Praise then darkness, and creation unfinished

errands and a bit of exercise

Fri, 26 Sep 2025 22:41:29 GMT

For reasons, I ran some errands today so Adrian and Cattitude could stay home.

The main goal was to take a bathrobe to the Zipper Hospital, and ask them to replace the damaged zipper. So I did that, and was surprised by the sign saying they took cash and checks. Cash only would have surprised me less; in practice, I doubt they're being given many checks these days. They want payment in advance, but I had enough cash to cover it, so I didn't need to ask them for the location of the nearest ATM.

I then went to LA Burdick's, for a cup of hot chocolate, and a bag of chocolate-covered orange and lemon peel. The hot chocolate was good, but I spilled some on myself when I opened the takeout cup. So, I drank the hot chocolate, carefully; went to Trader Joe's; and then took the trolley home.

The trip wasn't a huge amount of walking, but it's the most I've done in the last couple of weeks. I did a little PT this afternoon as well; I've been keeping up with that pretty well.

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exercise

Sat, 21 Sep 2024 18:51:43 GMT

I'm still having trouble lying down, as well as standing and walking, but after doing almost none of my exercises/PT for a couple of weeks, I did half a dozen different exercises, sitting down. Adrian and Cattitude to help with this, by moving a chair and hooking the elastic band, before lunch, and by bringing me my hand weights after lunch and Scrabble.

That's almost all the available PT--most of what I do, I do either standing up, or lying on my back. I also did biceps curls for the first time in a few months, because that seemed like something I could do sitting on an ordinary chair. (I used to do them sitting on an en exercise ball at the gym, back when I was going to a gym.)

( numbers, for the hell of it )

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Wed, 21 Dec 2022 15:35:40 GMT

I'm winding down the occupational/physical therapy for my right hand and wrist, after seeing the therapist last week and discussing how to do this. On a whim, I just tried the same range-of-motion exercises with my left hand. It's stiffer than my right hand, and I can't separate my left thumb and index finger as far, or curve the thumb and fingers as smoothly.

It looks like it would be a good idea to do those stretches and exercises with my left hand. Try once or twice a day? I'm reducing the right hand exercises from three times daily while I was seeing the therapist, to daily over the last week, and then to three times a week, "fading to zero" over three months.

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wrist exercise

Thu, 04 Aug 2022 20:54:02 GMT

I tried the strengthening exercise with the palm up again this afternoon, and did eight repetitions without pain. (Also 20 with the palm down, which I've been doing for the past week.)

Other than that, I've been doing a few of my older exercises (none so far today) and walking a lot. We got out yesterday when it was still nice and cool, and walked down to Beacon Street, then along to Coolidge Corner, and up until we got to Kupel's bagels. From there we got a bus to Comm Ave and took green line B home.

I went for a much shorter walk this morning, before it got too hot, which was bad for my hip. If I'd remembered how far I walked yesterday, I would have stayed home. As it was, I came home, took a naproxen, then sat for a bit; Adrian kindly brought me a cold drink so I wouldn't have to move.

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blood draw, and bagels

Sat, 30 Jul 2022 19:15:01 GMT

My doctor wanted a fasting blood sample, so I wanted to have the blood drawn as soon as possible after waking up. I looked around a bit, and had her office fax the order to a Quest location that's close to a stop on Green Line C. They're open Saturday 8-noon, and I got up, dressed, walked to the T station, and was there almost exactly at 8. I signed in at the kiosk, and was called immediately, by someone who checked my name and insurance, and whether I was fasting. When I sat down, the phlebotomist asked whether I have a preferred arm for this. I told her which arm to use, and thanked her for asking. Happily, she's good at her job--minimal pain, and no bruising.

Having done that, I got back to the T and went to Coolidge Corner for bagels. First, I had a cinnamon raisin bagel and a cup of tea, sitting at a table outside the shop. Then I went back in for more bagels, whitefish salad, and "Miami lox cream cheese," with smoked salmon and scallions, a tempting combination. (adrian_turtle says that "Miami lox" is saltier than most of what's called lox, though maybe not as salty as the lox I used to eat as a teenager.)

I got home before it got hot outside; my phone thought I'd walked 1.5 miles by then, and mappedometer said something like 1.06. (The iPhone "health" app consistently overestimates my distance, so if it says "1 mile" it's usually about 1 km.)

I did one exercise while I was in Brookline. When I got home, I did the one wrist-strengthening exercise I started on Thursday, and two sets (so far today) of the range-of-motion exercises and stretches for my wrist.

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occupational therapy

Thu, 28 Jul 2022 21:31:43 GMT

Progress in occupational therapy: ultrasound and massage again, and the therapist taught me a strengthening exercise, which I will do cautiously, and stop if it hurts. We're skipping a week, so it made sense to say "this specific thing hurts right now, try again in a few days, stop if it hurts."

The exercise is called an "eccentric wrist extension." When I tried it in the therapist's office, palm down was fine, palm up hurt immediately. That's not a surprise--it bends my wrist in a way that has been most likely to hurt for the last few months. I'm starting with one pound; since I don't have a one-pound weight, she suggested a bag of split peas. I may use a water bottle, if we have one of a suitable shape for gripping for this exercise (we have a scale, so I can check the weight, rather than having to guess at how much water is needed).

After OT, I wanted a cup of tea, so I walked to Kickstand Cafe, which has outdoor tables, and closes at 3. I arrived at 2:50, and decided to get a pastry to go with my tea, and sit outside. It had rained while I was doing OT, but it looked like a few of the chairs were mostly dry. An employee saw me, came over, and dried a chair for me. As soon as I had put put milk and sugar in my tea, the wind shook a tre and dumped water on me. When I asked if there were napkins, the man brought me some, and offered to put up an umbrella, and then dried another chair and table. That close to closing time, I had figured I was talking my chances with rain and damp tables, but I had been tempted by a pastry, and it was warm enough (84°F/(29 C) that I didn't mind getting wet.

When I bought my tea and snack, I asked if they serve the lunch part of the menu in the morning; the cashier assured me that everything is available all day. My next few OT appointments are at either 10:30 or 11, when it should be cooler than in the afternoon, and I might want soup or a salad before rather than after OT.

Getting to OT was annoying -- the 66 bus we were planning to take to Harvard was canceled, and the following bus wouldn't have gotten me to OT, or cattitude to the dentist, on time. We got Lyfts, and I got a driver who takes covid safety seriously: he arrived with the windows wide open, and when I asked him to put on a mask he did so. And then we talked about the precautions we are each taking, the difficulties of dealing with people who aren't being careful, and also that yes people sometimes forget to mask, but there's a difference between "oops" while putting on a mask when reminded, and refusing to put on a mask "because it's not required." If I'd known I would have to take a Lyft, I could have gotten it from home, rather than from a 66 bus stop. Alternatively, if I'd known there would be bus delays, I could have left earlier, and had lunch in Arlington.

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OT, PT, and other exercise

Sat, 23 Jul 2022 00:28:15 GMT

( discussion of exercise )

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three things make a post

Mon, 18 Jul 2022 22:55:16 GMT

Last night, I assumed I would wake up early (or at least earlier than Adrian and Cattitude) and planned to walk over to the supermarket before it got hot.

Instead, I was the third to wake up, so once I'd had my morning yogurt, I pulled on clothes and Cattitude and I went to the Star Market. We got most of the things on our shopping list, including whipped butter, high-protein cereal, and chocolate ice cream. The walk was less pleasant than I'd hoped, because of humidity more than heat, but now I know the route (straightforward except for the bit where I didn't spot the supermarket at first, because the store and sign are behind the parking area). There was enough of a hill to be useful exercise for my thigh muscles, and not enough to strain my hips or knee.

I have started carefully doing a few of my upper body exercises again (no more than one kind a day), along with the OT for the wrist. The OT is, so far, range-of-motion and stretching, and the therapist said last week that we may add a strengthening exercise at my next appointment.

This afternoon, I got a text from the V-Safe program, asking me to answer some questions about my health, six months after my most recent covid vaccine. I filled it out, meaning that I checking "yes" for "any new symptoms or health issues." I then described the wrist pain, noting that it had no apparent cause and I doubt it's related, and that I had a telemedicine appointment, X-ray imaging, and outpatient/clinic appointments related to it. I'm not sure I should have mentioned it at all, but done is done.

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catching up on exercise

Tue, 26 Apr 2022 23:53:36 GMT

Last week was busy, but one effect of that was that I hadn't been doing my PT-related exercises. So, I did a lot of those exercises on the weekend, and some more today (Tuesday). Yesterday I spent the afternoon with adrian_turtle, and walked more than I had in a couple of weeks.

( stuff about exercise, without numbers )

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misc. comments 64

Tue, 10 Aug 2021 20:08:43 GMT

More comments I've left on other people's posts: ( migration, genealogy, pandemic restrictions, physical therapy, subways )

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quotidian

Sun, 25 Jul 2021 02:20:40 GMT

I made an impromptu dinner of sauteed shallot, bell pepper, and a little bit of leftover shaved steak over rice, after abandoning my original plan because when we looked at the package of sausages, they didn't look like food. This was definitely rice with a bit of stuff for flavor, not A Food over rice, and I'll probably do it again if I have a little leftover beef and a fresh bell pepper. Some people start with "chop an onion," both physically and in thinking about a meal; I'm as likely to start with "start cooking some rice."

I thought of going for a walk this morning just in time, after barely getting outside yesterday. cattitude and I walked a few blocks, smelled a bunch of honeysuckle, and saw a monarch butterfly, then we came home and I turned on the air conditioning.

I did eight different PT-ish exercises today, and nine yesterday, and I am caught up, after falling behind while I was sick, and then being careful about exerting myself while recuperating. *crossing my fingers that I don't discover tomorrow that I overdid things*

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another busy day

Thu, 03 Jun 2021 02:19:20 GMT

I bought a new iPhone, to replace the old iPhone SE that I'd been hanging onto because it's a good size for my hand. I was hoping to wait a little longer, but dropped it yesterday in a way that left a sharp bit sticking out from one corner of the phone. So, a couple of hours, at the T-Mobile store and then at home, setting things up, re-entering passwords, and such.
A little more paid proofreading this morning
( medical test ick )
After that, I decided I had done quite enough grown-up things for one day, and my plan for the rest of the day was Scrabble and exercise. cattitude and I played two games of Scrabble, and I did a round dozen of my PT-ish exercises, which probably also counts as being grown-up and responsible.

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displacement activity

Wed, 03 Mar 2021 01:59:12 GMT

My plan for the afternoon had been to work on a copyediting test. Sometime in the 1:30-2:00 range, after lunch and a cup of tea, I realized that I had a serious case of the don't wannas. So, rather than spend all afternoon staring at the screen and doing online jigsaw puzzles, I did a few of my PT exercises.

Nope, still don't want to work. Let's do a bit more Duolingo French.

Still nope, so how about more exercise?

I have pretty much caught up on my exercises, including all the upper body stuff. I'm feeling a bit creaky, but not in ways that are stopping me exercising: what feels like a bruised tailbone from falling on my ass Sunday afternoon, and stiffness in my fingers.

The fall was otherwise not a big deal: it was from sitting on a low wheeled stool in the kitchen, so I only fell about a foot, and cattitude grabbed an ice pack, which I proceeded to sit on.

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Thu, 14 Jan 2021 02:59:41 GMT

A piece of proofreading work arrived by email, with a request to rush it if possible. Since I wasn't doing anything else at that point in the day, I did it right away and sent it back. That finished the proofreading for that issue of the magazine in question, and I have sent an invoice.

Afterwards, I went for a walk. I didn't exactly want to go, but I hadn't been further than the yard in a few days, and the sun was out, so I put on a mask and a jacket and went. By the time I'd walked a block and dropped a letter in the mailbox, I was enjoying myself, even though my feet hurt a bit, and I went a bit further than I'd expected.

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Welcome to 2021

Fri, 01 Jan 2021 21:51:22 GMT

So far (17 hours into the new year) I'm doing OK. I spent last night at home with cattitude, and talked to adrian_turtle on the phone (a year ago, I spent the night at Adrian's place and called Cattitude).

Because it might help to start the year as I'd like it to go: I went for a good walk after lunch and did the knee exercise that requires a step. I have written and sent both email and a postcard, and played lots of Scrabble.

The specific references of Sondheim's "I'm Still Here" are from the last century, but this seems to fit:

I got through all of last year,
And I'm here.
Lord knows, at least I've been there, and I'm here.
Look who's here.

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productive day

Wed, 02 Dec 2020 03:56:55 GMT

I did quite a bit today, several different things rather than one large one:

I proofread an article for Queue, this issue's first.
I made dinner: lamb chops and rice, and the last of the cherry tomatoes from the garden , which I'd been ripening in a paper bag since the unseasonably early first snow a month ago. The tomatoes weren't very good; as cattitude said, they tasted like they'd been picked before they were ripe, because they had been. But I had a few left, and it was worth a try.
I went for two walks, one in the morning with Cattitude because it was 7=61F at 11 a.m. and forecast to drop steadily through the day. Then the sun came out mid-afternoon, so I went out again, to walk in the sunshine and look at blue sky. This time of year, sunset is early enough for long shadows and not much shade at ground level, but I did find some bits of sunny sidewalk, and enjoyed pausing to look at the blue sky, with trees and some white clouds.
We tried out our new (Olson) masks today; I liked it better than Catitutde did, either because I'm happier with this design or because the ribbons to fasten the masks with are short enough to not work well for him. I think these will be mine, and Cattitude may order some of this style from Etsy or somewhere.
I did several of my PT exercises, including one I hadn't done as recently as I'd like. [That's one of the exercises I would ideally do more than once a week.) And I did one that isn't part of my PT, and gets done every week or three, as convenient.
I did a little bit of text-banking, urging Georgians to register to vote by December 7th.

We also played two games of Scrabble, and I did some Duolingo French, and spent a while doing online jigsaw puzzles.

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A productive day

Mon, 05 Oct 2020 02:29:48 GMT

My to-do list for today was to do some phone banking, and some of my PT exercises.

This afternoon's phone banking session was my most productive yet: I talked to four or five people, and got a few people saying they definitely support Sara Gideon and Joe Biden. Also one who said no to "can we count on your support for Sara?" and when I asked if she would list Gideon as her second choice said she was planning to do that. [1] She was lukewarm about Biden--she'll vote for him but isn't happy that he's the nominee. I said I understood, I was a Warren supporter, but since Biden is the Democratic nominee we need to support him. The other people I talked to included a man who had moved out of state, but said "yes" when I asked if we could count on him to vote for Biden. (This campaign won't be calling him back, because I checked the "moved out of state" button on the phone banking page.) One person was enthusiastic enough about the Democratic ticket that I asked if she'd like to volunteer. She declined because she's working at a food bank and as a guardian ad litem [to represent the interests of minor children in court]. I said that's important work, and thanked her for it.

I did some of the exercises I have flagged as priority, and a few lower-priority ones I hadn't gotten to in a while.

cattitude went to the farmers market this afternoon, and got several nice things, including scallops, which we had for supper tonight. Also, my post-phone banking snack was fresh local raspberries and homemade chocolate cake.

I did a little proofreading/light copyediting for a friend who has applying for an internship; this useful activity didn't require me to hang up rather than leave voicemail for a hundred strangers.

[1] If you live in Massachusetts, vote Yes on ballot question 2. If it passes, Massachusetts will use ranked choice voting, a.k.a. instant runoff, for most elections. Ranked choice means you can vote for a third party candidate without worrying that this will help the candidate you like least. Useful for those of us who agree that both major parties are too conservative and would like to vote Socialist, and equally for someone who dislikes both parties for how much they spend on the military. Maine has had ranked choice for a few years, as has Minneapolis. (For my fannish friends, this is used for the Hugo awards, where it's sometimes called "Australian ballot.") Thanks to julian for pointing out that I'd omitted the footnote.

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three things make an entry

Wed, 13 May 2020 22:38:41 GMT

Wednesday reading: Last night I finished reading Buddy Holly Is Alive and Well on Ganymede, a weird book that lives up to the title, with noncorporeal beings, a cyborg Doberman, and a narrator whose mother raised him in the Church of Rock and Roll. And, yes, more or less what it says on the tin: Holly is on Ganymede, doing a live concert that is being shown on every television channel on the planet. If that sounds like it might be fun or diverting, I recommend it. (The book is in copyright, but also available free online, the author having apparently decided to give it away in order to get a few more readers.)

I had two good long phone conversations today, in the morning with my friend Elizabeth, and in the afternoon with my mother. Mom is holding up well, though hoping she'll be able to go to the hairdresser again soon. We talked some about that and the varying parameters of stay-at-home orders, or advice, in different places. I called today because T-Mobile sent out a notification yesterday that the free international calling ends tomorrow. So, we'll be back to me emailing and asking her to call me (which she can do for free).

I realized that I haven't been reaching my exercise goals, so for a bit I'm going to do fewer of each exercise, in the hope of getting in at least some of more kinds of exercise. (These are mostly PT-related or derived, which is why I try to do each of them at least once a week; I have at least one I haven't done since the beginning of the month.)

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first trip to new fitness room

Tue, 04 Feb 2020 23:07:47 GMT

That's "new" to me, not newly constructed: I walked over to the Beech Street Center and used the fitness room, for a little while: about five minutes on the cardio bike, three of the exercise machines, and did one of my PT exercises with seven-pound weights. I'm still being careful about amount and intensity of exercise, at the tail end of recuperating from being sick; I'm not at all sure how adding new exercises fits in with this. (At this end of the paragraph, "new" means things that not only aren't on my exercise-tracking spreadsheet, but that I haven't done at least since we moved to Massachusetts, but that I have experience with from when I had a gym membership, back when we lived in New York.)

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Pleased that I overcame the "don't wanna"s.

Sat, 05 Oct 2019 01:58:36 GMT

After lunch and tea this afternoon, I was thinking that I really ought to go out and $do_stuff. At the point when I realized I was doing nothing in particular at the computer, in an avoidant way, I decided to go out right then, because that felt like depression getting in my way.

The timing was good, because the sun had come out, but I think it would have done me good to go outside even on an overcast afternoon. I decided that the key point was to be go, but also decided that I would take the bus to Harvard Square, and then decide whether to go further, do useful things right there, or just come home.

I did two useful errands in Somerville: First, I returned some hair product I had bought last week after my hairdresser tried it on my hair. What had seemed like a very mild scent to me bothered adrian_turtle enough that I washed it out a couple of hours later. Since I didn't want another product instead, I now have the money on a gift card, which I will use to pay for my next haircut.

I then bought Molly and Kaja more prescription cat food, the vet being conveniently a couple of blocks from the hairdresser. That was somewhat awkward to carry, but I made one more stop on the way home, at Lizzy's Ice Cream on Church Street, for a pint each of chocolate and black raspberry.

I was feeling enough better for this outing that I think I need to make more of an effort to get outside every day--in particular, to go further than five feet from the apartment door if at all possible. My policy/goal has been, go outside unless that would be stepping into blizzard or hurricane conditions, but I think it matters to be outside for at least a few minutes.

Separately, I note that my right shoulder has been sore lately. I am going to reduce the intensity and number of repetitions of my shoulder exercises, while trying to do the relevant stretching more often.

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Miscellaneous comments 61

Fri, 22 Feb 2019 22:23:08 GMT

More comments from other journals etc.: ( meta, snow preparations, moving, stretching and exercise, pronouns not based on gender )

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A brief exercise post

Tue, 22 Jan 2019 03:31:39 GMT

It hasn't been a good couple of days for outdoor activity (cold and windy, with icy sidewalks). So I spent a bunch of time this afternoon walking round and round in the apartment building hallway. This isn't remotely interesting, but it's a dry, flat surface with good traction, at a comfortable temperature. I walked fast enough to get my heart rate up a little, which I haven't been doing much in the last several months, because I want to spare my hips. It feels less risky when, if I need to stop, I won't be more than a couple of dozen steps from my front door.

This is in addition to an assortment of exercises, most of them at least related to physical therapy (ongoing maintenance, at this point), almost all of which I do in my apartment, and track on a spreadsheet (to avoid both overdoing accidentally skipping things).

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Back from Montreal

Tue, 09 Oct 2018 00:56:26 GMT

cattitude and I got back from Montreal a couple of hours ago; we were there for Scintillation, a small science fiction convention organized by Jo Walton.

I mostly had a good time, despite some bits where I was having trouble connecting/finding people to hang out with, and some down moods that I suspect were due either to physiological stuff (I bruised my left thumb badly, and pain interferes with sleep) or the state of the world outside the convention. I did a lot of walking, at least by my recent standards; if this doesn't leave me miserable in the next day or two, I'm going to treat it as hip strengthening PT and increase my goal for that. ( health/exercise details )

I went to a few program item and enjoyed all of them: Friday evening Jon Singer and Teresa Nielsen Hayden talke about medieval recipes, and Sunday morning Jon and Emmet O'Brien talked about lasers, odd corners of biology (endosymbiosis is more complex than I'd realized), and the possibility of using Bose-Einstein condensates to explore how event horizons work. (They told us that it's possible to slow light down to a few meters per second in a BEC; the suggestion is to see what happens if you move said concentrate at several meters per second, i.e. faster than the speed of light inside the BEC. As far as either of them knew, this hasn't yet been tried.)

As a tribute to Ursula Le Guin, Jo decided to have an hour of people reading Le Guin's work aloud. The pre-con description had said that it would be good if other people read, but Jo was prepared to read Le Guin aloud for an hour. I emailed her last week to say I wanted to read, and mentioning a couple of specific things I was thinking of. Yesterday morning, when I walked into the Jon Singer/Emmet O'Brien mutual interview, Emmet asked if I'd be willing to be organizer for the Le Guin panel an hour later, because Jo might be dealing with other things. I said yes, of course. I decided to read "Coming of Age in Karhide," which worked well: if I'd practiced and known how long it was, I might have picked something shorter, but people enjoyed it, and I got comments afterwards from people who were pleased because they hadn't already read that story. Someone else then read "The First Report of the Shipwrecked Foreigner to the Kadahn of Derb," a delightful piece that is partly about Venice. We then got a couple of excerpts from Malafrena about what it means to work for freedom, and a few poems. (The person who read the poems wanted to read from Le Guin's version of the Tao te ching; I don't think Jo owns that.)

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one last knee PT session

Wed, 18 Jul 2018 21:17:26 GMT

I went in for PT today, to see whether the therapist would have any more exercises for me, since at the last session she'd told me "try it for two weeks and then let me know if it seems to be helping." And then I got pneumonia, and a month went past, and I'm not sure whether/how much the PT is helping my hip.

So, we did some of the exercises I normally do at home, plus a couple I haven't been, and I think I have a way to add one of them at home. The PT office version is stepping sideways onto and then over a wide step; the home version will be step sideways onto the bottom stair of a staircase, back down, then turn around and do the same with the other leg.

I asked if there's any PT that I'm not already doing that might help my hips, and the therapist went away for a few minutes and said no. So: patience, and hope time and continuing with the exercises helps; the cortisone didn't really help, and I don't want surgery.

There's also nothing to add to the knee exercises, and no need/reason to go back unless something else comes up. Just keep doing them at home, four days a week for the time being.

(ETA: my knee, which felt mostly okay during and shortly after the PT session, is now--six hours after PT--hurting significantly. Proceed with care on the step thing, I think.)

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Lilacs and lily of the valley, and knee PT

Wed, 23 May 2018 01:02:00 GMT

Yesterday, cattitude and I went to the Harvard Arboretum to look at and sniff lilacs. We were a bit late: a lot of the bushes had few flowers left, and some of the rest had almost no scent. Unfortunately, the lilacs that bloom latest are a variety whose scent I don't like. Also, Cattitude had some problems with the pollen even though he had taken an antihistamine, and I will probably have to make this trip without him next year. (adrian_turtle has expressed interest.)

On our way out, we passed a fine patch of lily of the valley, and enjoyed that scent (which neither of us are allergic to. This past weekend, Cattitude found an allegedly lily of the valley flavored macaron at the patisserie in Davis Square. I thought it just tasted sweet, he said there was a floral note that reminded him of soap, and we didn't eat the last bit. It's an artificial flavor, of course—all parts of the plant are considered poisonous—and I was partly just curious as to what the creator thought lily of the valley should taste like.

I have an appointment at Mount Auburn Hospital on Friday. There is a very fine patch of lily of the valley in a small parklike area between Mount Auburn Street and Memorial Drive, which I plan to visit before, after, or possibly both, depending how the timing goes.

( physical therapy stuff )

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