Author: Elaine

Feeling Better

I seem to be on the mend from my case of shingles. I think I have a fairly light case: only one or two days of excruciating pain. Today I have almost no pain, though I am still having a lot of tingling and pins and needles feelings. At least these are far less bizarre than the weirdest sensation, when I felt invisible insects crawl on my arm. My various patches of rash seem to have reached the point where I should no longer be shedding chicken pox virus, so that is a relief.

I have been trying to get stuff done in the early part of the day, because when I get tired I notice the pain a lot more. Then all I want to do is read while resting my arm on a hot pack. The worst times have been in the middle of the night. Half asleep, I will toss and turn trying to find a comfortable position for my arm, when there are no comfortable positions.

Reluctant Hiatus Update

Shortly after my arm hurt so badly last week, I thought it coincidental that I had an outbreak of eczema on the same arm. In addition to the eczema failing to respond to home treatment that usually works, it stopped looking like any eczema I had ever had before. Also, although my arm was never quite as painful as that first day, it didn’t quite feel like past episodes of overuse either.

I went to see the doctor today. I had started to think that I might have shingles, and, unfortunately, so does the doctor. I’ll be taking one of the antiviral drugs, and ibuprofen does seem to help the pain, but shingles seems to be one of those wildly varying complaints that can take a long time to heal. It is good to know that all the weird symptoms in my right arm probably has the same cause. In the space of ten minutes, I will have throbbing pain, shooting pain, tingling and itching. The weirdest feeling is not painful though: occasionally I feel as though I have a drop of liquid on my skin, but it is dry when I look at the area. It is like the stupid little nerves in my arm are just firing at random.

Hap Nap

Hap Nap
Although it is still very cold out, Hap seems to find it comfortable enough to take a nap in his stall which opens south. (This photo was taken with the zoom, and the autofocus seems to have found the fence instead of Hap.)

Cold Snap

We got the forecast cold (-9F) but not the forecast snow. There is an inch or so of new snow, just enough to make things look pretty. We were slightly concerned when the lights flickered several times last night before we went to bed, and I was reassured to wake up in the middle of the night and find out that we still had electricity.

The horses, viewed from the house this morning, look fine. Hap is doing airs above the ground while Rags sees what he can find in the outside hay feeders. I threw hay to them in the barn yesterday afternoon, and called down blessings on whoever invented stock tank heaters. I can’t imagine taking care of horses during a cold snap like this without stock tank heaters.

The Calm Before the Storm

Sunrise

“They” are predicting significant snowfall today, and a high tomorrow of 1F. I am hoping that “they” are wrong. Since we are tucked up against the Palmer Divide, which is a snowfall magnet during big storms, we usually get close to the maximum amounts forecast for the area. I will never forget talking to Jack (who was in Texas at the time of the October 97 blizzard) about my worries of getting lost on my way to the horse field. He suggested I follow the extension cord that then led from the house to the stock tank. I looked out at four feet of snow, with near whiteout conditions, and thought “The man has no idea.” Fortunately, we now have fencing that contains the complete path between the house and the barn, so getting misdirected during a whiteout is no longer a risk.