zimena

This weekend has been... bad. Where do I even start?

First of all, I managed to catch the cold that two of my friends have also had. That meant that I spent the vast majority of Friday sitting under a thick blanket, drinking warm milk with honey. Or tea. Or, actually whatever I could make myself drink at all, because I didn't actually have the desire to eat or drink much.

Well, I felt a bit better yesterday, so I decided to try to get out for a little while. I had a parcel to post, and perhaps a couple of Postcrossing cards as well. Only, when I was about to leave, I found out that the tyre of my power wheelchair was completely flat. I don't know when or how that happened, but I know that it meant I couldn't get out as I had planned.

Sure, I could have used the manual wheelchair instead, but it sounded like too much work in my state right then.

Yes, I've emailed the repair people, but they won't read that until tomorrow at the earliest. As of now, I don't know when this will get sorted, or when I'll have my freedom of movement back.

Finally, the best friend decided that he can't afford the trip to Manchester that we've been planning since last Summer. We were supposed to go there to see the snooker Tour Championship, and we have tickets for the whole event already. I've not yet decided how I'm going to deal with this, because I suppose I could go there by myself. But there is also the fact that the best friend used to study in Manchester, and lived in the area near where the snooker is being played. Some of the joy of going to just that event was definitely being there with him; seeing the places that used to be familiar ground to him all those years ago.

There's also the fact that I'm still panicking over whether Mark will qualify for the Manchester tournament or not. The Tour Championship is only for the top 12 players of the current season, and he's currently in exactly 12th place. Meaning he's not safe for that event by any means, and being there if he's not playing would feel very, very sad.

For that reason, I'm mildly considering going to a different event instead. There's the Players' Championship in Telford a bit earlier in March, and that's for the top 16, which means he should be good for that unless he completely messes up the next two tournaments before that. I haven't decided yet what to do, but I'm going to check that some more over the next few days - it feels like I need to make a decision pretty soon, otherwise the tickets might be hard to get for another event.

Either way, it feels like this weekend has just been bad news after bad news, every day.

Can we get a new week soon, so we can get out of this stupid pattern?

PS: In other news, I updated my DW profile page. I had made a pretty profile layout with tables and colours and all, but it turns out you can't put tables on a DW profile, because for some reason it just strips out much of the formatting. So, no pretty colours and borders on that page. But there's a visitor counter with flags, so have a look if you want to make sure your flag is on my profile page.

My voice has almost completely left me.

Or rather, I've been feeling a bit under the weather since Friday or so. My throat hurt. My ears hurt. And it was quite hard to speak for more than a little at a time, though the words still came out, sort of. Then, yesterday, I started really struggling to speak. My voice would just break in the middle of a word, and all that came out was a kind of raspy sound. It was the same this morning, though it's been getting slightly better during the day.

I took a Covid self-test, though I had no real faith that is was that, because this is definitely very different to how Covid was for me, that one time I've had it before. Needless to say, the test came out negative.

Going to see the lab people at my GP's office tomorrow morning. At 8:30 in the morning, what sort of mad time for an appointment is that? I wanted to get this checked, though, so I had to accept the time that was available.

Let's see how it goes.

I'm so unnaturally sleepy these days. Sure, I've always been more of an evening/night-person than a morning/daytime-person, but over the past few weeks I've felt like I've been struggling more and more with staying awake for a normal amount of time.

I get up in the morning, but can then fall asleep again after being up for an hour or so. Or rather, I WILL fall asleep again, and will likely sleep until past noon if I don't take any active measures to prevent that (like setting the alarm on my phone). Even after a long morning sleep like that, I can still only stay awake a bit into the afternoon, before I'll be likely to want to fall asleep again, even while in the middle of some task or activity. In the evening I start to feel awake in the way I probably should be in the daytime.... but if I go to lie down in bed (for example to read), I will still fall asleep within minutes, AND sleep until morning.

It's annoying to be constantly that tired, with no obvious reason. Normally, my daytime sleepiness used to have the obvious explanation of me trying to live by a normal schedule, despite preferring to stay awake until 2-3am, which meant a constant sleep deficit.

I can't say I'm sleeping to little anymore, though. And there is no energy for staying awake late either.

It's a little bit hard to sort my thoughts around this, because I guess it's been building up to the current situation for a while, and I can't say exactly when or why things started to change. The point is still that this is not normal anymore, so I probably need to make an appointment with the doctor to get a check-up. Not looking forward to that - neither to the check-up, nor to the "making the appointment" bit.

I don't feel like writing a long post, but I have a few things I want to mention on here, so let's see:

⭑ My arm is slowly healing. Well, at least they said that the fracture is in a good position during my last check-up, and I'm regaining movement slowly, but surely. Apparently I'm not allowed to attempt any movement that involves lifting my arm above shoulder height for another few weeks, though. Not that I could do that yet anyway, but I can at least type comfortably and normally now, and also move my hand/arm a bit out from my body. I still have to pretend being left handed if I want to hold or lift anything that weighs more than a cup of coffee, and sometimes I get frustrated at that, but.... yeah, it's getting better.

⭑ Winter sports are back on, YAY! Cross-country skiing has been slightly less yay from my point of view so far, because a certain Johannes did not have a great start to the season. He kind of gave away the win in the first sprint of the season, because he did not bother to sprint at maximum speed until the finish line. Then, when he looked to the side to check where competitors were, Alexander Bolshunov sprinted past and won. Two things about this: 1) Bolshunov was really, really fast, and I'm not 100% sure Johannes would have kept him behind even without the idiocy he did. Probably, but I'm not sure. And also 2) I really hope he will learn from this, because he's annoying with the "slowing down before the line" thing. He does it in most races if he thinks he is far enough ahead, and it's scary as a fan... and yes, annoying.
As if this wasn't enough, the next sprint wasn't much better. Let's just say, Halfvarsson stepped on Johannes' ski pole, and Johannes threw a crazy hissy fit on the track because of that.
... and that's just the sprints. There were a couple of longer races as well, but let's not even talk about his performance there.

In nicer news, other skiers I like did well, though. Pellegrino won the sprint this past weekend, and I'm also not sad about Bolshunov winning the first one, because I like him as well - I'm just not as happy as I might otherwise be for him because it happened at the expense of someone I like more, as you saw above. Also, a lovely surprise for me was seeing Didrik Tønseth get his first proper world cup win (I believe he had two from before, but one was a "best time" victory in a pursuit, and the other was awarded late because of Sundby's doping case). I didn't think he would make it when he was coming into the final part of the race with Røthe, because I know Didrik isn't good at sprinting for the finish line in a head to head duel like that... but he was smart and made all the right choices and WON, and I'm really happy for him about that! He smiled so much afterwards, too. So nice to see how much it meant to finally get that victory!

Biathlon has started again, too, but so far only with mixed relays. I'm looking forward to more races. And can I just say "YESSS, winter sports are back on!" one more time?

⭑ I have a new mobile phone. Not an iPhone anymore, but a Huawei Mate 20 Pro! In short, it's awesome and wonderful, and I love it. I haven't found any "missing" important apps yet, either. This deserves a longer post when I've had more time to explore it - I've only had it for a few days. Mom was supposed to get my old phone, because her phone screen is cracked, but right now she's not sure she wants to replace the cracked phone anyway. Resistant to change, much? I guess she just needs more time to adjust to the idea, though... but I wouldn't have got a new phone now if she had not initially said that she wanted my old one.

So, first of all, my arm is much better. I can move it at least a bit, and it doesn't hurt too much anymore. Therefore, I was quite optimistic when I went for my first check-up at the hospital today.

...but unfortunately, there is still a visible anomaly on the x-ray pictures. It might even look like the fracture is bigger now than it was initially, but the doctor said that this might be just because the two sets of x-ray pictures might have been taken from slightly different angles. Because they're not certain that it's healing the way it should, I'm supposed to wear that annoying sling for another week, until the next check-up.

I'm not happy about that. Wearing the sling felt like it made sense a few days ago, when my arm was still constantly hurting. Keeping it still helped minimize the pain, but by now the sling just feels severely limiting. Another week with these limits feels like a long time, especially now that I feel able to do at least some movement. I guess I'll just have to manage, though.

And less pain IS a good thing, of course.

In other news, I randomly checked an old online Hogwarts site that some of you should know well the other day. I don't know what made me go there and look again, but... maybe I'm just curious? Much to my surprise, I still remembered my login over there, and after some guesswork I also managed to get into the email account I had used for that place, back in the day. It's quite strange to get into an email account where all the new mail is spam, and the oldest "new" spam is from 2006... that's so long ago.

Maybe I should've just closed the account, but seeing it again made me more curious what that place is like now...? For now I'm thinking of going back as a "casual" student, especially because classes look quite cool, and it's still mainly forum-based, and I miss having a forum to go to. I don't want to get back to the level of involvement I once had, though.

I'm still undecided about this, but it just feels right to mention it over here in case I end up doing anything like that.

Also, speaking of this reminds me that I still haven't seen any of the "Fantastic Beasts" movies. That's another thing on my to-do list. Another week with my arm in a sling sounds like the perfect opportunity to watch at least the first one, but I don't know if I'll get around to it. Someone needs to make me a comfortable nest on the sofa, hand me a bowl of popcorn, AND make me stop thinking of things I normally choose to do instead of watching a movie, and then maybe we'll talk about watching something....?

I haven't been posting that much here lately. Somehow, I ended up using Tumblr more since the Olympics. Some people posted good pics on there, so it became a habit to check that site several times daily... and of course my own reactions and rambles also ended up there instead of here. You know me, though - I still like DW the most, so perhaps I shouldn't neglect it like that.

So, quick update on me and things that matter to me:

Personal stuff: My mood is generally a bit better and more hopeful than it has been lately, at least as long as I keep my mind busy with things that aren't negative or depressing. I just got a haircut the other day, and I probably feel happier because of that, too. The snow outside is also melting, so that means it will be easier for me to get out soon, too. Oh, and my town now has a Paperchase affiliate store, so I'm going to check that out as soon as I can manage.

... perhaps not right now, though, because I have a cold or a throat inflammation or I don't know exactly what at the moment. I'm coughing, and I'm a bit more tired than usual, and I'm not really in the mood to do stuff. A couple of days ago, my throat was really sore, but by now it's less sore and I feel more like I'm having a mild version of a regular cold. I'll see what happens, but hopefully this will pass soon.

Writing: I wrote a couple of new fics lately, and there are a couple more that I haven't finished yet. I also rediscovered a poetry site I had been posting on some time ago, so I suddenly got excited about poetry again. It's nice to have a place to read what others write, and it also makes me want to write more. Hopefully something positive will come out of that.

I'm also still working on making an archive of my fics and writings. I have a nice setup in Scrivener now, but I'm also considering a text file with a list of when I wrote/posted what. Especially with poetry, I tried to keep such a list from the beginning - even back when I wrote my first poems back in 1998... only I don't have the slightest clue where that thing is anymore, so I probably still need to remake the list from scratch. I don't even know if I have all the old poems, but I believe I know where most of them were posted online, so if I were smart back then, I might also have all the needed info on those posts.

Cross-country skiing: Actually, this would deserve its own post, because it's so amazing... but because I didn't post about it immediately after it happened, I'm just saying it here. JOHANNES WON THE OVERALL WORLD CUP!!! At 21, he's the youngest male overall winner ever, and also the first to win the cup without having competed at the Tour de Ski. Have a nice photo of him with the trophy:

I'm just enormously happy for him for this! It's so very deserved, too, considering the season he's had. 11 world cup victories in the same season is a new record, I think. Plus, he also won two mini-tours before Christmas - one of them in absolutely crazy style, when he caught up with Sundby just before the finish line in Lillehammer. Yes, this might be my favourite memory of him from the world cup this season. (Before you ask, the Olympics are obviously also one long "favourite memory", but these races don't count towards the world cup). Even though the final mini-tour turned out to be tough for him, he got enough points to secure the trophy, and that was what mattered. (Let's not forget that he also won two "smaller" trophies - the ones for the sprint cup and the U23 cup.... and this year he remembered to take them home as well!)

He's amazing, okay? He's just giving me endless reasons to be happy, both with his results on the track and his behaviour outside of it. The only sad thing is the fact that the world cup season is over now. There will still be races for some time, but not much that will be shown on TV. Honestly, though? I usually die a little inside every time the winter sports* season ends, but right now I feel a bit relieved at it, too - almost like I need a break from constantly feeling so much. Maybe that sounds wrong, but it's true to at least some extent.

I will miss seeing him compete, though... and next season feels unbelievably far away when this one has just ended.

*not everything is over yet, though. Biathlon still has one competition weekend left, for example.

Oh, and I almost forgot, but I need to point out this quote, from a news report in June 2017. Didrik Tønseth said this about Johannes' chances to win the overall world cup in the upcoming season:

"It would be fun if Johannes could have a chance to fight for the yellow bib. At 21 that would be... impressive!"

Fun? Yes, this season has been so much more fun than anyone could have dreamt of. Other than that - spot on, Didrik. Absolutely spot on.

This is not the nicest day ever.

A couple of days ago, I started getting a toothache. Nothing too bad, just some discomfort. However, it got gradually worse until I decided to call the dentist today. I figured I could at least go and get it fixed, instead of suffering through the whole Christmas holiday. Let's say it wasn't the worst toothache I've ever experienced, but last night and this morning, the pain was there constantly... and I thought it might just get worse if the pattern from these last few days is anything to go by.

Anyway... I got to the dentist, and she told me that the problem tooth couldn't be fixed, and that the best choice was just to extract it. If I wanted to, I could have pills to see if that would numb the pain over the holidays, but I would still have to get rid of that tooth fairly soon afterwards. It's the innermost tooth in my mouth, so it's not a very big issue if it's not there... but of course choosing between two variations of the same non-desirable outcome is never pleasant.

Of course I choose to just get it over with... and Mrs Dentist agreed that it was the best choice, and also seemed to think that it would be done fairly quickly.

It was not done fairly quickly.

I had to sit there for about 90 minutes while she worked on extracting the tooth. Even though she of course gave me a local anaesthetic, it still hurts to sit with your mouth open for so long. Also, everyone who has ever had a local anaesthetic at the dentist can probably relate to how it only numbs pain - it doesn't make you immune to feeling them actually doing stuff in your mouth, and it's not exactly pleasant either.

In short: I was absolutely dead tired when I got home after that. Slept for a while, and I'm still stuffed with painkillers now. Also, the area where the tooth used to be also kept/keeps bleeding, so I'm probably not getting rid of the taste of blood in my mouth any time soon. It's bleeding considerably less now, though, so it's already better than it was a few hours ago.

Two days before Christmas, and this is what I'm doing...

I'm slowly regaining movement of my hand. Today I can do most normal things as long as they don't require supporting any weight on that hand. Yesterday was quite horrible, though. I feel like I was practically sitting in one position all day, doing nothing useful whatsoever, because my wrist hurt so much.

I mean it - I even had to eat with the left hand, because I couldn't hold a fork/spoon/piece of bread. I think that explains it quite well. Also, getting dressed in the morning was a challenge, and I had to pick out clothes that I could get "easily" on or off.

I wasn't even aware that CTS could be this painful. I had heard of the condition, of course, but never experienced it until now. Let's just say I hope it will be the first and last time.

By now the only constant pain left is a slight burning feeling, and a slight swelling. I guess it will fade on its own, too... hopefully soon.

Oh, and no more trackpad for me. Not even as an emergency solution.

So, my computer mouse has been acting up for a while. Some time ago, it started registering single clicks as double clicks. Annoying, but not often enough that I couldn't live with it. Well... that problem has been getting gradually worse. Then, recently, another problem started to occur: You can no longer drag and drop anything with this mouse, because it will simply let go of it mid-way through the motion. Any drag-and-hold motion like autofilling columns in an spreadsheet, is of course also affected by the same problem.

While I can deal with the occasional single/double click failure, I can't deal with these new problems. However, I also didn't feel like buying a new mouse, so I simply put the faulty one away and replaced it with a trackpad I had in one of my drawers. Now, I'm not a big fan of trackpads, but I figured I could use it for a while.

Well... wrong. I've been using it for about a week now, and my wrist is not liking it. At first I thought that I just wasn't used to the new pattern of movement, and it's not like it hurt that much during the first couple of days, either. By now it hurts much more, though. Hello, carpal tunnel infection.

I mean it: It hurts as f#&%.

I probably don't need to point out that I made a nice little trip to the electronics store today? Bought a replacement for my beloved trackball mouse, came home, and threw the trackpad safely back in its drawer. For now, at least. But honestly, I don't know if it even deserves to stay there, because it's not even usable as an emergency solution if the emergency lasts for more than a few days.

I've learnt that much by now.

Oh, and I'm now wearing support on my wrist, so my hand movement isn't perfect at the moment. However, neither typing nor using the trackball on the new mouse causes a lot of thumb movement, so I think this should be okay. I hope the pain decides to fade soon, though...

Being human is torture. Sometimes.

Today is one of those days. My chest hurts. My shoulders and hands hurt. Even breathing makes my whole body hurt. Most likely, I'm just tired because I didn't sleep nearly enough, and therefore I'm also more inclined to pay attention to pain.

But, still...

Sigh.

I bought a new pillow a few days ago. A weird one that looks like this.

... That might be one of the best things I've ever bought. Seriously.

As some of you may know (because I know I've been whining about it in my journal before), I have a lot of problems with pillows. Sometimes I wake up with a massive headache after sleeping on unfamiliar pillows (like in hotels and such). Even my own pillow at home can be a problem, because it has one "correct" position - if I drop it in my sleep or wash it or try to knock it into a better shape, it's very possible that I'll wake up feeling headachy and possibly nauseated even after sleeping on that one.

And of course this issue is not easily remedied by simply buying a new pillow, because I don't really know from looking at/touching a pillow in a shop whether it'll work for me.

This new one, though? Let's just say that I've read about these pillows various times, but they're usually very expensive. They also look very strange, so I couldn't imagine that I'd be able to sleep on such a thing. For those reasons, I simply never tried them until now.

I've had this pillow for a few days now, and it's seriously an absolute wonder. It's a little lower than I usually prefer, but getting used to that took only a couple of nights. I sleep mostly on my side, but I prefer to lie on my back if I'm "doing" things on bed - like reading, clicking around the net on my phone, lying in bed watching sports etc. This pillow is supposed to be ideal for both positions, because it's slightly higher on the part that goes under your neck. Having extra support there feels surprisingly comfortable. I know that I also used to have a tendency to lean my head back in my sleep. With this pillow, I don't think I can even do that, and supposedly it should help with keeping your head at the right angle to your spine even in your sleep.

Of course I can't tell whether that's actually what it's doing. I can, however, say that I slept very well on this pillow for the time I've had it - and I haven't had even one day of waking up with what I have always thought of as "pillow-related" pain. During the first couple of nights I switched back and forth between this and my regular pillow, but by now I truly like this new one. Also, one more thing about it is that it's actually less hard than it looks. Sure, it's hard in the sense that it stays the same shape even when you sleep on it, but you can easily squeeze it a little - it's not a solid "block" of a pillow (which I always thought these things were, honestly. I suppose they come in various qualities and softness levels, though).

I went to Denmark for the day yesterday. The trip was mostly nice, and I also managed to buy a bag/backpack (well, it has straps for carrying on your back, at least) for the Portugal trip. Now I just need to see that I can fit everything I need in there, but I think that should be okay.

Today has been significantly less nice, though. I woke up hurting absolutely all over - headache, nausea, cramps, dizziness, you name it... It feels like I spent most of today either sleeping or moaning about being in too much pain to even do anything useful. Even trying to eat has been difficult, and I only managed to eat properly after sleeping for another hour just half an hour ago or so.

Right now I feel a bit better. I'm still tired, but not hurting or feeling like I'm about to throw up anymore. I guess I will still go to bed very early tonight, though. (Perhaps there is still something not quite right if I'm sitting by the computer at 6:30pm thinking of "going to bed early"?)

On a nicer note: I rediscovered some old writings on my Google Docs account - including some half-written fics that I had more or less forgotten about. I don't think these are fics I'm going to finish anymore, but it's still interesting to see them again.

I just woke up with a maddening headache. Probably because I'm sleeping with a different pillow than usual, and it's absolutely not working. If I try to lie down, I feel like I'm going to throw up, but if I sit up that feeling isn't there.

I also wore shoes for too many hours on end yesterday, so my feet are hurting and my legs are cramping.

... and I'm in a crap mood, obviously.

I'm so tired that it physically hurts, and I don't quite dare to lie down again because of the headache and nausea.

Might have to try again soon, though, because I also can't sit here for the rest of the night.

I don't like this. Sigh.

My timing is horrible at times.

More specifically, my body's timing about health stuff is horrible. I started getting a toothache earlier today. Well, toothache or a wisdom tooth coming up and pressing on the tooth that is already there, I don't even know. If this persists, the timing is horrible, because it won't be easy to get any treatment for it during the Easter holidays. It's not too bad, though, so I hope it just goes away for a few days, and then I promise to go and get it fixed over the holidays.

Okay, tooth? Deal?

Also, speaking of Easter, I don't really have any sort of holiday mood about it this year. Maybe I will feel it more during the weekend, but not yet.

Right now I'm mostly a little envious (though not in a bad way, if that makes sense?) of people who are at The Gathering 2017, which is a huge computer party that has been held during the Easter holidays for several years already. I dreamed of going there already as a teen, and when I see pictures and TV reports from it nowadays, I still dream of going there. It's just such a cool thought - thousands of people sitting in this huge arena with their computers, gaming and making graphics and spending time online and doing generally whatever it is that they normally enjoy doing at the computer. Seems like a huge geek fest, and a dream to be part of. I know many people don't sleep very much during the week either, but there is apparently a space to have a lie-down even inside the arena somewhere.

I can't really imagine travelling to something like that by myself, though... which might be the reason I've never been there. Also, the friend I would trust enough to go with is less into this sort of stuff than I am, so I don't think it makes sense to try to convince him for next year either.

I still get to enjoy the reports and pictures from there, though, which is interesting, too!

I don't feel very good at the moment.

I've been feeling strange for about a week. It's hard to say exactly what has been wrong, as it's nothing specific, but pretty much every daily task has felt like an insurmountable challenge. When I had to go out to do some grocery shopping and errands yesterday, I did not enjoy being outside at all. In fact, I spent most of the time out just hoping that I could be done with this soon, so that I could go back home. Not that being home is much better, because I don't really feel like doing anything there either. For example, I wanted to change the tablecloth, but I just sat there for two hours thinking that I should do it, but I just couldn't make myself get up. It takes maximum a few minutes, including removing the old tablecloth and everything that is on it, but I just had no energy to get to it. I also have fun stuff to do, such as calling the best friend or writing an email for a person I truly enjoy writing to... but I just... don't get to any of it.

Then, a few days ago, my feet started getting swollen. Not so much in the morning, then more and more as the hours passed until evening. By bedtime, I would have problems getting my socks and pants off - and I usually wear stretchy, comfortable materials. I tried wearing compression stockings, too, but it didn't help very much. Also, today my wrists are swollen as well. I don't know if I can describe it as actually painful, though - more like, sore and "heavy" in some way.

At least I'm going to the doctor later today... but I'm not sure I truly want to go there, because I don't know what to tell him. Okay, the swollen feet/ankles/wrists are actually visible issues that I can point to and possibly get some answers about, but the rest of what I described in this post feels so abstract that it's hard to put to words.

Perhaps I'm even writing this post mostly for myself, because now I already put it to words once. Let's see if that will be helpful.

EDIT: Got medication, but can't start it until tomorrow morning, apparently. Also, was told to wear compression stockings and try to sit or lie with my feet up as much as possible.

Good excuse to go to bed early, find an extra pillow for my feet, and then watch some more Yuri on Ice?

No, but seriously, apart from the medication, this is nothing new. The other tips are the same ones I had already tried before going to see the doctor, so I hope the meds will help. Apparently I'm supposed to feel better in a few days' time, even though I should keep taking meds for a week.

Current Mood: crappy

Escaping reality

Weekend notes

No voice today

Zzz.... sleeeeeeeepy

A couple of notes

First check-up on my arm

A little update

Tooth trouble

Health update

Ouch

That "being human" thing...

Pillow stuff

Denmark trip

Whiiiine

Ugh

Health stuff

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