Living in the time of pandemic: COVID-19 (213)
July 1, 2024
Year 4 of COVID in the Bay Area.
Year 5, Day 89: What a DAY. Meetings upon calls upon meetings upon questions, and all before I got to the actual work that needed to be done. Made myself eat a fast bite at 2 pm and go outside for a brisk walk at 3 pm in an effort to not fall back into workaholic ways. I was rewarded by running into a neighborhood dog who is a great fan and of whom I am a great fan. Puppy skritches and a blissed out dog face were just the ticket.
JB’s at full day camp this week which gives me three whole days of working uninterrupted (except for all these meetings and calls). Love solid days. Hate meetings. Boo corporate life.
JB blew through all my hearts in Duolingo tonight so I have to get in several practice sessions to build up the heart stash. Apparently, you need hearts to get to do new lessons, which I forget frequently. I also forgot which language I was working in myself, and made a couple mistakes before I reoriented my brain. I don’t know if it’s worth paying for the paid version, I’m working on 3 languages off and on and paying for it makes me feel like I’d REALLY better be getting somewhere with them. That might not be worth the extra pressure (incentive).
Year 5, Day 90: Per Chef Jose Andres, it’s Bourdain Day, a day of remembrance on Anthony Bourdain’s birthday “to celebrate everything Tony did for the world and how he used food to break down walls and build longer tables”. Bourdain is one of the few food celebrities I respected. He brought humility to his shows about food in the world, unlike most dudes who make the food about themselves, and his condemnation of Kissinger were the first peek I had into what a monster that man was. I appreciated that learning. A moment of remembrance for a man who tried to be decent.
Our many waving potato plants are starting to turn a little yellow. It’ll be exciting to see if this spring’s regular watering and extra hilling resulted in a bigger yield or if the aboveground action was the whole party. Fingers crossed! Also aside from the novelty of (very occasionally) eating from our own garden, the garden potatoes just taste better. Sometimes the store bought potatoes come with a weird taste that only bothers me. Not quite bitter, not quite sour, just an odd offness. No one else ever noticed but our fresh dug potatoes don’t have that.
My work day went from 8:30 am to 10 pm today. Subtract two hours for two appointments and two hours for dinner and bedtime routines. That’s a 13.5 hour day containing 9.5 hours of work. Maybe not as much overworking as I’d assumed but you know what, that’s still a hell of a lot more than I think the job deserves given the recent developments. Partly the technology mess they created has slowed me down to a crawl but I need to get on top of this tendency to overwork to make up the difference. If work has to wait three more days, it has to wait.
Year 5, Day 91: A dear friend of ours recently caught COVID and it took two weeks for them to recover, their course of illness was awful. That, combined with my anticipation of summer socializing (the county fair is coming!), had me anticipating horrible things. I scheduled the whole family for boosters. We were last boosted in the fall and we are well out of that 4-6 month efficacy window so Kaiser better not give me any guff over these.
Some of the green blackberries are turning a beautiful deep red.
My plantings of sugar snap peas, lettuce, and second round of bush beans from three weeks ago were all a bust. If they were going to sprout, they would have done 1-2 weeks ago. I’ve popped more snap peas into water to soak for several hours for another attempt: hope springs everlasting unlike my sprouts. It’s a good thing I’m choosing to stress over growing something to eat out of our garden. If we relied on this garden’s success for our meals, our rations would be very thin indeed. This gives me something relatively harmless to direct my need to fuss at and only generated mild levels of proto-anxiety. It’s a reasonable pressure release valve. I go pester the plants whenever work or life gets to be too much.
Year 5, Day 92: Dental spa day! My teeth are now sparkling clean after a nice lie down on a soft reclining chair and they tell me that my gum pockets are actually improving. The anxious underachiever in me is soothed by this proof that our dental habits can make a difference. This is so much better than eye appointments where they just confirm a minor deterioration for me or a major one for JB and advise us to do certain things but say ultimately there’s really nothing we can do to stop it other than trying the course of therapeutic contacts. JB is very squeamish and afraid to try, and I will not fight with them over sticking contacts in their eyeballs, so that’s out. I can work with “floss better in these problem areas”.
United Healthcare has finally coughed up ten out of fourteen FSA claims submitted. They’re still holding out on 4 old ones.
I ALSO forced myself to put on those fancy new sneakers that PiC insisted on picking out for me to try and went for a brisk walk around lunchtime instead of hunching over my computer like a gremlin for an entire day without breaks. That felt really weird. Not just the walking part but also the new shoes part. They felt like mattress sized clown shoes. They’ll probably feel better after a few walks, or my calves will go into complete revolt. Po-tay-to, po-tah-to! I wonder what this time next year will look like and if it’ll be significantly better or worse for the battles I’m fighting today. My pessimism says worse. My desire to continue earning an income without simmering in frustration every day hopes maybe it’ll better??? I hope but I doubt.
Year 5, Day 93: Dual dental insurance: is it worth it? I’m trying to figure that out but it’s sort of a black hole in that I don’t know how much more it’ll cover, and if that outweighs the premiums. Assuming generally routine dental care, cleanings, exams, x-rays, and fluoride, has anyone found dual insurance policies to be worth it?
Well that’s awkward. I contacted Neighbor Kid’s grandma and politely begged off: it’s so busy for me at work, I’ve put JB in camps all summer. Playdates are really hard right but would NK like to be a penpal? We can manage that without having to juggle multiple schedules. We’ll mail them a treat if they’ll be hanging out at your place.
The response: we have a big backyard and both JB and Smol Acrobat could come play.
Errr, that’s not at all what I offered and I’m not letting my kids go to unsupervised playdates yet. Maybe it’s almost time for JB but there aren’t many people I know well enough to trust them for that. I’m backing away from the conversation because I truly am so swamped and frustrated at work, I’m not mentally or emotionally prepared to do any of this when it’s not what JB wants. If they were going to come around, they would have done by now, and I’d have carved out the space somehow. But since they didn’t, I’m not going to bother making any suggestions.
Anyway, I’m also not pleased with how Target keeps making their ThinkSport sunblock “unavailable” whenever they have promotions that would apply to that sunblock. It’s reef-safe but expensive. Then it mysteriously comes back in stock the day after the promotion ends. Three times now, that can’t be a coincidence. Sunblock IS an FSA-eligible item though, so at least there’s that.
The Hinge Health trainer guy told me that it’s good to start new shoes (like my inserts) every other day rather than every day so you don’t over stress new muscles etc.
I can see why neighbor kid’s grandma gave that response– it sounds like they want to take some load off of you since your reason given is that you’re working hard and having trouble juggling schedules. Captain Awkward is right that sometimes it’s best not to give a reason if it isn’t the real reason. It’s often best just to say something isn’t going to work out with out explaining. Backing away from the conversation seems like the right thing to do. I would also not bring up the penpal thing again since they didn’t respond to it– it’s quite possible that would be too much work for the adults, when they’re trying to have less work for the adults.
nicoleandmaggie recently posted…Replacing the battery on my kindle
In hindsight, both these things make so much sense.
I was trying to be civilized but accidentally made it seem like I was opening the door. Oops.