This morning it was very cold and extremely windy in Bridgeport, CT. I pulled the tarp off the saw and folded it up, but trying to handle a large tarp in high winds is an exercise in futility to say the least. It's very hard to keep hold of one of those things when it's trying to act as a sail, but I finally managed it and got unloaded.
After I left I got about 5 miles down the road and started feeling a lot of pain in my lower back. Uh oh. By the time I reached the truck stop I was in agony. It was very hard for me to climb down out of the rig. Walking inside was all about small steps and large pain. I'd obviously strained my lower back muscles while wrestling with that tarp.
I managed to climb slowly back up into the rig and started heading for Ft Dix, NJ to pick up an Army trailer to haul back to WI. It was a very long and painful ride. I got as far as Bordentown, NJ and had to stop. I decided to walk around a bit and get some breakfast. I was hoping moving around some would ease the pain and stiffness. No such luck.
I picked up some Ben Gay and rubbed it into my back, not really expecting it to actually help all that much but hell when you're in that much pain you'll try damn near anything. I downed a hand full of ibuprofin. I then called the boss to report my injury. I let him know I didn't think it was anything more than just muscle strain, but that it might be necessary for me to just lay down for a while after I made the pick up.
As he had just injured his back out in the cold Saturday he understood and told me to do whatever I had to do. I just wanted to make sure it was reported just in case of the slim chance of it turning into something that might actually require a doctor visit.
I got to Ft Dix but by that time I knew there was no way in Hell I was going to be able to crawl around under the trailer to do what needed to be done to detach the front deck so the trailer I was picking up could be driven onto my deck. I talked to the guy there and explained my situation. He said he'd noticed I was walking pretty badly. He said if I would tell him what to do he would do it for me. Great!
I talked him through taking the pins, plates, and lines loose and setting the 8x8 lumber under the deck to support it during detach. He did everything for me and I got the deck detached no problem. Nice guy. Once everything was loaded he reconnected everything for me and helped me chain down the load. I really appreciated him helping out as I would never have been able to get it done otherwise.
I called in and let them know I was loaded and was going to find a place to lay down. I'll be in WI whenever I get there. I could have stopped at Bordentown but the idea of spending the night in that zoo just didn't appeal to me so I grit my teeth and kept going on into PA. I'm now parked in a turnpike service plaza.
I'm laying down on my bunk for now. I couldn't even manage to get my shoes off for crying out loud. I have a feeling I'm not going to be able to get up again for a while. I hope this pain eases soon as I have no desire to visit any clinics or ERs. I'm going to have to try and move around at some point later if for no other reason than to get something to eat, but for now I'll just lay here like a beached whale and try to not move any more than I have to. The pain is seriously unreal right now.
Ok, that's enough pissing and moaning for now I guess.