Ow! And Other Odds and Ends
My fingers hurt! Specifically, the fingers on my left hand. For the last few days, Jeff and I have resumed practicing a medley of three Irish tunes (two jigs and a slip jig)--he on mandolin and I on guitar. The thing is, I haven't played in ages, and the ponderous and ugly calluses of my misspent youth are long gone. I'm building them back up, though! Currently, I'm playing on a classical guitar with nylon strings. And that can be murder on novice (or begin-again) fingers. We're talking about getting a steel-string guitar like the one we bought Greg for Christmas--that was a sweet instrument. But even though I'll have calluses by the time we do so, it's always a pain in the fingers to shift string-types. We sound okay though! I tend to get lost, especially in the slip jig (Kid on the Mountain), but the timing is WONKY. Most of my rhythm guitar work has been 4/4. You know. Rock 'n' roll. I'll adjust, though. I'm more Irish than Jeff. It's in my blood! The auld sod!
In other news, we've both been fighting colds for the last week or so. I'm the culprit who brought it into the house, although I'll be damned if I know where I picked it up. Last Tuesday afternoon, I was enduring yet another conference call (probably the fifth or sixth of the day) when my nose started running. By the time I got home, I was in rhinovirus misery. I HATE getting a cold. To that end, I take lots and lots of vitamin C and swab the Zicam in my nostrils at the first sign of trouble. And so I have been blessed with o, about three or four cold-free years. Until now. It's not just the feeling crappy. It's the feeling betrayed. How dare I get a cold? Feh. The really acute stage only lasted for about two and a half days, with the damned thing blasting from head to chest in record time, but the fatigue and general wooziness has lingered... Maybe tomorrow I'll feel up to snuff again? Sigh.
And finally... We bought a new range. Our old one bit the dust a while ago (thank goodness we got that Advantium microwave hood when we did the reno... it is a conventional oven too (and a speed oven and a warming oven! I thought it was overkill at the time, but it sure has come in handy...), but it's either been too snowy or we've been too sick to go out and buy a new one. Well, we popped over the appliance emporium after work today and picked out a nice stainless steel number from GE. It's not one of those super high-end Wolfs or Vikings (they look so nice and, well, high-end!), but it does have cast iron burner grates and a self-cleaning oven and such. It set us back a bit more than we had planned to pay, but it seemed so much more substantial than the next model down... They are delivering it on Saturday. Now if we can hold off until next year to replace the fridge, we'll be doing okay! (But can I live with an ugly almond fridge with that nice stainless steel range residing just across the room? Hmmm....)
In other news, we've both been fighting colds for the last week or so. I'm the culprit who brought it into the house, although I'll be damned if I know where I picked it up. Last Tuesday afternoon, I was enduring yet another conference call (probably the fifth or sixth of the day) when my nose started running. By the time I got home, I was in rhinovirus misery. I HATE getting a cold. To that end, I take lots and lots of vitamin C and swab the Zicam in my nostrils at the first sign of trouble. And so I have been blessed with o, about three or four cold-free years. Until now. It's not just the feeling crappy. It's the feeling betrayed. How dare I get a cold? Feh. The really acute stage only lasted for about two and a half days, with the damned thing blasting from head to chest in record time, but the fatigue and general wooziness has lingered... Maybe tomorrow I'll feel up to snuff again? Sigh.
And finally... We bought a new range. Our old one bit the dust a while ago (thank goodness we got that Advantium microwave hood when we did the reno... it is a conventional oven too (and a speed oven and a warming oven! I thought it was overkill at the time, but it sure has come in handy...), but it's either been too snowy or we've been too sick to go out and buy a new one. Well, we popped over the appliance emporium after work today and picked out a nice stainless steel number from GE. It's not one of those super high-end Wolfs or Vikings (they look so nice and, well, high-end!), but it does have cast iron burner grates and a self-cleaning oven and such. It set us back a bit more than we had planned to pay, but it seemed so much more substantial than the next model down... They are delivering it on Saturday. Now if we can hold off until next year to replace the fridge, we'll be doing okay! (But can I live with an ugly almond fridge with that nice stainless steel range residing just across the room? Hmmm....)
Labels: crappy colds, guitars, Irish music, new range, slip jigs
posted by Cathy VanPatten at 9:58 PM
4 Comments:
SOOOO sorry about the cold-that's always some serious suckage. On the other hand--and I'll post about it as soon as I'm able--I'm just starting to get over a week-long bout with pneumonia (at the doctor's: "Wait...pneumonia? NOT the flu? NOT a bad cold? Pneu-effin'-monia? Who gets pneumonia?" Response: "Well, at your age...").
So I'm living on aspirin, Centrum Silver (ack!), an Albuterol inhaler, and a few more days of Levaquin, a broad-spectrum antibiotic.
Bleah.
Oh my! Pneumonia sucks! Years ago, Jeff came down with it as we were in KY, almost to WV on our way to a visit to the big W! At first we thought it was an allergy (the first symptom to hit was itchy eyes), but he got so sick so fast... finally I took him to the walk in clinic where they gave the diagnosis, and I packed him off in the car and drove back to Chicago... it was scary!
I'm glad you're on the mend.
Somehow, the cold seems rather more managable all of a sudden!
Sorry you're sick. That sucks. So far this winter, I've avoided anything serious. Half our youth group came down with the flu a couple of weeks ago, so I'm especially thankful to have stayed well!
I hear you on the pained fingers! I had Steven teach me a couple of chords on his guitar a few years ago. In addition to the awkward finger placement, it HURT to play! I gave up that idea immediately and decided I'd stick with my piano when the urge to play an instrument kicks in.
Congrats on the new range! New appliances are always exciting, even if being excited over them makes me feel, well, old.
I'm usually the one that stays healthy when everyone around me is ill... but not this time! I really should have stayed home from work, at least the first day of the full-blown cold, but I had SO many meetings. And I had to chair one of them. So I couldn't stay home. Thank goodness none of my editors seem to be coming down with it, although it's early days yet. I hate to be a Typhoid Cathy.
I learned to play guitar back when I was twelve or so, and it's kind of like riding a bicycle. It comes back to you, even if you haven't done it for years. Although I AM quite rusty. Once I build up those calluses, though, I'll be able to practice longer. And then I should improve like crazy. That's the theory, anyway!
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