Headache Again

I am finished work for the day, the work that I get paid for and not the work that earns no praise or pay! I only had a little 4 hour shift today, but it felt like 8. I hate days like that! Give me craziness and chaos over minutes that feel like hours. To top it off, my back started killing me about half-way through my shift which started a headache. Once the head and back start hurting like that, time isn't the only thing dragging!

I've been noticing a little trend with the headaches. I think I can safely say that I no longer have a headache all the time; however, I do get headaches rather frequently now. When my back starts screaming at me, a headache forms. When my neck feels tight, a headache forms. Of course, there are times when a headache starts without any noticeable cause, but I think it is helpful to recognize some of these new triggers. I wish I could go back to life before the accident when I'd only get a headache maybe once a month or even less often!

Today is 'Cram It All In' Day or 'Cram As Much As I Can' Day, depending on how much actually gets accomplished! The second load of laundry is in the wash with another 2 or 3 loads yet to go. I've picked up some groceries and voted in our provincial election. Bread dough is rising on the counter with shaping in another 40 minutes, followed by another 40 minute rise and 30 minute bake. The dishwasher is running.

Still to do...finish putting away groceries, wash the few remaining dishes by hand, think about supper, take out the recycling (or leave it for Sam when he gets home), shower, and try to get some housework finished. I would also like to get to the library, but I'm not sure if that will happen today. I could potentially squeeze in a book drop-off on the way to baseball later, but I don't think I'll have time for getting any books. What are the chances that the book waiting on hold for me will still be there on Thursday? I'd say slim. :o/

Well, I'm a little disappointed with my Canucks being out of the play-offs, but I am happy that the Washington Capitals managed to pull out a win to force game seven at home! I'm a Canuck fan first and foremost, followed by rooting for any Canadian team, but I am also a fan of Alexander Ovechkin and would love to see his team go all the way.

Thursday/Friday/Saturday/Sunday

Thursday: Abby's baseball game

Friday: BC Environmental Mind Grind Play-Offs

Abby's school finished 3rd in the province

Saturday: Casey's double header in Kamloops

Sunday: Mother's Day and the only baseball is the Toronto Jays game on TV!

Kane made breakfast: bacon, hash browns, omelets and orange juice.

The kids gave me hugs, cards and gifts. Chocolates, a microwave magic bag, and flowers!

I made it to the gym today!

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Today was the BC Environmental Mind Grind Play-offs. Abby's team lost their first game but managed to get themselves into the semi-finals. They lost that game, finishing third. It was fun and exciting.

Now my head is pounding, and my neck feels tight. Sam has tennis tonight. Casey is umping. I may or may not go to the gym before watching Casey ump. It all depends on how the head feels.

Tomorrow we are gone for virtually the entire day as Casey has a double-header in Kamloops. We need to hit the road by 7:30 in the morning. Oh joy! Hopefully the weather is nice. It is bad enough sitting for one game in miserable weather. A couple of hours of travel one way followed by 4-5 hours of sitting for two games in bad weather would be most terrible.

Off to baseball again...looks like another cool night. Joy! The internet connection was down when I got home from work and just came back on, so no time to put together a proper post.

Road Trips

We have our first baseball "road trip" of the season tonight. It isn't terribly far but still far enough that a 6pm start time is stressful. On Saturday, we have a double-header in Kamloops which is a little bit bigger road trip. I don't yet know how I feel about spending an entire day travelling, watching baseball and travelling. I must be getting older...

Girls Just Wanna...

I wish that there was something like this when I was a girl! Of course, we had softball. I did play a couple of years of organized softball, but we couldn't afford much more than that. I grew up playing under the bleachers while my dad played fastball. As a teenager I played softball and slo-pitch alongside adults in church and rec leagues. I might not have been able to take advantage of any opportunity to play baseball as a girl, but it would have been so cool to do it.

Now I have the pleasure of watching my daughter play baseball, not softball, and she gets to do it on an all-girls team! I watched her game last night and mentally groaned at all the "errors". It would have been more exciting to stay home and watch Ovechkin get a hat trick in the hockey game on TV; however, I got to watch my little girl play ball and have strike out with a smile on her face. There is just something special about watching the girls play in this male-dominated sport. How many boys praise a teammate's cheering?





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I can feel a nasty headache forming at the base of my skull, inching up and over my head. Only time will tell just how bad it will get. Will I sound like a broken record if I say that I am tired of headaches? I've already had 3 or 4 bad ones in less than a week.

Casey's team played their second game of the year yesterday afternoon. After an humiliating 12-0 loss in the first game earlier in the week, we picked up our game and earned a 9-6 victory.

I forgot to blog yesterday, caught up with baseball and play-off hockey, but such is life for the next two months.






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May

Sweet. That's the NaNoBloPoMo theme for May. Can I successfully blog every day in May? I'd like to say that I can, but my track record isn't so good; however, I have been blogging more often since I've started "using" NaNoBloPoMo. I guess that is a good thing.

I don't particularly feel sweet today. I had to drag myself out of bed and then struggled to keep myself awake until the kids had left for school. Once the house was empty I curled up on the sofa and slept for nearly two hours, disjointed though it may have been. Even then it was a struggle to get myself up off the sofa and into the shower. I left the house long enough to pick up some more Advil and will be returning to the sofa shortly, though I don't think I'll fall back asleep now.

I've been struck with a cold this week. It isn't anything too serious, just a stuffy/runny nose, occasional cough, and a sometimes froggy throat. I didn't sleep well last night though, and my low back is killing me.

The last hour and a half of work was brutal today. It wasn't very busy, but I was working on the sandwich bar. I thought I'd be okay since the counter is now higher than it was before the renovation; guess I was wrong. My back is killing me. My head is pounding and spiralling into the abyss. When I was finally able to sneak to the back to blow my nose (stupid cold) and grab a drink of water, I noticed how red my face was. It is hot working on the sandwich bar when it is busy over lunch, especially now that we no longer have a fan to help cool us down.

Thankfully the remaining hour of work went by fairly quickly, even if I felt like I was trudging through jello. I have an hour or so to recuperate before heading out to baseball...and cold...and sitting. My body isn't looking forward to sitting in the cold and wind, but I am excited to watch one of my kids play. Too bad I can't split into two bodies, so I could watch both kids tonight!

Busy Days

I am having a somewhat productive day despite my fears that there was more to do than time to do it in. Two freshly baked loaves of bread are cooling on the counter. All the dishes have been washed, counters wiped down. The last load of laundry is in the wash. Milk, fruit and veggies have been replenished. Supper is in the crockpot. I was supposed to go pick up a tax receipt but plans changed at the last minute. I decided to check my email right before I planned on heading out and found an email from the person I was supposed to meet up with. She didn't have my receipt ready yet. It is a little frustrating that I'm hanging in limbo over that receipt, but I'm glad that I didn't drive across the city for nothing!

I have a couple of hours to relax now before the busyness begins once more. We have baseball every day this week, and I think we have baseball 6 days next week! Oh the joy! I didn't feel any joy last night as I sat wrapped in my blanket watching Casey umpire a game. We endured rain, icy winds and hail. I was cold, but at least I had a blanket, gloves and an umbrella. Poor Casey was an ice cube by the end of the game! Hopefully it will be a bit warmer tonight for practices...but I'm not confident.

The "I suck" theme seems to be rather common. It must be true then...I do!

I am cold, chilled to the bone, after being outside for several hours for our baseball Opening Day activities. Even with a jacket, I was still shivering, except for those brief moments when the sun poked through the clouds. A little more sunshine would have been nice. We've been home for more than an hour. I've had a mug of tea, and I am still cold. Casey has an exhibition game tomorrow afternoon. I am hoping for sunshine and warmer weather. Barring that I plan to bring gloves and a blanket or two. Still, this is not bad weather for so early in the season. This time last year, we had already risked frostbite to play in arctic temperatures and snow!

Once again I realized that I had forgotten to blog as I lay in bed late at night. There is something about having just crawled into bed that loosens up the memory cells. If there is ever anything that I "forget" during the day I am virtually guaranteed to remember it in the dark of my bedroom at the end of the day. Of course, by that time, I am comfy and unwilling to get out of bed just to turn on the computer and blog.

I Need a Nap

I had planned on baking bread today, even pulled out my large flour bin in preparation, but I decided to put it off until tomorrow. I still have a full loaf waiting to be consumed, so we can make do with that until tomorrow. I am simply tired and did not sleep well last night. Kane did snore but it wasn't too bad. The bigger problem, I think, was the pain and discomfort in my hips. This is really becoming annoying.

During the course of a day, my hips don't bother me a whole lot, unless I am sitting with my legs tucked under me (which I love to do) or in some other way that puts pressure on the hip joints. I certainly do not have the same level of pain that I first experienced with my hips earlier in the year. Thankfully! However, as soon as I lay down at night the discomfort and (milder) pain begins in earnest, especially if I'm laying on either side. Unfortunately for me, I sleep on my side.

Here is my nightly routine:

1. Get into bed and determine which side of my body I need to sleep on. It may sound weird, but sometimes there is only one side that feels right.
2. Get as comfy as I can laying on that side and hope to fall asleep before the pain prevents me from falling asleep.
3. Turn to the other side once I realize that the previous side is not going to cooperate with me and repeat #2.
4. Lie awake with my eyes closed trying to fall asleep, writing stories in my head, until the pain is just too intrusive.
5. Turn onto my back. Re-arrange my body pillow to elevate my knees in an effort to reduce the inevitable back pain/discomfort (my back hates being slept on). Flip the ergonomic pillow under my head to better support my neck in this position.
6. Lie awake with my eyes closed trying to fall asleep, writing stories in my head.
7. At this point I usually need to get up for a trip to the bathroom. Even if I don't need to use the facilities, I often need the walking movement to "crack" a hip joint and, hopefully, give a little relief from the discomfort.
8. Get back into bed, on my back. Repeat #6.
9. Eventually I fall to sleep, although it isn't always restful or unbroken. Sometimes I wake up enough to roll onto my side and fall back to deep sleep where the pain cannot reach me. If I do end up switching to my side though, I often find myself waking up kind of twisted onto my back. Not a good thing!

So most nights I don't sleep well, but I've managed to get "enough" sleep. This week so far has felt less restful though. I've woken to my alarm wanting nothing more than to shut it off and go back to sleep. I don't have that luxury.

Growing

Growing things in my yard...or things that grow and bloom without my help.

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Last Week

This is my final week of freedom. Work renos are nearly finished, and we're set to re-open on Friday. As of today I am not working this week still, but I fully expect to resume my unpredictable work schedule next week. The past few weeks have flown by, and yet it feels like I haven't worked for a very, very long time! But absence makes the heart grow fonder and I am looking forward to once again putting on my uniform and joining the rat race.

My time away from work might not have been quite as productive as I had hoped, but it was still time mostly well spent. I have fallen back into the habit of visiting the library, which means that I have been reading voraciously. My spring cleaning list never did get translated from my head to paper, and I can't even mentally cross off very many items on that list. I did clean all my windows and Sam's bedroom. I did some purging and re-organizing in the kitchen. My family has been enjoying homemade bread on a regular basis, something I want to continue with. I've finally tried my hand at tennis and loved it, even if I'm horribly out of shape and ached for days after! Mostly, the past few weeks have been quiet, relaxing, nice!

It is fitting, in a twisted sort of way, that the end of my "sabbatical" coincides with the start of baseball craziness for our family. We've already had baseball try-outs and a few practices, but the season officially begins this coming Saturday. Even this week, this final week of mine, is getting a little crowded. Casey has practice tonight and Wednesday. Abby has practice on Tuesday. Sam has tennis lessons on Friday. Saturday is Opening Day for baseball, and Kane and I are going to a school fundraiser dinner/dance event. This is what my life will look like for the next couple of months.

For this final week I can either relax as much as possible or cram as much into these last few days as possible. Or, I can try to do both...

2009 Environmental Mind Grind Champions

Yesterday was the Environmental Mind Grind competition. For the second year in a row, Abby was a part of the team representing her school. This was the year that her school went all the way to the top and became the Champions! It was surprising and exciting. There were shaky moments when our team was down 3 points to 1 out of a possible 7 points, but the team always managed to come back and win each round. They won $500 for their school and fleece vests for each team member. The team was questioned by a couple of reporters after which created the additional excitement of seeing a name and/or photo in the papers. There was an article in today's local daily paper, but it was rather disappointing. The accompanying photo was not of the winning team. The article focused on two team members from the winning team and failed to even mention the names of the other two team members. Abby was one of those omitted two. I was irritated. She was sad. We talked about it, and I encouraged her to write a letter to the editor explaining how she felt about not being included in the article. We submitted her letter to the paper online and will have to wait and see if it makes it into the paper.

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