Monday, May 30, 2016

Post #67- Big Limpin' - torn muscle edition

So check this out..... I was sleeping early Thursday morning (~5am), when all of sudden I feel a shooting, excruciating pain in my right calf muscle. It started as a cramp, but quickly felt more like someone was stabbing me in the leg with a red hot pitchfork. I jumped out of bed and did my best to mitigate the pain through stretching. The initial and most painful throbbing subsided after 2 minutes, but more general pain and associated tightness persisted for hours. Immobilized, I called into work sick for the first time in 5 years. My condition did not improve by the middle of the afternoon; I went into urgent care where I was diagnosed with a small tear in my calf muscle. An MRI on Tuesday will confirm, modify, or refute this preliminary diagnosis. Until that time - and likely well beyond - I am relegated to crutches. I have no idea how this happened. It feels like the worst joke ever. How I managed to bike 18,000 miles without any leg injuries only to tear my calf in my sleep is ridiculous! I feel like such a chump - seriously. Oh well, If I can't laugh at myself, I can't laugh at anyone else, right?

Out of commission

Sadly, birding will be curtailed as I heal in the next few weeks. Since I cannot walk, I must find places to bird that require, at least at this time, very minimal crutching. This weekend that meant a quick run to the north side of Los Angeles to chase a lost Glossy Ibis, an eastern species that is very rare in California. I'm certainly not a big CA lister, but as the bird would require only a short crutch it was the most exciting thing I could do considering my current condition.

Hop-a-long at the picturesque LA River

The great outdoors!
Gotta love LA birding :/

Scope kindly carried by Sonia!
We didn't waste any time on the whole "in sickness" thing......

Glossy Ibis - I promise. It was closer
when we rolled up.
I am terrible at digiscoping....

I'll have to reach into my bag of tricks to generate content these next few weeks. I have some fun ideas, so please stay tuned for upcoming posts! Until then, please enjoy another puffin photo that I took in Newfoundland....

 Atlantic Puffin - Fratercula artica
Canon 500mm f/4 IS v1 + 1.4x III on EOS 7D (original)
1/1000 at f/8, ISO 400

and a frog, because I'm going to be hopping around for a while!

1 comment:

  1. The cramps that are felt at the back of the leg and calf are horrible! Fortunately, you were able to get to the doctor to get some kind of relief for the tear before it became too serious. It only takes one injury to change the dynamics of the muscles.

    Alejandra Goll @ U.S. HealthWorks - Tacoma

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