By: Revanche

Living in the time of pandemic: COVID-19 (159)

June 19, 2023

Year 4 of COVID in the Bay Area.

Year 4, Day 80: I usually come into Monday feeling wrecked but this Monday comes with the extra spice of marrow-deep regret after spending most of Sunday washing loads of lost and found laundry and packing them away, and sorting and packing several unexpected boxes of donations from our friends who had also kindly saved empty large boxes for us to use. Unfortunately I burned through all my energy and my reserves of energy without realizing it, so I’m burnt out today. I had to pace myself very carefully all day, taking loads more breaks than my usual one, and work wrapped in a heating pad.

We also had a call with the daycare director today. There was another incident on Friday with the Prior Offender who attacked Smol Acrobat, this time right in front of PiC, where PO started shoving Smol when they wanted the toys that Smol was playing with. PiC intervened and they kept at it anyway. It’s developmentally normal but we still don’t want them in the same classroom where they’ll be around each other all day, everyday, and I don’t know what options there are but there had better be some.

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The one bright note: Smol Acrobat sat/stood at the table and ate their whole dinner on their own. No whining, no playing with their food, no flopping all over the place ignoring their plate. They just served themselves and ate!! It was a tiny miracle. The one odd thing was they called the BBQ sauce “spicy”, wanted to try it, deemed it thumbs up “goot”, but insisted that they only dip off my plate. That was an acceptable price for their feeding themselves without fuss.

Year 3, Day 81: We recently inherited a stack of old page protectors, from someone’s closet cleanout which is perfect because dun dun dunnnnnnnn….

Big project! Going through our financial and personal paperwork making sure everything is complete and organized. The paperwork currently merely exists in two binders. It’s not going to be particularly helpful to anyone in the event of our deaths. So everything is going into page protectors. Tabs will identify sections and the claims pages for life insurance and disability policies. I’m missing some information for my supplemental life insurance through PiC’s employer, and we’re missing his birth certificate so those two items are on the To Do list. Once things are complete and in order, I’ll type up a table of contents.

I’ve started a similar project with JB’s school records and notable moments. I’ve kept a journal with notes and pictures for them, in an old composition book, but it’s bloated with all the photos and cards I crammed in there to easily write in.

This inspires me to move my recipes to a binder system, too! My old journal method is good for storing data/recipes and useless for finding them quickly. I’ll need to pick up a new binder and possibly more page protectors by the time I get all these organized.

Generally I maintain a primarily digital records existence but some things you need to have in hard copy.

Year 3, Day 82: We were notified that Smol Acrobat was exposed to a COVID-infectious kid last week. We immediately tested the kids and we all came up negative but it’s going to be an anxious few days waiting to see if anyone else develops symptoms or tests positive.

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I’ve been trying to eat fewer carbs this week to see if it would help with my persistent pain spikes of the past few weeks and my unwanted companion belly bulge. It’s a bit rough going from ALL THE CARBS to some carbs, sometimes. This is a very moderate approach, just adding more veggies which I’ve always struggled with, and smaller servings of carbs but my cravings have zero respect for “moderation” and respond disproportionately. After three days of slightly reduced carbs, my body is urging me to throw in the towel. Shan’t. I’d like to give it an honest go for a few more weeks.

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Listening to my mentor and old friend talk to another old friend, both of whom I met through the PF blogosphere waaaay back in the day, talk about money is so heartwarming.

Year 3, Day 83: I’m doing the dropoff commute today so that PiC can bike in without having to stress about JB. I don’t mind doing my share of dropping off for camp and daycare but it sure eats up a large chunk of my day.

I lost another 45 minutes this morning to observing interactions between a white cop and a Black man. It seemed calm at first but then the Black man became upset at whatever he’d been told and I immediately worried for his life. I worried even more when three more cruisers showed up and surrounded the area. Why do you need to outnumber one upset, but absolutely and clearly non threatening, person by six or more officers?

I sat there as a witness, ready to film if anything went sideways, and was so thankful when they finally all pulled away without laying hands on him or escalating.

I hate this about our society. I hate that the moment he showed anger, I feared for his safety and his life because so frequently police have taken less as an excuse to murder. I hate that this is the norm and that my Black friends and neighbors and fellow residents cannot simply be human without potentially putting their lives at risk.

Year 3, Day 84: Whoops, I lost the note I’d written for Friday. Quick summary: a huge load of work came in and I cleared it all under Monday is a holiday for everyone else and I need to take some of it off to mind the kids.

PiC and JB are scheduled to help our friends move too, so they’ll be gone for a while.