Month: December 2019

A change of plans

My recovery from knee and hip pain has hit a setback. For the last several days, I have been experiencing aching on the side of my leg from my hip to my mid calf. After 10 weeks of physical therapy I was hoping to see some progress by now but I am getting worse.

I was going to throw in the towel on physical therapy, but, after reading Brittany’s post today, I decided to change things up.

When I explained this new pain issue, my therapist examined me and concluded that I probably have a sciatic nerve impingement. I need to stop tightening the muscles around the nerve and free it up instead. So we decided to drop certain exercises that were intended to strengthen my outer left hip and left butt cheek. Instead I’ll be doing nerve flossing. This involves gently moving my left leg out and back from a sitting position. I’ve done this before for other nerve problems. I don’t recall if it worked but at least I won’t be making pain worse. Also, based on another video I found, using a lacrosse ball or a foam roller to knead the muscles in my left leg is probably not helping so I drop that for now.

Another thing my therapist wants me to do is back off my bike riding. Eek! We talked about taking a couple days off each week a few appointments ago. Now she wants me to ride every other day.

Today, the weatherman cooperated. It was gross outside. I went to the gym and did some upper body weight lifting for the first time in a while. When I got home my leg was still killing me so I went to bed, laid on my back, and did a body scan meditation. Of course, as is often the case, I fell asleep. I woke up without any pain.

Hey wait a minute.

Take the Rootchopper hibernation cure! Send me $500 and I’ll show you how in ten easy-to-follow steps. Sign up for my new hibernation retreat. Only $2,000 for a fabulous weekend in the mountains. Ear plugs and eye masks provided.

Zzzzz.

 

 

And I Thought It Was Me

One of the worst, most depressing experiences I have ever had on a bike, or for that matter off a bike, was hitting the wall on my first day climbing in the Colorado Rockies. The day started with 30 miles from Pueblo to Wetmore. In the process I climbed about 1,400 feet. It was a bit challenging but not too bad.

Between Wetmore and Westcliffe, however, was a 3,000 foot climb over what I learned today is something called Hardscrabble Pass. The Google says the distance is 15 miles but other accounts have it at 12 miles. Either way it is a relentless grade of between 6 and 8 percent for most of the way up.

Today I read an account of a bike tourist who did this ride in 2009. He describes having to stop every 1/10 of a mile to avoid going anaerobic. His legs kept tying up as he rode. With no experience at this sort of thing, I didn’t stop until I was completely unable to get a breath. At around 7,500 feet, I leaned over my bike gasping. (My asthma didn’t help a whole lot.)

Another rider broke the Pueblo to Westcliffe ride into two days. He referred to the pass as “the wall.” He took five hours to ride 15 miles over the top. And he walked three times.

After starting and stopping several times, I ended up walking the steepest part about half way between Wetmore and the pass. I felt humiliated, but these two journals assure me that my failure to ride nonstop over the pass had nothing to do with my fitness or age.

My ego feels better now.

Belle View Bike Shop Update

My local bike shop, Spokes Etc.’s Belle View location, is the only shop within six miles of my home. I use it mostly for repairs and purchases of bike stuff. It’s pretty darn good. A few weeks ago, fire broke out in the Belle View shopping center and a number of businesses had to close, including Spokes. I had thought that the bike shop had suffered only smoke damage but that turns out not to be the case. Along with burning off the roof, the fire warped a structural I beam. Once the shopping center’s owners get the place structurally sound and covered, the Spokes people can go about building out the store. Although the I beam should be installed soon, the rest of the structural work will take a few months.

Finding and Fixing

Way back in September, I participated in the 50 States Ride in DC. When I got home, I couldn’t find one of my two bike headlights. I thought I had tucked my Light and Motion Urban 500 light in one of the side pockets of The Mule’s saddle bag. It wasn’t there when I got home so I assumed that a passerby had walked off with it.

Yesterday, I took Little Nellie to the Spokes Etc. bike shop in Alexandria to get it’s front shifting fixed. When I described how the chain wouldn’t stay on either of the two bigger chain rings, the mechanic suggested that my shifter had loosened. Sure enough, the screw that holds the shifter’s lever in place had backed out. The mechanic tightened it back up, I shifted the gears, and walked out a happy dude.

Today, as I prepared to ride to Friday Coffee Club, I could not find the helmet mount for my Light and Motion Stella 500 light. Without it I would have to mount the light on my handlebars. The Mule’s handlebar bag would obstruct the headlight’s beam so I chose to ride Little Nellie which features a lower profile handlebar bag.

I rode about a half mile and realized that despite yesterday’s mechanical intervention, the front shifter still would not hold the chain on the big chain ring. For whatever mysterious reason, the shifter would hold the chain on the middle chain ring. I reasoned this was good enough and rode 15 miles to the coffee meet up.

It began to sprinkle on the way there. Temperatures were on the low 30s. Despite this I managed to enjoy the ride being careful not to tempt fate by trying to use the bogus font shifter. This meant I relied excessively on my rear gears. The shifter controlling those gears was very stiff. And the chain seemed to want to work only in four or five of the nine available gears.

After caffeine I rode home in a steady rain. When I got home, I began to prep the bike for the trip to the bike shop. I took off the pump and grabbed my valuables from the handlebar bag. When I went to retrieve the Stella’s battery pack from one of the pockets on the handlebar bag, I noticed something tucked next to it. It was my “stolen” Urban 500 light! Yay!

Later, at the bike shop, a couple of mechanics took a look at my bike. Basically, it needs new cables and cable housings, a new chain, and a new cassette. If all goes well, I’ll pick the bike up next week.

 

Lucky Number Seven

Today I had my seventh colonoscopy. I’m afraid to report that colonoscopies don’t get easier with age. My mother contracted colon cancer when she was around 70 years old.  She hated them. More specifically, she HATED drinking “the stuff”, the liquid you take to flush your digestive tract out. Back in those days (we’re talking about 1990 or so) you had to drink a gallon of rank tasting liquid. Then repeat the process 12 hours later. In between you shitted your brains out.

It’s much easier now. You only have to drink 48 ounces (you save 12 ounces! What a bargain) twelve hours apart. And the foul tasting stuff is only in the first 16 of the 48 ounces. A friend of mine told me about her colonoscopy prep. She took a pill. Even better she was awake for the procedure and watched it on TV.

When you get your colonoscopy, try to schedule it for early in the morning. The only slot my doctor had was 11:30 a.m. so I was pretty much up the Shits Creek without a paddle, so to speak.

For three days prior to the procedure you can’t eat anything that might get hung up in your inner tubes. Popcorn, peas, fruit with skin, nuts, etc. I had Indian food one night and Thanksgiving leftovers the another. The day before you can’t have any solid food, only clear liquids. I chowed down on tea, gatorade, and chicken broth. How do you handle a hungry maaaan?

At 4 p.m. I drank my first round of the stuff.  I fought off the urge to throw up. Then, after an hour, I heard the telltale gurgle in my gut and ran to the bathroom where I made like a Saturn 5 rocket engine for about an hour. It’s unbelievable how effective the stuff is. It must have Drano in it to work it’s way through your intestines so fast. The entire time the stuff was doing, well, its stuff, I was thinking of one scatological joke after another. I was just making the best of a totally helpless situation.

After an hour, the storm receded and was followed by occasional shit squalls until midnight. I fell asleep with my alarm set for 4 a.m. when round two would commence.

Let me tell you, as a breakfast drink, The Stuff is rather rude. I downed the brew and waited. Then the voiding process repeated. This time, thankfully, I had no more solids in me. (The doctor’s instructions say that if the prep doesn’t work, you’ll have to do it for two days. I’d rather die.) We renovated the bathroom next to the man cave this year and I am happy to report that the toilet and piping passed the ultimate test with flying colors. Mrs. Rootchopper had put a new bottle of Febreeze in the bathroom and it kept the paint from peeling off the walls.

By about 7:30 I was empty. I could tell just by looking in the mirror. My belly was flatter than it has been since riding 4,300 miles to Portland in 2018. Mrs. Rootchopper drove me to the hospital and, after a 20 minute uneventful check-in process, I was taken back to the pre-op area.

I weighed in at 203 with my clothes and shoes one. I was down about 8 pounds from my last weigh in a month ago. (Have I got a diet for you! Actually, don’t even go there. I tried a water diet my freshman year in college. It messed me up for three days. And could have killed me.)

I got in my gown and laid down on a comfy portable bed. A nurse took my vital signs. My blood pressure was normal. My pulse was 44. (“I ride a bicycle. A lot.”) The nurse covered me with a warm blanket. Having had only about 4 hours of continuous sleep, I was ready to take a snooze. And so I did. Zzzzz.

The doctor was backed up. Wait, let me rephrase that. He was behind schedule. So I got a nice hour or two nap in. Then I was wheeled to an operating room. There the anesthesia nurse gave me a stimulant to increase my heart rate.  A pulse of 44 leaves too little down side. Then she injected one of the tubes leading to my veins with an anesthetic and I woke up. In the recovery room.

I have no recollection of the procedure. For all I know they went out for lunch at Denny’s.

After a while my doctor came by with the preliminary results. (My brain: Please don’t be cancer. Please don’t be cancer.) He had pictures that look like a tunnel except for close ups of three polyps. One looked innocuous to him. The others looked worthy of a biopsy. Once that was done he removed them. Actually, he torched them. Seriously. Thankfully, the prep had eliminated the chance for a fatal blue dart.

My doctor, who has been doing colonoscopies on me for 24 years, thinks that the lab results will show that the polyps he biopsied are benign. He gave me the good news that if they are benign, I don’t need another colonoscopy for three years. (Most people who are free of polyps or tumors and have no family history are put on a five or ten year cycle. Thanks, Mom.)

I do hope that the prep is made easier by then. This was the hardest prep I’ve ever done. I attribute the difficulty to age. No wonder my mother hated it so. I can’t imagine being 70 years old and weighing all of 105 pounds and going through this over and over and over again. She was one tough customer. She also survived her colon cancer and lived another 20 years.

So there you have the whole story.

Many thanks to Mrs. Rootchopper for getting me to and from the hospital and waiting several hours longer than we had planned. And thanks to my doctor and the staff and nurses at Inova Mount Vernon Hospital for being so professional and good humored.

Nearly three years in a row

Two years ago I was stopped less than 90 miles shy of 10,000 bicycling miles for the year. Having to quit with a week to go because of a life threatening illness really sucked. Of course, living is worth 88 miles.

Last year, I blew the doors off with over 11,000 miles in the saddle. Revenge was sweet. I crossed the 10,000 mark around Thanksgiving. I rode in eight new states (Illinois, Iowa, Minnesota, North Dakota, Montana, Idaho, Washington, and Oregon). And I crossed the continental divide for the first time.

Today, I crossed the 10,000 mile threshold again. Along the way, I picked off five new states (Missouri, Kansas, Colorado, Utah, and Nevada). I rode over Monarch Pass, above 11,000 feet.

From Colorado to California, I climbed well over 150,000 feet. Somebody stop me before I do such a foolish thing ever again.

Now it’s time to get well and have some fun. Colonoscopies are fun, aren’t they?

PSA – Get your ass to a doctor

If you’ve been meaning to do one of those cleansings of your inner organs, do I have a treat for you.

This week I will be having my seventh colonoscopy. PARTAY! Colon cancer doesn’t much care if you think a colonoscopy is gross. To be honest, the cleansing routine the day before is not much fun, although, unlike a decade ago, you no longer have to drink two gallons of foul tasting fluid to get the job done. Fair warning: do this at home. (Don’t ask.)

My mother survived it. My friend Bob is undergoing chemo for it. My grad school roommate Chet died of it a year ago. Like you, they were/are all very nice people. Colon cancer didn’t much care.

So if you are 50 or older, or if you have a family history of colon cancer, get your ass to a doctor and get a colonoscopy. It’s not nearly as gross as having eye surgery while conscious. (Been there. Done that. I have stories.)