Anterior Shooter

 Good morning world!  My local temp was 38 (F) this morning; being above freezing is better than below.  As I'd said a few days back, temps are going to be rather steady for the next few days... weeks, possible.  We are in what might be called an Autumnal Holding Pattern.  Cool, but not cold nights with daily temps climbing up into the mid to upper 50s (F).  I can live with this.

I worked yesterday.  To my surprise, another one of my measures sold making me the number one Sales Specialist in the department.  Not bad for a part-timer.  One of our full time specialists is going out for minor surgery in a few weeks, after that he'll come back for a few weeks and then retire.  He and I talked about it for a bit.  When he comes to work, he works, not that I don't do that too, but I'm more sociable. I have chitty chats with customers, as well as employees.  He focuses on the minutiae of an install and ends up creating problems.  Where I can sell an install in 5 minutes, it often takes him 45 minutes.  He said he's thinking about volunteering possibly with the community theater as an usher, and I thought, hhhmm, that's nice.  It didn't sound as if he had any real type of plan.  When you retire, you end up with a lot of free time and unless you have specific goals set out, you will end up sitting around waiting to die.

Today's going to be one where a lot gets done.  I know this because my second load of laundry has just finished up in the washer and is waiting to be hung out to dry.  And there is a lot to be done.

I do have a Facebook account, mostly to keep in touch with my Navy buddies and some friend; I don't have the patience to sit and scroll my way to Hell.  This morning they showed me a memory from 10 years ago: a pic I took of my spinal CAT scan.  If you click on it and blow it up you can see that L4 and L5 had already fused.  L3 and L4 had already shot out the disk jelly and were in the processing of fusing.  And the disk between L2 and L3 was in the process of getting rid of its disk jelly.  Whereas most people with disk problems shoot their disk jelly out the back.  Not me.  I'm an anterior shooter, meaning I shoot from the front.

Of course there are many videos of Dementia Don in Japan doing what he does best: dementiating.  If you're on social media, you got to seem him wandering away from the Japanese Prime Minister.   You got to see him pausing and staring straight ahead until she gave his lower arm a little pull to get him moving again.  And, of course he gave one of his dementiated speeches to a group of soldiers stationed in Japan.  Stephen Miller is running the government.  I'm thinking the GOP is in deep shit.  Almost every Congressman and Senator gave him their unwavering support because they believed he was going to our first king.  I'm also thinking many of them are now beginning to understand that they screwed the pooch because it's too late for them to have a change of mind.  And all the while prices continue to rise and jobs disappear.  Now is when they should be anterior shooters, and they're finding out they can't even shoot from the rear.

Oh, Canada!

 We're chilly this morning.  According to Accuweather, our outside temp was 39 (F) when I rolled out of bed.  We might hit 55 (F) today.  That's fine.  I don't mind Autumn.  In fact, I enjoy all of our 4 seasons.  Let's be honest, who doesn't mind snuggling under warm blankets in the dead of winter, maybe it's because so many of us enjoy that wombish feeling.  And summer, it's just as nice to strip off those blankets because in our hearts we all really enjoy... stripping?

My back is a little stiff this morning, so I must have turned the wrong way in my sleep.  Being someone who's had to deal with some serious back issues, I am well versed in what needs to be done.  Besides my morning meds of Lisinopril, Atorvastatin, and Omeprazole ('ve a tiny hiatal hernia), I took two Naproxen.  Most backaches are caused by inflammation.  For me, 2 things work:  Naproxen and walking.  I'm driving down to the Lebanon VA to get my annual flu shot and Covid vaccine.  That place is big, so I'll be getting a lot walking in.  This afternoon, I'll be getting another bike ride in, maybe I'll be somewhere in Spain.

I did work yesterday.  It was so slow.  Our Halloween decorations are almost sold out.  Here's a hint for those of you who like outdoor Halloween decorations:  wait until the reduced tags make an appearance.  Right now our decorations are all 50% off.  Oh, and in case you're wondering, we're still making a profit on those markdowns.

And the Orange Anus is lava angry with Canada because they ran an anti-tariff ad quoting the Republican Demi God Ronald Reagan.

Holy Crap!  Thank you Ontario for setting fire to his Depends.  For those who haven't heard Reagan's message calling for Free Trade, he talks about how tariffs lead to retaliation, and how retaliation leads to terrible economic woes.  So, what does the Orange pedophile in what's left of the White House do?  He retaliates.  You can bet Ontario expected this.  You see the world is so over Orangie.  By now, most countries know how to play him, and play him they do.  They are moving past the United States and finding other more reliable trading partners.  In a world economy, isolationism is not a good thing.  Because of corporate greed, most manufacturing jobs have moved over seas.  Those jobs are not going to come back unless a majority of Americans decided to take a very large pay cut.  Believe me, the American people will stomp the shit out of the conservative movement before that happens. 

To fuse or not to fuse, tis not really the question

Looks like I'm going to have a Laminechtomy on May 6.  I can't wait.  Of course, I had to do a little research to find out just what Laminae are, I mean let's be honest, the term does sound slightly vulgar doesn't it?  And it doesn't exactly sound gender neutral, either.  I mean, how many guys have you heard saying "damn, I'm having a problem with my lamina?"  Hearing some guy say that, and working in the Home Improvement field, I'd immediately think he was having trouble installing a counter-top.  Of course I'd be wrong, lamina has nothing to do with Formica, or any similar product.  We do, however, all have them.

That's right, they're in our spine.

They're also going to fuse some of my vertebrae together, and, of course, I needed to do some research.  What I found out was surprising.  In 2011 over 488,000 people in the United States had their spines fused.  That's more then 1300 a day.  They accounted for over 3.1% of all hospital visits.  Isn't that amazing!  If you had asked me a month ago how many people underwent this procedure yearly, I'd have estimated about 2000.  Education, isn't it wonderful.