It's been a long time (thankfully) since I've suffered any sort of great, prolonged pain.

Three years ago, I suffered through a pinched nerve or bursitis or adhesive capsulitis or whatever it was that made my shoulder a mass of pain for a week or more. That pain was so severe it prevented me from sleeping.

Then, of course, there was my knee injury and resultant knee surgery. I enjoyed periods of agony then — long, sleepless nights watching informercials with the cats.

Well, time has passed, and I've been without pain for a couple of years. Until now.

I slept on my neck wrong the other night or something. Now it's stiff and sore. I cannot turn it more than a few degrees right or left without experiencing stiffness and, worse, sharp pain. I can tilt my chin forward to my test, but I cannot raise it much past "staring straight ahead" level.

Though it sucks to be in pain again — and I can foretell a long, sleepless night watching infomercials with the cats — I'm grateful at least that the pain is not nearly as severe as it was with my shoulder or my knee. Also, I know from past experience that this sort of neck pain passes relatively quickly. (I've had similar, but lesser, neck pains before. Kris once had a neck problem so severe that she missed a day or two of work.)

My main concern is driving. I'm being very careful to take routes that do not require any sort of checking for traffic. I don't change lanes. I drive slowly.

With any luck, I'll wake in the morning to find the pain has passed. Now, however, I'm going to see what exciting new products Ronco has to offer...

Morning Update: As predicted, I had a fitful night. I got more sleep than I had anticipated, but that's not saying much.

Because I couldn't fall asleep, and because I didn't want to watch any more about the Bowflex Personal Fitness Center, I found my cable box's "video on demand" feature and demanded that it play me a free movie: St. Elmo's Fire.

For some reason, I've been craving this film lately. I only saw it once — in Houston, when it was released in the summer of '85 — but certain scenes stuck with me: Emilio Estevez in the rain, Andrew McCarthy and Ally Sheedy in the shower together, Rob Lowe with a blowtorch.

Unfortunately, and perhaps unsurprisingly, the film sucks. Even the scenes I remember aren't particularly good. (Only Emilio Esteves biking in the rain, chasing Andie McDowell, is something like well done.) The writing and directing are clumsy. The acting is overwrought. The mid-eighties costumes are painful to watch!

While I watched the film, I did self-imposed neck exercises. I tilted my head back-and-forth, both side-to-side and front-to-back. I did neck rolls. I tried to increase my range of motion. It seemed to help a little.

I fell asleep on the futon.

When I woke this morning, I could turn my head a few degrees in every direction. Still, my neck is sore. I ate an apple on the way to work, and the experience was painful. Who would have thought that a sore neck could be exacerbated by eating an apple?

On this day at foldedspace.org

2003 — Mix Tapes   Like a lot of other people my age, I've always liked to make my own mix tapes (or, now, mix CDs).

2002 — Notes   I am a copious notetaker. My memory is poor. By taking notes I hope to goad myself into remembering certain vital pieces of information. The trouble with this sleight-of-hand is that if I do not act on a note immediately after discovering it, the note's meaning becomes lost in the shrouds of time.