Office Monkey

Everybody needs some monkey sometime

Chiropracticing

(A deal’s a deal. Even if I’m slow.)

My back has been giving me grief for most of the last four years. I spent a year fencing on a pair of sore ankles, but then when I hurt my back as well, I decided to call it quits.

Now, one might think that I might be interested in actually doing something about continual pain in my lower back, but hey, that might make sense! Be reasonable! Be, dare I say it, sensible! Instead, I just dealt with it, figuring it would go away. It didn’t.

About a month ago, people from a local chiropractor practice came by our cafeteria at work. They were trying to drumb up clientele for their new location “directly across” from campus. (It took me twenty minutes to walk “directly across” the street to their location in back of an industrial park.) In the interests of screwing with their heads, I sat down for their brief examination. When the chiropractor asked if I was stressed, I laughed at him. He noticed some longer-standing issues than just stress, and suggested I come in for a full evaluation. Surprise, surprise. But, the receptionist was cute, and more importantly, they were copay-free, and local. So I went in.
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Filled under: Day-to-Day, Living, Song By: Andrew Tags: , ,
Posted on: July 11, 2008 1 Comment »

Vertigo -> Tranquilizers?

I’ve had a recurring vertigo issue for the past two, no, three months. If I happen to tilt my head in the wrong way, I have a feeling of dizziness that lasts for up to around thirty seconds. It goes away entirely for a period of time, but has been regularly reoccuring for three months now.

I finally accepted defeat and went to see the doctor again. He’s following standard practice on this, and prescribed me a medicine known to assist Benign Paroxysmal Positional Vertigo — which seems to be what I have. I now have a bottle full of these little tablets (0.5mg) of Lorazepam. Lorazepam is commonly prescribed as a antianxiety pill. A tranquilizer, in other words.

I don’t know how much I can hope to expect when the warning on the bottle for my anti-dizziness medicine consists partially of, “May cause dizziness, lightheadness, uncoordination…” It hasn’t worked, except to make me feel extremely groggy. This is 14 hours after taking the medication. Fortunately, that may be hope coming soon: DizzyFix — it isn’t for sale yet, but the symptoms and treatment have matched so far, and since this is apparently something I can expect to be recurring forever, it seems like a valid investment.

In the meantime, I’ll take my tranquilizers and wonder how I’m supposed to go to work — the next step if one dose doesn’t work is to up it to one at night, and one in the morning.

Update: 2PM PST – corrected link.

Filled under: Day-to-Day, Living By: Andrew Tags: ,
Posted on: January 27, 2007 7 Comments »

I got suckered

My local Safeway grocery store was having a sale on SlimFast meal-substitutes a week ago when I went. $5/box is pretty much as low as I’ve seen SlimFast products go, so when they also were “special boxes” that had an extra 2 whatevers per box, I decided to buy some.

As I was going through the store, the fact that I already had loads of SlimFast products colored my thinking; this was good, to an extent, as it meant I did NOT buy the chocolate chip cookies that were just looking at me, asking me to buy them…

I did, however, buy these marvelous, special 100-calorie granola bars. I figured they’d travel just fine to work, and 100-calories was about right for a snack during the day. They were a little more expensive than ordinary granola bars, but I figured it was worth it.

Was I ever wrong.

Did you know that Quaker Chewy Granola Bars are ALL in the 100-120 calorie range? And they taste better?

Bah. I know what I’m buying next trip.

Filled under: Day-to-Day, Living By: Andrew Tags: ,
Posted on: January 21, 2007 No Comments »

I love my doctor

Not only has Dr. Bunin always been absolutely phenomenal, honest, and helpful — answering questions over the phone at odd times on top of keeping track (somehow!) of everything, and acknowledging exactly how much Aspirin, Ibuprofen, and Acetaminophen is actually safe to take in any block of time (useful when you manage to hurt yourself while you have a headache, trust me), I just called to make Mandrina an appointment so that she can hopefully get some pain meds for her knee before we go to my brother’s wedding. Mandrina, who hates doctors, is okay with Dr. Bunin.

I call, and speak to the receptionist (Jean). She pulls up Mandrina’s super-thin folder (Mandrina’d been in once for a post-accident check a year and a half ago), and says that she doesn’t have any new-patient appointments any time soon… Is Friday okay?

It’s Wednesday at 2:30. They were apologizing that they couldn’t see Mandrina (someone they have no existing relationship with) until Friday afternoon.

I love my doctor.

Filled under: Day-to-Day, Living, Woman By: Andrew Tags: ,
Posted on: July 5, 2006 No Comments »

Fast food destruction!

Mandrina suckered me into the Atkins diet for the next week or two (I know, a real healthy way to diet). I didn’t have any warning, so I didn’t stock up on chocolate, or his close friend chocolate-chip-cookie, prior to starting this diet that says I can’t have a single cookie. (Mandrina refers to my typical mode of dieting as the “Salad and chocolate” diet. Much catchier than “Atkins” if you ask me…)

So I got “convinced” to be on this diet with Mandrina, and we started Friday night (I’m down two-three pounds in three days, so… *shrug*). On Saturday, we had a panic with Pixel’s health — he spent 24 hours at the emergency clinic under observation, but he’s fine now, thanks for asking — and I ended up going to work with Mandrina for a few hours.

Unfortunately, there was some degree of hunger involved, so we stopped at MacDonald’s. Have you ever tried to eat a hamburger without eating the bun? While driving on the freeway? This Atkins fad strikes me as a fast way to an accident. Which is not the cause for the title of the post.

This is: Mandrina and I spent the day Saturday on the road, and got home late. We went out grocery shopping yesterday, and got Pixel from the vet. We also went to Old Navy so I had enough clothes for our upcoming trip. In all these trips, our hands were rather full coming home. So we never took out the near-empty soda cups from McDs on Saturday.

Apparently, Diet Coke + ice => a substance that can dissolve within two days whatever material those McD’s soda cups are made of. So now I have sticky soda-water on my car’s center console. I’m not too happy. I think next time, we’ll go to Arby’s.

Filled under: Day-to-Day, Living, Wine, Woman By: Andrew Tags: ,
Posted on: June 12, 2006 2 Comments »