As I eat through each day, I can’t reach the end without some kind of avoid passing my lips. I do try for avoid-free days, but something always comes along.

Yesterday, hubby was marinating steaks for dinner. The marinade was compliant. I suggested sautéed greens (olive oil and garlic) for the vegetable. It sounded like a nice mix of beneficial and neutral foods. As we were going through the grocery store, he picked up a small container of pine nuts. I felt a little dismay, but kept my mouth shut. I didn’t want to cause tension by piping up “I can’t eat pine nuts”. I can’t expect him to care much about my food lists. So, I ate a few. No harm done. In fact, by not causing tension between us, I may have kept both our cortisol levels low. Funny, though, the only taste in my mouth this morning is of pine nut essence. A reminder that I once again I didn’t make 100% compliance.

On another note, the Capitol City Marathon is being run today. They changed the course this year so they run right past our house. I am amazed at the number of middle-aged and older folks zooming by. We are just past mile 14, and when I went out to watch for awhile, I only heard one person huffing and puffing. It makes me feel a bit wistful about not being more athletic. All I do is walk or bike on my home equipment. I play a little golf, and go to the Pilates studio three times a week. But then I have to remind myself that running a marathon is really for O’s. I do the type of exercises recommended in LY4YT for B’s. I'm OK.

I had an early wake-up today. It’s the beginning of the golf season and there was a Chamber of Commerce tournament I was invited to play in. It was an 8:00 am shotgun start. That meant getting up at 6:00. That’s the middle of the night for me any more. I generally snooze around until 8:30 or 9:00 these days. I get plenty of B sleep, that’s for sure. The weather was good. It got a lot warmer than the weather forecasters had predicted and by 10 o’clock I had ripped off all the layers I could and still be decent, and was still too hot. The tournament was themed for Cinqo de Mayo. Hole sponsors were pouring beers first thing …..ugh! I don’t get how some folks can drink and play golf. I, for one, can’t get my body and mind to coordinate after a drink. And believe me, I have tried! But, drinking beer at 8:00 am has no appeal, even though it is a neutral beverage. We were the only all female team in the tournament. We didn’t have the length that guys did, so we scored relatively poorly. But, it was fun. I hit the ball well, for me. And at this point, I don’t have any shoulder and arm pain. It feels used, but no pain.

This relates to yesterday. I had an acupuncture/physical therapy session. The acupuncturist uses needles to relax the areas that the PT wants to manipulate (she uses osteopathic manipulations). Then she gets right in and puts the bones and ligaments where she wants them.

I have to go backwards in time here. I had an MRI on my neck in January. The diagnosis was degenerative disc disease between c5-c6 and c6-c7 with spurring and stenosis, constricting nerves going down my left shoulder and arm. Anyway, this Dr. dude said he wanted to do an anterior double discectomy and fusion. Well, that’s way too scary for me, so I didn’t make a follow-up appointment. My PT is trying to get me a second opinion with a surgeon in Seattle, but it’s taking awhile to get a response. So, meanwhile, she and the acupuncturist are experimenting with trying to stretch out the nerve and relieving the pressure from the spurs. It seemed to work yesterday. I hope the golf didn’t ruin the results.

So, I may have to make a decision someday whether I can continue playing golf or not. It certainly has been frustrating for the last five years not being able to play as much as I would like. I have just so many swings in me before things get uncomfortable. Therefore, I have slowly gotten worse at the game. I can either practice or play. I usually choose to play. Practice is boring.