretty much despaired for the survival of my family. We somehow shipped out without cinnamon, red wine vinegar, or sugar, but we did stock six bottles of rum, three bottles of tequila, 13 packages of MacNCheese, 24 cans of tuna (in springwater), and four tubes of high quality wasabi.
The good news is we remembered to pack three jars of pickled ginger. The bad news is there is no soy sauce.
I have a new reason to lose weight, however. Boat trim.
Our boat is fat. Don Quixote has a weight problem. All cats have a weight problem. Cruising cats have a particularly unhealthy obsession with their weight. To stay safe, speedy, and strong, a cat should stay well above her water line and balance fore and aft, hull to hull. We know of cruising cats who raise their water line. This is a form of letting out your belt buckle by stretching thin, worn, cotton tank top over crucial parts such as your belly roll and butt cheeks. Yeah, you can do it. But as I tell my children repeatedly, “Just because you can, doesn’t mean you should.”
Yet for all our fine words, Don Quixote lists in an obvious and distressing fashion to the forward starboard side. This is tantamount to trying to run uphill with your right leg bent and a backpack perched precariously over your right ear. Her starboard bow is at or just a hair below the water line. In contrast, she’s got her left ass cheek flying up in the air on the port side nearly 3 inches above the water line.
Easy problem to fix, neh? Just move everything in the forward starboard bow locker (a.k.a. kid’s rumpus room) to somewhere under Mera and Aeron in the aft port cabin. Not so fast. First, the idiots who designed and built this boat decided to put the only water tank and the anchor rode on the starboard side. We have 250 of heavy gauge chain up there. When they say heavy gauge, that means it weighs a metric buttload per foot. Moving either item is basically a feat of extreme nautical engineering and not something we can easily undertake at the moment physically or financially.
Another problem is the holding tanks. We’re currently only using the starboard tank -- which of course is up near the bow. Dumb dumb dumb. So next time we’re at anchor for a few days, guess who gets to tear apart and fix the port holding tank. Time to pee only on the left.
More weight? The office, shower, and pantry are on the starboard side. We’ve been using those spaces to store all sorts of crucial, need-to-get-your-hands-on-in-a-hurry items as well as all kinds of useless crap. Also, most of the galley supplies somehow ended up starboard of mid-line. It’s feels as if in a vain effort to recover from the excessively liberal left-leaning, politically correct mind set of our home port, our crew decided to put all our eggs in the Right basket.
In a fit of parental homeschoolyness, I thought it would be a great math lesson for Mera and Aeron to conduct an inventory. This consisted first of pulling everything we own out of the salon seats and pantry cupboards and spreading it all over hell’s breakfast. Then, they wrote all the items down and counted them. At this point, I pretty much despaired for the survival of my family. We somehow shipped out without cinnamon, red wine vinegar, or sugar, but we did stock six bottles of rum, three bottles of tequila, 13 packages of MacNCheese, 24 cans of tuna (in springwater), and four tubes of high quality wasabi.
The good news is we remembered to pack three jars of pickled ginger. The bad news is there is no soy sauce.
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