Friday, December 16, 2022

Thank you, Chinese medicine

 I went to bed at 2AM last night, but before bed I got the flute out and practiced. It was maybe a half-hour, maybe a bit more, just the tone exercise and some of the songs on that two-page spread. And it went pretty well considering I'd not practiced in something like two weeks. Leroy had said something like, "If I practice one day, then the next day, I'm a lot better, but if I don't do it for a while and then pick it up, it's like I never started!". But this was not the case for me - maybe because I've been practicing pretty regularly. 

I woke up at a bit before 10, which is right for having gone to bed at 2AM, but I did not want to get out of bed due to the cold. I got up to use the loo and went right back to bed, and slept a little bit more. I should have turned my little heater on when I got up. I eventually did get up, started a coffee, did some push-ups and neck exercises, and basically started my day. 

I then noticed something. For a while now I'd been having a pain in the lower right quadrant of my abdomen, that seemed to be just right for the beginning of a case of appendicitis. I had lower back pain too but some exercises have helped that. This pain had me worried though, because covid is not over and the medical system is still a shambles. 

I did some reading about appendix pain and it seems the problem is the appendix has a duct and appendicitis generally starts when this duct gets blocked. I recalled reading in one of the many "kung fu" books we had around when I was a teen that according to Chinese medicine, a massaged organ is a healthy organ. So I massaged and drummed sort of, on the area yesterday. And today I noticed that the pain is gone. Massaging could certainly help a blocked or partially blocked duct. 

I packed 17 things and got out of here just before 4. I meant to leave at 3, but decided to pack things for another hour, 4 being the very latest I want to leave these days, due to cold, dark, and zombies. 

The drop-offs went fine, and I picked up some mushrooms behind H Mart. I got back here as the sun had just gone down, and true to form, there were a couple of zombies on bikes around the tire store, that I had to make my way around. This is a thing zombies will do; "randomly" ride in your way to observe your level of "fitness" as you go around. Contrary to popular fiction, zombies happily prey on each other, and so this is a way to see if someone is drunk or drugged or mentally ill etc., and thus a soft target. 

If I'm out doing my post office / FedEx run around the middle of the day, zombies are not a factor. I mean, they're always a factor downtown, but along my route, it's all working people and the zombies stay in their holes or something, I think because they sense that if they act up, Joe Hardhat might whomp on 'em for interfering with his workday, his workplace, and the genera public, whom he really works for. 

Leroy and I had talked a fair amount yesterday about how downtown's changed. He knew Johnny Rockets was closed, but was surprised to hear the movie theater's now a construction site. Muji's gone, this is gone, that's gone... I said the surprising thing is how buskers are just about extinct. He made an interesting point: The kids too young to busk would go downtown, on school trips and such things, and see him playing, and he could see them get inspired, and later, they'd be out there. With covid making the mature generation of buskers extinct, it's also killed off the next generation coming up. 

There are a few places with a strong enough busking culture to survive, like New Orleans, and this square in Boston that's got music schools nearby and where I believe even Ben Franklin busked, reading off famous speeches and such material. And Waikiki, being the only busking venue within thousands of miles, is actually one. But in this area, you're not "a" busker, you're "the" busker. 


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