December is Here

It is very windy here this evening and has been spitting all day. The temps are moderate though so it is not as bad as it might be. It's been a week since I've checked in with photos of Carne Beach and this has been an eventful week.

On Monday, I did my gym workout and walked around town finishing up my Christmas shopping. I was able to buy all my gifts in Wexford and they are all authentic Irish products. I got them into the mail on Tuesday at which time I was told they would arrive in time for the holidays. When the post person put the package on the scale she told me it would be €17.90 and I said, "Wow, that is more than I thought it would be." She told me that it was so high because I was .017 over the allowed kilogram. Wouldn't you know it. There was nothing in the package that could be removed, so I swallowed the pain and paid for it. I did have a very nice walk across the bridge with the usual group on Tuesday morning and we agreed to do our next Sunday ramble at The Raven and along Curracloe Beach once again.

On Wednesday I went to my Fab@50 class and Marie decided we should try kick boxing. We ventured down into the "torture chamber" which is really the Boot Camp room to run laps, box mitts to mitts and kick and punch a bag, then we did leg press, chest press and then hit the floor for some ab and core work. When we were done my thumbs were throbbing. I went home and iced them and then took a nap. When I awoke my left thumb was twice its normal size and was looking a bit wonky, and my right thumb was swollen a bit and very sore. I iced and took anti-inflammatories and decided to wait and see. By Thursday morning (I obviously couldn't do my usual aqua aerobics class), my thumbs were really painful and didn't look any better than they had the day before despite repeated icing and ibuprofen.

I called my friend Philomena who has assured me that she is my go to person when I have a problem, but she had the grand boys and they were sick, so she called Denis who also is a TidyTown volunteer and he came and drove me to the hospital. I had looked up the reviews of the A&E department at Wexford Hospital and they didn't have very good reviews, but I didn't know what else to do. I was completely surprised! I was registered, triaged, x-rayed, treated and released in 45 minutes. I had to pay €100 euros for treatment, but was assured that it covered the entire visit including X-rays and treatment and the follow up visit in 2 weeks even if that follow up included a session with a bone doctor. Amazing!!!

I have been wearing a splint on my left thumb and wore a wrap on my right thumb for the first day, but you literally cannot do a thing without thumbs, so I took off the right thumb wrap and am just being careful with it.

Last evening was our Christmas dinner at White's the hotel where my gym/spa is located. It is just a block from my apartment. We each paid €20 for the meal. I had black pudding stuffed portabella mushrooms (minus the brie) for appetizer, seatrout almandine with side veggies for my main course and apple crumble (minus the cream) for dessert. It was most delicious and the company was fabulous. So nice to get to know these people better. It is hard to do much socializing when you are working out. After dinner there was a holiday party in the Library Bar (also part of the hotel) where there was complimentary wine and snacks. I was way too satisfied from the dinner to have any snacks and I don't like wine so I ordered a black russian at the bar and made sure they didn't add any coke or Guinness to it. I sat for quite awhile out in the lobby (as you couldn't get seats in the bar) visiting with Michael and his wife Margaret. Had a very pleasant evening and was home by half eleven. Stayed up long enough to ice my thumbs and heat up a hot/ice bag for my back which went out during dinner. I am thinking I am not going to do any more kick boxing in this lifetime.

Stayed in bed until 10 this morning and was awakened by a text message from Richard seeing if I wanted to play Upwords with him and a young man named Patrick that I also met at the Monksgrange tour during the Opera Festival. They came over about one. I made tea and offered some cookies and we played. A very fine afternoon. Patrick is from Czech Republic but has lived here most of his 17 years - a very charming young man. The three of us are planning to get together again to play a game they called Robbery Rummy which is played just like my computer game Romi. Should be fun.

I walked over to Dunnes after the lads left and picked up a bit of meat that I cooked for dinner and am now lazing around with a hot pack on my lower back. I just took off the splint to get a look at my left thumb and give it some air. It is not quite as swollen, but is black and shiny and very painful.

I am reading a very strange book called "Making Nice". It is very different and quite readable if you can get past the language. I don't know if I will finish it or not as I have four more choices in my library bag in the corner, but for now I am going to try to stick with it.

Thursday it rained very hard all day. It has been very windy, but most days it is mostly dry. Unfortunately, the skies have been pretty gray all week. Tomorrow if the weather permits I am looking forward to the walk out near Curracloe Beach. I will try to get some pix.

Sorry this is quite a rambling post and I don't have any new pix. I promise to make the next one much more interesting.

Tata....