h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

This website.... or is it just me? - seems to take an age to load a page sometimes, at the moment, and, judging by how quiet it is on here, I'm guessing it isn't due to the busyness of the site - wish I still had my ripley link, as that always seemed quicker, but lost that when the PC died Hardly bother to turn the computer on now, day to day, just at most once a day or so, to check E-mails etc, and pop on here briefly to see if anything much is going on...
No gym today, so spent the day doing various things, squat thrusts, press-ups, situps, various balance/stretchy pilatez type things, plus of course core work, balancing on the exercise ball... oh, and a short walk out to the pharmacy to pick up some meds
Was at hospital a few days back, for another heart scan; the dilated aorta has got bigger, but will know more after the next appointment with the consultant cardiologist, no doubt she'll again want me to stop exercising, and get mad when she discovers I'm not taking the blood pressure lowering angiotencin II receptor blocker drug... err... cozar I think it was (GP should have written to her to say I reacted badly and couldn't take it, but I assume that letter never got written, or got to her)
Endocrine appointment this Friday, not sure what I'm ment to say to them... - "you know that osteoporosis and fractured spine you diagnosed me with; well I'm still not being treated for it, and the published medical literature implies a better response in patients started early on treatment; now one year since they DX the osteoporosis... " . . I could mention the spots again; probably steroid induced acne, but they wouldn't even examine them so far and I'm getting boared of keep telling temn the same things.. I expect I'm ment to be all gushing about how now I'm full of energy thanks to the levothyroxine, only, of course, I'm not, if anything my energy levels are lower now...

Did some housework today, first time in ages. and, as useual, apart from exercise, spent the day sitting on the sofa, doin gnothing, just drinking tea, no desire to do anything, just wishing there could be total scilence, but occasionally putting on the radio just to make it look like I preferred that to scilence. The dulling and numbing affect of the steroids seems more as time goes by. Still need to try find a dentist, but I've still not got round to that, the broken tooth doesn't hurt as far as I know, so I've not bothered, but I should I guess if there was any way to find a dentist that locally, took NHS patients, the stupid NHS site, to help you find a dentist doesn't work, as its not up to date enough to show those that have vacancies

Was at gym yesterday, did 5 KM on the exercise bike, in 10 minutes, about 240 -260 abdominal crunches at a mixture of 28 and 35 KG, then did weightlifting for about 45 minutes; 300 reps at 25 KG, mix of squats, curls, shoulder shrugs, lifts, raises, deadlifts upright rowing, etc., etc.,

Should be ten pin bowling tomorrow night, after gym, but I'm not bothering to go but may pop out in evening instead

probably oughta shower now, try not to be in bed too late, as up early for gym, getting a real drag, having to wake so early, to take the levo, then wait half an hour, before even having coffee, and then a further half an hour before I can have food and take steroids, before thinking about getting ready to go out

It's usually slow in Pliny.

In Alabastard I frequently have to refresh by using the F5 button.

Other than that I have nothing to report.

To get back into Ripley, can't you just change the setting in preferences - and then bookmark it?

"I expect I'm ment to be all gushing about how now I'm full of energy thanks to the levothyroxine, only, of course, I'm not, if anything my energy levels are lower now... "

Still makes it sound like you've been diagnosed with something you haven't got, hence all these things are not having the effect they're expected to...

Thanks for posting, anyway - always good to hear from you.

Here's the link to the Preferences dashboard https://vogons.h2g2.com/dashboard in case that helps.

Pages are loading at reasonable speed for me in Pliny this morning, but I've just received an alert that my virus checker blocked suspicious content, so I'm not sure what's going on there! Ah, I see the advert at the bottom of the page is missing, so that might be something to do with it...

I hope you have a good afternoon, whatever you decide to do

ahhh... its in preferences.... - why the didn't I even think to look there

Well saw endo, went quite well, although the clinic apointments are always back to front; they don't do bloods until after clinic, so there isn't much of a concrete nature to discuss, until they get those results; which are then out of date by the time of the next app two months later
anyhow; still waiting for appointment for metabolic bone clinic, to address the fractured spine and osteoporosis; I could start meds for the osteoporosis before, but I think it makes more sense to see them first - no doubt as a result of the bloods yesterday I may get an increase in my thyroid/levothyroxine dose not much to say really, so wasn't wildly exciting, BP low, weight down again (84 KG on their scales fully dressed; 107 KG was my weight about this time last year) - we're pushing the intervial between testosterone injections longer, as my trough level, I.E., just before the previous injection was quite high, so going to a 14 week intervial (asides anything too much testosterone can thicken the blood, which for me with my heart thing, can lead to blood clots and nastiness etc) - bloods were also taken for regular stuff, plus for my IGF-1, to see if I need to increase the growth hormone dose; as being on levothyroxine means the body can use, therefore use up more growth hormone...

went to gym this morning.
5 KM on the exercise bike, in 10 minutes.
240 abdominal crunchs, at a mixture of 28 and 35 KG, mainly 28 KG.

then did some free weights, bent over rowing and bench pressing, 5 X 20 reps at 10 KG each arm before I went into the squat rack; squats, bicep curl, reverse grip bicep curl, shoulder shrugs, more upright rowing, press, deadlifting, etc., etc., about 400 reps in total at 25 KG...

just over an hour in gym in total... home for lunch, and just showered, may try for a short nap now, then out tonight for a Thai meal, with the local LGBT group, and thence to a pub after the meal...

The sticker on my arm, from taking blood, survived a shower yesterday; including a scrub with sugar exfoliating scrub, soap, and showergel, and just survived soap and showergel just now.... -= its still there! me thinks slightly more sticky a plaster than one needs for just a single puncture wound from a blood letting needle I guess I oughta just pull it off - but maybe I'lll leave it, see how many days it can survive - the max so far was 5 days, and that was for a IM injection site plaster from the testosterone depo injection

Sounds good indeed, that the T levels were taken into account Shame about the results of the new bloods not being available yet, though - will be interesting for you to find out how the levo affects the growth hormone levels

Impressive work for an hour in the gym - that's a superb number of total reps

well; as goes the reps; I've grown out of the weight I'm lifting... which is strictly speaking slightly more than I'm supposed too, according to the cardiologist... but, as I've got stronger I a't just keep doinjg 20 KG; asides anything, doing something like squats, or dead lifts; with a 20 KG bar now; would in effect be lifting minus 5 KG; as I've lost about 24 - 25 KG... - plus I try to keep all the weight lifting cardiovascular, by getting heart rate up, to start on the exercise bike, running machine, or cross trainer, etc, then do the weights fast... but doinhg them correctly of course; mainly I just don't have any rest when moving from one weight exercise to th enext

Didn't do quite so many reps today... probably a bit fatigued from yesterday at the gym mind, still did the cycling nad about 300 reps on the abdominal crunch machine then about 200 reps on weights in the squat rack, similar mix as before

Then, we went to the Arabic shop, and got some diced lamb from their butchers, nad some weird Algerian lamb sausages (looking forward to try the sausages for breakfast tomorrow). Oh, and bought some almond flakes (to go with trout later in the week)

Spent the rest of the day cooking.

Turns out, to get really* really* fresh ground cinnamon, its best to grind it yourself... also turns out, grinding cinnamon sticks in a hand grinder, first involving using a pestal and morter to break themn small enough to get into the hand grinder, takes..... a long long while..., but they smell gorgeous filled a small tub with ground cinnamon

then I ground, cumin, black pepper corns, fennel seed, sea salt (ouch my wrists!) no... I refuse to use an electric grinder

got some pita dough I made out of the freezer....

then grated two onions (yep, my tear glands defo work now again )

I soaked some bulghur in water, for about 15 minutes, then drained that and squeezed out the excess water.....

Added the bulghur to a big bowl, with onion, the spices, a whole load of fresh torn fine mint leaves, a little oragino, and a tiny amount of dried rosemary

Threw the 400 Grams minced lamb in... and worked it all together

once it was sort of bound into one large meaty spicey herby bulghury ball, I made 13 large kofta kebabs and put them on a large dinner plate, covered with kitchen film, and put in the fridge to cool

Then we had a nap...

cooked up the kebabs, under the grill plus sliced more onion, and a whole red bell pepper, and once the koftas were about cooked, I cooked the pita breads that I had rolled out, then grilled the onion and red pepper strips, with more rosemary olive oil and oragino

Served up with plain yoghurt, and a whole ton of pickled shole long chilis

oo... adding the cinnamon and bulghur (a Lebonese thing apparently), made them even better than last time - best... kebabs, ever.... and each kebab came in at about 85 KCal, the pita bread 175 KCal per pita, had two pitas each and three koftas plus the grilled veg and things

I must have burnt extra calories today, just spending so many hours in the kitchen... - actually, maybe my energy, and concentration is getting closer to nhormal

no gym tomorrow, off on a quest for bread flower, more pickled chilis, and probably some other stuff I forgot...

oh, and the thai meal last night was gorgeous (as was the beer ) in the pub afterwards

Right, its time for my epic bath now... plenty of magnesium salts I think, plus all the lush and body shop bubbles and gorgeous scented ness