Neck issues

Alright, so the chiropractor said that I'm not allowed to really do anything physical until I go back on Thursday and he fixes me some more.

But in other news, as he was working on my neck, it felt SO good. If I were a cat (or a mithra), I would have purred. It was awesome. Although, ever since like an hour after that, my neck is nearly back to the usual hurting.

...and I'm the fucking pre-op?

The old couple were planning to go on a second honeymoon for
their 50th wedding anniversary.

The old woman said, "We will go to all the same places that we
did on our first honeymoon." "Uh huh," said the old man.

"We will do all the things that we did on our first honeymoon,"
said the old woman. "Uh huh," said the old man.

"And we will make love like we did on our first honeymoon,"
said the oldwoman.

"That's right," said the old man, "except this time 'round you've
had the operation."

"What does that have to do with it?" said the old woman

Her husband looks at her and says,
"It's my turn to sit on the side of the bed and cry, 'It's too big, it's too big!'"

chiropractor

So I went to the chiropractor today. Turns out I have a dislocated vertibre. GO ME!!! "Could be from all those years of skating and jiu jitsu...ya think?" So uhm, yeah, that's an issue.

He did electro shock theapy, and massage to loosen up the muscles. Until the muscles are loosened up, he can't re-set it. I laid on my back and he tried to pull my head straight up. Don't know if it worked. I laid on my stomach, and he tried to crack my back, and failed. He must have been trying for nearly 10 minutes, and my back is so tense it won't crack.

My neck still really hurts. Like super fucking bad hurts. But there is an increase in mobility. I can move my head farther to the left before the pain sets in. It hurts on the right side now. It's just more of a constant pain than one that comes and goes. Not entirely sure if this is progress or not. It still hurts to be at the computer because of the way my head tilts when I'm typing, and it hurts to chew, and swallow, and yawn. Consequentially, my online time is minimal.

I go back on Thursday.

heh farmer...

A farmer is sitting on the front porch of his house one hot
summer day, when this kid comes walking down the road carrying
a big bundle of wire.

“Hey kid!” the farmer says, “where ya goin’ with that wire?”
“Well,” the kid drawls, “this here ain’t just any ol’ wire,
this here’s chicken wire. I’m fixin’ to catch me some
chickens!”

“You can’t catch chickens with chicken wire!” says the farmer.
“Sure I can!” the kid says, and takes off down the road. He
comes back at the end of the day and sure enough, he’s got a
whole mess of chickens caught in his chicken wire.

Well, the farmer’s sitting on his porch the next day, and the
same kid comes walking down the lane, carrying a big roll of
tape. “Hey kid!” the farmer yells, “where ya goin’ with that
tape?” “Well, this here ain’t just any ol’ tape,” says the kid,
“this here’s duck tape. I’m fixin’ to catch me some ducks!”
“You can’t catch ducks with duck tape!” says the farmer. “Sure
I can!” the kid says, and takes off down the road. He comes
back at the end of the day and again, the farmer can’t believe
his eyes. The kid has a whole bunch of ducks all wrapped up
tightly in his tape.

The next day the farmer’s sitting on his porch again, and the
kid comes walking down the road carrying a stick. ”Hey kid!”
the farmer says, “where ya goin’ with that stick?” “Well, this
here ain’t just any old stick,” says the kid, “this here’s
pussy willow.” “Hang on,” says the farmer, “I’ll get my hat!”

I want to be a jelly fish

I would love to be a fucking jellyfish. They don't have spinal cords.

That's pretty much the only justification I have.

Around 11pm or so my neck started hurting.

From the center of my spinal cord, to the left, is all throbbing pain. It hurts when I don't do anything...it hurts when I turn my head to the right, or look up. It's absolutely fucking excruciating pain if I turn my head to the left, or look down. Fucking kills, actually. When this happens, my neck spasams, I get a shooting pain all the way down my spinal cord, and all the way into my hands, where my hands start to tingle, and I can feel my pulse in each and every one of my currently prune-ish finger tips.

I rubbed it a bit, it got worse. I've taken 3 showers and let the hot water beat down on me. I've taken 2000mg of Motrin since midnight. (strongest pain killer we have) I used this homeopathic creame called Traumeel, and it still fucking hurts. I tried to lay down a couple hours ago, and the muscles in my neck siezed, I screamed (thought for sure I woke up Frank who's upstairs), and I've pretty much been in tears ever since because it won't fucking stop hurting. I thought for sure if I took some time away from the computer, and I laid down, and I just relaxed, it'd be better. Pain killers, fuck, 2000mg of Motrin should have done the fucking trick. But no, it didn't.
I feel worse now than I did 7 hours ago when this started hurting. I'm wondering if it's a pinched nerve. Because, honestly, that'd be my fucking luck.

I was working on www.hardlight.org when it happened. I had just put up the beta version of the podcast. And I was talking to one of the guys who helps them out with that kinda stuff, and he told me to go ahead and make the podcast live tonight. Well, ya know what, I fucking woulda loved to do that, because it means more money, honestly, but instead, (this was when my neck started throbbing) "Does it have to be done now? My neck is fucking killing me."

Luckily for me, he was half way in the bottle, and was fine with that. The Hardlight people love me. They've agreed to all my prices. They love the work I've done for them. And the most important thing, THEY ALWAYS PAY ME ON TIME, and they ALWAYS pay what they say they're going to pay. The last check I got from them was from the manager's personal account. They make me feel really great, and really appreciated for the work that I do. I really love it, and I need it. It's hard to find a company, even in my relativly short time in the web design industry, that appreciates you and your work

This one guy that I met like 3 years ago or hopefully only 2 years ago, [We'll call him X] wanted me to do his site. I got really sick with whooping cough, and I didn't want the stress of finishing that on top of feeling horrible. So I told X that I was going to take some time away from it, and I'd get back to him when I was feeling better since he doesn't want the site done until Christmas anyway. Emailed him the other day and told him I was back up and running, and he says to me, "Oh, I didn't hear from you, so I hired somebody else. Sorry."

What fucking bullshit. X had my email address, he knew how to get a hold of me. If he wanted to get a hold of me, he would have. It would have taken 2 fucking minutes to drop me an email and say "hey, just wondering if I can get a status update." I thought it was suspicious that he didn't email me AT ALL when I said I was feeling awful. He just...fucking vanished, it seems.

It's people like that who make me really disgusted with society, and with the whole web design industry. I realize that the clients don't know what they want. That's almost inevitable. When it comes to web design, they're morons, which is why they hire people like me. I'm okay with that. I'm alright with taking the time to explain to someone what it is I'm doing, or would like to do, and give the pros and cons of all the possibilities. The folks at Hardlight generally don't know what they want, but they have a basic idea. They trust me to put it together, and make it work. It's nice to have a client with that kind of confidence in my skills. It really reinforces the reasons I like building websites in the first place.

But assholes like X, really, really make me feel like washing my hands of the whole fucking thing. Which would be a shame, because I'm actually pretty good at what I do. I'm not great, and I'm always looking for new skills to make my sites more dynamic or interesting, and toying around with new languages. I can't design PHP with my eyes closed or anything, but compared to what a lot of people are paying web designers for these days, I'm pretty good at what I do.

I'm trying not to become too bitter, jaded, cynical about the whole ordeal though because I'm afraid it will get to the point where I don't want to design websites anymore when it's something I've loved doing for 7 years now.

meh

I've been battling bouts of depression lately because I feel rather unaccomplished. I got my GED. I'm healthier than I was when I moved here. I'm happier, but while I know that I am my priority, and that being healthy and happy is more than enough to keep me satisfied, I feel like I'm not doing enough.

I've been studying for my CLEP Exams, and I've been doing more work for www.hardlight.org. In fact, right now, I just finished setting up the podcasting for them. As soon as I get the go-ahead, it's going to go live.

I keep telling myself I just need to get through the holidays though. Thanksgiving is over; I just have Christmas and New Years to get through now. The holidays always remind me of how fucked up my childhood was, and how my parents don't get along, and all that crap. It's just kind of depressing for me sometimes.