Maybe I will paddle this weekend?

Eerily, it turns out there are people looking at my blog? Nah, robots. Robots ate my baby? No wait, dingos, dingos ate my baby? It's too late at night to edit my blog, apparently.

Returning to the question of robots: How did that happen? And why? When I saw my stats going up I thought maybe real live humans were looking at the thing. But it is not to be. Which is probably ok as I really am fine thinking about this thing hanging in cyber space unread. But since I am already asking questions: Maybe I can put the racks back on my Subaru? Maybe my hip will let me sit in my boat for a few hours? This is my online inner monologue.

I buckled down and had the hip surgitated two weeks ago. Operated on, that is. The surgeon told me afterwards that the joint was packed with inflammatory tissue. He cut sanded vacuumed the whole mess out. No idea if it fixed my problem.

The weekend before the surgery I bolted out the door with some die-hard club members to go for a late-season paddle on the Patuxent at Jug Bay. I hadn't taken my new boat out yet and was really climbing the walls after six weeks off the water. I was glad to get out. The Elias turns with maybe two sweeps of the paddle and a push on the rudder. Fancy. But I have trouble saying the word "Elias" and just call it the Eli, easier that way.

Did I mention we ran into some paddle boarders? This I do not get. Balancing = good, balancing for hours when the water is cold = not so good. At least in  my mind. Plus I am skeptical of anything that's being labeled a "craze."

I dressed for the water temp, like a good paddler who's listened to her gnarly boat elders. In the photo above you'll note the fellow beside my husband is sleeveless. He's a good chap, very congenial. But always sleeveless. He came up in conversation at Happy Hour the other day as well. Someone said they think he is "genetically sleeveless" as no one can ever remember seeing this fellow in sleeves of any kind while on the water.

Any way, back to the Eli: That's me in it above. The boat is a really nice paddle, like its sister the Eliza. It paddles and handles exactly the same way so I am liking it a lot. Amazing what raising he front deck two inches and going from 1.2 to 1.4 in volume will do. Both my sea kayaks are 1.4's now so I can use the same skirts with them.

However, my hip hurt so bad while paddling that I literally wanted to claw my way out of the boat. And I couldn't stand up on my own when we stopped a couple of times. My husband literally had to lift me up. How humiliating. It drove home the point that I should go ahead with the hip surgery.

So now I am fixed. Maybe this Saturday I can paddle. I will let you know.