Not So Bad

Here's what I look like with a neck brace on. Pretty pathetic. Of course, the whole tongue out, droopy eyes set-up is a bit of an act. It's really not that bad. I dented my skull (concussion) and schwacked my neck (sprain). All in all, not a great combo, but I can live with it.

I'm supposed to wear that neck brace at all times, but I am convinced that it only makes things worse. I wore it the whole first day, but it was hard to sleep and my neck was super tight and sore. After that, I took it off and I have felt much better. The last couple of days I worked on a little flexibility and today very very light lifting. All I know is, I feel much better compared to when I had that brace on. I still only have limited mobility, but at least I don't look like a walking accident.

On a side note, about 15 people asked me if I crashed my motorcycle when they saw me with the neck brace. Apparently they don't realize that sailboats are way more dangerous than motorcycles.

Fishing/Ouch

Today we went fishing on the high seas. The ocean was at 4-6 feet today, which wasn't too bad, but definitely some decent sized rollers (2 cases of sea sickness with one guy throwing up about 4 times- crazy). We didn't catch anything, but it was a pretty good time none the less. Not only that, but now we know that we can, in fact, sail and fish at the same time.

Since the seas were a bit rough, and we were only out in the ocean for about 2 hours, we decided to go to the sand bar in the bay. While out there we were doing our typical swimming, grilling, and messing around that we usually do. Since the tide was ebbing (this is important in a little bit), the keel started to rub against the sand as the water level lowered. I wanted to go out and move the anchors to avoid the scraping, but they were still pretty deep, so I took goggles with me so that I could find and plant them a bit easier. As I prepared to jump off, I made the awesome decision to hold the goggles behind my back and jump head first in order to avoid dropping the goggles. Well, the water had gone down a bit and I smashed my head into the sand. From there, I'm still a bit fuzzy. I somehow climbed onto the boat (I don't remember) and made my way to the V-berth. I laid down for a little bit. While I was down there Derek asked me some questions. One of them was, "what day is it?" and I had no idea. I was trying to put it all together in my head, "well, I played softball during the day, so it is the weekend." For the life of me I couldn't figure out if I had played the day before or that same day. I didn't even remember that we were fishing. That has never happened to me before. I was pretty out of it for a while.

Right now I am feeling a bit better. My memory started coming back after about 30 minutes. I still don't know how I got from the water to the V-berth, though. They said that I climbed up, which is pretty crazy because I don't have a ladder and it takes a bit of struggling to get out of the water. I must be a better climber when I'm dizzy then when I'm not.

At any rate, my back and neck are shooting with pain and my right arm is slightly numb, although the feeling is coming back quickly. My friend, Dr. Mike, told me to go to the hospital to check it out. I would like to, but when I called the emergency room, they said not to come in until around midnight (almost 7 hours from the time I called) because they are really backed up. Good thing I'm not choking, because I am terrible at holding my breath and, at most, I could only hold on for half that time without dropping. On the bright side, I do have an appointment open to me at midnight, on a Sunday--before I have to be at work at 4:30am tomorrow.

Somehow I don't think I will be awake at midnight.

Sunrise, Sand, and Potential

This past week or so, some friends from Wisconsin were visiting. I am a bit weak and go to bed at 7:30pm, so I didn't hang out much durning the week. On the weekend, however, we were busy. We caught a sunrise (the picture is really weak... just imagine how great it was) and went sailing on Saturday. We were the second boat out there and got actual sand! That was a first for me. I was so excited, we stayed too long and were a little late for the Polynesian Cultural Center luau. If you are ever in Hawaii, it's worth the $62. Be sure to get there at noon so that you can have a full day.

At any rate, everyone is gone now. The big plans for this weekend is a fishing trip in the ocean. We aren't sure how well it will work off of a sailboat, but we won't know until we try. Lots of potential for good times and fish steaks. Still planning for the trip to Molokai. From the sounds of it, no one wants to go on the first inter-island trip. They all want to wait until the second one to see if it's safe. Weak.