December 1, 2025

Living in the time of pandemic: COVID-19 (287)

Year 4 of COVID in the Bay Area

Year 6, Day 217: Every time I log into Fidelity, this message flashes at me: Attention: You appear to be invested too aggressively. Fidelity has investment strategies to help you stay on track for retirement.

So judgy! What business is it of yours that I am invested very aggressively? Could I not have a PLAN? In fact, I do. Invest as aggressively as possible to ensure our savings will see us through a long layoff or a medical emergency. Remember 2008-2009? I do. I job hunted for 18-20 months during a miserable economy. Nowadays we could probably, if it was just one layoff, make it a year without extreme panicking. Financially. Emotionally I might not be able to hang. But a medical emergency or crisis? THAT would be serious stuff and I don’t think we can withstand one of those. Not a severe one.

Every time I read an article about how folks have to go into full time medical care for something serious the calculator starts going. The costs of the care, the costs of childcare (if we could even get reliable childcare), the cost of feeding everyone when no parent has time or ability to cook, all adds up to a staggering number in my head. That would have to be entirely out of pocket for us. Like my pregnancy during 2020, we’d have to cope entirely on our own. We have no local family or friends who are financially set with the ability to put their lives on hold to help us out, so it’d be like the past ten years of parenting: one or two weeks a year when a trusted relative comes and cooks and hangs out with the kids. Everything else is on us.

Year 6, Day 218: There isn’t any day I don’t hate my job right now. We’ve been given impossible KPIs with next to no time to make them work and contradictory KPIs at that. Think: Double our productivity at the drop of a hat sort of impossible. “Dire” consequences are hinted at if we don’t meet them. Well, we won’t! It’s impossible. It’s been a long time since I thought any job was worth killing myself over, and this one definitely isn’t, but my priority is about my people, not the work and that’s what’s going to get me.

I’m damned if we do, damned if we don’t.

If I don’t put in the legwork now to prep support for next year, we definitely won’t have the support. So if we all still have jobs, my people suffer. Or if I’m the only one who gets the axe, they suffer because I didn’t take care of them. If I do put in the legwork now but we miss the target this year (as expected), maybe we lose that support anyway. It’s really stupid! Unless I can talk them around and say look – we’re all as well placed as we possibly CAN be to aim for the stars because I did all that work, surely you don’t want to waste it.

But my ability to talk sense into corporate “line goes up” types is naught because I argue logic and reality. They just want line to go up, completely divorced from logic and reality. So maybe I have a job for 12 more months before they decide it’s my fault that their impossible demands aren’t met.

That realization rubs up against my survival instinct. Day to day, I want to help people and that means giving money. Lots of it, these days. But if I’m likely to run out of job runway in 6? 12? Maybe 18 months at the outside? If nothing else, I don’t really want to be miserable for that much longer. It’s been awful since 2023.

And PiC is feeling similar heat at his work – massive amounts of work while having layoffs twice a year every year for four years. In his twelve years prior to that, maybe there were a couple layoffs? It was not the norm.

It’s hard not to give in to the feeling that we have to save every penny for our family. We do save aggressively but in the moments I remember the Great Recession, my whole being clenches up with stress.

Year 6, Day 219: Every day feels like a week these days but my cousin being in town for the holiday makes life seem bearable again (temporarily). This is the one long weekend in the year I can truly relax. There’s an adult in the house who can manage my kids that isn’t PiC and isn’t completely exhausted all the time and loves us. It’s a rare feeling and my body obviously feels it deeply because I can actually sleep deeply when she’s here.

We did cake deliveries in the neighborhood together, since we had a giant Costco cake and no party, and it was fun surprising friends with a large slab of cake.

It’s suddenly cold enough to see your breath now. I’m also finally feeling 80% human again. That’s about my baseline for health. Every time I hit this phase, I realize that I haven’t just been lazy for a month. I’ve been down and out. Now I can do my workouts. I can get out of bed and do a full day of work at my desk. It don’t have to work in bed all day to conserve every ounce of energy. It’s a huge difference.

Year 6, Day 220: JB asked what Thanksgiving is about for us since we don’t celebrate the Pilgrims being colonizing jerks. Well, I said. It’s a federal holiday whether we buy into the reason or not so it’s our time and our chance to have our own family traditions with food and chosen family.

I used to spend this holiday with in-laws and other family but I haven’t been able to face Other People since my mom died a month before Thanksgiving. From my still-raw grief and need to avoid people grew a new tradition where I don’t travel, we just host whoever might be around and we set an overly ambitious table for five. It’s become a far better day than it used to be and I’m grateful for this time.

It’s funny. Stuffing (dressing) and being with a wide array of people this weekend used to be the most important thing to me, back when I was young. This year I forgot the stuffing and was happy that it was just the five of us. We wouldn’t have minded friends joining but I didn’t feel like anyone was missing, other than our beloved dogs.

Year 6, Day 221: We spent this day freezing our toes off in the city. It was planned so far as: we met up with SmolAc’s schoolmate and their sibling and parent at a park. They had a hell of a time biking and cackling their little heads off. JB didn’t like the biking conditions so I ran an impromptu calisthenics routine for them.

The play time dragged into snack time, we’d all packed some things, and then into forest exploration. That turned into a hike and then the end of that turned into an hour on the playground.

The kids clearly had fun and I was too busy trying to find patches of sunlight to care about much else other than hoping that no one tore the seat of their pants or their knees, sliding down the hills haphazardly as they were.

November 24, 2025

Living in the time of pandemic: COVID-19 (286)

Year 4 of COVID in the Bay Area

Year 6, Day 210: JB broke their retainer and I can’t get the damn ortho to call me back. Our modem went down and required a VERY expensive replacement. I managed to replace that quickly only for the replacement to screw up our network setup, taking out my printer connection and screwing up our security system. Then my laptop starts blipping in and out several times a day, restarting on me with wild abandon, sometimes losing all my work, sometimes not. Then my phone dies which really feels like the kicker because that screws up everything and it’s going to take HOURS, and energy that I don’t have, to fix this problem.

I’m exhausted and at the end of my rope and want to cry.

And yet.

As tired as I am, as sick as I am, as bone deep annoyed as I am, I’m incredibly lucky that if the only way to solve these problems is money, it would sting, but I could do it. Money can’t buy me more time, or a working immune system, or feeling better but it can solve each of the problems above if fixing it isn’t possible.

So I take a huge deep breath. Several more. Call the ortho again. Go through tech support for a while, no dice on troubleshooting the phone. Get offered a discount code for a new phone – not my preferred route but I’m not covered in the GOOD luck fairy dust so I’ll take that. Get an appointment to deal with the phone. Schedule all of JB’s math tutoring lessons for the year. Get a quote for the phone. Things are in motion. That’s better than lounging in the trough of despair.

Year 6, Day 211: TIL that some credit cards have cell phone protection coverage. I thought I knew all the credit card benefits out there, but this is completely new to me.

Since so many of my day to day apps require an actual working phone, right now, I had to cough up the money for a new phone. I set up the mail in repair order, that’s $400 in hopes I can get my data back. If I can’t, at least an otherwise reasonably working phone will be available for use – I have an offer for a free phone line through Xfinity for a year. I wouldn’t rely on them for any regular use phones but that’ll do fine for a back up phone. JB’s activity fees landed today, too, so that’s $3000 out the door.

And there’s my heating pad quitting on me. I just ordered the same one again without taking time to be distressed about it because at this rate, I can’t keep up with all the things demanding replacement if I spend time having feelings about it. *flop*

Year 6, Day 212: My cough is still a giant rattle in my chest but it’s possible I might be turning a corner today. I don’t feel good but also don’t quite feel horrible either.

Tech heavy day: getting the new phone set up, fighting with log ins, changing my 2FA so that it doesn’t rely solely on my phone, learned that in Slack DMs, you can just click over to a files view to find that file your colleague shared with you a few months back but you couldn’t remember precisely when. Handy!

I’ve been given two absolutely impossible directives to reconcile at work and I don’t even know how we’re going to do this amid the sheer gutwrenching stress of having the goalposts moved on us multiple times throughout the year. I have so many regrets and “should have known” and at the same time, I bet if I had known, they still wouldn’t have listened to me protest and we’d still be in the same kind of boat.

It’s deeply upsetting after everyone’s hard work all year to be told none of it matters because the highly inflated totally unrealistic numbers weren’t met.

Year 6, Day 213: We were furious to hear that another kid had attacked JB trying to grab the mask off their face at their self defense class earlier this week. I’m surprised I was able to sleep the prior nights even while I was thinking about who I was going to talk to about it, picking and discarding one possible person after another – testament to how absolutely exhausted I am every day now that my anxiety can’t keep me awake when just three weeks ago my stress anxiety stopped letting me sleep. My congestion is slowly clearing up, and my coughs are less death rattle today, I wonder whether stress insomnia or total fatigue will win at nights once the virus has cleared my system

About JB. They didn’t want me to tell anyone because they didn’t want to get singled out or embarrassed. I admonished them that we don’t let people get away with this stuff when we have any leverage to stop it – if we do, they think it’s ok and carry on doing it. At this age, it’s important to correct and really important to impress on them – you stop when people say no.

I had firm words with the person in charge, and they actually dealt with it reasonably appropriately, so that was a relief. For now. I’ll be watching that kid.

My old phone has reached the repair center who declares I’m eligible for a refurbished replacement phone. I suspect that means they’re giving me another phone and my data is farewell forever – support chat confirmed it. Wah wah sad trombone. I knew that was possible and I’m sad but there’s nothing more to be done but to accept. It’s not like NOT repairing it would save my data. Alas, my texts weren’t backed up so those are gone forever.

Year 6, Day 214: Big day for JB and friends. They have been working hard on their art and I’ve been working hard to helping them create sellable merch with their art. I want them to learn from this experience about quality and presentation and the math of creating art to sell.

It was a long night, but comparatively very short, market they sold at. It was only two hours for the actual event. We were there over three hours to make sure they got a good spot, were set up early, and knew what to do and how to do it. The whole event was kid-centric within the community so people were motivated to spend money and support the kids. They didn’t have to pay a table fee or transport costs, it was local so they didn’t have to pay for hotel etc costs.

They will have to deduct their materials costs from their cash intake to reimburse me for their supplies – I want them to know how to do that and what the reality is between creation of art and selling to what kind of wage you can make by creating and selling art. It was a good training wheels for younguns event. I was extra proud of them because you could tell the kids were not primarily responsible for the work at a lot of the other kid booths. They were, as much as possible. I helped a lot with the parts they needed help with and then I had them do the majority of the work after that. I’ll be beat up from being on my feet and talking so much on the sale floor but I hope they remember some of the lessons. PiC insists this will be a core memory. I hope he’s right.

November 17, 2025

Living in the time of pandemic: COVID-19 (285)

Year 4 of COVID in the Bay Area

Year 6, Day 203: Damn that moment of sharing a bite of food with JB! I had been fending off their germs pretty well the last five days and got complacent (forgot, even). The germs immediately took advantage of the direct infection vector and ambushed me. I came away the loser in the confrontation with congestion and cotton fluff for brains. There are no good times for this but this is definitely a bad time. We have the final prep for SmolAc’s birthday coming up and we have to make our final selections for Open Enrollment. With minutes ticking down, I finally told PiC that if he wasn’t sure of some of his healthcare plans, we can just stick with the HMO in 2026 and prepare ourselves for HDHP/HSA in 2027 assuming everything else stays the same (remaining employed by the same companies). *Knocks wood, throws salt, etc*

The added complexity is that I just started physical therapy and we have no idea what they charge for that. So it’s a crapshoot where we’d land financially in 2026 if I’m still going to PT. Right now it’s entirely covered.

Year 6, Day 204: Our neighbor’s busy season hit at the same time as her partner’s scheduld had surgery and has needed favors left and right for their school age kid. Luckily it’s super easy, just picking them up or dropping them off on our way out or back in, and sometimes I only get the ask a few minutes before it needs doing but that meshes perfectly with my schedule since I try to force myself to get ready earlier than necessary. I like banking the favors. I know they’re not keeping score but it makes me feel better and yes, I know, it shouldn’t be a thing. And yet. This is my brain.

As my reward this week, their cat came to meow at me for petting, even in the rain!, and I was very pleased to oblige. We had a nice chat of MROW. mow? MRROWWW. MIAO.

Year 6, Day 205: I was up and working at 5 am and that should have been good for knocking off by 2 pm but instead I worked 12 straight hours and then tacked on another 1-2 after getting the kids off to bed. Chalk that up to the weird intersection of being really sick but also incredibly stressed and anxious.

It was interrupted by one of my favorite neighborhood dogs tackling me, though, and that was The Best. He’s as happy to see me as I am to see him and that feels like a compliment seeing as how I don’t provide for any of his needs. I DID have a bacon treat hidden up my sleeve but he didn’t even notice it until I held it out, he was too busy trying to hug me and rubbing on my legs like a cat.

Year 6, Day 206: Utterly overwhelmed today. I think every year, the pressure starts cranking up at the end of August now, with the start of school and dozens of school activities that make me cranky and spiky and then sometime in November the whole Jenga pile comes tumbling down. We may have hit that point. Bad meetings at work. This damn virus has its hooks in me, I’m feeling worse than ever. I hate the pressure at work and don’t see any way of turning it down. The kids have events this and next weekend that will require me at my best and I’m nowhere near there. I took some really deep breaths, ate a food, and tried to reset my spinny circle of death brain spiral.

Year 6, Day 207: We have entered the “Hast ye offended yon witch?” era. My computer started acting weird last week, restarting randomly or anytime I put it to sleep and woke it back up. This week, some of the restarts are accompanied by a screeching that would put the AOL dial up screams to shame. Then to cap it all off, though I must say I was taking this all in my stride up to this point, my phone just bricked.

That’s a real problem. 2-step authentication is generally linked to my phone, as is my work authentication app. I use my phone for everything. Texting, alarms for schedules, my medication regimen, emails, notes for everything that I think of during the day that I need to do later but will forget if I don’t write them down. All my books live there now! (A moment of: oh this is what I get for not buying a Kobo device, isn’t it? Maybe I can load the app on my old phone.) Sigh. I missed the ONE appointment available so I’m going to have to wait til Monday to get this fixed. What a giant pain in the caboose.