So I went under the knife...

Most people probably don't know this because I didn't spread the news around much but last night I had Laser (well, more specifically 'Lasik') surgery on my eyes. Yes, the goal is to join the ranks of those annoying few who have immaculate vision and flaunt it for all of us 'glasses-wearin folk' to see.

I had some tests done last week, including the normal eye exam (three times with three separate doctors), an inner eye scan (very interesting... they take digital pictures of the inside of the eye), and what can only de described as an eye poke (done to test the thickness of the cornea... with topical anesthetic thankfully). The poke was just done with a little rubberized pencil like thing.

When the doctor who did the surgery (who speaks fluent english helpfully) was trying to get a second scan of the inside of my eye he was finding that my left eye was too deepset in the socket to get a good picture (thanks for the genetics Dad) so he actually needed to send back to the other lab for their pics.

My roomate Michael had his eyes done at the same time and so we hired a cab driver that we call a lot to come with us and hold our clothes, wallets, and dignity, while we got dressed up in the little throw-away scrubs. Actually I think Michael kept his dignity just fine. I with scrub pants that only came 2/3 of the way down my leg due to my distinctly un-Colombian height did not.

The actual surgery only took 10 minutes. Clamp the eye, get anesthetic drops, the thin top flap gets cut open, and then I stare into the blinking light for about 30 seconds to a minute. Easy, painless, weird, and very very interesting. Last night after getting discharged everything was quite fuzzy. I couldn't read and my eyes felf very tired. At night I wore the clear facemask above to keep my from rubbing my eyes and during the day today I'm wearing the funky looking lab goggles for both stylish and functional purposes. Eight days before I can swim. Two months of lubricant drops. Two weeks of Antibiotic drops (I think that's what they are). No contact sports for a month (sadly this rules out basketball.... nearly 1/2 the reason that I got the surgery). And guess what.... it only cost me $600 Canadian!!!!

If you want some more information on Lasik (and if you'd like to read that I can't go swimming for three months and then fight with me about what my doctor told me) the following website is really good. Especially when you know that I've come out of it just fine.

www.fda.gov/cdrh/lasik/

Today I woke up and could see crystal clear just like I had my glasses on, and with no pain at all. This is looking like it's going to be one of the best descisions that I've made.

Back in Canada in a little over a month!!!!!

Bye for now,

-Matt

Mom and Dad visit Cali - Pics

Here I'm making dough for ravioli - a novel party idea by one of my neighbors. My ravioli didn't turn out too pretty but it was tasty! The clothes I'm wearing here I bough in Cartagena. They make me look a little strange but they are WONDERFUL for hot weather. And since when did I worry about looking strange.

The countdown begins

Just two more months left to go until the school year is done. It hardly seems like any time at all. I worked it out the other day and I'm only going to see each class about 17 more times this year. Crazy. It made me realize that (as usual) I'd spent way too much time on things during first semester. This is the time of year that teachers decide if they want to try to cram topics in or just pick a few and do them well. I think I'm going to try for something in between.

My parents have been here to Cali for a few days. Not enough time to do too much but they got to meet a lot of people and come see the school which was wonderful. It will be nice to have my Colombia stories have a little more context.

I had sports day on Friday and then played basketball for two hours. I'm still sore (it's sunday). I'm young enough that I can still go hard when I want to but I'm not in terribly good shape so I feel it afterwards. That's a funny thing about having my physiology though... I don't really look different when I'm in or out of shape. I know this because of basketball season in high school. Anyway, a regular chance to play ball would be great... it's really just a matter of being ok with taking more time away from doing work I guess. And that's ok.

Time to visit with Mom and Dad:)

Hello loyal readers! (is anyone still reading this? I havent posted in a really long time so hopefully some people are still looking. Please excuse the lack of commas. Im typing on a spanish keyboard so contractions might look pretty funny.

It is the week of Semana Santa here in Colombia (holy week) and Ive got the week off school so Ive come to Cartagena on the north coast and my parents have flown in to meet me. They had some problems with the flight but made it here in one piece but without much sleep. Today we did some history stuff (my favourite!!!) by walking around the wall of the old town and visiting museums etc. Mom and Dad didnt want to bring the digital camera so they were using a disposable camera. I guess we arent getting free copies of their pictures.

Im going diving tomorrow. Cant wait. A friend Im going with has an underwater case for his digital camera so hopefully I can post some fun underwater pics.

Emily is coming down soon

Alo! Emmers is coming down to visit soon which is going to be fantastic. I can't wait. Sadly I'm going to be working for most of it but there is a long weekend at the end so we are going to do a bit of traveling.

Sky and Wendy sent out some fantastically adorable pics or their daughter Ellie. She's smiling in most of them. What a cute baby.

Looking at babies makes me think a lot. Babies have really different brains from adults so their emotions change very quickly and they are happy with much different things and see the world in a much different way. I figure that our adults brains are just as conditioned to see things through a forced perspective (because of our biology). We might think that we are seeing truth but our brains are a lens that must INCREDIBLY shift realities to fit with our biology and what we know.

Too deep? Ok, I'll stop.

Whoa!

I think that Llama wants to fight me. He is totally sizing me up.

Birthday in Villa de Leyva

This past weekend I was in Villa de Leyva again to celebrate a good friend and fellow science teacher's 50 birthday. I hiked every day. It was glorious. Hiked to some huge waterfalls. Hiked to the ruins of a 350 year old church and found some Llamas inside. The invite for people not staying over was "come at 9am for pancakes, stay until 9pm for dancing", the idea being that people would be gone by 10pm. Well several showed up at 9:40pm so it went a little longer than expected. But of course, good and interesting people, good times, and dancing in the kitchen. Can't much beat that.

Just rollin' along

Greetings avid readers.

You'd think that having 1/2 decent internet access at home would cause me to post more on this darn thing but it doesn't seem to be working that way. Now I'm just splitting my decreasing degree of free time between more electronic options. Yes I'm talking about youtube, facebook, along with all of the random show downloading. I'm certainly not spending as much time just sitting in the hammock as last year..... a good and bad thing I suppose.

Michael whupped me in zappo today (zappo means "toad"). It's a game where you throw metal rings and try and get them into holes for points. If you get one in the pewter toad's mouth it's big bonus points. We were playing to 500 and I lost by 300. I'm not sure how that's even possible but what are you gonna do. Maybe I'll start practicing every day.

I'm jealous of -40 degrees

Ok, I know that I don't have to worry about converting from degrees F to C when it gets really cold.

Technology is still finding new ways to connect people. I recently got sent a link to a youtube video of my family members skating on a smooth-as-glass lake superior. Perfect skating as far as the eye can see. Incredible. Getting a video from home was heartwarming too.

Here's the link if you want to check it out. Make sure to check out the kite skating as well. That one REALLY made me jealous.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3pluvRYvWgs