Twisted Ankle in Lincoln City

After Rocking Nia HQ, the following day was a day off. And we didn’t have to be in Eugene for two days, so River and I headed to the coast.

River facing the wind storm.

We stopped in Lincoln City and went to the beach there, where it was so windy that it almost knocked me over. Needless to say, River, who weighs a quarter what I do, was also being tossed around a bit. It was almost scary, but fun. We ran and ran and he chased his toy and we played tug-of-war and ran to the water. It was cold, so we didn’t stay in it. 

It was during this run that I injured my ankle. My driving ankle, wouldn’t you know it. On the top of the joint. It feels like it over dorsiflexed. Now it hurts to run up hills. It’s very red and swollen. I’ve put some ice on it and will elevate it later, too.

It was raining a lot, so we stayed in the hotel. I spent most of the evening putting together my final lesson plans for the weekend in Eugene.

I also soaked in the bathtub while listening to the playlist for the Nia routine Soul.

In the morning River and I walked to the local vet. Mainly because I wanted to get River a can of dog food, but also, I was going to see if the doctor was available to look at River’s toes. He has had what looks like it might be a wart developing between two toes on his front left paw, and while we were running in the sand yesterday, it must have grinded it up really bad and caused it to open and bleed. 

We got the dog food, but the doctor was in surgery so no one could look at him.

We just got back in the car and headed to Eugene.

I love driving this car. The lights come on when it’s dark and go off when it’s light. The windshield wipers detect when there is water on the windshield to keep it clear without my having to do a thing. It has cruise control. I can set it to keep the temperature at 72 degrees inside the vehicle at all times. There’s a remote sensor in the key, so I don’t even need to take it out of my pocket to unlock the doors or the hatchback or even to start the engine! There’s a feature called Ambient Lighting, that is a few carefully placed accent light bulbs that slowly rotate through the all the colors of the rainbow. The navigation system is so convenient. I love just driving straight until I hear her voice say ‘Prepare to Turn Left”. I only wish I could set it so that she’d have a British accent.

I feel sorry for River, though because the stereo system has such a booming bass, and when I play my music loud I can see him reacting with his ears. So I refrain from doing it too loud.

So far it looks like I’m averaging 27 miles / gallon.

The one thing that I don’t understand about the car is the SPORT button. I test drove them both, but I bought the Countryman S instead of the Countryman because it had a turbo engine and was much more responsive that the non S, which just seemed sluggish by comparison.

This is the first known picture of the three of us together. JAG, River and Thumper

So now I’ve got this button in my Countryman that basically switches on the S. When the dealer was describing everything in the car to me, he got to that button and i was confused. I asked, “So, what’s the downside to having it on. Why would I even not switch it on?”  He said he didn’t know. 

So, every time I start the car, I have to remember to engage the SPORT. Or I’ll be driving sluggish non S. Sometimes I’m driving for a while and I think, “gee, this hill seems to be fatiguing Thumper more than ....” and then I look and see that the green light is not on and there is no S next to the D on the dashboard. All I do is flip that Sport switch and my power comes zooming back. 

I wonder if that feature is just to continually remind us why we paid extra to get this feature.