I Got Some Rest!

By Shamus Posted Thursday Apr 3, 2008

Filed under: Personal 13 comments

For the last few days my body, chief victim of my ambitions, has issued vigorous protest against the things I was asking of it. Indeed, protest was the only thing it was willing to do with any degree of vigor. Its complaints were coldly rebuffed; I’m simply too busy to be bossed around by my body, which I view as nothing more than a support system for the all-important brain, which has a bunch of important stuff going on if you don’t mind, so suck it up.

But the body cannot subsist on willpower alone. Jedi Knights notwithstanding, the mastery of the mind over the body is a tenuous relationship, and one which is easily reversed. For example… about thirty-six hours ago my back went out and I lost the ability to move about the house without making pathetic little animal noises. Standing hurt. Sitting hurt. Lying down hurt. This curtailed progress on my various projects in short order. Actually, it halted all activity. The only thing I could do was experiment with different positions and try to discover the one that caused the fewest spasms. Eventually I concluded that I could only be comfortable in the following position: Slightly curled up, arms out, head forward, with my body positioned several miles above the surface of the Earth where gravity would leave me alone. Since that wasn’t an option, I settled for laying on my side, hugging a body pillow. It was painful, but not nearly as bad as not laying on my side with a body pillow.

Twelve hours later a seed of pain germinated behind my left eye and promptly grew into a thriving blossom of agony, the roots of which reached into the deepest regions of my skull. These roots choked out all other activity, smothering thought, until all of my gray matter was converted into nothing more than an elaborate system for experiencing and cataloging misery. A migraine seemed uncalled for in this case: I was already incapacitated. Why kick me when I’m down?

In any event, my body got the rest it wanted and my brain was idle for the better part of a day. So to those people who have been advising me to get some rest lately, you’ll be glad to hear your advice was inadvertently heeded. I do apologize for filling this space with complaints lately. I shall write about something more compelling as soon as I have something more compelling going on.

But let’s not end this on a sad note. No, what we need at this moment is unprovoked singing!

(Video found Via.)

 


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13 thoughts on “I Got Some Rest!

  1. Strangeite says:

    I sympathize with you on your back going out. The first time that ever happened to me was at the age of 26 after camping all weekend. I was moving stuff inside the house when my back went out on the front porch. It took four hours before I could stand the pain enough to make the trek ten feet from the porch to the foyer, where I spent the next two hours.

  2. Dan says:

    Napkins make everything better.

    Except back agony and migraines.

  3. hotsauce says:

    my body, which I view as nothing more than a support system for the all-important brain

    “I used to think the brain was the most important organ in the human body, but then I thought ‘who’s telling me this?'”
    – Stephen Wright (I think)

  4. Roxysteve says:

    Perhaps you also gained something else here. Namely, a stimulus that brings on your migraine – exhaustion.

    Maybe these things are tied to the amount of rest you get?

    Steve.

  5. David says:

    LOL at the Stephen Wright joke from hotsauce.

    I recently had a 19-day stretch of work with one day off. Two jobs, with a couple of 12.5-hour days in the mix, and also with full days of teaching while hiking. Then there was some family stress and such thrown in for fun… I was pretty whacked by the end, and my temper had developed a pretty short fuse.

    But at least my various aches and pains weren’t anything like what you had, so you have my full sympathies, Shamus. Glad you finally got some rest.

    I’ve discovered that having a little downtime (even passing out on the couch for 20 minutes) here and there will keep me going longer, and I stay sharper. Sharper being a relative thing, of course! ;)

  6. Terrible says:

    “I used to think the brain was the most important organ in the human body, but then I thought “˜who's telling me this?'” – Emo Phillips

    edit: Not that I don’t think Steven Wright isn’t brilliant as well.

  7. hotsauce says:

    Thanks for the correction. I figured someone would know for sure.

  8. Davesnot says:

    uh.. I have this sudden desire for a napkin.

  9. RPharazon says:

    Today I ran for 5 minutes and by the end of it my lower legs hurt so much that I could barely walk. Sitting and lying down was not an option, so I did stretches.
    That pretty much relieved the pain enough to play a bit of Volleyball.

    It was my body teaching me a lesson to stretch before I run and that I am getting older. I hate when it does that.

  10. Christian Groff says:

    Holy ****! I never saw that before. If it were me, I’d run out of the food court and cover my ears! Man, that was some crazy ****, with those people doing a musical number. ^_^

    I’m sorry you had a bad day with all that pain. I know how bad it is – I had a migraine yesterday and it was killing me something fierce.

  11. Sandrinnad says:

    Ice. Ice is your friend. Heat feels better, but icing your back helps bring the swelling down, and icing the back of your neck can help with a migraine.

    A good chiropractor is worth their weight in gold too :)

    I was in my early 20s the first time my back went….while cleaning a toilet. Stupidest thing I ever did was finishing that day at work :)

  12. Viktor says:

    Ugh, sorry Shamus. I’m just waiting for the day humans can start keeping our brains alive in jars and quit dealing with this “body” nonsense. :(

  13. ArchU says:

    We could all use Jedi powers, as far as control over our own bodies is concerned…stupid things only end up running into other things and getting hurt anyway…

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