the russians.....

i got tired of waking up with my fingers tingling, and my thumb trembling, with me having no control over it. to be honest, the tingly fingers weren't too bad - it always went away fairly quickly, and i knew i had probably just slept slightly wrong. the random 30-60 second trembling thumb did sort of freak me out a bit though.

so i started with some physio, on the prescription of my doctor. things were going well, until i pinched the radial nerve of the other arm. so then i was doing chiropractic visits, and physio. great.

so 3 weeks go by, and the pinched nerve isn't solved, but seems to have finally stabilized - i'm down to a slightly sore arm (area depends on the shoulder condition) and some numb-ish to tingling fingertips.

both of them agree on how it happened at least. slept wrong. i have a tendency to tuck my arm under my head - which means my pillow isn't properly supporting my head.

no surpirse. i haven't found a pillow i thought was comfortable yet. including the last one my chiropractor sold me - he swears by them (and oddly enough, my physiotherapist hates them). for anyone wondering - it's an orthopedic water filled pillow.

now, my physiotherapist, bless her heart, is on a mission to find me a comfortable pillow. because some of the specialty pillows cost a bit, she has a pillow loaner program. for 3 days, you can borrow and try one to see if you like it. (sorry to anyone that's cringing at the idea of a 'used' pillow under their head).

the latest one, is a $200 pillow. nasa technology. some variant of memory foam. two hundred dollars. a pillow. space technology? who gives a shit. $200 (ok... so that's $200 canadian, still!!!!) so, that got me to thinking about something.

makes me chuckle, and think about the jokes in the 80's about the $2000 us gov't hammers, $5000 toilet seats.... you know the joke, they used it in independance day.

the fisher space pen. the short version: nasa sends man into space. man needs to write reports. someone realizes, pens won't work in space - no gravity. (must have hired someone with a university edukashun - 'cause the alternate thought of having figured it out the hard way of trying one in space makes my head hurt). they poured (so i heard) millions into solving this dilema. the result - the fisher space pen. a pressurized ink canister based pen, with a ball point made of tungsten carbide - virtually indestructable.
the russians.... used a pencil. that's all of what, 20 cents?

i wonder if they have a similar solution for my pillow issue?


addendum:

ok.... i had my bubble burst a little, when i went to the fisher website, and found out it wasn't developed for the space program, just happened to come along at the right time. as various quotes from their site below fragment the highly amusing story i had always heard:

The cartridge was pressurized with nitrogen so that it didn't rely on gravity to
make it work. It was dependable in freezing cold and desert heat. It could also
write underwater and upside down.

Fisher's development couldn't have come at a more opportune time. The space race was on, and the astronauts involved in the Mercury and Gemini missions had been using pencils to take notes in space since standard ball points did not work in zero gravity.

They are still used on all manned space flights American and Russian.

ok.... so maybe the americans have a low tech solution for my pillow too ;)

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images:
ussr flag - snarfed from a images.google.com web search
pillow - snarfed from an e-bay search
fisher space pen: http://www.fisherpen.com/
http://www.geocities.com/arabsocialistcoalition/sovietflag.gif