Work, Crowds and Pain…All Gone

We finished up our 10 day work at Big Lou’s BBQ on Sunday at 5pm and in all of the years we have been working for vendors in Quartzsite, this has been by far the BEST experience of all.  Jerry and Blake are a father and son team out of Fresno, there was no drama, no screaming, no yelling or dysfunction.  They are who they are and they say what they mean and mean what they say.  It was a pleasure to work with them and if we are ever in an area that they are doing a show we are invited back and we would definitely work with them again.

Along with the closing of the Big Tent on Sunday, the crowds are leaving.  We will stay for another week since we are paid and the weather to the east is not appealing, we will take our time leaving here and heading east.  We do not have to be in Charlotte until April 1^st so we have two months to just relax and enjoy the travel and try to avoid all that terrible weather along our way.

We do have a little more shopping to do in Quartzsite, a few meetings lined up with fellow Bloggers and some work on Maggie to keep us busy.

Now for the pain in my knee...

It has been excruciating for about 3 weeks, it came on suddenly without any injury at the time the pain began.  I am not a weakling when it comes to pain and I can tolerate a lot of it but this, this was so bad it brought me to tears several times during the past few weeks.  The pain was on the inner part of the knee cap, there was other pain along with it but the pain at that point was so strong it covered up all the others or I would have realized where it was coming from a lot sooner.

We are NOT doctor people so the hospital was never an option.  We try to stay away from drugs as much as possible and I knew if I went to them that is what they would give me so we looked for a more natural approach.  We iced it, heated it, massaged it and tried all sorts of natural things to ease the pain but nothing was working.  Advil was bringing the pain to a more manageable level but I was taking 8 to 10 doses per day which was making me loopy. 

During this time we were working 8 hour shifts for 10 days but those guys were so good to work with they allowed me to work the window sitting down.

Just a little note here about the Emu Oil…it didn’t seem to help but we did notice that the oil doesn’t sit on the top of the skin, it penetrates into the skin without leaving an oily film on the skin which was nice and we do plan to continue using what we have left but we will not be purchasing any more.

One of the vendors noticed my pain and told me to come down and see him and it was the beginning of a fantastic adventure. 

Ray and Pam McCutcheon are owners of McCutcheon’s Products, which is Magnetic Therapy.  I have always been quite interested in this type of therapy so I went to see what they might have to offer.  He wrapped my knee and I rested for 30 minutes…I could feel a difference but it still hurt but I went back and then I bought a wrap.  Expensive does not begin to describe these products but even though it was not taking the pain totally away, I could feel some difference.  After a few days the excruciating pain on my knee cap was gone for short periods of time throughout the day which opened up my awareness to the other pain.  All along it was my Sciatica that was causing my pain so I switched the wrap to the lower back area and within two days the excruciating pain is GONE.  It will probably be awhile longer before it is completely gone but it is now manageable.  I no longer scream in pain or am taking so many Advil that I am a Zombie.  LIFE IS GRAND!!!!!

On our last day of work Jerry decided to wound himself…he cut the tip of his finger off, a good chunk is missing.  I tried to explain that we worked at a Tri-Tip, not Finger Tip place and also if he needed to STOP washing dishes that all he had to do was ask me since I was feeling so much better…but NO instead he had to slice off the tip.

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