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• RT @jasonwebley Watch this unbelievable new video by Hoku Uchiyama. If you are unimpressed, I'll mail you a dollar:
  http://t.co/GwwLfDYb #

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Geneveve in a ball pit inside a portable birthing tub

from Matt Robinson – Google+ Post Feed https://plus.google.com/100504923941344481377/posts/iZ6T1HxhMy4

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I did a sprint distance triathlon today, so 750m swim, 16 mile bike ride and 3 mile run.

My worst event was definitely the swim. It’s the one I’ve been training the most for, although I’ve really not done enough training for any of it. I was much better prepared for my marathon a few years ago. The swim was hard partly because open water swimming was so much different from the practice I had done in the pool. I didn’t have a line to follow on the bottom of the pool, so I often would put my head down for a few strokes, and look up to realize I was headed the wrong way.

I didn’t have a fancy triathlon suit, so my first transition time was pretty slow. I also just did the bike portion on my mountain bike. I figured I wasn’t going to spend a ton of money on triathlon gear until I knew if I liked it. Turns out I did, so I’ll be doing another at some point, and probably getting some better gear.

Surprisingly, my best event for rank was the run. I’ve only done one run in the last month for training, and I felt pretty weak. I guess I didn’t push myself hard enough on the first two events, because I didn’t even feel that tired when I finished.

After the finish line, there was a beer tent with free beer. I couldn’t resist, but it’s definitely not the best idea to drink beer and when you’re really thirsty.

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• Great site for learning Chinese characters and vocab http://t.co/83InA2F Not so good for grammar and usage #
• Today, without stopping, I swam the distance I'll swim for my sprint triathlon next month, about 16 laps, and it was pretty easy. #

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• I did my first Kung Fu class last night and am now very sore. #

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• I'm in #chicago for a few days to help teach a #puppet developer training. What to do for fun while I'm here? #

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• Geneveve attended her first concert tonight: Krishna Das. She loved the crowd and clapping. Fell asleep for the finale. #

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• I took apart my dryer to assess the squealing. Easier than I expected. Needs a new belt. #
• Two days in a row I've been slowed down biking through ladds addition by film crews. http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1838544/ #portland #gone #

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• Excited for lasik tomorrow. See you soon #
• Lasik is awesome. I already feel back to normal and can see great! #

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I got Lasik (Laser-Assisted In Situ Keratomileusis) eye surgery yesterday at about 5pm, slept for more than 12 hours, and woke up seeing perfectly!

This all started with a Groupon back at the very end of December. Yes, that’s right, I got half price Lasik with a Groupon. I was skeptical, but I researched the eye surgeon Dr. King and the price and everything looked legit and had good reviews. The price included all the top of line stuff (intralase, custom wave view, lifetime adjustments) so ended up being about the same as it would have been for the most basic work.

A whole lotta other people got the groupon too, so I had to wait a few months for my initial exam, and then another couple months to actually do the surgery. I showed up to my appointment on time at 2:30. Unfortunately, a guy before me was having anxiety attacks about the procedure and kept getting up and down off the table. I didn’t hear any commotion, but it was close to 4:30 before I got on the table.

Nothing hurts during the procedure, but it’s certainly not comfortable. First they give your eyes numbing drops which makes it feel like a fat lip in your eye. Then they somewhat roughly put a suction device on your eye to hold it in place – a little bruising is normal and I’ve got a few spots on my eyes today. The only part that’s mildly scary is when they start to cut the flap on your eye you lose vision temporarily, but they tell you to expect this otherwise it would have freaked me out. There’s a countdown while this happens to each eye, something like 15-20 seconds per eye. Then they fold the flap back so they can laser the cornea, how I don’t know since I still couldn’t see at that point, and next thing you know you see a bright white circle with a red dot in the middle.

This is where the magic happens. The laser begins to reshape the cornea in what I think were short bursts. It sounded kind of like a bug zapper going off in quick succession. While this was happening I had to focus on staying in the white light. Even though I was suctioned it seemed I could move a little bit, so I was very motivated to keep looking at the laser so as not to mess anything up, even though they say that’s not possible. Again, there was a countdown for each eye, also around 15-20 seconds. I remember my right eye taking a little longer than my left since the prescription is higher in that eye.

Once the laser had finished it was time to put the flap back in place. This is the weirdest part to watch but isn’t that uncomfortable. It’s like watching someone clean your windshield as a movie. This is a like a squeegee smoothing the flap back into place while they flush your eye with a lot of liquid. I think this is when Kim had to stop watching though. If you’re not squeamish it’s easy to find video of the procedure online.

After sitting with my eyes closed for a very short period, I sat up, opened them and could read the clock! It was like looking through wax paper, but it wasn’t out of focus like it used to be. After a quick check eye check by the doctor and a couple eye drops, I was free to go home. Everything was bright so I kept my eyes closed with sunglasses on while Kim led me to the car and drove me home. On the way home I pretended to be Stevie Wonder and sang to Geneveve to keep her from crying.

I went right to bed and slept from about 5:30pm to 6am since they recommend sleep as the best healing method for the eyes. It was wonderful to catch up on some sleep deficit too. Waking up and being able to read the clock, see the details of the weather outside, and not need to fumble for glasses was sooooo great! Again, more eye drops, which I’ll be doing every couple hours for the next week. Then I drove myself back in for my follow up. I think technically someone was supposed to drive me until the doctor had cleared my as being good to go.

The follow up was super short and they just asked to me to read an eye chart. 20/20 easily! Since it was so easy I asked to see how I did on the 20/15 level and below, but the doctor didn’t want to get my hopes up since he cautioned that my eyes can settle and change over the next few weeks. My left eye is still a little better than my right.

Today I took the day off from work since I thought I’d just be lying around recovering. However, I was feeling great so I went with Geneveve to Book Babies group at the library, helped out with some errands, organized some clothes and generally had a normal day. By 5pm my eyes were starting to get tired as though I had in contacts, so it’s probably good that I didn’t look at a computer monitor all day at work.

I just woke up from a nap and my eyes felt pretty good again, so I figured I’d check in electronically. I’ve got a few weeks of eye drops and being careful in the shower. I’ll have to suspend my swim training for the triathlon I’m planning to do in August, but other than that I should be back to normal life less than a day after the surgery – you know, just without contacts or eyeglasses :-)

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