Surfing seems to make it better.

No, really.

My reiters causes swelling of the left knee and right ankle (that’s the worst affected parts anyway), previously a moderate does of steroids for a week kicks it back into touch… but on Thursday surfing did the job.

Now I thought this had been the case before, but I dismissed it as a co-incidence.

Wednesday I had a bad flare up while I was away with work, so I had no access to the emergency steroids my doctor left with me. Upon my return to Bournemouth I spotted some good swell, despite the pain (visible swelling and heat) in my knee I really wanted to go out.

I surfed for an 90 minutes or so and I’m sure the combo of restriction from the wetsuit plus the cold sea water sorted my knee.  Wow!

Is that even possible? Next time I get a flare up, I’ll be heading into the sea!

Have made the move to dark chocolate, that has to help… and tea I’m now a 1/2 a tsp man (down from 2) so I think I can say the trend is going the right way!

Reiters has declined a bit, knee still gives me grief; Have to wait for a specialist appt (4-6 weeks) to try and figure out the triggers. (What if its a lack of sugar? that’d be hilarious!)

wow. ok when you look at it like that, it’s even worse! Must… drink… less… SUGAR!

I have started to cut back on the sweet stuff generally, eat the odd bit of dark choc as a treat… must.. eat… BETTER!!!

In other news, the Reiters is back and I seem to have an intolerance to dairy, god… I’m a bundle of health. Sorry folks. On steroids again (prescribed btw!) so makes my brain a bit crazy.

DJs – often reduced to glorified ticket agents…

Web Design – I saw someone offering site builds for £50 and a flash “hot box” for £20!

Dancers – I could have a different troop of “dancing” girls every night if I wanted.. for free.. which is actually tempting…

Photographers – any pro-spotters still able to charge more than a few beers n petrol money?

Producers – there’s so many wannabe producers with a whole cracked studio in abox, you can get them for £75 a track now, no wonder beatport is full of clone-a-tracks in the latest electro-tech-hard-mnml-grime-bassline-bouncecore or whatever this weeks cool genre is.

The sad thing is, I haven’t even had to exaggerate to make my point, you can find all these things on DSI without much effort.

Here is my question…

What is worth anything now?

I’m worried everyone is working shite jobs they don’t really like, sitting on facebook and dreaming of being a Dj/dancer/photog/web-designer/cat tamer/reality tv star/singer* (*delete as applicable) when really its only ever going to be a hobby.

Kinda sad, I feel like everyones deluded… or am I talking shit?

/ramble-ends

Problem is, the plan was to work and just enjoy DJing (as above – kinda)… make some tunes and work on the ebook site in evenings… job market = shite still :: agency rang me about a job yesterday, put my CV forward, got a call asking when I was free for interview, I gave dates/times… call back 2 hours later, no longer hiring, MD has made 3 people redundant. 2nd time this has happened – kinda.

Gaaaaah stupid illness, messed Plan A up… now Plan B isn’t working… I kind of have a Plan C forming… pppfffft

why I don’t love bike club… my knee wasn’t loving it on the return trip. reckon I’ll be limping tomo. Ah well.

Monday 645pm Bournemouth Pier (usually to the left as you look at it).

Fixed the bike up yesterday (back wheel needed some love, some rim tape and a new inner tube) and took it out for a short trundle to test the knee today.

Didn’t seem too bad, knees felt a bit shaky for a while when I got back, didn’t really put any effort in either.

Lovely day down here, a bit windy n cold but the beach looked lovely. Went to the Durley and back, lower gears than I’d normally use to make it less effort/stress onto the joint.

Verdict:~ Gentle rides to build up the strength, I reckon will be fine.

I’m noticing that now I’m more flexible I’m using muscle groups that are weak.

i can kneel down again!!! Just about….

Squatting, nope, but I think that’ll come with time.

AND

for the first time, I felt bendy enough to get out of the pool without using the steps…. dum dum duuuuh!

Only managed 48 lengths as my ankles were really hurting, when one joint feels better it seems my body finds new and wonderful places to hurt.

Despite only doing 48, I did swim a set of 16 so that’s progress of sorts.

In other news…

Thanks to Stu – I now have a shiny new pair of 750GB drives in my RAID array, much needed as my PC was grinding to a halt at times.

I’m starting to formulate an updated plan nout of this mess, coming to terms with the job market being dead to non-existent…. onwards, ever onwards.

She took a look, ultra-sounded my joints (bit cold)… then the bad news…

I want to drain the fluid from your knee and inject steroids direct into the joint.

Having drained 45ml of fluid out of my knee… using a giant syringe… she then stuck a steroid needle in too.

Ouch – uuuuuh – eeeeeee

As if I wasn’t having enough fun, she sent me for a bloodtest too…. yay, I love needles! (ahem – NOT)

Good news is the knee should be noticably better after 48hrs, I’ve got to rest it loads… so no hill walking when I go back to Hereford – ah well, have to settle for the cider museum and some RnR with Mum n Lucy at my beck n call

Sofa’s calling. Have a good weekend y’all.

Health-wise I’m loads better, my knee still seizes up if I put a lot of weight on it, do loads of stairs or twist a lot. The index toes are still mostly solid.

Back to the specialist on Thursday, then hopefully BIKE CLUB will return next monday… weather and doc ok permitting.

Jobs: Had a few agencies chase me up, online portfolio is getting good feedback so far – any geeks, please feel free to critique… (view source… ahem)

WebSites: Finished phase 1 of the new site for JonGurd – have a look.

Music: Recorded a new mix last night, for my loyal fans on facebook… all 36 of them… and my promo site