Rudynate

I had forgotten about Hercules movies. I was so infatuated with Steve Reeves that it was upsetting. I would sit there, in the movie theater, on a Saturday afternoon, at age 7 or 8, and watch him in his loincloth with this incredible longing that I didn't understand - I wanted him to pick me up, to carry me on his shoulders, to be my friend; to admire me, to go places with me, I wanted to be like him, etc. etc. etc.

Getting boners over the pictures of Charles Atlas on the back of comic books at age 6-7.

I'm very curious about Kobe Raphael. Wonderful looking guy.

Pradaxa is big offender.

I got pill esophagitis once from taking a pill with a small sip of water and then going straight to bed. I woke up a couple hours later with the worst sore throat in memory. I had a lot of difficulty swallowing food for three or four days after.

I mostly stay out of such places, but now and again, I like to splurge. I kind of like Cal-Mart in the Laurel Heights neighborhood. Down the street from them, there's a place called Bryan's that sells esoteric stuff like real Japanese Kobe beef.

In San Francisco, there are high-end grocery stores that make shopping at WF feel about like Safeway or Luckys.

All the advice nurse ever does is tell you to come in.

+1 I luv 'em all.

Wonderful build!!

I thought he lived in San Francisco. It seems, though, that once someone reaches a certain age, they move from SF to Palm Springs. They will have to revise the Oscar Wilde epigram: “It's an odd thing, but anyone who disappears is said to be seen in San Francisco" to "It's an odd thing, but anyone who disappears is said to be seen in Palm Springs." What have we come to?

I haven't thought about him in years. My partner used to do erotic glass sculptures of hot guys' torsos. I remember that Donny commissioned at least one piece from him. Donny, as I recall, was concerned that his dick be depicted in its full glory, with appropriate attention to the size.

No question about it - My all-time favorite would be Gordon Grant. Even as a young 20-something, I had an enduring fantasy of hiring Gordon and putting him through his paces. I knew a guy who knew him and told me he could make that happen, but I never really believed so didn't follow up. http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-hQmCKD51OrI/UiSHZNMcCYI/AAAAAAAAZHk/XC6uNuHpCoI/s320/4085_002.jpg

"Strong Hands."

Agreed. I was fortunate enough to have my procedures at a spine surgery center of excellence, with one of the best surgeons in the region who used a conservative, structure-sparing approach.

After the first spine surgery, I worked one-on-one with a Pilates instructor who had a rehab credential for six months.

Pain relief is almost always the overriding goal. Occasionally, the nerve compression can pose a serious risk to the sufferer's well being, as in cauda equina syndrome, but the main goal in almost all spine surgeries is symptom control. It is for this reason that even an aggressive surgeon doesn't like to operate on someone whose imaging shows serious problems but whose symptoms aren't particularly bad. Outcomes of spine surgeries are still uncertain enough that the surgeon risks making someone worse who wasn't particularly suffering in the first place.

My first procedure was an L3-S1 decompression. They removed a large synovial cyst at L3-L4 that was protruding into the spinal canal and causing lots of pain. They excised the intervertebral ligament at L4-L5, did a discectomy at L5-S1 and did lateral recess and foraminal decompression at all levels. 18 months later, I had a L4-S1 anterior-posterior fusion. I'm in fabulous shape now - I have a rock solid core. I can't say that I'm completely pain-free, but close to it. I haven't taken anything stronger than tylenol since about a month after the fusion procedure. I may be developing adjacent segment disease because I have developed a mild scoliosis that I never had before. My spine has a slight, but noticeable, lateral S-curve.

I won't say I would never have another spine surgery, but I sure don't want another one. I had a L4-S1 fusion procedure four years ago. I've worked extremely hard to rehab from it. I wasn't going to settle for anything less than being pain-free, most of the time. I've substantially achieved that, after four years of constant work.

Normally, a spine surgeon requires a trial of conservative therapy first.

I don't think it's rare. How many times have you heard somebody complain of a "pinched nerve" in their neck? That's cervical radiculopathy. There are a few things they can do for you - NSAIDs, which is what your doc gave you, opiates, physical therapy, steroid injections at the injury site and fusion surgery. I'm not a doc. I'm a veteran of two spine surgeries, so I know the landscape pretty well. Pretty much, when it comes to treatments for spine problems, I can truthfully say, "Been there, done that." There is a newer procedure, not widely available yet, where they replace the worn-out intervertebral disc with a prosthetic disk.

I was completely lovesick over Dick Cavett.

And they still talk like that in the Southeast.

Right, like that.

Oh come on. When I was a young child, people of my grandparent's generation used all kinds of old-fashioned words and expressions. We all understood them, we just didn't use them ourselves.