The Pain King

As I got to work yesterday, my pain from the "tree watering incident"
remaind excrutiating.

I called the chiropractor my wife goes to see, because I knew he'd see
me immediately. He did and he took X-rays of my back. So he looked at
them with me, and one of the bottom ones he said "look there, see how
there's a nice gap between all the other spinal bones but there's not
one right here? (he pointed at the bones right behind where my belt
would be) There ought to be a space there. There's probably some
things being pinched in there that's causing your pain. Maybe a disc
bulging or something. You're too young to have this happen to you. I
hope it's nothing too bad."

Then he cracked my back, and I hollered out "OOOOOOMPH!" and
"OOOOOOOOHHHHH!"

It felt maybe 10% better for about 30 minutes.

What if there really was something pinched in there and his violent
cracking could have messed it up even more? I am very concerned about
future appointments with this guy, if there are any.

But I have X rays I think I can borrow to take to a "real doctor" I am
scheduled to see tomorrow afternoon.

Probably the best thing to do right now is to gently exercise the area,
stretch my back a little bit, and increase the efforts a little each day
to get back to normal.

Until then, I walk like an old man. Even the pregnant woman at work is
walking faster than me!

A Thousand Bites from a Thousand Tiny Snakes

Over the weekend I hurt my back while watering a tree. Bent on down to pick up the hose and SNAP! a huge sharp shot of pain at the small of my back.

I immediately fell to the ground and was literally moved to tears as I tried to stand back up ten minutes later.

For some reason, I thought it would go away. Here on Monday morning it has not and I am preparing to call a chiropractor to see if I can be seen today.

I have a negative predisposition about chiropractors, as my dad's a doctor and he has convinced me that they are all quacks. However, my wife goes to one and she says he really helps her out.

My experience with regular doctors is that it takes several days if not weeks to get just an initial appointment. This chiropractor can see my wife without an appointment, and is usually done within 20 minutes.

So I will try to see this guy today. I cannot wait several days to a week for satisfaction.

Every step unleashes a small but sharp piercing pain into my lower back right where I awlays thought the spine would be. Standing up is a big challenge. there's even a dull pulsating pain as I sit in place.

Saturday night my wife let me take some of her heavy-duty pain meds (rhymes with Dercocet) and other than make me sleepy and dizzy, it did not dull the pain.

Skipped church do to this immobilizing pain.

I need this to get fixed one way or another.

The Low Fuel Light Taunts Me

The other day as I was driving home, I was watching for the "low fuel
warning" light to turn on in my dashboard. I have been trying to note
the distance traveled when the light turns on, to give me an initial
indication of what my fuel economy might be.

Usually the light turns on and stays on. But two weeks ago, it turned
on and remained on as I drove home, but the next day it was off for a
while as I drove around town. Naturally, my suspicions were raised and
questions filled my head.

Is this a new phenomenon brought on by the increasing age of my car?

Has this always happened and I just never noticed?

What mileage mark is correct to use in my notes of when the light turns
on?

I decided that the mileage when the light lit and stayed on permanently
would be the standard reading. I chose this because the fuel gauge, and
this the low fuel indicator light, varies according to the slope of the
hill I am driving on. Up a hill = tank appears emptier, down a hill =
tank appears fuller.

So that afternoon, the LFI (low fuel indicator) lit up at 398.6 miles.
I thought that was pretty good. The light went off, but I did not note
the mileage as traffic was heavy. Then it came on again at 400.5 miles,
and off again at 401.8 miles. I never realized my trip home was so
hilly!

The LFI lit again at 405.1 miles, and incredibly turned off again at
406.5 miles. Obviously, I was getting excited. The light stayed off
for five more miles before turning on for good at 411.7 miles.

I made it home and filled up the next morning to discover this tank had
served me well, providing greater than 39 miles per gallon.

My goal before the end of the year is to have two tanks in a row with
better than 40 mpg.

http://www.lazymanandmoney.com/

I stumbled across this website after seeing its name at another blog
that talked about good health. There are toons of financial advice
blogs out there (this is not one of them), and the lazy man seems up my
alley.

On the main page, there's an article about women's hair. I can relate
to this because, while my wife cuts my hair for free, I can not cut
hers. She must go our and drop a pile of cash every six weeks. I am
glad to see I am not alone with this concern.

It seems the lazy man, although I don't know how old he is, has a
similar personality as I do, and I have just added him to my
"favorites." He has a tracker of his current net worth, which I assume
is correct and updated, as he is keeping his true identity secret. I
haven't learned how he tracks this net worth, but mine may be close, if
we both include homes, rental properties and such. Perhaps I'll learn
this soon.

If I figure it out, I'll ad a link to his website near the bottom of the
right hand column of this here blog.

You could do worse than checking out http://www.lazymanandmoney.com/.

Gas Tank Statistics Chart I Made

I have done a bit of research and think this might be a little more readable summary of my gas tank statistics since the Mighty Corolla was bought in 2004:

Tank 124 - 26 July 2007

Filled up at the Fredericksburg Costco this morning with 10.943 gallons
of gas, at $2.639 per gallon.

I traveled 427.0 miles on this tank, which made for fuel economy of
39.02 mpg this tank, nicely above average for the year.

Reasons for such an increase in fuel economy:

1) average commute home time over the last week and a half has been
under 60 minutes. For my last tank, my trip home averaged about 74
minutes. More time idling in traffic = worse fuel economy.

2) Increased awareness of traffic ahead of me, and taking my foot off
the gas when I see brake lights ahead in the distance so my car
naturally coasts slower to match the speed of those cars without the
need for the brake. More coasting = better fuel economy.

This tank was my 25th tank of the year. I have spent $627.87 on gas
this year on my first 25 tanks. So I looked back at 2006, and the first
25 tanks in '06 cost me $627.46, practically the same!

I made this chart to show relationships among the first 25 tanks from
the last three years:

I posted it as a picture, but it looks bad. I'll work on improving the appearance of future charts...

Obviously, the big thing that jumps out is my gas expense for the first
25 tanks leaped from under $500 to over $600 over the course of one
year, an increase of over 20%.

There are other interesting relationships I will address in the future.
In the meantime, I continue to drive frugally in the Mighty Corolla.