Lifestyles

Sinusitis is common this time of year when the air gets colder and drier. Sinusitis is the inflammation of the lining of your sinus cavities caused by allergies, a virus or bacterial infection.

There is acute, subchronic and chronic sinusitis. Anybody can get sinusitis especially those prone to allergies or with weakened immune systems.

Symptoms may include:

• Facial pain/pressure
• Nasal stuffiness
• Nasal discharge
• Loss of smell
• Cough/congestion

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“Pain is part of the body’s defense system, producing a reflexive retraction from the painful stimulus, and tendencies to protect the affected body part while it heals, and avoid that harmful situation in the future.”

This is the evolutionary and behavioral role of pain as described on Wikipedia.com. Yet this is not generally how we think of pain. Our view of body pain is more in line with the dictionary.com definition: “A distressing sensation in a particular part of the body.”

What is pain?
Combining the above, pain is a protective Read More

The lower back is one of the most often injured areas of the body. It also is one of the most difficult areas of the body to train – meaning that strengthening the region can be a challenge and rehabbing a lower back injury can be a long and tedious process.

The lower back does not have a great deal of muscle. It has many large tendons that attach the muscles to the bones. Tendons do not have the stretch and contract that muscles have, adding to the difficulty of strengthening the area.

One way to strengthen the lower back is to begin with exercises that do not involve Read More

I hate to admit it, but domestic birds have some questionable social … uh … tendencies that are less than attractive. Take, for example, the serious pecking order incidents that erupted amongst the Hen House gang years ago.

Peeky’s broods had grown into handsome black and white roosters. All were fine until they started crowing. We knew we couldn’t keep them. There’s a reasonable ordinance in town that prohibits roosters. Some male chickens have no regard for neighbors who like to sleep past 4 Read More