Training Log Archive: cedarcreek

Event: US Team Trials & Return to Boggs Mountain A Meet
 

(Didn't attend)

Actual text conversation with my niece:

Her: What is the number of valence electrons in bromine, 35 electrons?
Me: Need to look at table.
Her: It's atomic number is 35..
Me: Find br what element is in top row?
Her: It's in row 17, period 4..
Me: Name top element above br
Her: chlorine(17)
Me: Then 7 right
Her: idk
Her: Oh i get it! Omg!

So there you have it: An actual Eureka! moment.

2nd Doctor's appt for wrist. Had 2 x-rays taken, and then into the exam room. He detected a linear indication in my scaphoid, which is really bad---means 9-10 weeks in a cast. I'm skeptical. It sounded like a reason to order an MRI. I don't know.

{edit: Scaphoid wiki. Sounds like a common bone to fracture. My wrist doesn't hurt here, though.}

Fortunately, the x-ray is necessary in this case only to allow him to order an MRI, which offers instant diagnosis to a trained eye. So I verified coverage with my insurance company, and then made the appt. They have slots until 945pm, and it was open, so I went to an OCIN board meeting and then left straight to the MRI place. So Drs appt at 330, and MRI at 945.

It was an open MRI (big cylinder maybe 15 inches above a bed). They put my wrist in a little trap device (called a coil), and added pillows and various spacers around me so I could lie motionless for about 30 minutes. When I was comfortable, they slid me under the cylinder until my wrist was approximately on axis with the center. This put my eyes right under a low ceiling maybe 2 inches from my eyes. I tried to adjust the pillow under my head and gave up because I kept banging my forehead against the stupid cylinder. In my field of view was the cylinder 2 inches away and the actual room ceiling, so it wasn't claustrophobic at all.

The scan actually took about 35 minutes. I think 6 separate scans of various times---4, 4.5, 5.5 minutes.

I can really see how it could be scary. I had an elevated breathing rate, but it wasn't too bad. There are about 4 distinct sounds as they do the different scans. One is like a guy with a jackhammer a couple of rooms away. It's like a 2 per second hammering sound. My friend texted that it would sound like this:

BONK! BONK! BONK! BONK! BONK!
BONK! BONK! BONK! BONK! BONK!
BONK! BONK! BONK! BONK! BONK!
BONK! BONK! BONK! BONK! BONK!

I'd say, "Yeah, that's pretty accurate." Maybe not a B sound, but more like an old tractor idling or something.

One sound is like being inside a noisy transformer (or really close to a noisy fluorescent bulb), with an annoying 60Hz buzz. The other two are sort of beat frequency sounds that remind you of old science fiction movie UFO and high-tech equipment sounds. All of these sounds are not especially loud, but you feel them in your chest. They're very acoustic or something.

I was thinking of the double-E joke about "We torture electrons". I mentioned it to my PhD Chemist friend, and he said, "No! Not electrons! Nuclei!" It's actually NMR (Nuclear Magnetic Resonance), but people freak out when they see "Nuclear", thinking it means radiation rather than the little balls in the middle of atoms, so the marketeers renamed it Magnetic Resonance Imaging, or MRI. So my recommended slogan for MRI is "We torture your nuclei, and give you massive anxiety!" Or something. My chemist friend also opined that MRI is much, much safer than x-rays. It's ironic that the quick easy one is dangerous, and the one that takes forever and beats you up with acoustic anxiety is the safe one (as long as they're really careful keeping ferrous objects away from the big magnet. And they are).

I've looked at the MRI Images, and I just don't know what I'm looking at. It's nothing obvious to me.

Event: COO Ohio State University
 

Event: SMOC Waterloo Rec Area HQ
 

Quick run around the 'hood with Katie. I had overused my wrist on Saturday, and it was hurting a little. Some pain in my right ankle, esp on the gentle uphills. After I got warmed up I felt a lot better. More walking than I'd care to admit.

Event: Camp Ransburg O-Meet
 

ARDF practice at Stanbery Park--10am

2m radio orienteering course at Stanbery Park, set by Brian DeYoung.

My wrist is still very sore, so I started off after Bob and Dick and planned to stay mostly on trails and avoid the difficult gully crossings, and probably just get 3 Ts. I asked Brian to not tell me which 3, and to just let me figure it out. So I ran a little but mostly walked in the first 4 minutes. I got a good bearing on 3 as I went by, but planned to get it as I finished.

5 came on, close, when I was near the large round shelter, and I ran down a spur towards it. I waited about 3 minutes at the trail---stupidly---and got 5 just as it went off, pretty much in line with where I was standing for 3 minutes.

I ran along the stream on the trail, and as I got to the major stream junction, 1 came on strong down the stream. I found a good crossing, and went down the trail. When 2 came on, it was strong and behind me, on the same hill as the round shelter.

I waited in a decent spot for 1, and got it about a minute after it went off. 2 was strong behind me (up a different hill than before---this may be my bad memory, but I think this is right).

So I had 5 and 1, knew where 3 was, and needed 2 and 4. So I headed towards 2, quick up a hill and waited near the flat part of its spur. I was wondering where 4 might be as it came on. It was pretty weak, and in the far part of the map (1 was already outside my original plan). But I headed toward 4 anyway, just to verify it wasn't tucked in a streambed that was muffling the signal. I was dumbfounded when I saw it---I had been about 50m from it, and it was fairly weak still. We might need to check it out.

So now I needed 2 and 3, and I knew 2 was next. I hightailed it back to the stream, got a little up the hill, and waited for 2. I was about 150m off my earlier bearing, and I planned to run across the slope to get it. It came on, and I started running, and I just kept going. It was taking a long time to reach it. My receiver beeped the 12 second warning and I slowed down and got a good bearing. It went off, and I went on my compass. Actually, that's not true. I didn't bring a compass. But I went on my best guess, and saw it about 20m uphill from me. I could've easily missed this one.

I needed to get back to 3, so I planned a route and went back past the round shelter and to my best recollection of where 3 was. I had selected a shallow gully, which I was sure was right, and it wasn't there. 3 came on, and it took me about 10 minutes to figure it out. I found it offcycle, but I'm claiming zero spikes for this course. The one I was most certain about took me longer than any other.

When I got back, Brian was surprised when I told him I got them all. I was surprised when he said I was the first back. So it was a win. Going really slow for the first 4 minutes probably made the difference. (That and that Dick was trying out a radio he had just soldered together in the previous 11 hours---rather than sleeping.)

A really fun course, and a beautiful day in the park.