I was the last man standing in this trip of illness. Notice I said "was." It appears as if I fell victim to the Novo-virus which is part of the reason why I have not been on-line for the past day or so. It was not a good feeling I can tell you. The stomach was just not in the right place. And I paid the price overnight. Mina was crashed, Tyler was still recuperating in the hospital and the Mrs. was with him.

It was a long uncomfortable 24 hours compounded by the fact that I thought my back had gone out as well. If you go back through my earlier blogs here you know that I have a problem with my disk in the L5 vertebrae. Depending on my weight, stress and what not, it can get inflamed and pinch against my sciatic nerve. A truly debilitating form of pain, for which there is really no cure other than surgery to fuse the spine or replace the disk, both of which were not recommended last year by te specialist I went to see as my problem was note that bad.

It usually starts with a "twinge" I feel as if striking a guitar chord. Pain slowly sets on until I can hardly get up to walk around. Fortunately, this time it was a different feeling after waking up. It was higher up in my back and in the dead center, not to the left or right as it usually is. I also know that when this feeling comes on I need to start stretching my hamstrings immediately. I began the regime of stretching and being VERY aware of my movements and heavy lifting.

Long story short, the pain has gone, stiffness is still there so stretching continues and as for the stomach, well thank goodness it is only a 24hr bug. I am back to normal, if anything about this trip can be considered normal. Tonight though (Saturday night) I will be going to my favorite Gym here in Tokyo to soak in their 3 hot baths, partake in the Sauna and steam room to help relieve some of the stress and tension that may be the cause for this latest adventure in my back.