Chugging along

Well, I'm still around. I was just viewing my last post and decided an update was in order. I really need to keep up on this blog as I find it very relaxing. I passed my kidney stone the following Thursday. It's not something I care to go through again. The day before I passed it I had a 6 hour session of intense pain and discomfort. No amount of pain medicine was going to do the trick. I took a little more than prescribed hoping it would knock me out. About 5 hours into it I finally drifted into a restless sleep mode. When I awoke about an hour later the pain had subsided. The next day I had an appointment to see a Urologist. I went to the hospital to pick up my MRI photos and as I was leaving I had this sudden urge to urinate. I found a bathroom and as I did my business, PLOOP, out it dropped into the toilet. I was so happy that it finally had passed yet, was disgusted that it had decided to come out at that particular time. You see, I had previously had to strain my urine for four days to try and catch the stone and the one time I didn't have the mesh funnel it decides to come out. Unfortunately, I had to reach into the public toilet and retrieve the stone. Yuck! After cleaning and sanitizing my hands and arm I examined the stone. I kept envisioning a small pebble, you know, all smooth with rounded edges. No. This was a shard of glass. It was oblong with dagger like points on both ends. It looked like a minute piece of shale. Now I know why it gets stuck in there. It keeps sticking itself into tissue on it's way out the urinary tract. The Urologist sent it off to be examined and I have a follow up appointment this week so he can tell me to stay away from certain foods - or not. He said that Atlanta is known as the "stone belt". The emergency room staff told me they see on average, 3 patients a day for stones.
Enough of that... well sort of. I saw a new primary care physician, the following day after I had passed the stone and she put me on an elimination diet. It's basically a "fast"- for 25 days. It's to allow my body to cleanse itself from all of the junk I eat. It's not designed as a weight loss program but, when you can't anything good, you are going to lose weight. No red meat, pork, dairy products, eggs, wheat, soy, sugar, corn products, alcohol etc. Lot's of fish, chicken breasts and all the fresh fruit and vegetables I can eat. Brown rice and beans have become a staple for me. I feel like I'm living in Costa Rica. Thankfully, I'm 2/3 of the way through. Honestly though, I am feeling so much better I'm going to try sticking to this as a way of life. Don't get me wrong, I'm not going torture myself and not indulge once in a while but, I hope I don't have the cravings that I once had for all the processed foods and sugars. Time will tell. The wife's work has a fitness center that I can join for only $50 dollars a year, so I'm going to start on that soon.
Let's see, what else? They are starting on the house painting this week - can I get a hallelujah? I'm going to be bottling my brew today, it' been in the secondary fermenter for about a week and a half and the fermenting has stopped. Once it's bottled, it will need to be aged a few weeks - just in time for a little celebration from getting off this diet! The boy and I are planning a trip to see my family in Penna. for a week or so. My sister has some projects in her house that she needs some help with and my mother just bought a house, so naturally she wants me to help her move - fun, fun, fun. My work has been slow but, it's starting to pick back up. I have a basement build out to wire for one of my previous clients.
I've got some pics to post of the brewing process but I need to take a few more...