Already mid-July, Wed. July 14, 2010

Hi everyone,
I am going to try and write regularly in my blog from now on. The latest thing in my life is the fact that I have an injury that I have been dealing with. I was helpng Andy put camping gear up in the attic. I bent down to pick up a tarp and I didn't bend my knees. I heard a pop in my butt. Thereafter my butt has hurt. It has been about 1 1/2 weeks since I injured myself. I went to an orthopedist today. It didn't take him long to diagnose my injury. He says I have a high hamstring pull. I guess the big problem with these injuries is that the healing process causes the formation of scar tissue. The scar tissue then causes the muscle to tighten. A tightened muscle allows you to reinjure the muscle more easily. So, he is suggesting some physical therapy to help reduce the scarring and help with the healing process. He said it would take 4-6 weeks to heal and by 6 weeks I should be able to try some activity. So I will be doing a lot of sitting around and the way I have been eating....getting fat. It is a shame because I came off the bike tour in such great shape and now I am becoming jello again.

The other activity that keeps me busy is transporting Sam (Andy's Dad) to the doctor and to his other various appointments. His last appt. was with the radiation oncologist. The news was good. She no longer can feel his rectal tumor. It looked like the treatment worked. He also no longer feels pain and has no rectal bleeding. So things look good there. He will have his third chemo treatment this week. He gets 5-FU weekly. There have been some side effects. After the first treatment he had some diarrhea. Yesterday and today he is complaining of blurry vision and sensitivity to light. The paperwork said sensitivity to light is a side effect of the chemo but there is no mention of the blurry vision. We are hoping it will go away. His third chemo treatment is tommorrow. If he seems well enough we will have him over to the house this Sunday for dinner.

Andy has been getting in some great activity on the weekend. Last Saturday he went open water swimming in Folsom Lake with some of his Masters group swimmers. After that he ran for 1.5 hours on the trail from Granite Bay towards Auburn and back. On Sunday he drove to the base of Indian Hill and then rode to Grass Valley via Dog Bar Road and Rattlesnake. It was 75 miles and 7000ft of climbing. He thinks it would be a good ride for me after I am back in shape after my injury heals.

Nothing else new. I am doing no activity except walking the dog so I have been doing a lot of computer based reading.....athlete blogs and bike touring blogs (crazy guy on a bike journals) and other reading. I am also very up to date on popular culture.
Cheers, lisa