Living in the time of pandemic: COVID-19 (117)
August 29, 2022
Year 3 of COVID in the Bay Area.
Year 3, Day 157: Monday. Ugh. I’m still trying to recover from the weekend. Our Saturday afternoon plan turned into an 8 hour affair late into the night. The kids had a ton of fun, and the adults were completely wiped out by the many extra hours on our feet.
We retreated, sweaty and tired, and regrouped at our place. We all had late drinks and dinner in our pajamas. I even tried a couple sips of White Claw. That went straight to my head, but it was tasty. Sunday I worked and rested, napped even, but it wasn’t enough. JB kept me up quite late because they were crying about Seamus so I had to soothe them until they could sleep. End result: starting the week like a couple sacks of bricks are tied to my ankles. What l a bad week for this. In addition to the usual school/work/Smol Acrobat/swim lesson juggle, we have an eye appointment for JB today, a big daycare orientation tomorrow, PiC has a dentist appointment and late Friday meetings, and I’m shorthanded at work. Whoof. I needed to be at what passes for my best. But we’ll do what we can.
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At breakfast, Smol offered me their banana: “biii?” (bite) and then wiped down the peel, my knee, and their foot with a napkin. Very kind, thank you for the help.
Unfortunately our usual morning yardwork had to be postponed because I’m still broken. This was a great disappointment to Smol. Fortunately PiC was able to stick around and spell me with Smol for a little while before he had to go.
We were wrong, btw, the car battery wasn’t fine. It had to be replaced today. We expected it would be $240 but there was some prorating that brought it down to $120. Yay/boo.
After they got to observe a battery replacement, I wrangled an overtired Smol down for an early nap. They were absolutely losing it because they didn’t want PiC to leave. Or just because. It’s hard to tell, really.
I’m grateful they took a solid nap. I desperately needed those hours of sitting down even if I was still working. I’d considered moving to the sofa for a more comfortable sit but it’s too hard to set up a useful work station there now. Our new sofa fits our small space and does the job but I really don’t enjoy it. A shame that our $200 Craigslist sofa was more my cup of tea.
Year 3, Day 158: We did some really satisfying weeding but it was too much, too soon. My muscles were quite angry at me. Then my whole body quit on me. Extreme fatigue took over. You know that feeling when you’re about to be overwhelmed by sleep and can’t hold it off? That plus a feeling of my whole body being smothered under 100 lbs of weight is what the extreme fatigue is like. It is awful. I had to call it quits on Smol-care earlier than usual and set up my invalid workstation on the bed for the day. This sucks.
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Smol’s development continues to entertain. It’s funny to see someone so little be so dialed into certain things like: we weed together in the mornings, the snacks live here so push the stool over to reach them, the dog gets these treats.
I’m enjoying our together time even when they pick a patch of weeds for us to tackle together. I do all the work and they carry the results to the compost.
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A local car dealership that PiC looked at recently is asking for a $1000 (unclear if refundable) deposit to be waitlisted for a new car for 12 months. !!!!
We need a lot more details and confirmation in writing that it’s refundable to even maybe consider this but that seems like a big risk to take for too long a wait. I don’t want to have to fight with them to get my $1000 back if they never turn up a car that meets our needs.
Have you ever had to leave a deposit to be waitlisted for a car without getting an actual order / car assigned with a VIN?
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This Avatar / Bronte mashup makes me laugh.
Jane Eyre
Jane Water
Jane Erthe
Jane Fyre
Long ago, the four Janes lived togethir yn harmonye…
Until the Fyre Janes attackid.— Chaucer Doth Tweet (@LeVostreGC) August 22, 2022
Year 3, Day 159: What a day. The school has started minimum days again, elevating Wednesdays to be neck and neck with Mondays for the worst/hardest day of the week. My body is still struggling today, though a little less since I didn’t foolishly do yardwork again. I did take Smol Acrobat for a walk from which I had to carry them home, kicking and screaming, though and that didn’t do me any favors.
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Most days I like my mundane life but I was struck today with a feeling like I’m not doing one damn thing that matters. Some of the malaise may be related to the number of meltdowns that Smol had today but I bet it’s more related to feeling like I’ve wasted my precious time. First, my computer scare this morning which directly led to me spending more than one precious hour setting up my backup computer and fighting with a few key functions not functioning. Then, a friend asked me to help them make a decision and it turned out to be a waste of time because they’d already had their mind made up and they failed to provide key information upfront. Then, least consequentially but just adding to the pile of “ugh waste” feeling, some people changed their minds about stuff at work and that meant everything we’d done on that project will have to be thrown out.
It’ll pass. I just hate when what little routine remains to me is overturned and even more hate when hard work is wasted. It feels like I poured myself out and it was all futile. Not cool
Also! The many many meltdowns and toddler whining wasn’t my favorite. Was JB this whiny and melty? I don’t remember if I ever had to work this hard for them to just get through a day. I could go through the archives to find out but the answer to that question isn’t going to make today any better.
Year 3, Day 160: I hope we always have a Zoom option for back to school nights. We were able to fit in swim lesson, making dinner, JB’s homework which required two calls to two aunties, and the back to school night all by 710 pm.
It’s been a hell of a day and I absolutely forgot to finish a couple important things at work but in the end, we got it done. Fewer days like this, though, please.
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We need a wider variety of delicious crunchy snacks for the kids that are actually healthy and low-mess (easy for Smol in particular to self feed in the car) but I’m starting to doubt that’s possible.
JB will eat crunchy veggies but Smol won’t. They just chew them up and dribble them back out. Gross. They only want nuts, raisins, and carbs. Maybe they’ll eat dried fruit… ? We’ll try that and see.
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For your timeline needs. pic.twitter.com/YlcGE9DO5B
— Mary Robinette Kowal@🏡 (@MaryRobinette) August 26, 2022
Year 3, Day 161: Boy, my psyche is working overtime. This time it was all about being left, lost, late at night on a vaguely familiar college campus to find my way out to my best friend who could easily have driven up to pick us up but chose to park miles away. Not the most deep metaphor for feeling tired, and abandoned by people I trust. Whoof.
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Longest. Day. Ever.
I hate when Fridays act like Mondays.
Smol Acrobat was a hysterical mess to and from school dropoff, they didn’t want to walk a single step. They begged to be carried but I can’t carry them all that way, and you can’t carry them partway. Once you cave, it’s a whole thing of “don’t put me down!!!” Not that it’s better than the constant “pick me up!!!” demands.
My stomach has disagreed with every single food choice I’ve made all week and ramped it up this morning to stabbing pains just at the thought of food. Rude.
After we got through all that mess, I got bad scheduling news from one staff member and then a huge project of “bad news please fix it” from another. The latter is actually a huge problem. But I’m going to mentally reclassify it as a non urgent issue because it’s been broken so long.
We made it to mid-afternoon, when PiC doublebooked himself for a meeting and a tire repair. Whoops. He went ahead with the tire repair, taking the call while he was out, and then was trapped there for the next five hours. His appointment was at 3 and they didn’t get to our car until 8 pm. Thankfully the kids were in great moods and played well the whole time but wow what a day. WHAT a DAY.
