Health

The evil that is the can opener

A little over a week ago I went to open a can of beans to enjoy with my dinner. Beans are full of protein and yummy and strangely do not give me gas. Opening a can for dinner is about as mundane an event as you can get.

But not this time.

My can opener, which is a fairly good one, seems to have been getting a bit dull lately, talking about soap operas and going on about the weather. Worst, though, it was also not as sharp as it once was. This meant that sometimes after a full rotation around the lid it would not have pierced through the metal, requiring me to go ’round a second time. Not a big deal, it’s not like I’m going to blow a muscle doing it twice.

However, one of the side effects of the repeat at opening is the lid will sometimes have strands peel off. Since these are very thin and metal, they are most comparable to piano wire.

You may see where this is going.

After cutting the lid a second time, I lifted the can opener slightly while it was still gripping the lid. The lid pulled up, indicating all was well. I then released the opener and put it aside on the counter. I carefully pulled the lid off as always but this time I failed to notice the metal strand. This was a very generous strand, kind of like a King Strand or something, but still so thin as to be almost invisible. I rammed my thumb into it.

As the pain registered, I jerked the thumb back, momentarily puzzled because I still could not see what I had cut myself on. The thumb did not care, as it bled in copious amounts from a small but deep wound on the tip. I jammed it into my mouth to suck away the excess blood. Not wishing to sparkle and become otherwise vampiric, I took the thumb out of my mouth, at which point it continued to bleed with great vigor. I tried staunching it with a paper towel. My plan was to get the bleeding to settle down then apply a bandage. The paper towel quickly soaked and was generally not effective. The cut had formed a line that went around in a 3/4 circle. Had it completed the circle that fleshy little bit of my thumb would have been on the counter, in the can of beans or somewhere other than on my thumb where it belonged.

As I dabbed with the paper towel I noticed the would formed a kind of flap that could be opened (gushing blood) or closed (gushing blood, but less so). I felt a bit queasy. I decided to put a bandage over the thumb and then wrap another around that one, sealing off the top of the digit like one might cover up a cursed tomb. A cursed tomb that would not stop bleeding.

The thumb was tingling but after a few minutes there was no blood seeping through, so I vowed to leave it for 24 hours before having a peek.

When I did look it wasn’t as bad as I had feared. I kept bandages on it for about a week and a half before finally removing them and I’m pretty sure there will be a small scar when the healing bit is done. I have my ‘wrestled a mako shark’ story ready to go.

And the can opener? The next time I used it it created another impossible-to-see strand that I jabbed my index finger on. This time it wasn’t enough to draw blood. I calmly walked the can opener over to the garbage can, its new and permanent home. I have a new one now. It’s called the Little Beaver. As long as it doesn’t bite me, I think we’ll get along.

The thumb, about a week after being can opener’d:

Our education system demonstrated in Price Smart Foods

Ahead of me in the “dammit, I’m having an actual cashier serve me instead of using one of those robot self-serve thingers” line at Price Smart Foods the other day was a guy who looked to be in his mid to late 30s. He was not in what one would call prime physical shape so it was perhaps no surprise that he was buying a package of cigarettes (“Du Maurier KING size!” he admonished the cashier who could not seem to find this particular brand and size). Another cashier came along and was able to find the cancer-causing source of addictive pleasure he sought. His total rang up to $19.39. “Just like when World War II ended!” he chortled.

Yes, just like it if you were writing an alternate history version of Earth, maybe, Mr. “Du Maurier KING size”! At least he knew the year had something to do with World War II, so there is that.

In other random news, it was reported that Vancouver received less than 1mm of rain in July. It normally gets around 40mm. It’s been a little dry.

My grocery list

In case I ever become a famous author, here is my grocery list from today for someone to put in hardcover to see if it really would sell. It also highlights how unexciting my diet is and why I managed to lose 40 pounds.

  • fat-free cottage cheese
  • 3 hothouse tomatoes
  • 1 head of green leaf lettuce
  • Grape Nuts cereal (a friend refers to it as ‘dirt and sawdust’)
  • Tomato and balsamic rice crackers (this is my ‘fun’ food)
  • Vitasoy unsweetened soy milk (for the dirt and sawdust above)
  • 1 can 6-bean mix
  • 2 tomato & basil boneless & skinless chicken breasts (I usually make my own marinade but got lazy today)
  • 1 dozen large white eggs

I should note this is not an all-inclusive list since I walk to the store and have so far been unsuccessful in growing additional arms for carrying extra bags, but it’s a good overview of some of the staples I regularly pick up.

I am probably one of three people in North America to eat breakfast cereal with no processed sugar in it (zero in both the cereal and milk). I cheat a little by sprinkling a dozen fresh blueberries on top, though. Yum.

There are times when I use dried beans and others when I go for the can. The only thing I don’t like about dried beans is the long prep time (an hour or so), especially when it’s already quite warm inside. If I can (ho ho) I try to buy beans that are low sodium. Most stores offer this now.

The cottage cheese is my usual go-to snack for later in the evening. The veggies are for my turkey sandwiches, which are quite yummy, if I do say so. Eggs are for breakfast, obviously.

What’s missing from this list vs. one I would have made slightly more than two years ago: any processed food, sugary drinks and/or cookies.

I kind of miss the cookies.

Honey, I shrunk me

One of the pieces of info you are typically asked to provide on a profile for a dating site is your height. I had measured my height long ago and recalled it as being slightly under 5′ 11″. Don’t ask me what that is in metric, it’s one of those things my head never wrapped around, probably because the closest equivalent to a foot in metric is the decimeter. Now think of how often you hear people talking about decimeters.

Today I whimsically decided to measure my height using the good ol’ ‘mark a line with a pencil on the door frame’ trick. It turns out I either mis-remembered or mis-measured, as it seems I am actually under 5′ 10″ — about 5′ 9¾” to be a bit more precise. I may have to start using metric instead. 177.8 cm kind of sounds impressive.

I am not sure how I feel about being a full inch shorter than I had always thought but I don’t think I like it. I feel slightly less manly now.

I’m off to rip a phone book in half.

An earful

On June 12th I attended the Miss WESA competition at Celebrities. Being a drag show in a gay club you might imagine that there was loud dance music playing. You would be correct.

I have not been to a club of any sort in quite awhile so the experience left me a bit dazed, though I enjoyed the show. During the competition I was on the dance floor with several guys from the Vancity team. To our left several people would whistle every time someone came onto the stage or did something — anything, it seemed. Their whistles were of a high-pitched, squealing variety that would make dogs bark then go insane. I flinched every time. My left ear felt like it was being stabbed. I did not like this.

The next day my ears were ringing, which did not surprise nor even bother me. A few days passed, the ringing stopped and all was well. Or was it? Dun dun dun!

The answer is no, all was not well, alas. A week after the show I could hear a distinct ringing in the left ear that matched my heartbeat. It’s one of those sounds that once you hear it, once you notice it, it becomes very difficult to ignore. I tried and failed.

I went to the clinic and the doctor explained that the ear became irritated and fluid had built up. The artery near the eardrum was pulsing against the fluid, hence the ringing. He prescribed an aggressive steam treatment to clear the nasal passages and get it to ‘pop’. He recommended tea (I have tea!), hot showers (every day), a vaporizer (do not have) and maybe even a towel over the head with a steaming pot of water underneath (sure, why not?)

I tried all of these things except the vaporizer. Keeping your head under a towel while steam wafts into your face is not exactly an unpleasant experience but it is a rather damp one. I don’t recommend it.

Alas, after over a week of this I noticed no change and under doctor’s orders returned to the clinic for a reassessment. The second doctor said there was no fluid in the ear, so perhaps I misunderstood the first doctor. He theorized that there was inflammation or blockage in the nasal area and prescribed a nasal spray I am to use for a week. Two shots in each nostril twice a day. I started this treatment today and I offer two observations:

1. This better work!
2. Shooting a liquid up your nose is grossbuckets.

Next time I’m wearing earplugs.

Updated photo galleries

I’ve made a few updates to ye olde Photo Galleries, adding several to the School Photos section (not sure why some of the photos aren’t linking to each other, still sorting that out). I still marvel over what I thought was pretty stylin’ hair back in junior high and high school. In my defense, I can claim to have never worn bell bottom jeans. I think. I’ve also added some photos that were taken yesterday (June 29) by Denis in a gallery cleverly called June 29, 2010. The outdoor shots were taken in Nelson Park, safely away from the ‘all dogs poop here’ area.

The contrast between me in June 2010 and July 2008 (not quite a month after I totally changed my diet) is interesting, to say the least. Not only did I lose about 40 pounds, I also shed my full beard, got rid of my big-ass glasses and generally became a lot healthier.

July 2008:

[singlepic id=32 w=320 h=240 float=]

June 2010:

[singlepic id=81 w=320 h=240 float=]

This is why you don’t refuse sunscreen

Yesterday I was at a WESA softball game. Unlike most spring days, it was actually sunny and warm. Prior to game start I was offered some sunscreen. For some reason I was convinced I was impervious to the sun and declined the offer.

This is the result:

Yes, I am dumb but perhaps a smidgen more humble today than I was yesterday. I will now look for “Sunburning for Dummies” on Amazon.

Aye, eye

I had my annualish eye exam today and nothing unusual to report. My near vision is slightly worse, as to be expected of “men of your age”, as the doctors like to phrase nowadays. To be especially thorough, the optometrist put drops in my eyes to fully dilate the pupils. I had 20 minutes to kill while the drops did their thing, so I went to the bookstore, which is about the most useless place you can go if your pupils are dilated because everything is keeningly bright and out of focus. After my less-than-satisfying browsing at the bookstore, I went to the washroom and checked out my eyes while washing my hands. The look is alarming. By that it means I looked like I was alarmed and it wouldn’t stop.

I have an updated prescription and I think I may opt for a new pair of glasses with polarized lenses. Unlike the last few times I will probably drag along a friend to make sure I come out stylin’.

Weights: 1, Body: 0

Two days ago I resumed my weight-lifting regime after taking a number of months off to focus on my running. Because of the lengthy time away, I started with my ‘sissy’ 10 pound dumbbells. The workout went fine and all was well. I woke up around 3 a.m. that evening and was surprised that I did not feel sore at all! I reminded myself that I still had some time before I was out of bed.

The morning after I was sore as hell. It’s amazing how many muscles you don’t use while jogging. 😛 I am now re-acquainted with all of them.

Tomorrow I limber up with a 10k run then the next day I am back to the weights. I should be past the initial soreness within a week, I suspect.

I hope.

Fat World

CBC has a news story today about how Canadians’ Fitness Levels Plummet. Some findings:

  • the percentage classified as overweight or obese [since 1981] rose from 14 per cent to 31 per cent among boys, and from 14 per cent to 25 per cent among girls aged 15 to 19
  • based on BMI, 19 per cent of males and 21 per cent of females aged 20 to 39 years were classified as obese. By age 60 to 69 years, the percentage was about one-third.

A BusinessWeek story painted a similar picture for the U.S. with the “good news” being “obesity in the United States may finally be stabilizing instead of increasing”. One of the findings from the studies south of the border:

  • the adult study found the prevalence of overall obesity was 33.8 percent — 32.2 percent in men and 35.5 percent in women

I have written about weight loss and exercise before and I am utterly dismayed at these figures, especially after I found out something myself: unless you have some kind of medical condition that prevents or complicates it, achieving a healthy weight is simple. Here is all that’s required:

  1. Don’t eat junk food.
  2. Don’t eat fast food.
  3. Eat plenty of fresh fruit, vegetables and lean meat.
  4. Avoid processed food that is loaded with sugar and/or fat.

That’s it. Eat properly and your body will maintain its own natural weight. You may still be a bit thin or thick depending on your actual body type, but you’ll be the right weight for that body type.

Add in a modest exercise routine three times a week for 20-30 minutes to help out. More if you’re into it.

In June 2008 I weighed 187.5 pounds and was probably on my way to 200. I am a thin person so a lot of this weight was packed around my middle. I changed my diet to something sensible. This morning I stood on the scale and came in at 144 pounds. No magic pills, no special powders or drinks needed. Just a bit of willpower and the desire to stop feeling uncomfortable about my own body.

I wish more people would have the same sort of epiphany I did a year and a half ago (okay, so a doctor also told me I was pre-diabetic. That was the “epiphany-assist”).

And what’s the deal with McDonald’s being an Olympic Sponsor, anyway? Somehow I don’t see the medal winners chowing down on Big Macs and fries before they go for the gold. Or maybe they do and their freakishly perfected bodies somehow transform that junk into something with real nutritional value. Or they’re all fembots. Well, except the guys. They’d be malebots.

The Competition

Today’s run was around 11 a.m. on a cool but sunny Saturday (around 12ºC). I opted to go with just the usual short and t-shirt and will confess my hands felt like a pair of ice mitts by the time I got to the park. I resisted the urge to overdress and rightly so — I was sweating lightly within a few minutes.

However, in my rush out the door I had forgotten to make a stop in the loo and by the time I was at China Creek, my bladder was pointedly reminding me of this fact. A port-a-potty had been placed at the northwest corner of the park as part of a pilot project (a sign explained that it might be removed at the end of the month, based on public reaction).

Now, portable toilets are one of those things that are gross. No one ever says, “Wow, that sure was a nice port-a-potty!” You hold your nose, go in and do your thing as quickly as possible and without touching anything. I braced myself and opened the door. To my surprise, there was no odor at all, despite evidence that the toilet had indeed been used. I speculate the chemicals used to completely remove all trace of foul smell must be the kind powerful enough to bore straight through to the molten core of the planet and the toilet itself must therefore be made from the fused material collected from said core. There is no other explanation.

As usual, the start of the run was good but I was feeling a little logey by the 15 minute mark. It was also then that a shoelace came untied and I had to pause the workout to tie it, lest I stop running and do more falling on my face. There was a soccer practice/game underway and at one point an errant soccer ball made its way onto the path ahead of me. Today I would need to be vigilant not for delinquent girls but rogue sporting equipment. I continued on and right near the 5-minute mark a fellow jogger passed me. As you know, this is the official sign that It Is On. He widened the gap between us a little but not by much. I turned it up a notch, closing the gap and then passing him.

At the 2-minute mark The Competition passed me again. At this point in the run I am on my final lap and usually pick up the pace for the finish. The Competition was increasing his position ahead of me and it flickered through my mind that I may have to cede him the victory. But then I looked to the fountain by the path and realized that I was within reach of it — something I had never done before on the final lap. The Competition’s pace then flagged slightly, perhaps due to being comfortable with the lead or maybe due to tiredness. It didn’t matter. I turned on the afterburners. I intended to pass him and reach the fountain before the nice lady in my iPod announced the 35 minutes was up.

I felt good at this point — my stamina was easily keeping pace, the second wind having kicked in a few minutes earlier. My calves were holding up. The space between us began to shrink. I entered the final bend at the southwest corner of the trail, the fountain mere meters ahead on the right. I caught up and then strode ahead of him, reaching the fountain as I did so. A moment later, as if on cue, the iPod lady announced 35 minutes up, run complete. I came to a halt, allowing The Competition to pass me. He probably thought I was dicking around with him at this point. Just a coincidence, though — this time!

I went to get a victory drink from the fountain and found it wasn’t working. My one defeat.

I achieved a raft of personal bests on this run and Lance “I did not take steroids” Armstrong came on the offer his congrats. In all, I had my:

  • fastest km — 4.54/km (previous: 4:58)
  • fastest average km — 5.19/km (previous: 5:23)
  • greatest overall distance — 6.6 km (previous: 6.53)

Overall I have to say I’m pretty pleased with how it went. I feel pretty good tonight, too — none of my body parts are screaming at me.

Jogging: Of midgets and mud

After over-exerting my calves with last Friday’s run, I opted to delay Monday’s run to Tuesday morning. It was cool and a bit showery so I wore a jacket for the first time since starting. Across from the park a truck was unloading at a warehouse, so coming around the northeast corner of the trail I was met with the smell of diesel. Bleah. That was soon replaced, however, as the big metal doors were rolled up to accept delivery. As mentioned before, it’s a fish warehouse, so the ripe smell of raw fish was soon wafting over into the park. Fortunately with little wind to move it, it mostly hung to the one side of the trail. The run itself was deliberately low key to insure I did not re-injure my tender calves.

I had an annoying pain in my abdomen that had plagued me Tuesday night. It seemed unrelated to running since it didn’t hit until after I was in bed, which leads me to wonder how exactly I sleep. A webcam could shed disturbing and possibly amusing light on this but I think I’ll not go there. The pulled abdominal muscle delayed my usual Wednesday run to today (Thursday) but with the muscle no longer bothering me, I decided to push myself a little harder. Success came as I clocked my fastest km, breaking my previous mark of 5:01 by coming in at 4:58 and also my fastest mile, which my iPod informed me of at the end of the run via the voice of Tiger Woods. As we all know, golfers are pretty hardcore athletes. My overall distance was 6.52, a shade off my best of 6.53 and close enough to be a draw. I am going to try to do my usual Friday run so we’ll see how it goes with 24 hours between runs instead of the usual 48 or so.

Regarding the midgets and mud: the trail was a bit soft in a few spots due to earlier rain but it didn’t present a problem. Likewise, the wee lads playing soccer for the first half of my run did not punt a ball at my head, so all was well there. At a glance they really do look like midgets in their striped uniforms and shorts. Given that it was cool, cloudy and threatening to rain, I was the only one out on the trail jogging, though a few people were walking their dogs, none of which ran in my way and threatened to knock me down. Good boy(s)!