Ab Circle Pro update

My Ab Circle Pro is a feature in my living room. I'm used to it now, so much so that when I visited a friend who has her own ACP obsession - keeps her ACP in her lounge - I didn't even remark on it. Along with the comfy chairs and television, the ACP seemed to be in its rightful place.

In my case this isn't testament to my regular workouts. In fact, my ACP would be gathering dust except for the efforts of my housekeeper. She treats it like everything else in my house, including apples in the fruit bowl. She polishes it weekly.

I didn't reject my Ab Circle Pro. The opposite. It rejected me. Sorry, that's not quite right. It ejected me; spat me off.

This happened one ordinary Saturday morning. Al and I were home alone. He was in the shower; I was in tee-shirt and knickers, assuming the position on the ACP for a few intense arse swinging moments.

So, head up, back straight, working those abs then WHUMP! I'm splayed painfully across the machine. My right knee had somehow lost purchase on its knee pad thus upsetting the entire apple cart: me.

I whimpered a little. Al strolled in drying one ear with a towel. Wanted to see what the crash was. He raised his eyebrows and strolled back in the direction from whence he'd come. He'd had his inward chuckle at the beknickered idiot hanging off the side of the contraption.

I gathered myself up and pushed the machine back into position by the armchair.

That was at least three months ago.

They say you should get straight back on the bike if you fall off. I've done this a couple of times in my life, even after someone ran me over back in the day. But that's my bike. I actually still get a buzz out of cycling.

Get straight back on the ACP? Nah. It's not as much 'fun' as the adverts would have you believe. And pity my second hand machine didn't come with a guarantee. Discovered a couple of days ago that part of the knee pad that had rejected me so spectacularly had actually split.

My Ab Circle Pro is going for a ride to the tip come the next hard rubbish collection. Dare say she might find a few of her fellow rejects there.

Oh yes, I'm the French Pretender.

I'm sick of saying I'm a qualified middle school French teacher and this being my little joke. That is, I'm crapue at French and you'll be pleased to know I don't teach French at my school.  Perhaps if I did, I'd be heaps better at speaking it.

Recently, on an impulse, I grabbed my '4th form' - me, 4A - French text book from the book shelf. Il faut practiquait - I must practise - my French.  Did I just use the correct conjugation of the subjunctive? Beats me.

Within the pages of this tome, Chez les Francais, first published in 1969 - thus state of the art in 1971, my fourth year of high school - I found an essay I'd written in French, in form 5, for which I'd received A minus.  It's beautifully handwritten, and in the judgment of my teacher, whose expertise I had no reason to doubt, it was worthy of a high score.  Interestingly, I can no longer remember lots of the words and constructions I'd almost faultlessly written, aged 15.

Don't know what happened to my skills in form 6, HSC.  Despite my teacher's optimism, I infamously scored 49 percent and thus Failed my second favourite subject.  Fail.  Failure. Fraudster. (See how it gets in?)

What a surprise then, when I enrolled at Melbourne State College the following year and was permitted to continue my French studies and still qualify as a French teacher.  The fact that I'm only qualified to teach to year 10 was due to my choosing to major in English rather than French.

I successfully completed two years of university level French, and loved it.  Some fellow French students and I formed a French folk singing group and had the audacity to perform not only around the college but at events at the Alliance Francaise.  We attended French galas, saw the opera, Carmen, the libretto of which we'd studied in our second year.  Great music and lyrics and hilarious for us late teens.  I can still sing lots of it now.

I was seventeen and eighteen during those two years of French study.  I was insanely confident swanning around with my guitar and my repertoire of French folk songs.

As it turns out, I've only had the opportunity to actually teach French for one semester at year 7 level.  Hence my lapse in skills.

At my fourth French conversation meet-up last week, I really did feel like a fraud explaining my qualifications to this woman I'd just met. (Well, she asked, I think.)  Another comedy of errors, literally.  With my paucity of vocabulary, tiredness - I'd been marking year 8 exams for the previous three hours - and my new friend's 'idiosyncratic' accent - I'm being kind - we were stymied.  Perhaps it was just that eating my poached eggs and carrying on a conversation in French required too much multitasking.

So.  I've decided to go back to basics.  My old French text book is a good place to start. 

Night terrors?

In the small hours, Al's 'action dreams' kick in.  Can't call them nightmares. Not for him anyway.

His dreams involve sudden violent jerks and starts; actions, like flinging his hand back and smashing the bedhead - catching a basketball, he said on waking, because he'd actually hurt himself.  Or leaping over the side of the bed to land on all fours on the polished boards, seeming so surprised to wake up and find himself down there.  Last week, making some gruff devil noise, he snatched the pillow out from under my head.  He's also given me a few quick boxing jabs in my belly - as many as he could get in, apparently, before I woke and stopped him by yelling, and clouting him back.

He apologises then falls immediately back to sleep.  The dreams continue for a couple of hours, with me waking him when he's at risk of harming himself or me.  I'll manage a couple of hours' sleep before the alarm goes off.  Given his dreams, me having diabetes and checking my blood sugar for possible hypos and the fact that I've always been inclined to insomnia, it's no wonder I've got black rings under my eyes.  I tend to hit a wall early in the afternoons that has me struggling through meetings.  (And they're invariably tedious, repetitive and useless, which doesn't help at all.)

Al's sort of dream disorder was explored on Embarrassing Bodies a couple of weeks back.  A night vision camera filmed this man and his wife.  In the green light we saw him sit up and peer around, walk, all while soundly asleep. 

Al's done lots of this in his time.  It's usually prompted by him needing the toilet.  Occasionally I've had to steer him towards the bathroom, given he's opened the wrong doors - a cupboard, the kids' bedrooms.  A few times he's lined up a convenient corner or other 'receptacle'.  See, I have to be vigilant.

The 'action dreamer' on Embarrassing Bodies began to resolve his issues through anger management counselling as opposed to medication.  In his case, therapy revealed that he did have anger issues.

I suggested to Al that he might need therapy.  He says not.  "I'm just taking a protective role in something I've seen on TV.  Don't you ever do that?"

Perhaps, but it's all happening in my head.  I don't act it out. 

Last night I could no longer tolerate Action Man.  Given I now have a made up 'guest room' where son Pete used to be, I grabbed my pillow, jelly beans and blood testing gear and abandoned the marital bed.

Still took me an age to get back to sleep, given I was mulling over the significance of us not sleeping -as if - together.  I'm not into separate beds as a solution. 

Then I dreamed bizarre extra-worldly colourful markety narratives.  I can't remember why I was riding elevators and escalators.  Too strange.  Waking up, again, had to grope around in the dark for a distant light switch so I could check to make sure I wasn't hypo. I was okay.

Probably after five, I fell into a desperate recurring dream.  Won't bore you with the details, but in these dreams, Al finally, inevitably realises that he got a bum deal with me, and sometimes the kids, and he decides to leave. In last night's dream he was taking his chances with a young adoring athletic woman with wild springy curls.  As usual, nothing I can say or do will make him stay with me.

And then I wake up, sobbing - yes, my own action dream - in my freaking guest room. I listen for Al moving around the house getting ready for work.  Nothing.  I stumble through to our room and he's made our bed.  I was going to get back into it.  I'm even sadder.  We haven't spoken this morning and I can't bear it.

Seven-thirty and I stagger through to the kitchen.  Clearly he's gone to work and didn't want to wake me.  I'm still sad from my dream.  It's as though he really has left me this time.

Over by the kettle, he's made me a thermos of real Earl Grey tea.  He's warmed my special mug by half-filling it with boiling water which is still hot.

Why do I worry?  Back for more action dreaming tonight. 

Outside my comfort zone on a Saturday morning.

I arrive at the agreed rendezvous point.  After some small talk with a few strangers that doesn't really go anywhere I decide to approach the man sitting quietly at the end of the table.  He's alone.  Looks young; at least twenty years my junior, but what the hey?  I'm also here alone to meet new people.  I take my drink and sit next to him.

He seems more than happy to talk to me, despite my age.  He's fashionably dressed in a well cut black zippered jacket. 

'Hello, my name's Fraudster.  (Well, obviously I told him my real name.) Have you been here before?'
'I've been once before,' he said.
'What do you do for a living?' I asked.  Cut straight to the chase.

'I'm a photographer,' he said.
Okay.  Interesting.  He asked what I did and I told him I'm a secondary English teacher.  He seemed interested that I'd taught VCE and expressed admiration for the expertise he assumed I must possess.

My next question.
'Where do you live?'
He told me he lived in an affluent Melbourne suburb.
'Wow!' I said. 'Do you live in a house or an apartment?'
'I live in an apartment,' he replied. 'Where do you live?'
I told him and we agreed that this cafe meeting had been convenient for both of us.
'So,' I mused, 'do you own your apartment or are you renting?'
'Renting,' he said, before telling me that he also owned an apartment in another wealthy suburb.
'Okay, so you must be doing well in your profession!' I dare say I was beaming at this stage.  He was smiling and fielding my questions well.  And then I hit him with it.
'Are you married?'
'No,' he laughed. 'I was in a relationship but it's over now.'
'Sorry to hear it,' I said.  'Are you sad?'
'I was, but I'm getting used to it.'

At this stage I leaned back in my chair, took a breath and laughed, perhaps hysterically.  My questions were bordering on rude.

'Sorry!' I wiped tears from my eyes.  'I'm not normally this nosy! I'm just making conversation.'
He wasn't offended; had probably experienced such curiosity from a total stranger before.  This was his second meeting, after all.

BTW, the above dialogue was all conducted in laboured French.  That was the funny thing about the whole experience.  From my perspective it was a bit contrived as I struggled to apply some of the few words I have in my store.  I knew the verb 'to rent' hence me chucking in a question about whether he was renting his flat.

When  I returned from France, mid-July, I was desperate to keep up my French speaking skills.  So I did the obvious; searched the web for a suitable group.  Unfortunately, the small French conversation meetups are oversubscribed. I was unable to secure a spot at a meeting for two months.

Saturday was my first meeting and leading up to it, I was a nervous wreck.  It's not knowing what to expect.  I nearly cancelled.  What's worse, the meeting would be held at a cafe that specialises in crepes and chocolate.  Basically, I was heading off on my bike, not only into gale-force winds but also a potential diabetic nightmare.

Worst case scenario?  I'd be working the room explaining, in faltering French, that I couldn't eat anything because I have Type 1 diabetes and I can't guesstimate the carb count.  I even practised saying it.

I considered calling the cafe beforehand to see if they had anything I could toy with while I honed my French conversation skills. But I stopped myself.  I'd simply say, if anyone asked, that I wasn't hungry. Je n'ai pas de faim.

Does this sound ridiculous? How about the fact that I couldn't sleep the night before the meet up brunch?  I was as nervous as if I was going for a job interview. .

En route to the venue I got lost in those labyrinthine North Melbourne streets.  Made a left instead of a right and cycled up hill a few blocks in the wrong direction, as it transpired..

I asked a couple of strangers for directions, because, in my vanity, I'd worn my contact lenses and  I couldn't read the map on my iPhone without my reading glasses.  They had no idea being New Zealand tourists checking out Victoria Market.

A couple of extremely obliging parking inspectors came to my rescue.  (Another first:  I've never spoken to a parking inspector before.  Who does except to curse them?)  One was instantly talking into his collar to get a Google search on the address and soon I was back on my bike and pumping it back up the hill from whence I'd come.

At the meeting I spent a pleasant enough hour, initially making French small talk with a few people before settling to interrogate the aforementioned photographer.  Hard work; intellectually demanding.  The second hour was much easier.  Most people left and three of us remained.  And spoke English. 

Think I made a couple of friends, oiled up my French speaking skills and no one force-fed me crepes and chocolate.  I'd call that a good outcome.

Back for more in a couple of months.

Numbers.

5.48*

Peered closely at the digital clock simultaneously reaching for the 30 year old glass Moccona coffee jar that still contains my handy store of jelly beans.  I had that feeling.  Vague; light-headed; spacy; heart pounding.  I grabbed a handful, stuffed them into my mouth and started chewing as if my life depended on it.  Worried then that the chewing motion was further depleting what little glucose was in my blood, exacerbating the hypo.
 
2.3**

That was the reading on my blood glucose meter..  I'd checked my BG while still lying on my side ( - thanks, Accuchek Mobile, for inventing a meter that doesn't require me to mess with test strips.)  Al had already woken at the tell-tale sound of my jellybeans rattling in the jar. 

'I'll get you a juice,' he said.
'I may not be here when you get back,' I murmured, but he'd already darted off to the other end of the house. I thought I might lose consciousness, as in general anaesthetic black-out

I tried to relax; reduce the palpitations that had increased since I'd seen how low I was. I breathed through the fear of losing consciousness which has only happened three times in 31 years. 

Somehow the horror of that first time hasn't left me.  That was back in 1985.  We'd just flown to England; my first time dealing with the change in time zones with my relatively recently diagnosed diabetes.  I was on three injections a day - two fast-acting insulin and one fast-acting protaphane combo - and somehow the exhaustion of the trip had me waking out of a deep sleep and jamming a couple of complimentary hotel toffees into my mouth before passing out.

Props to Al.  He managed to call for help and get my 28 year old body into undies and tee-shirt before the ambulance arrived.  All while I was seizing.  Al says I was out to it for about twenty minutes.  I was conscious when they put me into the ambulance and took me to Emergency at London University hospital, where of course, I was discharged within an hour or so.  I didn't need an ambulance, I needed a shot of Glucagen.  But I didn't know that.  I didn't know that the n-th degree of a hypo was losing consciousness.  Just part of a steep learning curve on a lifetime journey.

I recovered quickly from that hypo, as I usually do.  It took a bit longer for the cuts on the palms of both hands to heal.  I used to have long nails back then.  While I'd been seizing I'd clenched my fists, my nails consequently digging into my palms.  I'd also bitten chunks out of the insides of my cheeks.  No doubt the mother of all cold sores that plagued me for the next six weeks was a result of that hypo fear too.

I didn't think all this today as I was breathing through that hypo, but I was mindful of the same pre-losing consciousness symptoms.  When my blood sugar is that low it seems to get me in the eyes.  Hard to describe.  They 'burr' and feel like they're turning in my skull.  It's a terrifying feeling, as if my eyes are being pressed with wads of cotton wool.  Why cotton wool?  It sounds so benign and fluffy.  Soft, thick pressure?  Feel like I'm back in France searching for the right words.  The other feeling that I get when I'm this low?  Imagine having your eyes pressed into your skull as you're pushed backwards off a cliff with no safety harness.

Then there's the heat and drenching perspiration and no energy to throw the doona off.

But I got over it. And this has only ever happened to me when I've been sleeping.  When I'm awake I test frequently to avoid being stricken unawares.

Glad today, as I frequently am, that I'm working part-time and today's a day off.  I struggled out of a deep sleep at 8.47. 

Damn you, digital clock.

BG 9.0

Thanks for reading.

* That's a.m.
**  Normal blood sugar ranges between 4 and 8 mmol.  Yeah.  I wish.

Tech savvy.

Yesterday, I had three free Embertec Automatic Power Down plugs fitted. There was a moment of embarrassment when Enzo, the fitter, appeared from under my 'home office' - for tax purposes - desk covered in fluff.

So, a two-fold Sunday mission.  1.  Vacuum under my desk and clean the desktop - that's the timber, not the virtual desktop - and 2. find out why my printer isn't working.  Reasonably straightforward, except perhaps for fixing the printer.

BTW, I'm really missing son, Pete.  He could pretty well fix anything technical around here.  Now he's a 'man who's moved out' he rarely gets in touch, despite my attempts to lure him home with pork roasts, crackling, apple sauce and gravy.  Hoping he gets over this phase.

So, the vacuuming was going well, almost aerobic.  Had to strip off a couple of layers getting into the far corners.  Was going brilliantly until I sucked up a pin.  Not me.  The vacuum.

My desk is hard-wood; about two metres by one.  I carefully pulled it out from the wall to release that tangle of cables.  Alternating between crawling under the now dust-free desk and rolling across the top of it, I followed each cable back to its source, ensuring each plug was firmly in its correct hole.

Still no response from the printer.

Contemplated braving the Sunday bum's rush out at DFO - Direct Factory Outlets; Aussie religion - and buying a new one.  But decided instead to email myself at school and use the printer there.

So everything is pristine and squared on the desk.  I've thrown out receipts from 2007, bent paper clips, old CDs and other dusty detritus.

On a whim, I pulled the printer out from wall again and had a bit of a feel around the back.  Where I found the on/off switch and suddenly the printer is spitting out recipes for beef stroganoff and fish pie - some 1970s comfort food for the winter months.

You'd think I'd have learned my lesson.  A couple of weeks ago I was chatting to the Telstra help-desk in the Philippines, trying to fix my modem.  The guy was checking my line at the same time as I glanced down to discover I wasn't actually connected to the telephone line.  The plug was lying innocently by the wall.  Rather than admit to my idiocy, I acted all grateful; pretended he'd magically 'fixed' something at his end.  You see I'd already spent twenty minutes with the automated service prior to being put through to a human for further assistance.

The IT Crowd definitely had it right with that line 'have you tried turning it off and on again?'  For me, however, it's more a case of have you tried plugging it in and switching it on?

Comforts of home

Woke up from a dream yesterday.  Won't bore you with the details but in the dream, Al was telling me we were heading off to London. Now. Two weeks after returning to Melbourne from that other side of the planet.  I quite emphatically told him, in this dream, that I wasn't going with him.  Don't know how it ended and who cares?  Just a dream.  However, it's clear I've been processing the whole travel thing in my subconscious.  If I could blink myself over there for a weekend of cycling along the Loire in good weather, then blink myself back again for my structured three day working week, I'd do it.  But I'm not yet ready for the trauma of packing and travelling.  

I'm relishing the comforts of home, which aren't overrated at all when you feel like being home, although curiously, I'm finding it hard to bond with television, despite my efforts.  With enough couch rolling I'll probably get back into it.  Perhaps wine is the missing link.  I'm on my eighth AFD - alcohol free day- following ten weeks of quite solid quaffing not to mention self-medicating after dad died..

I've just been to Highpoint shopping centre, swanning around.  I overuse that expression but it seems to describe my gait perfectly.

Why write about Highpoint again?  It's still the same place as it was when I wrote about it last year. (Link here, if interested.) One of the things I missed overseas - only a tiny bit and I got over it easily cycling through the French countryside - was the sense of belonging to a community.  At Highpoint today I went to see my niece, Moss, in her little 'kiosk'. Got her a coffee; had a chat because I hadn't seen her since she left home this morning and I needed to catch up.  Moss is living with us for the time being.

I dropped my wedding ring off at a jewellers.  Needs resizing to cope with my arthritic clicky knuckle. (If you have any inclination to take up knitting after a twenty year hiatus, I'd advise against it.  My hands are wrecked!)  Whilst there I was able to ask after a former student of mine who works there part-time; find out what she was doing.

Dawdled a bit further along, gawping at this and that and stopped to chat with a friend who works in a kiosk at the other end of the centre.  Good catch up.

On my return walk I stopped to take advantage of a free power saving plug offer at another kiosk.  The young woman who served me was a former student whose brother I used to teach. Another good catch up.

Yeah, boring blog, I know, but it was really good to speak to people in fluent, idiomatic Australian English.  No searching for the right word.

In France I knew no one.  In eight weeks we only met three Australians.