A few more random musings

 I had my physical yesterday.  I really didn't want to go just yet but the Dr's office is proactive in contacting me to schedule one if I put it off. My weight is as high as it's ever been (all gained since November ;-() and my blood sugar was high (thanks, Covid and menopause) but everything else was ok. My Dr. was ok with it. In this weird year, staying up to date on all my routine stuff (gyn, dentist, eye, mammogram, vaccinations, etc) and not catching Covid are enough.

I went through a month of serious demotivation. You'd think that getting vaccinated would help, but it didn't.  Perhaps I let my emotional guard down too early. I couldn't get my shit together to write a simple report and had little motivation to cook, exercise, or give a shit and I had zero willpower against junk food, hence the weight gain. All my surge capacity was depleted about 6 months ago. I muddled through by getting stuff in at the last minute. No one seemed to notice, perhaps since many of them are going through something similar. 

Sewing is my pandemic hobby, or perhaps buying fabric, patterns and supplies is actually my hobby.   I enjoy the meditative mindfulness that I have when I am making something.  My brain is working just enough to keep me from thinking about other stuff and I can get into happy hyperfocus mode.  It reminds me of doing chemistry back in grad school, where I didn't have everyone coming to ask me questions all the time like now. Getting clothing that fits in fabrics that I like is an added bonus.

My mom is annoying me with her vaccine-hesitancy. She won't admit to not wanting it but she's using every excuse she can not to get it, and my libertarian brother doesn't help matters. Her usual excuse is that it's hard to get an appointment and she doesn't get out much so other people need it more.  Fuck that fake martyrdom bullshit.  Seriously.  If she was 50 years old, living alone, working from home and ordering all her groceries on line that would be one thing. She's reliant on my brother and to a much lesser extent me, and her not getting it makes our lives harder not easier.  Second, if she gets it she is way more likely to end up in the hospital than someone younger. She also parrots random statistics she reads online, some of which I've heard and are legit, and some are gleaned from the sketchy right wing corners of the internet such as the Drudge Report. Sheesh.  I should just find her an appointment and book a LYFT for her when it's time.

So much hypocrisy

I am just so sick of selfish people thinking that they're magical unicorns that won't get COVID or infect other with it.  COVID-19 and the other events of have laid bare a lot of hypocrisy.  Here are a few.  Feel free to add more.

SNOWFLAKES: Holee shit this one is so damned obvious. If you're protesting not being able to go to Applebee's or get your nails done, you can never ever call anyone a snowflake again.

SELF-CONTROL: As a fat person I have had my self-control and willpower questioned for most of my life, despite doing other stuff that obviously takes lots of energy and willpower, like getting a STEM PhD.  If you can't deal with wearing a mask/not having happy hour at Applebee's/not doing non-essential travel/getting take out instead of dining in, you have no right to say diddly-squat about anyone's self-control.  Likewise, you just lost the right to pretend you were just worried about my health, not that I ever believed that one.

EXERCISE: No, the risk of not going to the gym is not higher than the risk of COVID, even if it's coupled with a year of eating too much. STFU.

PRO-LIFE: If you are anti-abortion and aren't masking up/social distancing/doing everything you can to prevent spreading COVID/etc now, shut the fuck up about the sanctity of life. The same goes for any churches pushing to re-open for in-person services.

KIDS' EDUCATION AND MENTAL HEALTH: Look, this is hard on everyone, but if you don't give a shit about guns in school, you don't get to get up on a soapbox about how we need to reopen in-person K12 schools now.

 

 

Enough FB vaccination posts already...

My probably unpopular hot take of the day, part 1: If I have to wonder why you were able to get a COVID vaccination, please don't post it on Facebook right now.  I don't begrudge you getting it, but the process is pretty random and I'm jealous. And if you're working from home and aren't in a high risk yourself or living with people who are, hold your horses and chill for a few weeks and let people who can't work from home get it rather than busting your butt spending several hours online or on the phone trying to cut in line

Longer version. I'm 100% in favor of the COVID vaccine, and also in favor of my friends and acquaintances and everyone to receive it as soon as possible. However, I've reached the point where I'm getting snarky about seeing FB vaccination posts from people who are NOT older than 70, don't have obvious pre-existing conditions, and aren't health care and front line workers (including public-facing retail and food service), and teachers. Yes, you, random FB friend who is 60-ish and teaches yoga online a few times a week, I'm talking about you.  I really don't need to see your FB post about it. You won't get  an in person audience for your yoga classes until a lot more people get vaccinated, anyway.

I was a bit taken aback by my reaction.  Most of the fault lies in the random and haphazard way that it is being rolled out to the public, as well as all the Trump-induced delays/missing vaccines/etc.  Figuring out how to prioritize who gets it first becomes a crazy ethical and statistical morass after the obvious folks at the top of phase 1A, and there are no obviously right answers. For instance, my 82-year old cancer survivor mom claims she doesn't need to rush to get it* since she never goes out, but she still relies on my brother and I to help her out, so she still is indirectly exposed.  I don't know the right answer to this - my gut feeling is that she should get it now that she is eligible, and I don't object to anyone doing that, even my dilettante yoga teacher acquaintance.

Still, with everything varying from state to state and county to county, it's easy to get jealous.  I'm in a low incidence county so we're not allocated doses as fast, which makes sense, but I still get jealous.

* My parents and brother are being stubborn and don't want to get the vaccine.  I am not thrilled by this and am trying to convince them to get it, but that's a blog post in itself.

Surge Capacity

 If you haven't already read Tara Haelle's article on how COVID has sapped our physical and emotional reserves, go read it here.   

I hit a wall shortly before Christmas.  By this I mean I just got absolutely cranky and fed up with things. The pandemic had totally depleted my surge capacity and left me totally drained.  After sewing a bunch of masks for gifts and making a bunch of holiday cookies I just got absolutely fed up with doing anything for anyone other than myself. I know that sounds horribly selfish, but at both work and home I had been putting my own needs and self-care at the bottom of the priority list. After a week of being a slug, I had returned to normal, more or less, but some recent collaboration drama has taken a toll and it will be good to have a different set of responsibilities for a while.

I’m super privileged and recognize it, but I’ve hit a wall/just gotten completely fed up with things a few times already.  I haven’t said much about it because I know I have it so good compared to most people. The first time was shortly before lockdown ended, because I was burnt out from doing virtually everything around the house.  It started out randomly enough, with our dishwasher dying shortly before lockdown, but then we were stuck without one. Add to that me working from home and Joe still going in, but doing a lot of the duties of his furloughed colleagues as well as his own.  He fell into a funk, and when this happens he usually becomes lazy AF.  I fell into the trap of doing almost everything, either because I was home during the day or because he was really tired after work and I thought that letting him chill would help him snap out of it. That strategy works for me, but rarely works for Joe. The endless dishes pushed me over the edge and I blew up at him a few times before the new dishwasher was installed in early June.

I hit another wall in the late summer.  I was back in lab full time and was trying to do my own work and at the same time most of the extra COVID hassle/logistics was still around.  Things were very much up in the air with all the undergrads coming back to town, and the grad students/postdocs were a lot more needy than in pre-COVID times.  Some of it was just coincidental (e.g. new postdoc working on my project) but some of it was a result of there being fewer people around – my boss was mostly working from home, as was our admin, a bunch of people graduated, and we were social distancing so there were just fewer people around at any given time, so most of it ended up coming to me. I could feel it coming in slow motion, and mostly just let myself ride the wave of crankiness until things settled into a new equilibrium.

The latest wall was not a surprise at all, although the way that it hit was unexpected.  I had known I’d be tired in early/mid December since I had a proposal due on my birthday. Joe was falling into a funk at the same time and starting to slip into slug mode; fortunately I recognized that early on and offloaded a lot of the cooking to him.  This helped a lot and I suspect that if I hadn’t done this I would’ve gotten fed up much sooner.  

Flying in the time of COVID

I am on a plane as I write this, although I will post it after I’ve landed. I’m headed to CA to visit my parents for three and a half weeks and let my brother get a break.  I’ll be working remotely for part of that time and mostly just trying to take care of my parents and not give them COVID and not catch it myself. It’s been almost a year since Jim was able to get any time away, and even that was less than optimal due to my mom going rogue and the fact that he was still recovering from a very bad flu he had, which may have been COVID or maybe not. He had a shorter break scheduled in the fall but that was derailed by a health issue with one of our parents.  There are so many I can’t even remember the specifics.  Fortunately, in 2020 they had a total of one night in a hospital, compared to 70 nights in a hospital or convalescent facility in 2019.

I’m sitting in first class and am masked up with a KN95 and wearing a face shield. The flights have been nice and empty and I was comfortable in my level of safety on the Ithaca flight.  It was very empty and the passengers appeared to be mostly Cornell folks, who typically get COVID tested once a week, sometimes more and are generally careful. The Detroit airport was a mixed bag, with a few maskless folks as well as those with their noses hanging out, wearing bandanas, or taking off their masks more than was absolutely necessary.  Unfortunately, the asshole behind me had his nose hanging out for a while until I complained to the flight attendant.  I am very nervous about that. He took his revenge by ripping some loud farts after I complained, which may or may not have been coincidental.

I wish I could’ve waited until we all got vaccinated, but that may be a long time. I am very conflicted and scared that I am travelling at all, but Jim really needs a break and I’ve delayed this visit three times already.  I won’t be able to fully quarantine but will stay masked at all times and keep a distance.

My mom’s cat, Yogi, is very old (>20?) and is at the tail end of his nine lives. Jim is spending as much or more time taking care of Yogi as he does with our parents. I may have to take him to get put to sleep while I’m in CA.  Jim and I are both worried that when Yogi dies it will be very hard on them.  Unfortunately, this isn’t the first time we’ve dealt with this situation. Two years ago my dad’s cat was really doing poorly and I had to push him to agree to put her to sleep. It was the right thing to do, as she was suffering a lot and tended to stand underfoot and was a huge tripping hazard for him.  His health took a downturn a few months later.

Random cranky thoughts part 1

 I'm not even going to try to write a standard full post, but here are a few thoughts that are rattling through my head

I'd like to yeet all those Trump fanatic Republican Congresswomen/spokeswomen/Instagram models/groupies into the sun, especially the ones who build their whole persona or campaign on how they like to carry guns around.  Since that is unfortunately not going to happen, I want them to have a nervous breakdown as they age and are no longer useful cute little thirst traps for Republican men. 

Bonus points if they have a miserable time during perimenopause.

Negative points if they actually shoot someone during perimenopause.

It goes without saying that I want to yeet all their male counterparts of all ages into the sun or prison. 

My husband has successfully predicted a lot of what would happen well before 2020. This is based on his experiences hanging out with bikers, many of whom are right wing, as well as his general tendency to stock up on pantry staples and toilet paper.  I am never again going to get away with being a toilet paper minimalist. If he dies before I do, I am planning on selling all my stuff and moving into a condo and living a lifestyle that would make Marie Kondo and minimalist hipster dudes proud.

On a more serious note, he's been worried about the right wingers getting violent for more than a year.  At first I thought he was overreacting, but he was right.

On a less serious note, for the last six months he has been egging me on to buy sewing stuff to keep me occupied. 

How to fix Facebook in a few easy steps

Dear Facebook, 

You scour my photos and posts to try to sell me medications/treatments for conditions I have and some I don't even have, so you damned well can do something about right wingers organizing attempted coups. You might even get more clicks this way.

Love, 

Old Biddy

1. Stop letting posts from groups take over people's feeds, and stop suggesting groups for people to join. Cut the group content to 10% of the total feed and let people use the groups tab to get caught up. If someone's friends don't post much, let them get bored and head over to the groups tab of their own volition.

2. Let people further minimize or customize the amount of content from groups and or people in their feeds.

3. Go back to showing a chronological list of people's friends posts in their feeds. Or at least let people opt in to the chronological feed without having to reset it multiple times in one session. Yes, I do like to see those infrequent posts from people I'm not really close friends with.

4. Figure out a way for people/groups posting time sensitive stuff to have it stop showing up.  No, I don't give a shit about the weather report from three days ago. If FB can use AI on my pictures to try to figures out which obscure medical conditions I have, they ought to be able to not show yesterday's weather report.

Seriously, the group thing shouldn't be that hard to fix.  Most of my friends aren't constant Facebook posters and I'm a sucker for topic-related groups, so I might be an outlier, but the minute I join a group which posts a lot, the damned thing takes over my feed, until I get fed up with it and hide it from my feed or leave the group. In my case, it's just benign stuff like cats, sewing, menopause info and inappropriate jokes, but I can totally see how people become caught up in fake news and right wing groups via Facebook. Heck, one reason I got into sewing is that I joined a FB group, then another and so on.  That's fine, but I would prefer it in one place and not taking over my feed.