A thunk, dissected

There was that wonderful run on Sunday. But the rest of the weekend I sat too much, and I could feel it in my low back and hips.

Monday I hoped the swim would help. I had a nice chat with Katie for about 15 minutes, then swam 1.5 K (first time for that in quite a while) in 29:30 or so. Most of it was pretty easy, but I was struggling with my nose clips till I took a break for a second and put them on the right way. Then it was good. Stretched a little after, with a few minutes in the hot tub too.

Hips and low back still hurting. Stood at work almost all day.

Tuesday was a dreadful start. It's a good thing the liquor stores aren't open at 7am or I'd have been pouring scotch into my coffee. There was lots of Grrr. Then a morning dissecting that particular bit of grrr, so I could explain exactly what was wrong. There were several unhappy people by the time I was done, and I was feeling better. I suspect there will be still more unhappy people as the ripples spread.

Stood all day, hips and back still hurting. Leaning against the stair railing at home, it hurt to pick up my foot to take off my shoes. Lots. Breathing and straightening up, and shifting my balance hurt at unexpected times.

I slithered downstairs to my mat, and slowly and gently started to stretch. A few seconds in and I could tell my back liked it. I was on my back, both knees off to the right. I let my knees settle, and there were little creaking sounds as some of the muscles gently stretched. I stayed like that for a while.

Then I slowly flopped my knees over to the other side, and as they passed the mid-point I knew it would be good. I could feel my vertebrae slowly moving, the muscles shifting. I hadn't even got all the way when there was this wonderful, slow, sliding, drawn out, meaty, satisfying thunk. Not a sharp click that feels like something snapped. No, just a nice feeling of everything settling back into place, vertebrae talking to their neighbours again.

There was instantly less pain. I did some other stretches, with some residual tingling. But as soon as that thunk happened, I knew I could go for a run this evening. The matter had been very dubious before.

A few minutes later I was dressed and on the way out the door. I couldn't believe how good my legs felt. I decided to run exactly what my legs felt like doing, and it turned out to be 4 K, 27:30. It felt great! Breathing nice and easy, not getting too sweaty. My cadence gradually dropped throughout, so this is something I'll have to work on, and my pace gradually increased. See for yourself. I finished it while it was still good.

Then off to write club. They're trying out a second location in the SW, not all that far from home, so I thought I'd try it. Perhaps this will be where lots of my NaNoWriMo activity will take place. So far so good, though the wifi is really slow.

Cat photo reward for getting this far! This is what literary criticism looks like in our house.

This is complaints about not getting a lap.