Everyday Systems

I am sorry to say I may no longer be able to do shovelglove. I have herniated disk in my back and though it is improving slowly I do not know if I will ever be able to do shovelglove or sledgehammer exercises that involve twisting the back or put pressure on spine. I regret this as I really liked doing it and feel sad whenever I look at my crochet hammer. I have been doing isometrics which do not involve back muscles and walking a lot but I cannot lift weights or run. However I have not given up. I live in Chiang Mai which has many tai chi and chi kung classes which are supposed to be good back exercise and will eventually be able to run again according to doctor.

I'm sorry to hear that. I do hope that things improve for you and, even if SG is out, you're able to keep up all your other activities.

chiangmaiboss wrote:I am sorry to say I may no longer be able to do shovelglove. I have herniated disk in my back and though it is improving slowly I do not know if I will ever be able to do shovelglove or sledgehammer exercises that involve twisting the back or put pressure on spine. I regret this as I really liked doing it and feel sad whenever I look at my crochet hammer. I have been doing isometrics which do not involve back muscles and walking a lot but I cannot lift weights or run. However I have not given up. I live in Chiang Mai which has many tai chi and chi kung classes which are supposed to be good back exercise and will eventually be able to run again according to doctor.

Thank you for kind words kevin.

I'm so sorry to hear this, Changmaiboss -- and best wishes for a speedy and total recovery.

You (and your family!) have been great contributors to this bulletin board.

I hope you'll continue to keep us posted -- who knows, maybe there's an aspect of shovelglove (14 schedualistically insignificant minutes?) that will stay useful.

Reinhard

Thanks Reinhard, you are very kind. I have enjoyed both the exercises and your forums and I will continue to read the forum daily and as I still walk a great deal I can still involve with the urban rangers. Some interesting shovelglove information though. I have moved to Sansai which is about
7 kms from Chiang Mai. My crochet hammer stands out front of my new house and people ask what it is for so I explain how shovelglove works and some Burmese workers who are building house nearby were doing the exercises such as the butterchurn and the chopping wood and enjoyed it immensely. So you see now shovelglove is spreading in Thailand and perhaps they bring it back to Burma. Also I have been doing Chinese tai chi and chi kung exercises for back and it is much better and even doing shovelglove moves with wal;king stick. Back is much improved and God willing perhaps some day can do shovelglove again.

Tai chi and chi kung are very healing. Don't get discouraged, just do what you can do!

Thanks Jan. By the way i also liked The prisoner but didnt understand it. If they had dvds I would watch them again.

Today I participated in Habitat for Humanity project in Chiang Mai. As I am just recovering from herniated disk I did not plan on doing any heavy lifting, as only exercises I have been doing are Chinese and isometrics, but trying not to stress back. Problem is although I have lost weight I am still 200 pounds and so much bigger than little Thai guys. So everytime there was something heavy to lift boss comes to me. So being an idiot and because I felt guilty watching little Thais and even women trying to lift heavy stuff like roof trusses and purlings, I said the hell with it and carried the things anyway, even up onto the roof. The reason I am writing this is that since I was able to do this and seem to be okay, I am planning to start doing the shovelglove tomorrow. Maybe just the butter churn exercise as there is no back twisting with that. On a separate topic, I rented a 3 story building and my wife Marisa is opening beauty salon and massage on first and second floors. I have project for third floor which is sort of charity deal. Marisa's photo is in shovelglove website and she says hello to Reinhard and all the "shuffergrove" people. (it is very hard for these people to say r and l, just like the Chinese.

chiangmaiboss,

I admire your determination, but please do be very careful!

Hello back to Marisa from me and the other "shuffergrove" people

Best wishes and let us know how it goes,

Reinhard

Thank you Reinhard. Marisa says hi back and happy thanksgiving. I did butterchurn exercise with no problem. I also built house here with habitat for humanity. I went there with other volunteer police officers. They told me I just had to work as translator but since I was biggest guy working on this particular house every time there was something heavy to carry the foreman asked me to do it. As I am too proud and stupid to say no, and since everyone else working on house was a little Thai guy except this one guy from Belize, I did it. Carried some really heavy stuff. Had some back pain but nothing terrible. After this I figured maybe I could try shovelglove again and so far just butterchurn but did not have any pain so I will try to do more.