Laughter Through Tears

My PCR came back negative today, so I'm not reinfected. Most likely, I have a stubborn cold virus or light strep. All the same, if I don't feel better tomorrow, I'll try and make a doctor's appointment. There's not much my PCP can do for either cold or strep, but I want to be prepared, just in case it gets worse.

I'm reading fic and noodling around with some orig fic projects, but I've stalled progress on BFS because I'm so tired from being sick. And I'm more than a week late with posting the next chapter, even though I have the draft ready. I'm just... trying to summon the energy, but the well is fucking bone dry.

I'm so bored of being sick. It's only been two days, but I'm so bored of it.

We got word of the lockdown on the twelfth or thirteenth, two years ago. And the thirteenth, I remember, was a Friday. So that was when I started my personal self-isolation. Exactly two years ago.

The first lockdown, March to May, was the most difficult. But I was a ball of nerves and stress well into the next autumn, as I recall. It feels like a long time ago, but also like no time at all. We are in the same place somehow, but somehow miles ahead.

I don't know.

Today was a long day. Good, but long, and very tiring.

I went out to pick up a coffee in the morning and that (and my bad memory) ended up making me late for my ERG appointment. The ERG is an annoying and slightly gross eye exam that I get for side effect reasons, about once a year. And it requires eye drops, so when I got out of the test I could barely see and sunlight bothered me even more than normal. Yeah, it wasn't quite cloudy enough for my taste.

I made my way back home and managed to get some rest and some lunch -- and to wait out my pupil dilation. Once I was sufficiently rested, I headed out to one of the university libraries. They're operating on a program where you book seats in advance so that they can make sure they don't go over the legal limit for how many people can "congregate" in a closed space. And they assign desks to make sure social distancing is in effect.

Being outside all day is still super weird and a little anxiety-inducing. But I had the option to work somewhere outside of home, and I snatched it up. I might be able to book another afternoon this week, I hope, because I was *so* productive.

...for the fifth time in two years, if I'm counting right. Last time was last March, and before that, the previous September.

Anyway, I had an exhausting medical test yesterday, so the long and short of it is, I was exhausted enough to go to bed early and consequently it's six-thirty and I'm up and dressed and ready to perform my democratic duty. Assuming the polls are open at this hour, which I can easily check now that I'm verified that they haven't sneakily moved my polling location at the last moment (as they did in the municipal elections).

Then I can get coffee.

( Covid stuff )

I got my second vaccine shot on Sunday morning and so Monday was kind of a lost day because I was tired and suffering a little more of the side effects than I really expected to be. ( Cut for Covid talk )

I'm still ahead of word count, despite a minor setback each today and yesterday. I also have two more Zoom write-ins with the local group this week, and at least one late-night (for my timezone) write-in on the NaNo YouTube channel. So if I have a bad morning, I can recover. Evening writing is often only a few hundred words, though, so that's a good reason to make an effort in the morning, regardless.

Quarantine is still hybridized, and there are active restrictions on the Pilates studio I attend. Soon, it may be too cold for outdoor lessons. I have to decide what I'll do, then.

Anyway, the book is going well, so far. Even if I haven't gotten to the good stuff, yet. But honestly, even the "not having gotten to the good stuff" feeling is a good one. New book energy. It's revitalizing.

Monday through Thursday is the online convention event that's replacing the usual annual fall geek con, Icon, which takes place every year on the week-long holiday. Taking the con online has prompted the organizers to switch to a payment model where a one-time cover price gains the user access to all events, which has allowed me and my brother to make last-minute, stress-free decisions about what to watch. For example, there was a GOH event on Monday that I had thought about attending, but it was quite late at night and I was tired. I ended up watching two events on Monday (not quite back-to-back) and two and a half on Tuesday.

Then I was going to take a break on Wednesday and do some intensive writing on The Flower of Fairmont, which is getting very close to being ready for a demo, but alas. After a migraine on Monday night (surprise!) and a worse migraine late Tuesday night (my fault, for playing too much Skyrim), I was a wreck on Wednesday. Not the worst rebound I've ever had, but I was not good to work. And that's with being at home and having all the resources available to make things easier -- shades down, dimmed screen, low volume. So Wednesday was not the productive day I had hoped for, and the first week of October passed without me making much progress on my writing goals.

I did get some stuff done this week, but much less exciting.

Today I have stuff I need to do around the house, but I am also going to try and write a little. The only event I definitely want to watch is in the evening, so I can just make that my dinner break, instead of TV. Oh, I also started watching the Mars show, and I found it... watchable, I guess? I'm not super into it, but I still enjoy the sciency aspects.

Fairmont is still pretty far from being done, but I'm making progress on chapter 4 of TC. Slower than I'd like, but progress.

We're back in quarantine, more or less, and on Friday we celebrated Rosh Hashana over Zoom. This morning (once the holiday was over) I had to pop out to the shopping center, to pick up lightbulbs. My living room bulb burned out on Friday night, of all times. On my way, I picked up coffee from the bakery, because I was out of instant and my grocery delivery won't arrive until tonight.

There were people out, but many shops are closed and the area wasn't exactly crowded.

Then I came home, did a little reading, made lunch. Did some house chores. In between, managed to write some code for Fairmont and do a bit of outlining. I realized from my struggles with ending TC that my main problem is that I didn't give enough through to the structure of the gameplay early in the design process. I'm trying to do better with Fairmont. This is giving rise to an interesting phenomenon of variable theme and tone, which will affect player experience even more interestingly.

But I'm not ready to expose Fairmont to more eyes, just yet.

The heat has been less intense. That's something. Still, my allergies are acting up, and last night I had a surprise migraine.

Erev Shavuot was Thursday and we had our family dinner on Friday night as usual. I cooked a very rich pasta sauce that was a hit, but also I made twice what we needed so now I have a plastic container full of very rich pasta sauce in my fridge. I also made cheese biscuits (subbing emmental for the cheddar the recipe called for) and bought mini cheese suflees. The rest of the family contributed other dishes and on the whole we had a real feast on our hands.

I passed Saturday in a legitimate food hangover. I regret (almost) nothing.

Today I'm going to see the lung doctor for the first time in two years of being off my asthma meds. I'm not sure how that's gonna go.

We might be getting a second wave of Covid-19. There have been clusters of infections in schools.

Otherwise things here are as well as can be expected, while the rest of the world looks to be on fire. I keep up with the news but not as closely as I might have done. Somehow or other I have to keep working.