I suspect I didn't do anything serious, but when you're pressing on a nerve it doesn't have to be serious to feel serious. Hell, I was about to go to work this morning until my wife gave me the evil eye.

Anyway, this guy seems really good. Understood exactly what I did -- he does almost the same workout, and he specializes in sports injuries. I told him what I was doing and what I felt, he said, "I know what you did, but we'll do the full workup to confirm it."

He started pushing, pulling and twisting me, asking when it hurt. First he did all the things that shouldn't hurt, if it was what he thought. Then he said, "Okay, now it's going to hurt." Pushed just a tiny bit and yup, that was it.

It's a very common thing for people over 40 (check) who have a desk job (check) and who work out first thing after getting out of bed (check) without warming up properly (check).

The disks start to lose their flexibility in your 30s. Then when you sleep, they absorb fluid, becoming slightly enlarged and softening the outer layer. Put any pressure on them and the fluid starts to push out too fast and you get a lesion.

Solution is to warm up for 15 minutes to a half-hour first, to give the disks time to shed the extra fluid. And get a lumbar support for my chair at work.

Being 20 again would also help, but he wouldn't write me a prescription for that.