Above Average for Age in Everyday Ramblings

…my exercise capacity, according to the results of my stress echo test.

That is much better than being told by a young doctor a few years back that a woman my age probably has arthritis. I do have arthritis in my SI joints but being told that by a whippersnapper as he sends me off for a hip x-ray is not something a body wants to hear.

We were talking on Sunday about how we feel about being told that we are exhibiting signs of aging by professionals in Kes and Most Honorable’s kitchen as we were making homemade pizza. (It was yummy and I even was able to bring some home.)

That was after Most Honorable and I went for an 8-mile low-key bike ride at their local 1,200-acre park and wildlife refuge. It was a test, my first bike ride in a year to see how I would do.

We, of course, managed to get vaguely lost. Getting lost is a bit of a tradition with Most Honorable. We must bring out the pioneer spirit in each other. In this case we were following the trail signs with the white bunny on them without knowing for sure which parking lot we had parked in. It all worked out without major backtracking, though there was a bit of that.

The picture above was from the end of our ride crossing a slough.

The good news from my test is that there is no ischemia (that means blocked blood flow to my heart). That is specifically what they were looking to rule out.

I do apparently have exercise or stress hypertension though. I have a follow up appointment with the original sports medicine specialist in three weeks.

What a ride this has all been.

I sure hope they are not going to recommend meds for this.

The bike ride was fine. I just need to build confidence in navigating paths with unpredictable kids and dogs coming the other way. Oh and building strength in the middle outside of my quads, (something we don’t really do specifically in yoga though I could design a practice for that) as well as working with weights at the gym and ye old stair climbing protocol.

So I think I will go ahead and buy a new bike, once I get all the medical copays for all of this out of the way.

Our fire season is just starting here. The scenes from the California fires are terrifying. This head in sand approach to climate change at the national level has me completely baffled. I guess some folks believe the earth is flat too.

One of my students slipped in her loose shoe on the way into class last night and fell. It is a worry. She stayed for class and I modified as best I could. I do hope she is okay. She left with a close friend who I know will look after her but still…

I ended up not seeing Mrs. Sherlock this weekend. She has been a bit too active in this heat and needed to rest. They want me to come over next weekend and watch Avatar in 3-D. That should be fun.

Tomorrow afternoon I am taking off from work and going to a road show and listening session by a group I belong to called the Yoga Alliance. I am looking forward to asking other teachers if they are getting mass quantities of page likes from males in India on Facebook like I am.

My guess is that it has something to do with the government in India and the Hindu Nationalists that are trying to claim that yoga is theirs and we are culturally appropriating it.

There is a fascinating article in this last Sunday’s New York Times Magazine about what they call a godman named Baba Ramdev who has a great deal of influence over the Prime Minister.
The only other thing I can think of is that I belong to an organization that is basically a bit of a cult with an Indian leader called the Himalayan Institute. They do good work in many arenas and they have useful resources for teachers. I could have gotten onto a list.

It is a mystery, like so many things in our lives.

I for one, am happy to be here to experience them.

Last updated July 31, 2018