Thursday Thirteen - 272 - 13 Things About My Eye Surgery Odyssey

1 - As many of you know, almost four years ago I embarked on the Great Acupuncture Adventure, wherein I started down the road to relief from a world of chronic pain and assorted immune system disorders. Last spring my body flipped into detoxification mode, which--as I've discovered as regards all things Chinese medicine--what seems horrible is good.

Sure, all of my joints, and I mean all of my joints--finger joints, ribs, joints I wasn't aware I even had, you name it--all of them flared up and put me into a new level of pain, but that meant that my body was finally getting rid of long-stored toxic material from many decades of allergies and chemical sensitivities.

I'm pretty zen when it comes to all of this. I've lived with this all of my life, so I have a lot of patience when there's an actual light at the end of the tunnel.

However, last year I had my first major solo author event scheduled in Toronto--Fan Expo, and I'd also scheduled a photo session while I was in town with Helen Tansey.

As soon as Fan Expo finished up, my left eye swelled as though I'd been punched, not an unusual allergy reaction for me, and not unexpected as there was a lot of stuff in the air during Fan Expo (inks, plastics, cleaners, beauty/health care products on the 90,000 people who took part in the convention over the four days.)

If you look closely in the picture of me having lunch with my friend Lisa above, my left eye was showing the first signs of a blocked tear gland, likely from my allergic reaction in combination with my overall acupuncture-triggered detox.

  

Photo by Helen Tansey

2 - As someone who normally doesn't much care about what I look like, the irony of having a swollen eye in time for my professional author photo shoot was not lost on me. I used tea bags every day to keep the redness and swelling down, and by the time my appointment with Helen Tansey came along, her excellent hair and make-up artist had my swollen eye concealed beautifully.

3 - I got back from Toronto in the fall, rejuvenated psychologically from being back in my favorite city, seeing friends and family, and touching base with lots of Toronto spots I miss so much.

I was ready to continue on with the long-haul healing process, at peace with the knowledge that my detox healing crisis or Herxheiner reaction was all good. 

4 - What are these fabulous symptoms, you may ask? The ones I've personally experienced are: extreme fatigue; arthritic joint pain; intense bouts of vertigo/dizziness that lasted for several horrible days; skin eruptions including rashes, boils and my blocked tear gland; the feeling that I'd been punched repeatedly in the stomach and the accompanying loss of appetite; interesting eliminations where I can actually smell the chemicals used in plastics leaving my body; and profuse sweating.

5 - Believe it or not, I was never at risk of wanting to stop my acupuncture treatment, even when all of these magical symptoms appeared. Last year, for the first time in over two decades, I'd managed to make it through the entire summer season without taking my narcotic painkiller for chronic migraine.

Not one of those heavy-dose painkillers passed my lips between May and September. Didn't need one. 

6 - However, my swollen eye became more and more problematic. I was given an antibiotic that really worked beautifully on my rosacea, but didn't make the eyelid lump drain in any way. I had three courses of this antibiotic, but no reaction from the eye--only a bigger and bigger lump.

7 - Eventually, I couldn't even see properly out of that eye. Not only do I use my vision throughout my records management day job, but then I had to see in order to write my books and manage my social media in the evenings.

8 - I was referred to an eye specialist, who only took about five minutes to schedule me for surgery

9 - Unfortunately, it then took two months for the surgery to be performed. During that time my eyelid swelled to really exciting proportions. That's a shot of my husband and me on our way to a film conference a few weeks ago. The eyelid blob got even worse before the long-awaited surgery day.

10 - The day before my surgery, the blob finally started draining as I was on my morning commute to work, on the bus. Good times!

11 - My mom and my husband both came with me to my surgery appointment yesterday. It was a minor procedure where the area was frozen and I was awake for it all. The doctor was the same specialist to whom I'd been referred--he was really, really great. It was completely freaky but quick, and I was on my way home in no time.

12 - I would like to take a moment to thank the many people I work with, ride the bus with, who work in customer service positions where I buy coffee, get groceries, check out library books and so on, and all of those people whom my husband and I met at the film conference a few weeks ago when my eye blob was impossible to miss seeing.

None of you blinked or skipped a beat as you spoke with me. You just carried on as if there wasn't a massive thing weighing down my eye. All of you get the Kindness Award from grateful me.

13 - After an admittedly long afternoon, evening and night that was spent laying quietly with both eyes closed so that my good eye's movements wouldn't make the recovering eye roll around under the bandages, when I listened to 'radio-show-TV' and my husband Brad provided the narration for the visually-impaired--thanks, Honey!--morning arrived and my mom helped me out with the bandage removal and post-surgery eye drops.

She said, "It looks like you've been in a bar fight. But you should see the other guy!"

It's been quite a journey, this healing journey that  I'm still on. But I embrace the opportunity I've been given, and I thank everyone who has helped me get this far.

At this holy season, I wish all of you many blessings.

Thursday Thirteen - 268 - 13 Things About My Latest Adventures With My Bad Knee

1 – Anyone with a knee injury involving torn ligaments and cartilage has likely discovered over the years that it will make a return engagement from time to time. The photo above is from 2008, when I re-injured my bad knee and had to use my late Gram's cane to get around.

If anyone has seen me slowly making my way around with Gram's cane this week, you'll know that I'm in another season of re-injury. 

2 – The original injury happened twenty years ago. I was captain of a team doing a scavenger hunt through downtown Toronto in support of The Children's Aid Society, and I'd just turned to make sure everyone was all together before we arrived at one of the call-in stations. A homeless man who'd been sitting over by the Salvation Army building had moved and when I turned around, I tripped over him. I tried really hard to stop myself from falling and ended up looking like I was doing a snazzy Broadway move, but eventually I went down hard on the cement sidewalk.

3 – My knee took decades' worth of wear and tear in one instant, my second physiotherapist explained to me. So in my late 20s, I was the proud owner of the knee of a pensioner.

4 – Over the years, I've had a special brace made for it, I've had physiotherapy twice, surgery once, and for the past three-and-a-half years, acupuncture treatment.

5 – I'm definitely hanging onto Gram's cane. I never know when it's going to come in handy again, and this week it's been worth its weight in diamonds.

6 – All had been going well in the past little while with my knee, until my husband and I were out last Friday for his doctor's appointment, then a stop at the bookstore and a movie. When I headed into the bookstore, I forgot to push the seat back when I got out of the car. Climbing back into the car, I whacked my knee hard on a corner of the dashboard. My whole body went weak inside and I felt nauseous. When I got back to my feet, my knee was rubbery and weak, as it has been in the past.  

7 – Basically, walking down the street and getting into a car are all it takes for me to do some serious damage to myself. No spectacular ski falls for me, no sir.

8 – Thankfully, Gram's cane is never far from reach. I've hobbled my way through the week so far and have a few more days to go.

9 – It's amazing how exhausted it makes me to hobble around. I suppose it's the re-injury. Basically, I've gone to work, come home and slept. 

10 - Luckily, my day job is a sit-down job. I've been able to get a lot of work done there, although my book revisions in the evening have given way to sleep.

11 – Sending a huge shout-out to my friend Tara for getting me home after a long day, all week long.

12 – Sending another shout-out to my husband for putting me back together again for another day. 

13 – Looking forward to my next acupuncture treatment. Gram's cane will be tucked away again until the next time.

Poetry Train Monday - 179 - No Pain, No Gain

I'm on Day 21 of NaNoWriMo.

I had a lot of catching up to do on my NaNoWriMo manuscript this weekend, since I'd planned to be at 37,500 words by Sunday night when I laid out my original word count graph. This year - my fourth NaNo - I had vowed to be finished ahead of time. Not 15 minutes to midnight on the 30th, like last year. Or the other years.

No, this year I was going to finish before the 30th. That was part of my word count plan. And for the first time doing this writing marathon, I was keeping pace with the other writers who'd finished early in previous years.

I'm a year-and-a-half into acupuncture treatment for my migraines and chronic pain issues, and I was having the best writing sessions ever. No crushing pain. No mental fatigue. No having to sleep with a heated Magic Bag on my neck. This NaNo was turning out to be awesome.

Then I went to my every-three-weeks acupuncture session last Saturday. My acupuncturist treated my back (which is always more of an ordeal for me) and then did gua sha.

This is what my back looked like when I got home.















That's my body shrieking. No, really. My office has had renovations recently and I'm highly chemically sensitive. I'm hanging in there, but only because I was able to move to a different desk. Still, I've been exposed to a multitude of things that bother me, and it shows in my gua sha marks.

Gua sha urges the body to detoxify, so with this much internal warfare going on, I felt hideous all week, as if I had a really bad case of flu. I muscled my way through daily word count for NaNo, but I couldn't keep up my previous pace. By Friday I was 10,000 words behind schedule.

But here's the good news. We had a swift temperature drop here in Nova Scotia over the weekend, which usually brings on a migraine for me. I had some signs of an impending migraine on Saturday morning, including the dreaded floating prism visual disturbance, which usually preceeds intense nausea and other wonderful miseries.

But remember my detoxing gua sha from last week? The visual disturbance lasted all of ten minutes or so. Nothing grew. No miseries. No narcotic painkiller.

It's all good.

I've caught up on my missing 10,000 words. My NaNo word count now stands at 36,011. So for the Poetry Train this week, I give you this opus:

No Pain, No Gain


Gua sha stripes are red
They lay you flat like flu
No pain, no gain it's said
But they sure as heck fix you


© Julia Smith, Nov. 21, 2010


For more poetry, Ride the Poetry Train!

Thursday Thirteen - 163 - 13 Things About My First Year of Acupuncture

1 - Last June, my life was ruled by the all-encompassing migraine. I'd been captive to pain for years, and couldn't see a way out of it. Ever.



For my 45th Thursday Thirteen, I opened the door slightly on this aspect of my life by posting 13 Things About Chronic Migraine Pain.

Art work by Clayton Campbell


2 - I also had chronic knee pain from an injury I'd sustained in 1993. Sometimes it was so bad I had to borrow my gram's cane. This was after I'd had physiotherapy and surgery on it.

Basically, I was in pain 24-7.









3 - A woman from my office went to see an acupuncturist here in Halifax, and my close friend and co-worker asked her if the acupuncturist could treat migraines.

Of course, said our co-worker.

And does our health plan cover it? my friend asked.

Of course, said our co-worker.

So my friend made me call the acupuncture office, which was nervewracking for me, because I have phone-out phobia. But I persevered, made the appointment, and so began the most astounding year in my history here on planet Earth.














4 - Wei Yuan began my treatment with two sessions a week, treating my whole body literally from head to toe, generally using about 30 needles a session.

She focused immediately on my knee, and in a matter of weeks I regained strength in that joint, which used to give out on me without warning. The perpetual swelling which stiffened the knee disappeared. The unending pain which made touching the knee impossible faded away. Now I can actually tap my knee, which a year ago was unthinkable.


















5 - When I first arrived at their clinic (she treats patients along with her husband, Tom Tian at I Stop Pain in Halifax) Wei sat with me and went over my symptom history, establishing what had brought me to her in the first place.

She asked me what my goals for treatment were.

I said I wanted to stop missing work (my migraines made me at the least, late on hideous days, and absent when I just couldn't take it any more.)

Last year at this time I took painkiller with codeine every four hours, nearly 24 hours a day. This had been going on for years.

When my migraines reached a shrieking crescendo of agony, I had narcotic painkillers to turn to. But one must have experienced that level of pain to understand that it never actually goes away, opiates or no opiates.














6 - You'll have to excuse me for inwardly scoffing at Wei's stated goal to get me off those painkillers.

But hey - who am I to get in the way of anyone else's dream? Sure, I thought to myself. Like that is ever going to happen.

I didn't even have that little glimmer of hope perking up inside of me at the idea. I had a full-time job I had to keep. Painkillers kept me upright and functioning, and prevented me from hurling myself off of tall things when I just wanted it to stop.














7 - One year later, my treatment with Wei has radically altered my life.

Though I hadn't expected to be completely freed from the Iron Maiden of my pain-filled life - had hoped for some relief, but not freedom from it - one year later I have gone entire 24-hour cycles without any painkiller at all.

Imagine the power in these tiny, fine needles, and their placement at specific meridian points on the body. These needles spoke to the dormant energy inside of me, known as Chi.

Wei asks my body to listen to itself as she treats me. I am called to participate in my own healing.


8 - After Wei places the needles, she sets a heat lamp over whichever area needs a little extra nudging, dims the lights and leaves me to heal.

It's during this time that I use my own powers of visualization. I meditate on whatever my body brings to my attention. To begin with, I say a prayer of thanks for being given this opportunity to heal. Then, whichever section of my body aches, feels heavy or blocked, I focus on that area and imagine all sorts of things to break up the blockages:

Explosions!

Swirls of butterflies

Whirlwinds

Beams of light














9 - After she removes the needles, Wei often treats me with cups, which are placed over meridian points and the air vacuumed out of the cups.

These are left in place for awhile, but not as long as the needles, which generally stay in place for about 20 minutes.



10 - Because I knew I wanted to document my healing, I've been taking pictures of the myriad patterns that appear on my body after my treatment. This particular set of marks came from a session of moving cupping, where she rubbed the cups up and down my meridian line.

In Traditional Chinese Medicine, marks are expected after treatment, as the body responds to the stimulation of blocked Chi. The types of bruising and redness, how dark or bright they are, informs the practitioner of the state of the body being treated.

What has been fascinating to me is what marks show up where. Not every cup will produce a bruise. Sometimes there's no mark at all. Sometimes it's incredibly dark.

As you can see from my back in this shot, the left side of my spine has no marks - yet she used the cups there in just the same way as on the right side. But the left side had no blockage.


Here are some of the cupping marks that appeared on my husband's back after one of his sessions with Wei.

Because he could see the incredible results I was getting with her, my not-so-great-with-needles husband actually began acupuncture treatment.

Brad has bipolar disorder and has been on powerful medication for two decades. We're both hoping to preserve his liver health, because he has no option but to take his sanity-preserving drugs. So he began whole-body treatment with a view to keeping his body in balance.

I have to say, I never in a thousand lifetimes would have imagined my husband receiving acupuncture. But his first session was on his birthday last November, and in these seven months he has missed two major depressions which generally hit in the winter and in the spring. They generally last for a month, and so far he has had episodes this year that have lasted about a week. We're heading into the summer now and normally that would bring a third month-long downer. So we'll see how it goes.










11 - This is the Gua Sha tool used to rub in a scraping motion along the skin to promote healing through stimulating the blood. It helps to break up blockages in the body system. It's often used for people with chronic conditions, such as my pain levels and asthma.

As well as cupping, Wei uses Gua Sha in my treatment. Sometimes I get the Full Meal Deal: needles, cupping and Gua Sha.

Below is the photo I took after my first Gua Sha treatment. You can see I had a lot of chi blockage in my neck, and along my spine.


















Here is another treatment with an altogether different pattern showing up - although following along the energy meridians and focusing again on my neck.














This is my husband's first Gua Sha treatment - check out how dark the mark is on his neck! He looked like he'd been in a motorcycle accident.















Here is another pattern of healing for my husband, including Gua Sha and cupping marks.



















12 - I have also been treated with Chinese herbal pills, which are perfectly round like tiny, 18th century grapeshot. So far I've had herbs for my lungs, my head pain and my stomach/spleen/gall bladder. As opposed to western medicine, symptoms aren't always what they seem. Currently Wei is concentrating on treating my stomach area, which has been the root of my chronic pain.

Who knew?














13 - As I embark on my second year of treatment, I no longer doubt the possibility that my life will no longer consist of four-hour blocks counting down the seconds until I can take my next painkiller.

I've discontinued a daily pain management drug (that I was surprised to discover was more effective than I'd thought.)

I've downgraded to extra-strength acetaminophen - something I haven't taken for at least a decade. Without the pain management drug, my pain levels shot up over these past two months, but still not in the same league as when I began treatment. Even though it felt like two-steps-forward, twenty-five-steps-back for awhile there, I had the memory of what we had achieved very solidly in my mind.

By next June, I may very well be truly pain free. Who could have imagined it?

Janet says Not only have you shared a most personal journey, but in that sharing, you will have opened someone else's eyes to the possibility that is Eastern Medicine.

Deborah Hale says Doing Toaist Tai-chi for the past year has certainly given me a great appreciation for the Oriental view of health and healing.

Akelamalu says I haven't tried acupuncture or cupping but I have tried reflexology (amazing) and of course I am a Reiki practitioner so I know the benefits of that. It's a shame that some people dismiss alternative therapies so readily.

Thursday Thirteen - 154 - 13 Things I Did This Week

1 - Even though last week included Good Friday, and this week included Easter Monday, which meant a four-day weekend for me, I worked so hard for the three days I was at my scanner - including two overtime shifts - that I gratefully embraced my Friday off. We're at an especially high-volume time for my department. I'm so-o-o tired.

2 - To make matters more trying, I battled a migraine last week which culminated with Thursday's rather exciting color-prism aura which developed in the afternoon. Since my acupuncture treatment which began last June, I have gotten to the point that my pain medication has been radically downgraded. But once the prism-aura started I went for my narcotic painkiller. Within 20 minutes the aura was gone. I guess it's true that if you're in enough pain, you see stars.

3 - My husband and I went to our every-other-Saturday morning acupuncture treatment. I told Wei about my migraine adventure, and she 'listened' to my chi along one forearm, and then after awhile along the other forearm. (The points she's feeling are not the same places western doctors feel your pulse.) Her expression was a mix of confusion and solemn concern. After awhile she pronounced, "Weak," as though beyond comprehension that my chi could be in such a state after all my treatment. I wonder if she's ever treated anyone before who visually appears to be living, but is registering as half-dead in the chi department, as I apparently do. I'm nothing if not a challenge.

4 - Was contacted by a major Acadian genealogy figure here in the Maritimes about our shared family lineage due to a blog post I did two-and-a-half years ago. It was my 22nd Thursday Thirteen - Introducing 13 of My Ancestors. That post has legs! It has led to a most incredible set of developments, including the upcoming DNA testing of my cousin through the AMERINDIAN Ancestry Out of Acadia DNA PROJECT.

5 - Went to lunch with some of the women from my writers' group on Sunday, then stopped in at Chapters before the meeting started and snagged a book by one of the Popculturedivas, Kayla Perrin.

6 - Learned about the YA market (Young Adult) at the meeting, with a workshop given by Renee Field.

7 - Worked overtime on Monday. It's like shooting at 18th century redcoats. No matter how many go down, the formation remains intact and the line continues to advance.

8 - Luckily, the second-last episode of Spartacus cheered me up. It ROCKED. Of course, it turns out that it was directed by Michael Hurst, who played Iolaus on Hercules. My three favorite episodes of Spartacus have all been directed by Michael Hurst.

9 - On Tuesday, Mom picked me up after work and we went to dinner at The Great Wall, my favorite Halifax Chinese restaurant. Then we found a parking space near St. Matthew's Church, nipped into Niche for an hour for coffee and headed to our choir rehearsal for our upcoming concert next Tuesday.

10 - It was the first of three rehearsals at the performance space, so there was a lot of rearranging of our physical placement as well as musical rehearsal. Here's a little preview of part of the Schubert mass we're singing, as performed here by the Ocean Springs High School Choir from Mississippi:



11 - After working overtime on Monday, and having a long rehearsal on Tuesday, I once again worked overtime on Wednesday. And my acupuncturist wonders why she can't find any sign of my chi.

12 - Today I discovered why it's a good thing to fully read work emails that say Wear pink to support anti-bullying. I thought it meant Friday. But it was in fact for Wednesday. So even though my manager sported a spiffy pink dress shirt with matching pink tie, and three other members of my team were radiant in pink, and even though I have several pink outfits I could have worn, I showed up today in my tiger-skin-print shirt. For Anti-bullying Day. Tiger-skin-print.

13 - It's 1:00 in the morning. Time to get off the computer. Only 5 and a half hours till my alarm goes off.

Janet says #4 - How cool is that? As soon as I'm done this comment, I'm off to read that blogpost and check out the link. Fascinating!

Anne MacFarlane says Hope the migraines - and the ot - settle down soon.

Sandy Kessler says #7 priceless.

Thursday Thirteen - 141 - 13 Views of 2009 at A Piece of My Mind

Colleen at Loose Leaf Notes took a look back at her blog through 2009 last week - and I so enjoyed her post, I decided to borrow her format for my own blog this week.

Clicking on the month will take you to the entire post I've excerpted here.


1 - January 2009 - One of the things I'll be looking forward to is a new tradition I've begun with my two dads. Both of them passed away recently. When the first birthday for my dad rolled around on Dec. 29th, 2007 - the first without him - my husband and I were in Toronto. It's my intention to fill a day when my thoughts naturally turn to missing someone so very, very precious with something that brings me great joy. And so last Dec. 29th began My Date With My Dad - a glorious matinee watching my favorite ballet company with my Dad along with me, sharing my joy.


2 - February 2009 - Welcome to my Second Blogiversary Celebration! Come in. Find a seat. I've got a show planned that celebrates life as I love to live it. And I'm grateful to you, my blog readers and fellow bloggers, for sharing this life with me. First up is Gene Wilder singing Pure Imagination from Willie Wonka and the Chocolate Factory. My life just wouldn't be the same if it wasn't fueled by imagination.


3 - March 2009 - I got a good writing day in, which included some internet research on methods to treat cuts that my little laundry maid Helen would use in 1840's Van Diemen's Land. I settled upon tea, as it fit seamlessly with the preceding scene where three characters have a rather surreal tea party. And I realized all the information I just gathered would make a fabulous post for my Blog Improvement Project. Et voila! The Common Tea Bag and Its Uncommon Usefulness in First Aid.


4 - April 2009 - For my second interview here at A Piece of My Mind, I've got Thomma Lyn Grindstaff joining me from her home in East Tennessee in the United States. A big Down East welcome, Thomma Lyn from me here on Canada's east coast.

Question - Your novel Mirror Blue releases May 1st. Will you be doing anything special on that day?

Answer - I'd thought of having a Virtual Book Release party on that day, but my hubby and I are planning a celebratory hike on the mountain!




5 - May 2009 - I've got a busy weekend. Tonight, after an extremely challenging week at work, I had a dress rehearsal for tomorrow's choir concert. Tomorrow morning I'll be hopping on the bus and heading for Spring Garden Road, to have an afternoon at the ballet - La Bayadere. After the ballet, it's hurry-scurry home, get changed and drive my husband and me to my choir concert, where he'll watch from the audience.


6 - June 2009 - For Summer Stock Sunday, I've got my lovely peonies which I transported from their original home in Yarmouth, Nova Scotia when we moved to Cole Harbour eight years ago. As we packed up the house to move to Cole Harbour, I made one final walk-around to make sure we had everything. I looked at the garden to make my goodbye - and realized I hadn't dug up the peony plant. I grabbed a broken, jagged broom handle from the trash and started digging madly for the peony bulbs. I plunged my hands into the earth and felt around until I could grasp the tubers. I yanked as hard as I could until a few broke free and came to the surface. I threw them in a box with some dirt and we slipped them onto the back of the truck.


7 - July 2009 - If you're anything like me, the idea that 39 tall ships will sail into my home port of Halifax Harbour is enough to send you into paroxysms of joy. I have always been attracted to these majestic ladies of the sea for as long as I can remember. So when the first Tall Ships Festival arrived here 25 years ago in the summer of 1984, my sister and I went down to the transformed waterfront filled with awe, our necks cricked up to stare at the forest of masts, the elaborate rigging, to see the faces of sailors from all over the world and hear languages spoken we'd only heard in movies.

We didn't know that we were walking towards the most incredible summer of our lives - the Summer of My Sister's Russian Sailor.


8 - August 2009 - I've been a form of weather vane for several decades, a sort of Doppler radar as far as the weather was concerned. I've felt an oncoming low pressure system, even when it was a few days away. The really bad storms are just giant low pressure systems, and my degree of pain was unrelenting for up to 10 days at a time.

For some reason earlier this year, I began thinking to myself: I resign from my weather vane job. The Weather Network can do it.

I started acupuncture for my migraines in June. There's another big storm coming up along the eastern seaboard toward Nova Scotia this weekend. Tropical Storm Danny. I first heard about it on the news in the middle of the week. I stared at the TV screen in confusion. Whenever a storm system appears on the weather report, I'm already feeling it. But this was actual news to me.


9 - September 2009 - I'm currently reading Everything is Illuminated by Jonathan Safran Foer for the Dewey Reading Challenge. The writing is so exceptional that I could craft found poems from every single page in this 382-page book. Here is one little nugget.

Terribly Lucky

By her twelfth birthday
My great-great-great-great-great-grandmother
Had received at least one
Proposal of marriage
From every citizen in Trachimbrod

She forced a blush
Batted her long eyelashes
Said to each, Perhaps no
Yankel says I am still too young

They are so silly, turning back to Yankel


10 - October 2009 - A few weeks ago I didn't even know who Eugene Hutz was. But I'm reading Everything is Illuminated by Jonathan Safran Foer for a reading challenge, and even though I hadn't finished the book I asked my husband to bring home the DVD of the film adaptation from Blockbuster, where he works. Playing the Ukrainian translater for New York-Jewish Jonathan was Eugene Hutz, turning in a remarkable performance for a non-actor. Now I'm quite obsessed with him.

I started thinking about Eugene's charismatic hold over women. I believe it's his Unattainable Man persona. Who could be more unattainable than a part-Gypsy globetrotter whose undying passion is Music?


11 - November 2009 - Whistleblower diplomat 'Richard Colvin sent senior Canadian officials no fewer than 17 messages in 2006 and 2007 warning that Afghan interrogators used torture as 'standard operating procedure,' that Canadian troops were handing over 'a lot of innocent people,' and that could make them complicit in war crimes. He also copied more than 70 people.' (Toronto Star)

'I find it insulting to listen to the governing party in Canada trying to discredit someone who is standing up for the Canadian sense of human justice.' (Rod Sarty, letter to the editor, Chronicle Herald)


12 - December 2009 - 13 Things That Kept Me Going During NaNoWriMo:

Stewie Griffin ('Victory is mine!')
Gogol Bordello - Forces of Victory ('I can't go on/I will go on')
My fellow bloggers who also did NaNo
My fellow Romance Writers of Atlantic Canada sisters who also did NaNo





13 - Since we don't have thirteen months in the year - although, think of all the stuff we could cross off of our collective lists if we did - here's an extra post that's a favorite of mine from 2009:

13 Reasons Why It's So Much Fun To Go To The Writers' Retreat

Nearly Wordless Wednesday - 105

Thomma Lyn Grindstaff says I'm glad to hear that the acupuncture is helping! And Happy Birthday, Jacquie! :)

Shelley Munro says Ouch, Julia. That sounds painful.

Brooke says My friend SWEARS that not only is acupuncture relaxing but that it has done wonders for her pains and medicial issues.