So yet again…..I had to make a grown-up decision…

…………………(I hate when that happens)…

There was the option of going on one more Mounted Hound Walk in preparation for the up-coming 2020-2021 fox hunt season…

(the new hounds needed one more organizational/touch-up with our Huntsman, Devana)

or………….

should I take yet another (necessary) one-day (twelve hour) virtual seminar…..in order to obtain the all-powerful & eminently-crucial C.E.U.’s (continuing educational units………….sigh)…

It’s time to renew my massage therapy license…..

…..blah…..blah…..blah…..

…..bet’cha  didn’t know…..I’ve been a massage therapist since 1974…..(?)

…..all that means is…….I’m old…..and that I don’t have hands anymore…..I have paws…

It’s hard to find new techniques to learn after decades of going to educational seminars…..

…..over the years I’ve learned the basics (Swedish massage) along with:  Reflexology, Cranial Sacral, Sports Massage, Trigger Point Therapy, Acupressure, Deep Tissue, Cross-Fiber, Shiatsu, Foot Massage, PNF, Aromatherapy, Rolfing…..

I have all the certificates…..

…..somewhere…..

I must know what I’m doing………….the certificates say so…..

…..maybe I should frame them?………….(well, at least the ones the cats haven’t pee’d on)…

I suppose I could learn more about Hot Stone massage or Lymphatic Drainage…..I would like to level up in Aromatherapy…..

…..but this time…I managed to find something new…..tra!…la!

…..well, it’s not really new…..it’s been around for…..hmmmmmmmmm…..a very very long time…..

…..like maybe…..thousands of years…..from multiple cultures…..

*****The History Of Cupping*****

*****More Information About Cupping*****

Amazon easily supplied me with a beginner/silicone cupping set…..

eBay offers old/used classics made of metal or horn or glass or stone or clay…..

This seminar offered basic instruction, using fairly conservative (dry cupping) techniques…..

…..there are more advanced/complicated techniques that involve igniting herbal mixtures under the vacuum of the cups…..or sucking up blood and bad humors…..(?)…..

***The Four Humors Explained***

…..hmmmmmmm…..

…..I may just pass on those…..

However…..did I get to go to the Mounted Hound Walk…..(?)…..

Nope…..

I made that big girl decision…..

I was stuck in my den all day…..watching my laptop computer…..learning about cupping…..and sticking sucking cups on my voluntary offspring (my older daughter)…..

(we both learned)…..(we’re real party favorites now!)

The Wolfhound adolescents have already shown a propensity for wanting to chew up the silicone cups…..

…..they do look like quasi-Kong toys for dogs…..

…..the cats like how they can be batted and bounced off the table…..

(maybe…..I should get a back-up set?)

*****Upon reflection………….I probably wouldn’t have hauled Addy and ridden in the Mounted Hound Walk anyway…..

…..there’s still that blast-furnace “Feels Like” temperature going on out there…..

…..and Addy is big and black and blubbery…..

…..she would have absorbed the heat and melted into a lard puddle alongside her saponified (good word, huh?) rider…..

…..hmmmmmmm…..

…..well, poop…..

…..at least I learned something new…..got my precious C.E.U.’s…..and I’ll start trotting Addy up and down the street (in the cool of the day…..whenever that is…..)