Surviving The Fire, But Not the Move

My wife and I, through no fault of our own, had to fill our SUV with boxes this weekend and take them to our house. (The boxes were full--otherwise, what would be the point?) Okay, it was kind of our fault, but that's another story.

This SUV, which holds more than it looks. No, that one. Or the other one. Aw, jeez.

My arms and shoulders were a little sore, because I'd spent some time a few days before trying to break into a business in a neighboring town. Really tough plywood covered window that had to be pried open.

Um, guess I should add that the building was on fire.

That window. And I was actually inside, trying to break out.

So I was kind of taking it easy, I thought. Emily would take the boxes out of the SUV and walk them through the garage. I would carry them up five steps, then throw them up into the garage attic. When we were done, I climbed a ladder into the attic and stacked the boxes up real neatly. (The attic used to be a hayloft, and has no steps going up to it. No, I don't know how the horses got up there to eat.)

Due to a cleaning spree we went through over the fall and winter, everything up there is now nicely organized. I've turned from a packrat into a neat packrat. I guess "hoarder" is the new PC term.

This is my garage, as it appeared several years ago. That car is now an ash tray.

It all went very quickly, and I didn't even worry about my chronic back pain. I'd been doing special stretches the chiropractor taught me, and have gotten to the point where I can almost touch my knees. In addition, I recently cleaned up my act a bit on the diet front, so overall the chances of me pulling a lower back pull again were low. Lower.

Then I took a nap, got up for work and took a nice hot shower, and couldn't lean over to put my socks on.

Ah, well ... just goes to show, the lower back can be sensitive if you don't take care of it for, say, fifty years. I spent the next twelve hours sitting in a chair and typing at a keyboard and yeah, it hurt, but it's not like my bottle of naproxen and I couldn't function. My coworkers thought it was a little odd, walking in with no shoes and socks on in thirty degree weather, but the dress code technically only requires pants and shirts.

It felt like a dog was jumping on my back.