An Eventful Weekend

To those of you that don’t keep up with me on Twitter, I managed to put my back out on Saturday playing rugby. Well actually that probably gives be a little too much credit. I was about to play rugby as I only made it to part way in to minute number 3.

As I led on the ground in pain the one thing that went through my mind was “Mrs Geek is going to KILL me”.

It would be fair to say that there is mounting pressure for me to “reduce my exposure to rugby” as it is a large amount of time that I could (and I will concede maybe should) otherwise be spending with my family. So the thought of returning home broken the day before Maggie’s Baptism (I will post that separately) was not an appealing one. It was not helped by the fact that my team were beaten so badly that I am not sure that we managed even to come second.

I have therefore spent the last few days eating enough tablets to make me rattle and smelling like … well I know nowhere else that smells like it other than sports changing rooms. The overwhelming whiff of liniment.

Fast forward to Monday, I was told by my doctor that I should go to the worlds largest time sink … A&E (for the Americans out there that is the UK equivalent of the ER without the gun shot wounds).

So after an uncharacteristically short wait of about 2 hours, the doctor told me that the good news was that it was not broken … WTF !?! How was that even under consideration? And if it was, why did I not get a somewhat speedier treatment!

So I returned home with the same advice that I had self prescribed … it is simply a muscle pull, take Paracetamol and Ibruprofen and feel sorry for yourself (OK so I added the last bit).

Cosmetic Injury

Once again I am have been given a gentle reminder that my indestructibility seems to have worn off.

Let me start by saying that as captain of my team I am responsible for ensuring I have a team for the match, and as things stood on the Saturday morning I was still a player short.

Now it sounds simple enough that the team below us is supposed to pass up their player and request downwards etc, but alas it is all too easy to come up with reasons that any given player is “unable” to change plans. Thus it is always wise to go with a some form of leverage, and being that our game was due to finish before the start of their game I suggested that some of my players might be interested in a second game and thus quid pro quo.

However our game did not go overly well and all of a sudden the international match looked more appealing to many of my players than the thought of staying out in the rain and getting battered and bruised any further. I attempted to remind them that this is what they choose to do for recreation, but to most the allure of a warm bar and a big screen was too great, so as seems to be the way I had to fall on my sword and offer myself up (Does it sound like I may be protesting too much? I must remind you that Mrs Geek does occasionally read this so it needs to be convincing … shhh).

In all honesty it was rather pleasant to play for them. It meant that I didn’t walk away from the day without tasting victory at least once (don’t even speak of the International debacle that I was all too lucky to have missed).

It did also leave me with another souvenir of the day.

To be honest it looks worse than it feels and at least it gives other people the opportunity to be a stand up comedian. It is what we always used to describe as a “Cosmetic Injury” as it makes it look as though you have been doing a lot without the associated pain. Unfortunately Mrs Geek’s well of sympathy regarding rugby injuries seems to have run dry, but that makes me feel less guilty about telling everyone I meet that it is a result of her temper at my leaving the laundry discarded on the bedroom floor once to often.

On reflection, maybe two games in a day is a little too much at my age. If nothing else maybe I should take care to protect my ravishing good looks.

Spring Has Sprung

Well keeping up the blog rate was going to fade sometime. The past few days have gone in something of a blur.

Having set up the Photo Studio (i.e. The front room and enough lights to illuminate a major sports event) I have been trying to fit both taking and processing photos (I will post some later) around the hectic routine that Mrs. Geek and I try to convince ourselves resemble normal family life.

To be honest, as weekends go, this one was really quite enjoyable. Starting with a school Disco on Friday night.

School discos are great fun to the outside observer. The recipe seems to be take 1 or more children, fill them with approximately 1 ton of sugar (multiply this for additional children), gee them up and play silly music. It is like a large scale model of Brownian motion. Having been all but frisked to ensure that I was not leaving with any money left in my pockets, the job is to some how talk my 2 little sugar saturated balls of energy into the idea that it was time for bed. All in all, not the most relaxing of evenings, but I have to admit to being amused by my daughter’s attempts at dancing and as much as it was not exactly a quiet dinner for 2 that I would have chosen, it was nice to have an opportunity to sit and chat to my wife without too many distractions (other than the music and the room full of kids).

Saturday also went well as on top of the second successive victory for my rugby team (I’ll spare you the details of my try, I will however not fail to mention it at any available opportunity), it dawned on me that maybe, just maybe, we had finally finished with winter. It was a lovely clear day that could even have been described as… well if not warm, then at least tepid. Also the sun decided that it would hang on until beyond the end of the match, so rather than walking in heads down in the dreary twilight as has been the case all too often, we got to bask in our glory and feel as though we had turned the corner and there was no stopping us … well at least not until next week.

And on top of the general melee the accompanies a Sunday Mrs. Geek had invited two of the kid’s friends around with their parents for a late lunch, so I have been Jonesing for my internet fix, and my blog neglect. Back to work now, so I have far more time on my hands, just don’t tell my employer.

Things I Have Learnt Or Been Reminded Of This Weekend

1. In a cosmic ray a proton can be accelerated to have the same amount of energy as a tennis ball traveling at 50 miles per hour!
2. No matter how simple the shopping list … I have the capacity to miss something
3. Pizza always lands topping side down



4. 1 portion of Marks and Spencer Pain au chocolat bread and butter pudding contains 114% of your standard daily fat allowance
5. I still want it
6. I should not underestimate my team’s capacity to underperform
7. Do not feed a 4 year old cheese before bed time
8. A 4 year old can produce enough vomit to cover ~2 square meters
9. Vomit defies most logical assumptions about direction of spray
10. A 4 year old rarely vomits just the once
11. Whilst further rounds of vomiting may not produce the same quantity of mess, it still creates THAT SMELL
12. I really REALLY HATE THAT SMELL

Cauliflower and Mash

No prizes for guessing how my game went today… We got mashed. I really am beginning to wonder if I have already met the boundaries of my talent as a captain, which after 2 weeks does not reflect so well on me. Unfortunately the thing we are lacking most is a little experience. A couple of old heads amongst the young lads would help them to develop. We can but hope.

Not much went right for me today, be it the result to the fact somebody dropped my towel in a puddle while I was in the shower. I did say the other day that not all my posts would be quite so positive. In fact you would have to look quite hard to find somebody quite so self pitying at the moment.

I play prop. For those that are unfamiliar with the technical aspects of rugby, it is the butt ugly one that basically shoves his head into the oppositions face on a far too regular basis. Now obviously with my angelic features, I am an exception to this rule. My opposite number however made up for me and went the extra mile, truly it was a face that even his mother must struggle to love and to be honest I am not sure he will be submitting his PHD thesis any time soon (On reflection I may be a bit bitter). So having grunted and snarled at each other for 30 minutes, my new friend Quasi Modo decides to add injury to insult by head butting my ear … at every scrum.

Alas I had another invulnerability malfunction and as a result I ended the match with a lovely cauliflower ear.

Isn’t she a beauty. For those that are unfamiliar with the concept, a cauliflower is when you ear takes a hit and starts to bleed in between the two surfaces of itself, causing it to turn into a balloon being filled with blood, mmm lovely! So after the match I went to see the club doctor to get him to drain it. This also did not go as I might have hoped. After looking for, and I quote “The biggest needle we have got”, he promptly shoved it in my ear and shoved it around which might have hurt a bit (how do you communicate the sarcasm of that last sentence?) only to be told, “Nah, it isn’t working we will have to squeeze it out”. If by some bizarre coincidence you find yourself in a similar situation, and you hear those words, just stand up and leave. Go and see someone that knows what they are doing because your doctor is a masochist.

Alas this is hindsight talking. I did not walk out, I stayed there while he squeezed and bent the ear that has been causing me the pain. This hurt a bit too (there is that sarcasm again). This would be bad enough if it were not for the fact that the picture above is a shot of my ear after it had been treated. Hence I am currently spending the evening sat in the Emergency Room of my local hospital, while the staff mock me for playing a silly game and bringing it on myself. It is in these moments that you see why the NHS is the envy of the world.

P.S. whilst sitting here, I have learnt the following startling piece advice. Apparently, despite seeing it done on TV, it is defiantly not a good idea to try to punch somebody through the window of their car, when the window is wound up! Who would have thought..? Apparently not the chap sat just in front of me. This guy has to be in practice for a future Darwin award.

I have lost my Superpower

It was not so long ago when I was indestructible. Now I am not talking about the arrogance of youth that makes them believe that they are indestructible, I actually was indestructible. If only I had realised at the time!

That is the only way that I can explain how I managed to play rugby for nearly 20 years with no injuries worth noting. Sure I would ache on a Sunday, but there was something noble and satisfying about aching that said that I must have put everything into the game.

That however was before turning 30. Everyone asked me the “is it weird”, “do you feel old now” type questions on the big day, and genuinely I didn’t. However, unbeknown to me this must have been the expiry date on the indestructibility. It would seem it was only valid for the first 30 years as now I seem to be falling apart. I feel like Clark Kent, in Superman II, when he gives up his powers and gets battered in the cafe. Only I don’t have a crystal castle in which to regain my powers.

Let me explain. About half way through last season I got a smack in the face, and bizarrely the whiplash caused me to have pain in my left shoulder. Bad enough in fact to make need 2 weeks off, this had never happened before. Injuries just aren’t meant to last 2 weeks!

Then at the end of the season I tweaked my knee, so innocuously that I actually do not remember doing it, but again this caused me (or at least gave me an excuse) not to train over the summer.

The thing is, I am still carrying the effects of these injuries up to this day! Now I will admit that I have not had any proper treatment on them, but how would I do that? I can not go into the doctor and say my shoulder and my knee ache a bit, but not enough to stop me running or playing rugby … just a bit.

In fact I did go to the doctor about the knee, and her advice was to stay off it! How exactly am I supposed to stay off of it? Is she really suggesting that I stay at home, or should I request a wheelchair for my slightly aching leg?

The reason I mention it now, is that I am finding it increasingly difficult to find a position in which I am comfortable enough to fall to sleep. This caused either of 2 things, I either go to bed at a sensible time and spend ages rolling around trying to get settled (which isn’t helping the popularity with Mrs Geek, I am obviously doing it just to annoy her), or I stay up until I am so tired that I fall in spite of the discomfort. Neither of these sound like an ideal solution.

So why not just give up rugby? Well …

To look at me you might, if you were being polite, say that I am somewhat robust. What can I say, some people eat to live, I live to eat! Rugby is the main thing that stops me from ballooning into Pavarotti (apart from the lack of singing talent … and the continued breathing)

And the fact is I am only 31. My dad played until he was over 50. I really enjoyed, as a young man playing alongside my dad (or even better for the opposition against him). I would hate to think that my son will not get to do the same. But what chance have I got of that? 10 more years of not sleeping properly? I could be mighty cranky by then.