The Risks of Shuffling

Instead of listening to songs in any logical order, I like to shuffle them on my ipod and listen to whatever may come next.
As I was driving in the dark, I realized that shuffling your songs is risky.

The Jolt: If you're listening to a slow and pensive song that ends with 10 or more seconds of almost complete silence, you're putting yourself at risk for "the jolt." It's inevitable that someday after one of those quiet songs, a loud note or intro of the next song will jolt you out of your seat!

The guilt-trip: My ipod automatically uploads everything from the itunes library on the family computer. So, once in a while a conference talk will come up. Now I'm on a guilt trip...I really want to skip it, but what if it came up for a reason? Maybe I'm supposed to listen to it....so I wait out the 15 minutes, so I won't have a guilty conscience.

The blush: Sometimes you have unplanned trips with your friend. The first thing they hear when you turn on the car is some crazy random song that you just love, but they look all queer, and express outloud, "you listen to Monty Python's Spamalot?!" Clay Aiken is worse, though. Or Evita. Or....

Those were the only ones that came to my mind. I think I'm going to think about this some more. Or you could just tell me some other risks.

19th Birthday in Las Vegas

playing with cotton candy

I had to go to Las Vegas for a swim meet for about five days. And I was in Vegas for my birthday.

As my high school coach put it, "If you don't drink or gamble, there's not much for you there." I quite agree. Las Vegas is way overrated.

We had to swim in the meet both morning and night, Saturday, Sunday, and Monday.

So, last night after the meet, I decided to hang out with the "Canadians" on my swim team, because they were getting something to eat right after the meet then go to the airport to go home. It was a lot of fun, and I had the best frozen yogurt with big ginormous blackberries on top. It was definitely better than any $35 buffet on the Strip.

By the time I got back to the hotel, everyone was already dressed up and leaving the parking lot. We weren't allowed to wear anything with "University of Utah" on, and seeing I was decked from head to toe with that or a "U", people didn't want to wait and left. I was all alone at the hotel, and it was pleasant. Instead of making my cold take a turn for the worse, I was enjoying two full hours of "Whose Line Is It Anyway?" Then I went to sleep. Lovely.

Vegas and Birthdays are overrated.

So nice to come back to salt lake.

Finals Week

Finals week is interesting.
I had a music final last Friday (a joke).
I had an English final on Monday (wonderful, I love English!)
I had a chemistry test today.
"Wow! This is easier than I expected! The first two pages alone took me five minutes to do! (turn the page) ...CRAP!"
Looking at the values of questions, I'm certain I got 62 points right. Out of 200. The rest, I'm not so certain. We'll have to see if I pass the class.

Tomorrow I get to do Calculus.

Then I get shipped off to Las Vegas for a serious three day meet, prelims and finals.

Then I get to come back and train at the U for a couple more days.

Then I get 6 whole days away from the pool for sure.

Then I get shipped off to Mesa, Arizona to do winter training for about 11 days.

Then I start next semester (which I'm actually excited about because I'm taking more English classes and classes where you get to read, and not think hard about little atoms that I can't see. I admit, chemistry is very cool, but way too sophisticated for me. Trigonal bipyramidal? Meh. Pi bond? Ack. Viscosity? Grr.)

Tape

If I'm being naughty or bad, all you have to do nowadays is show me some athletic tape, and I'll disappear.

Athletic tape wouldn't be so bad if I didn't swim. But since I swim, it rubs on my armpit, chafing it to shreds. (not literally. It just hurts.) And recently, every time I have to take the tape off, it pulls some of my skin off as well. Oh, joy. I hope my shoulder heals quickly!

On a happier note, I went to Temple Square with my close friends this evening. It was beautiful, because it was foggy outside, but when we re-emerged from watching the Joseph Smith movie (which was beautifully done), it was snowing. Hard. I got drenched. It was very pretty, magical, and lovely.

Tendonitis

Yup. That's my diagnosis-tendonitis.

I felt very stupid in swimming this afternoon. My shoulder started hurting again, despite all the therapy and tape that I've been through and put on. Listening to the dad side of my shoulder (not the mom), I stopped, and the coaches looked at me funny. What do I say? I need to talk to the trainers and see if I can get my shoulder to stop hurting? I say in a clumsy way that I need to do something about my shoulder.

The trainers had fun pushing, prodding, and pulling on my shoulder, stuffed a couple of asprin down my throat and sent me swimming again. Unfortunately, about a 500 later, it was hurting big time again. Rather than adjust my stroke and lose my technique, I decided to stop, put on some flippers, and kick the rest of the long set. Coach stopped me and asked me "what's going on?" I explained to him that I have tendonitis according to the trainers, and that I'm doing my best to take care of it for once. He nodds his head thoughtfully, and turns back to the pool he's coaching (not mine).

After practice, we got yelled at/lectured at again. Only this time it was reprimanding us for not taking care of ourselves. Two boys had to drop out of practice today because they were struggling. Why? They didn't eat anything today. Coach is very frustrated that we are all adults, but we can't seem to take care of ourselves properly.

Healing?

Last Thursday, my left shoulder started hurting more than normal. Of course I had the "Vickie Syndrome." I refused to get out right when it started hurting, because I thought it was nothing, and that the others would think I was weak and just pretending to get some time out of the pool. Only until I wasn't making the times in the workout, and the coach came to yell at me, did I confess what was wrong with me.
I don't know what the trainers think is wrong with me, but the treatments I've been having are...not what I expected to say the least. Sure, they tape up my shoulder and such, but before practice, I actually have to put gel on it, hook a weird instrument to a machine, and ultra-sound my shoulder. Apparently it helps realign the tissue that may be out of place and such.

All weekend I had the joy of having tape in a couple of different places on my shoulder. Today after afternoon practice, I finally took it off, and the trainers wouldn't put any more tape on until my skin heals. It's cut in several places, from the rubbing. So...I'm tape-free for a day! Yay!

After practice I get the joy of having my shoulder electrocuted. I don't remember the exact name of the procedure, but they put four pads on my shoulder, and the entire 20 minutes, it feels like my shoulder has fallen asleep-only it's more painful than asleep...but the same tingling sensation, anyway. The interesting thing was, my shoulder felt like it was twitching. When I looked down at my shoulder, it was convulsing violently, it looked like it had a heart in it, wildly beating to get out of my arm.
Just for kicks, I pressed at one of the pads, and the muscle convulsed even more violently for a few seconds. I push a different one, and it seizes somewhere else.

Who knew that someone couldn't only feel butterflies in their stomach, but in their shoulder?