Certainly! Just ask Fr. Mike. He'll tell you the same thing. (kidding of course)
I hope this works for you. Be sure to get back on the heating pad as much as possible and use wet heat if you have it. Another thing you can do is take a bath cloth MAKING SURE IT HAS A TAG - wet it, put it on a microwavable plate with tag sticking up and nuke it for a minute. You will have an extremely hot cloth then, so pick it up by the tag and swing it around a bit to cool it some - not too much and then put that on your neck. CAREFULLY. You'll figure out how much to nuke and how much to wave if you'll do it a few times, but it will burn you if you're not careful. I only add this as the heating pad is always so hard to get to the right place on your neck. Do not set your house on fire; do not burn yourself. I think that if you can keep the Alleve in your system it will do you the most good. However, this will FEEL good if you have the time. Rice in a sock is good too, but it doesn't have the moist heat. But if you have to go to work, you can take this (rice sock) and still get some bennies. I don't think "minute rice" and it's friends work (no moisture in the grains) but "real" rice does and it feels ever so nice! Good luck!