Purple weights

Not me.

OK, so that's another 30 minutes of treadmill and 30 minutes of bike-machine, plus a bunch of weight lifting today. I got home, a little wobbly, and had a huge attack of "LIE DOWN AND GO TO SLEEP RIGHT THE HECK NOW!!" But it seems to be passing. I wonder if it's some kind of blood sugar thing. Or maybe the four cups of tea has just perked me up unnaturally.

So today, there I was, sitting in front of the same mirror as this guy sitting on another weight-lifting seat-chair thingy, and we were both doing the same things with our arms at the same time, and it was hilarious because there I was struggling with these little girly purple - yes, purple, - weightlets and I was all scrinchy-faced and huffy, and the guy was lifting 15 k in each hand. In real weight, that's like thirty freaking pounds! In each hand! He was, I hasten to add, also making the scrinchy-faces and huffy noises, but seemed to have a deal more justification.

Every time I go to the gym, the same thing happens, I get there and I'm all, Oooo, I'm at the gym! and I'm going to be the best looking old person in town! See, I figure it's a big accomplishment to have left the house while wearing clothes that aren't my pjs, and be going to an actual, real gym! And then I get on the treadmill and I'm doing the fast-walking and thinking, look how fast I'm walking! Gonna be Angelina any day now!

And then I notice that the treadmill and bike-machine setting is on 2 (and it goes to 25) and the "weights" are like the kind of weights you'd imagine Paris Hilton picking because they match her purple chihuahua, and I look down and that podgy jiggly gooey thing is still right the heck there in front of me...

Oddly, I actually really like it. They're very nice to you, and it's weirdly fun to concentrate on doing this purely physical thing that you know is good for you and is actually pretty hard to do. And, given what my brain has to pay attention to during working hours - the end of the world and whatnot - having to concentrate on the simplest thing, the immediate here and now ("Thirty more?! Seriously? You saw the scrinchy-faces for the first 15 right?") and beat each challenge each time, feels really great.\

And the place is quite the nicest one I've been to.

First, it's not in Rome, which means I can get there without having to get on a train for an hour and struggle with Rome (for those who've never been, getting around Rome is always a struggle; remember all those dreams you've had where you're desperately running towards or away from something and your legs won't move and it's like you're running through molasses, and you're completely surrounded by chaos and there are inexplicably thousands of shrieking lunatics all around you and you've got no pants on? Rome's like that...) which means I'll actually go to it. I signed up last year for a gym club/Pilates studio in Rome and it was pretty great, but was such a fight to get there I just gave up.

This place is brand new and in Santa Mar., which means I will actually turn up. And it's staffed basically by one person, the owner/ trainer and the Pilates guy who's just there for class time. She and Francesco the Friendly Pilates Guy do this thing of kind of diagnosing you to see what stuff you need to do, how fast and hard you have to do it, kind of where you are to start with, and they coach you through individually. Even in the Pilates class everyone does slightly different stuff at slightly different rates and with different intensity, according to what they need. So you don't have the feeling of being way wimpier than everyone else. You just toodle along at your own rate with a personalised programme.

And, being Italians, everyone there is very nice and friendly. And they're all quite curious about what a Canadese is doing there. I've given my "I've had cancer treatments and am recovering" spiel so many times in Italian now that I'm getting quite good at it. That and counting to twenty.

Anyway, at least I've been getting a Rosary in every day now. The treadmill is kind of boring, so it's good for the boringest prayer in the Catholic world. And you can offer up all the frustration and embarrassment and the non-Angelinaness of yourself at the end. It's just GOT to be worth something in Purgatory, right?



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The mummy lives!

Well, here's the report on the experiment so far: that's more or less a month of Pilates and gym workouts, three or four times a week for an hour+ per time, and I'm happy to report that I'm feeling a lot better. I'm starting to get less stiff in general and more stretchy; my back doesn't hurt any more when I wake up. Today I wasn't tired at the end of the Pilates session and it's nearly eleven now and I'm not stiff or achey or tired. Stuff that wore me out and was really difficult or close to impossible is now too easy. So much so that I think I'm going to have to step it up a bit.

I was on the treadmill yesterday for 35 minutes, just walking but really fast, and on the recumbent "bike" for 20 minutes (9.5 km) plus did a bunch of weights and crunches and whatnot. It wore me out plenty, I won't lie, and when I got home, I was out like a light for 2 hours. But naptime ended naturally and was only two hours, not my usual disastrous four. And I was able to think clearly enough after to get some work done. And today I was fine. Perky, even after Pilates. Back for PE class tomorrow, so we'll see if it's any better.

One thing that's really obvious is a general improvement in strength and cardio endurance. I've been riding my bike around town a lot, at least 20 minutes a day most days, and simply, there are hills that I sail up now that I had to get off and push before. Biking is just plain easier and more fun, less work. I've been amazed that I can handle 35 minutes on the treadmill at 5.8 - 5.4 km/h without any trouble.

Something I noticed right away was that all this jumping around, while fun and good for me, just makes me sleeeeepy. Like I've been drugged. And it was coming in these weird attacks all of a sudden; I'd be home from the gym and putting groceries away or getting the tea on, and all of a sudden I'd have to just about crawl off to the nearest horizontal surface, as if someone had hit me with a dart. It was like that for the first couple of weeks after starting just the Pilates three times a week, and then got better. Then I started the extra PE class that is a lot harder and it started again. So I expect I'll adjust again, and maybe will see this effect each time I jump things up a notch. We'll see. And meantime, there ain't nothin wrong with naps.

Is it possible to come back to life, and get to a point where you're generally healthier and stronger than you were before All That? I don't know yet, but it's starting to look pretty hopeful. I haven't stepped on the scale again, and won't for a bit yet. I'm with you all, I don't think it matters very much. I'm quite interested in boosting metabolism, though, which takes a considerable amount of work.

I'm also getting pretty concerned about bone density which is something really affected a lot by both chemo and (h-word), so I'm looking now for a few videos of high impact aerobics. As far as I can tell, there isn't much that can be done for postmenopausal women, but what there is seems to be just a hell of a lot of exercise. Which is fine by me. The other thing is the drug I'm on, and will be on for years and years... basically for the rest of my life. Its main function is to help stave off osteo, but the exercise and green veg rule can't do any harm, I figure. I haven't been tested yet for bone density, but we've got to wait now until the end of the summer (medical things in Italy don't really happen much in summer). Which will give me enough time to see if the high impact thing can work.

I've also, finally, totally cut out sugar and grains. I was cheating regularly, with an ice cream here or there, a bit of bread with dinner in a restaurant and I was having a lot of honey. I've found a place that sells stevia and the only thing I use it for is my yogurt/cream/fruit/egg milkshake in the mornings. No more honey at all, and the big jar I bought over a month ago is still in the cupboard. I'm still guzzling fruit like it's going out of style, but I think it's OK as long as the exercise level stays the same or increases.

And every day, as I'm carrying my bike and a bunch of grocery bags up the stairs to my flat, I remember that two years ago, at the end of third chemo, I couldn't make it at all, and had to be carried myself. I couldn't walk around my apartment and had to have a chair in the bathroom to sit on while I brushed my teeth.

So, win.

"Thus saith the Lord God unto these bones; Behold, I will cause breath to enter into you, and ye shall live:

And I will lay sinews upon you, and will bring up flesh upon you, and cover you with skin, and put breath in you, and ye shall live; and ye shall know that I am the Lord.

_

Sound of Thunder Game - bumped up

We've been having such great responses to the Sound of Thunder Game, I thought we should bump it up. So far my favourites have been Sinéad with "To sleep with the fishes Margaret Sanger. To advise Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens and The Big Bopper not to get on that plane." And "Childermass" with "To warn: I'd put together a DVD tour of mainline and Evangelical Protestantism with all their bastard children (Catholic Modernists included) and make Martin Luther watch it 20 times in a row."

(btw: Childermass, the only reason your offering wasn't deleted was it made me laugh out loud, for realsies. Please see the commbox rules posted to the sidebar to the left regarding the use of assumed names, monickers and pseudonyms. We're very strict around here about using real or plausible sounding names.)

I call it the "Sound of Thunder" game.

Everyone will know the general gist: you meet someone with a time machine who says you can go back in time and kill one person in order to change, and hopefully improve, the course of history.

So, tell who you would pick and the rest of us get to guess why and how the course of history would be improved/changed.

Less violent variant, for those with delicate sensibilities, is to go back in time and give a single piece of information to a single person. Who would you pick, and what would you tell him?

I'll go first.

My first pick to shoot, would be William of Ockham.

Second pick would be Henry V of England while he was on campaign in France. And I would tell him, "Buddy, boil your water for ten minutes before you drink it."

OK, now you.

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Devilled Coratella

Just invented an English version of coratella di agnello. Basically it's my old Edwardian deviled kidneys recipe combined with lamb coratella. Awesome!

There's no way to pretty-up coratella. When presented with a plate of lamb's innards, heart, kidneys, lungs and liver, you're either gonna rub your hands in delighted anticipation or run for it. The Italians seem to be of two minds about it, but like all pure peasant food what sounds gross ends up being really great. I grew up on organ meats and have long resigned myself to being thought peculiar.

I must say it can be fun to hold up a lamb coratella in thumb and forefinger by the esophagus and chase your more squeamish roommates/kids/spouse around the apartment with it while cackling maniacally or yelling "And your little dog too!". I haven't had the opportunity to try this with lambs innards yet, but I've done it with a live blue crab purchased in Toronto's China Town, its many legs flailing grandly, and I can attest to its value as a stress-reliever.

I love the Italian way of doing coratella and will almost always get it if it's on the menu in a Rome restaurant, but have no idea how to do it myself. So, tonight I just did it the way the English used to do kidneys for breakfast. Lots of mustard and curry powder and lovely spicy gravy.

The English used to have it on toast in the mornings in the winter, and when I discovered the recipe I pestered Gerry the Butcher for as many pork and lamb kidneys as he could give me. As a lover of traditional English cookery, Gerry understood and he always saved them for me. It was another one of those things he said no one wanted any more (people eat nothing but chicken breast and ground beef) and we would shake our heads together and lament the disintegration of traditional British culture.


Take
1 coratella
1 onion
2 cloves garlic
dry mustard powder
curry powder
chicken stock or dry powder
dry ground ginger
cup or so of wine, red or white
ketchup or tomato paste

non-teflon pan. Mine is stainless and is the best frying pan I've ever had. Cast iron also good.

Cut up the meat into bitty bits, about forkfull size (getting rid of the yucky/anatomically interesting bits); dredge in a tbsp rice flour + a few shakes of ground ginger and set aside.

In a small mixing bowl, combine
2 tbsps dry mustard
1 tbsp chicken powder
1/2 tbsp curry powder
2 tbsp ketchup
cup red wine

Slice an onion and some mushrooms and a clove or two of garlic and saute in the pan with some olive oil (remember, keep the heat down!) until the mushrooms start releasing their juice. Turn the heat up and add a little more olive oil and add the meat. Cook in the pan with the mushrooms and onions until the rice flour has started to stick to the pan and the meat is starting to sear. Keep stirring, scraping the pan a lot so the nice stuff on the bottom of the pan doesn't burn. This can be a little tricky because you want the meat to sear but want to avoid letting the rice flour make a paste on the pan which will burn. And you have to do it at a fairly high heat or the meat won't sear. Just keep scraping the bottom of the pan. No teflon! Teflon bad!

After just a couple of minutes of this, when the meat has started to sear nicely, all in one go add the sauce and stir the whole thing in the pan until there is no crunchy stuff on the bottom of the pan and it's all incorporated into and thickening the sauce. The back of a fork works better for this than a wooden spoon. Essentially you are deglazing the pan only with all the meat and stuff in there already. Add a little more wine or water if it's too thick or sticking.

Once the sauce is thickened (and there's nothing stuck to the bottom of the pan) and simmering, turn the heat way down and pop the lid on to finish cooking the meat. About ten mins. tops.

Eat.



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Let's play a game!

I call it the "Sound of Thunder" game.

Everyone will know the general gist: you meet someone with a time machine who says you can go back in time and kill one person in order to change, and hopefully improve, the course of history.

So, tell who you would pick and the rest of us get to guess why and how the course of history would be improved/changed.

Less violent variant, for those with delicate sensibilities, is to go back in time and give a single piece of information to a single person. Who would you pick, and what would you tell him?

I'll go first.

My first pick to shoot, would be William of Ockham.

Second pick would be Henry V of England while he was on campaign in France. And I would tell him, "Buddy, boil your water for ten minutes before you drink it."

OK, now you.



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Philosophy geeks

"I've got an appointment with my ontologist for a metaphysical".



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CIPN

Chemotherapy-induced peripheral neuropathy.

It's what I have. It started shortly after I came home from First Chemo and got so bad that I was unable to walk and had to be taken to emerge in Civitavecchia one day because I couldn't stop crying from the pain. It gives me a feeling in my fingers and feet like you get when you whack your funny bone. If I touched anything hard, like turning a key in a lock, opening a yogurt tub (those razor-sharp plastic tub edges!) doing up buttons or typing, would send firey little shocks of pain, like electricity, up my fingers. It made my coordination poor and I would often drop things and trip on things and I found I would make a lot more typos, and my typing speed slowed way down. I fell down some marble stairs once because I couldn't feel my feet. Sometimes the sudden unheralded lances of pain would just shoot up my legs and arms and I would fall. As it got worse, it felt like my hands and fingers were swelling up and burning, like the fingertips were going to explode. My skin got ultra-sensitive, so much that I couldn't stand to have the shower on me on full, and had to keep it down to a trickle.

It's nerve damage as the chemo drugs eat the cell structures that allow the nerves to grow. About 30% of chemo patients get it, and no one really knows why it happens and there is very little that can be done to treat it. With most people, it gets better by itself, but very, very slowly. And with some people, again for no reason anyone understands, it just never clears up completely.

I was on huge gobs of opioid painkillers for over a year. I slowly weaned myself off the Contramal through the winter, and the neuropathy hasn't been much of a problem, though my right foot still felt funny. It was going away, I thought.

Until a couple of weeks ago. It started coming back with the shooting pains and tingly feet and aching arms and fingertips. The other day, I realised that touching hard things was getting difficult and I found it hard to hold the pencil I was drawing with. I've started turning the shower down again. Today, though, my feet and fingers are on fire and I'm sitting here typing this very slowly with the flats of my fingers instead of the tips, to try to make it hurt less.

The only thing I can think of is that it's the exercise. I went to the gym this morning to start the extra work-outs and everything was fine. I had no problem doing 1/2 an hour on the treadmill and held up pretty well to the other stuff. I was there an hour. I was pretty tired after, and it was quite hot out, so I got in the shower, and it was awful. I had to turn the shower way down. The rest of the day, my fingers and toes have been burning and now the pressure is building up in my fingertips.

What the hell?! It's been two bloody years since chemo!



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Hope and change

Feeling slightly better about Western Civilisation? Seeing faint glimmers of hope from afar off?

Here, let me help you with that.



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Meet the next generation

Anti-choicers are nothing more than a bunch of bitter, angry old white guys...




oh wait.


Alissa Golob, Sharon-Rose Milan, Stephanie Gray and Lia Mills.


And my old buddy, Jojo Ruba


There! There's an old-ish white guy. He might be angry...you never know.

Here, you can go learn how to make the case, and become a cranky old white guy like us.



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Fatty

Well, that's annoying: stepped on the scales last night and found that I'd gone up 1.4 kilos since starting exercise classes. This is especially vexing since I was starting to think that I was looking slightly better. Francesco the Helpful Pilates Guy said it's because I've started putting on more muscle mass but haven't started burning fat yet. He and the gym owner/trainer have decided to take me on as a project, starting tomorrow morning. I'm an experiment, to see if an old lady whose had her metabolism more or less surgically removed can be brought back to life. I spose it couldn't hurt. Or at least won't do me any harm.

I've collected an array of fun exercise videos and it's a funny thing that I can actually get motivated to do it just by watching a couple of them. It just looks like fun, and I can hear my brain saying, "Hey, let's try that, I bet it will feel good." And oddly, it does. My secret is to put the exercise video on one window and my 80s club and synthpop mix playlists on another window, turn the sound off on the exercise video and just remember how much fun it was to dance in clubs in my 20s.

What the hell. No one's watching except the cat. And she's very open-minded.



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