New Wheels for the Bumbling Bicycler

Here's a photo of my new girlie bike! I'm even having it fitted with a wicker basket on the front for runs to the market and picnics in the park! Given that my broken wrist of last summer still sends me occassional reminders of my spectaclular wipeout, I plan to start riding around a track before hitting the trail. To those of you who have reminded me that the term is cyclist, let me assure you I'm not at even the beginning level of one of those. I'm still a bumbling bicycler, remember?

In other news of the day, we had a lovely urban adventure in Bellevue today. We had a chilly walk around the downtown park, lunch at a Chinese restaurant with excellent salt and pepper squid, and browsed around the mall and bookstore. We may even have found a sofa for downstairs!

Playing and Reading

Alex playing dollhouse.

Ari and Anni reading a story.

Today was another warm, sunny day. The garden smiled.

We had another busy day. I had my PT appointment this morning. The bumbling bicycler can now raise her arm. Anni had speech and assistive tech appointments this afternoon. Alexander cooked up a very spicy pasta for dinner tonight. Ari and I had our writing group this evening. And David gave the telescope a look to see if he could spot Jupiter in the night sky.

Congratulations to Ari for getting her first job! Now, about that rent (just kidding!).

Many thanks to Karen and her sis for the pasta machine. We'll give it a test run this weekend!

Back to school joy

The utter joy of back to school. See Alex's ecstactic look of ecstacy as he begins his computer work? Ari is so daunted by her upcoming college schedule that she's taken to hiding behind her curly locks! Just kidding. They are actually kind of excited about their new subjects, specifically Alex wants to get going with life science and Ari is looking forward to archeology.

Anni had a great day to restart her Yoga program, most of it was outside today. She down dogged and chanted while I harvested plums from our friend's tree. The kids also went blackberry picking with David this afternoon. We love free fruit! The garden yielded another oodle or two of tomatoes today.

We had a BBQ for dinner tonight with WA coast salmon with blackberry-chipotle sauce, rosemary (front yard) fingerling potatoes (farmer's market) with baby carrots (garden), and a tomato (garden), cucumber (CSA), and lettuce salad (farmer's market) with dijon vinegrette (homemade in kitchen), and fresh blackberries (field across the street) for dessert.

After dinner and clean-up, we took the telescope out to the back yard and looked at the moon. It was a clear sky and we could even see the individual craters on the moon! Very cool.

In the continuing saga of the ballad of the bumbling bicycling, I saw the bone specialist today. The wrist is still broken in two places and I'm back in the splint for another month. Alex calls it mom's gauntlet of unlimited power. I kind of like that (but only for the peaceful pursuits of ecological good.)

Demonic dog takes over chair

Barkley, the wunder hund, exhibited a frightening side of his otherwise friendly nature. He turns into demonic dog while sleeping, with stiff limbs and wild eyes and intermittent grunts and whines. We all love his silly long legs!

Today was another sunny one. Yahoo! a couple in a row. The garden is smiling. It was another busy day. Anni had appointments all day!

Then we did some weeding and plant clean up in the front yard. Tomorrow we tackle the weeds in the garden (yet again!). The tomatoes are coming in like gangbusters now! Anni and I are in tomato heaven! Yum!

The results of the MRI on the bumbling bicycler (me) are in, and ...(building suspense and awe)...I have a fractured radius, right at the wrist and major inflamation and -itises in three parts of my shoulder joint. Well, that explains the ouchies and why one should never mix speed with rapid encounters with gravity and ground. So, I'm off to see the bone doc and more PT - oh joy!

This evening's local meal featured Cod from the WA coast, a pasta salad full of garden tomatoes, market peppers, and CSA celery, and a fruit compote of CSA mango and market plums. It was tasty and light. My cholesterol level is smiling (and hopefully heading downward!).

A minor correction: the brown sugar listed as one of this month's exceptions should have been brown sauce, a very British concoction that we all dearly love on breakfast potatoes.

Definitely not claustrophobic

Ferocious Alchemy Kitty defends against equally ferocious toy snake.

Today the sun came out for an hour or two. The tomatoes smiled, and the slugs retreated. The kids are also smiling at the thought of less green tomato dishes.

I had the MRI's on my wrist and shoulder today. I didn't look at the needle going into my shoulder which is probably a good thing because the hole it left was really big! I spent a total of nearly two hours in the MRI! So, I know for 100% certain that I am NOT claustrophobic. What was the result? I'm not quite sure. The tech wanted to know when I was seeing my doc again and then suggested I make it sooner. The he said I shouldn't use, put any weight on, or pressure my wrist in any way. I asked if it was broken. He said, "I'm not allowed to say, but don't use it." Guess I'll find out next week??? He didn't say a word about the shoulder which is what has been bothering me the most. Go figure!

Ballad of a Bumbling Bicycler

All was quiet on the garden front. We haven't been quite as active as we would like on the construction front in the backyard farm. This should explain why:

Ballad of a Bumbling Bicycler

As part of our upcoming sustainability project and in an effort to both reduce my carbon footprint and the size of my rumpus, I decided to go for a bike ride with my buddy, Lisa. As I’m a fairly decent runner and swimmer, I had dreams of triathalon glory if only I could remaster the fine art of cycling in the open air. I had thoughts of all the money I’d save, being able to leave the Prius in the driveway and cycle over to the farmer’s market, but first I had to stay upright.

So one fine Sunday morning in July, we unloaded our bikes on the Sammamish River Trail near Woodinville. Lisa, looking the part of an experienced cycler in appropriate gear on a well put together bike, and me on David’s old bike, too big, with a seat that kept twisting itself off to one side. After figuring out just how to get my leg over the “male” bar, balance, and take off, we rode along at a slow speed for a couple of mile.Then we hit a curve and I hit the grass, left hand first. Yowie! After a few minutes of howling and jumping up and down, we continued our ride for a couple of mile more, until my left wrist began to swell and change colors. We decided to head back.

All was going slow and well until we hit the dragonfly bridge underpass near the winery. Here, the trail has a sharp little curve combined with a quick vertical dip. That combined with a sweet little old lady walking on the trail caused me to crash! The decision became whether to take out the lady or attempt to do so with one of the concrete pillars of the bridge. I took neither, opting instead to down the bike hard on the pavement, again with the left wrist hitting the pavement first, followed by the left shoulder, and the bike then slamming the pillar. The lady was spared. The bike and cyclist were not. My wrist was now really beginning to swell and purple and the bike chain had cut a serpentine track across my lower right leg that was dripping copious amounts of blood onto my sneakers.

So on that fine Sunday morning in July, we reloaded our bikes and headed to Evergreen ER. After X-rays, not broken, and a fiberglass splint, sprained wrist, I headed home to clean up my leg and ice up my wrist. But by the next day my hand was very purply, swollen like a lemon, and my wrist felt hot and itchy. After a trip to my doc’s office, I found I was allergic to the fiberglass. The splint was replaced with a neoprene one.

After many, many ice packs and several weeks, most of the wrist began to feel better, but the shoulder did not. The large bruise from the initial impact faded, and I thought perhaps it was just stiff from elevating and protecting the left wrist. I tried swimming to loosen it up. The breast stoke felt fine. The freestyle (crawl) was okay as long as I didn’t rotate the left arm too much, but then I attempted the backstroke. I thought I was going to die, drown right there in four feet of YMCA pool water!

After another trip to the doctor and a physical therapy evaluation, I’ve learned I may have damaged my rotator cuff in the left shoulder. I can’t raise the arm higher than shoulder level laterally or straight vertically or back. Now, I have two PT appointments weekly and am scheduled for an MRI on my wrist and shoulder next Friday.

I now believe the medical costs of my cycling endeavor far outweighs the potential gasoline cost savings. Ari says I need a girly bike with no “male” bar and upright handlebars so I can see where I’m going. Alex is offering me his old training wheels, and Anni says I can have her tricycle. David is still laughing!

In other news, while in the changing room of the pool today, a tiny trapped frog hopped on Anni. She screached and flung it my way. I caught it, and it is now a happy hopper in the garden patch.

The other hopper in the family is David. He's star hopping with Alex in the back yard tonight after putting together the telescope this afternoon (thanks Lisa). Are there supposed to be left over parts?