Happy New Year 2011

I see I haven't posted since last spring.  I would say the biggest contributors to my noncontributions to the blog world have been:

1. World of Warcraft
2. Shoulder injury

Let's start with the shoulder injury, since the root cause was the subject of previous posts: those raised beds.  I did clean out the area for the two additional in front and built the last two beds.  Then I took on the task of moving the dirt from the huge pile in the front yard into the beds.  Most unfortunately, I thought it would go faster if I used a bigger shovel, so I dragged out the snow shovel and scooped huge piles into the wheelbarrow, which I filled to brimming and pushed up the hill.  Over and over and over.  Yeah, not so bright.  After a couple of months of thinking the pain would pass, I saw my doctor, who sent me to an ortho, who gave me a cortisone injection and sent me on my way.  That eased it a bit, but even that small relief faded.  Eventually back to the doctor, who sent me to physical therapy.  Another couple of months of stalling, and now I'm in my 11th week of PT, with some improvement.  The PT did warn me that with the nature of my injury and the length of time I had been dealing with it, I should view my progress on a month to month basis, not week to week.  So I have hope, and am already planning my gardening for next year.

On a related note, the dirt pile in the driveway remained through the summer and fall, though not as massive as upon delivery.  It sprouted tall plant life and became a sort of wildlife refuge, which I thought was pretty cool, even though it blocked my side of the driveway and I had to navigate the Mini around it daily.  One day eleven turkeys were meandering around and through it, and on several occasions entire flocks of small birds would launch themselves from it when I pulled into the driveway.  Julie was not amused.  I was rescued by my sister and nephew, who came over one afternoon prior to snowfall and cleared away the last of the pile.  My existing framed beds are now nicely topped off, and I have a couple of new unframed beds for next year.

On to World of Warcraft.  Sometime in the late May timeframe I finally tried WoW, which I had been avoiding for years as I suspected I would be drawn in to the world of online gaming like a speck of space dust to a black hole.  I was right.  In recent weeks, however, the Azeroth fever has broken, and I've cut down my logged in time to permit the return of other pastimes.  Jules is immensely relieved.

So anyway, blah, blah, blah.  All this to say it's New Year's Day, and time for fresh starts.  I changed the design of the blog a bit, and hopefully I'll be returning on a more regular basis to entertain with tales from my continuing adventures.  Happy New Year!