I wouldn't be doing this past week justice if I didn't talk about the food. Such wonderful specialties and old time favorites were eaten in the name of the holidays. You ask, but aren't you on a diet? I reply, no we aren't. We are eating healthy and exercising. In doing so, we've both lost weight and gotten in better shape. However, we are simply leading a healthy lifestyle which includes occasional splurging on tasty treats guilt free. Since we aren't on a diet plan, there is no cheating. All the better for us, because Thanksgiving included some can't-miss delights. The first noteworthy meal was not a traditional American Thanksgiving meal, but a lunch out for Japanese food. Christopher ordered maguro nigiri and tekkamaki, and I ordered a lunch bento that included teriyaki salmon, edamame, steamed veggies, rice, and miso soup.

As you can see, delicious! The fish was very fresh, well cut, and constructed beautifully. I didn't take a photo, but my bento was equally stunning in a pretty bento box-style dish. Bringing the cuisine back stateside, the next meal stayed in the realm of seafood. We were beckoned by the host of a restaurant to try crab as it was the first week of harvest. Oh man, so good. Normally, I would not go for crab at a restaurant because of the price and the work involved. I generally don't like my meals messy. However, the price was right due to the harvest specials and the mess was more than worth it. The meal was started with a savory yet creamy cup of clam chowder. This was accompanied by the best sourdough I've ever tasted. And of course, the crab was the star of the show. What's Thanksgiving without a casserole or two? The last food-foto I took was of my mom's stellar breakfast casserole. This year she really knocked it out of the park. It's always good, but something about this one was a chart-topper. The casserole includes eggs, cheese, bread, and sausage with a few other ingredients rounding it out. I took the photo while the casserole was still bubbling immediately out of the oven. It rested a little bit before we enjoyed its offerings with our morning coffee. And of course, what I'm remembering now are numerous other candid food moments that I neglected to catch on "film" to record in our Thanksgiving memories. There was the breakfast burrito, the Happy Chopped Salad, the baked sweet potatoes, the pumpkin spice lattés, the crèpes, and oh the cake! We were lucky to have a week to cover all that ground and not only one day.

Read More...

I had my follow up appointment with the specialist after having had the NCS on my wrist. My appointment was at 3:30pm. I arrived at about 3:20pm. They didn't call me until 4:05pm, so I spent a good amount of time with a book in the waiting room ignoring the chatter of small children (2) who were there with their parents. Luckily, I remembered to bring the book; otherwise, I might have been bored for my 45 minute wait.

The nurse took me back and took my blood pressure. He asked if I had low blood pressure. I told him it was usually the low side of normal. I said that's I'd just spent a relaxing 45 minutes reading a book and that could explain the low blood pressure. He seemed to think that was funny.

Talking with the doctor, it seems I have nueropraxia. There was latency in the amount of time it took the electric signal to reach the nodes in my finger tips, and this is what confirms the diagnosis. Basically, the nerve has been smushed. It can be done through athletics, which I did a lot of growing up. Also, the icing on the cake would be when I fell directly onto the outer part of my wrist. I did this while running and on concrete. Definitely enough to smush my nerve.

I had gotten a wrist brace to wear to as not to agitate the situation, thinking it might be carpal tunnel (see previous post). However, per the doctor's orders, I'm not to wear it at all, and I should do my activities as normal. Instead, I am supposed to massage the site with vitamin E (I bought d-alpha vitamin E softgels), and use a stress ball to strengthen the muscles around the nerve. Doing so will help the nerve regrow/heal as much as it can.

So, there you have it. The case of the tingling hand solved.

Read More...