JoDrRe

Yesterday I told myself I’d keep the TV/YouTube off so I wouldn’t be distracted and would clean up the house and get the guest room situated. Well, that didn’t happen. So today is going to be a short post.

Didn’t do much today. Got caught up on COVID-19 updates, saw that the CDC is recommending masks, looked for masks, and checked on my aunt who lives by herself near me. Started getting freaked out, so I decided to spend a couple hours playing Minecraft to clear my head.

Turnip’s food arrived today. When the driver dropped it off, I waited until he was well past the porch before opening the door to say thanks, but he was too far away (and it was too loud with Floof-n-Boof barking at him) for him to hear me. Thanks, FedEx Guy, for keeping the world running.

Had an all-associates call with the GM and Director of HR at work, and after hearing them I became much calmer. A lot of companies tout that they’re close-knit and a family, but my company truly embodies that. Just from the call, I could tell they both were upset about the current situation and wanted us all to be able to return to normalcy. Our management company says the same, but you can tell our local leaders actually mean it from their heart, not because they have to.

After the call I watched some podcasts, played my mobile game, and just sort of stayed chill.

Played some JackBox with an old friend over Zoom, had the last of my taco meat, and then played a couple rounds of Apex with another friend.

Which brings me to now. I’ve had a couple glasses (3 as of the moment) of wine and am ready to head to bed early.

So I’m going to bed now. An entirely non-productive day. Which isn’t a bad thing, it’s just weird because usually I’m trying my hardest to stay busy.

Have a great weekend.

I’ve really been digging these last couple stream of consciousness posts, it’s so easy to just save a draft and update it throughout the day. Yesterday I was in the living room all day. The day before that I stayed in my room. Today I’m probably going to stay in my room. I’m not splitting the difference very well over the course of a day, but I seem to be doing just fine if I dedicate a day in each room. It may be simpler once I fix the guest room back into an office/streaming area.

Woke up this morning with a cough, what I thought was shortness of breath, and felt like I had to puke. Oh no, this is it, I’m infected. Well, I’m not warm, I’m not sneezing, the coughing went away after a little bit as did the shortness of breath (I can still breathe deeply without issue). You know what the problem is? I’m dehydrated. For the last couple weeks I’ve gone from coffee to a couple sodas for lunch to wine at dinner. No water, and those are all diuretics.

I had an appendectomy almost a year ago, and the one thing they didn’t tell me was that I needed to drink a lot of water for a lot longer than you’d think. Last summer I couldn’t eat at restaurants more than like 1/3rd of whatever I ordered before I’d suddenly feel nauseous. It would go away after a minute or two but there’s no eating after that. A lot of takeout boxes last summer. No problem eating a large meal at home because of how I was sitting on the couch vs. a restaurant’s chair (leaned back vs. straight).

I mentioned to one of the managers that I kept feeling like I had to throw up and something had to be wrong with me, and she said that I was dehydrated because of the surgery. This was 3 months later, there was no way! I took her advice and got some Pedialyte, instantly felt better.

So last fall and this winter I made a concerted effort to drink half my weight in ounces, like I was taught in HS Bio. Problem is I also have a couple glasses of wine every night (before you think anything, I’m not an alcoholic, I just like to have wine.) so sometimes I’d dehydrate myself again. Pedialyte and Gatorade, feel better. At least two full Hydroflasks while at work and then half of one at home. Bam, 100oz right there, more than enough.

Well, since starting working from home and now not working just isolating, I’ve not been drinking any water. None. I’m about halfway through my first Hydroflask and I feel so much better already. I will admit that the last couple nights I’ve gone a little overboard with the wine (seriously, a couple pieces of watermelon in your sangria is the best). Last night I didn’t have my first glass until like 10, but somehow still managed to have like 4 or 5 glasses. That’s a little much.

So at the very least for tonight no wine. Just water. My body will thank me.

I used to have a “no alcohol on school nights” rule but that gradually went away. Since I don’t have school nights until the resort opens back up, it became really easy to drink like it was the weekend. Not good on the liver or my wallet. I’ve already lost like 5 pounds since I’m not eating out for lunch any more, I would be curious to see by next Friday (assume wine tomorrow and Saturday nights) how much I can lose by cutting out that sugar for just 6 days. Last time I didn’t drink for a week I lost 10 pounds. Which is scary and I don’t want to think about it.

Well, I did the autosave thing, opened my school assignment and put a Jenna Julien podcast video on to the side, and promptly did nothing else.

Made some dinner, chili dogs, and started organizing the guest room. Didn’t get very far. I have a lot of crap in boxes. Lots of work to get things organized. I hoard papers, so I need to sift through and just get rid of everything that isn’t actually important. No, I do NOT need to keep this giant stack of credit card offers.
Just to be clear, I don’t have a giant stack of those letters, but they’re just scattered everywhere, taking up space. Get rid of them.

I’ve had almost 100oz of water today, feeling better. Tomorrow before I start my weekend partying I’ll just need to make sure I’ve drank enough.

So yeah, water. It’s important, folks.

This is going to be another one of those posts that don’t have a theme, just a stream of consciousness.

Today I didn’t get much of anything done, to the surprise of exactly none. Deep Space 9 marathon continued, and given my lifelong attraction to TV I just kind of kept watching it, playing my mobile game, and just did nothing.

Turnip ran out of his prescription food this morning, I only had a little bit left. Thankfully I stocked up on Friskie’s wet food and he loved that, so until the doctor approves the shipment he’s just going to have to eat that.

For lunch lately I’ve been eating an everything bagel with chive and onion cream cheese. Chive and onion cream cheese is the bomb and where has it been my whole life?!

Trying to work on this task for my business ethics course and I just can’t seem to get into it. Maybe it’s the TV playing in the background. Maybe it’s because the topic is so dry. I just need to get this task done and then I’m technically finished with the term, only 3 months left. I’ve almost reached my loan limit so the sooner I get this task submitted and passed, the sooner I can finish the last few classes before the end of the term. I’ve been going to school for almost 10 years, I just want my Bachelor’s. I just want the piece of paper!

I made tacos for dinner last night, so tonight all I had to do was reheat a little of it. When one of my old roommates moved out, he moved in with a guy who didn’t have a microwave, so everything they needed to heat or reheat was done on the stove or the oven. I didn’t understand how you could just not have a microwave, they’re essential! But now that I’ve lived alone for 2 years (that doesn’t seem right…) I get it. Microwaves are like shotguns: they’re going to just blast through and get the job done. Reheating on the stove or in the oven is like a sniper rifle, you have much more control. That’s a terrible metaphor, I know, but I can’t think of anything else. Bottom line is if you reheat something on the stove you can tweak and make improvements to get the result you want. Like reheating the taco meat: just add a little water to the meat, stir, cover so it heats everything, stir, and add more spices if you want. Once the excess water steams away, you’re left with beautiful taco meat.

Dang it, I’m hungry again.

The only downside of reheating things on the stove is now you have So Much More Dishes To Do. I’m already terrible at doing the dishes so it becomes a problem. Though I will say that since I’m stuck at home all day now, I am getting a little better. I still need to find my groove on cleaning up the rest of this depression den, but since I started getting better at keeping the kitchen clear it’s been helping to motivate me.

Also, dang, I really need to figure out how to make my own GIFs. There’s so many that I can’t find for specific things. Like the GIF above, I wanted the one where Shin says “I’m so hungry my tummy’s gonna eat itself. Now I know why models are such bitches.” I say that all the time! I need a GIF of it!

A’ight, peace out, Cub Scouts.

Well, crap. As I’m starting to write this it’s 00:30 1 April. Oops.

As I wrote before, I have a mouse/mice under my bathroom sink. Every once in a while I can hear them chewing things. Well, today I heard at least two of them fucking around in there, in the middle of the day.

Thankfully when I went shopping yesterday I picked up some peppermint oil, so I mixed 25 drops with about 4oz of water and sprayed that all under there. I’m a little concerned with the fumes from the oil affecting Athena, but everything I can find suggests ill effects when in a diffuser, not when mixed with water and allowed to naturally evaporate. If I’m wrong, let me know. I don’t want to hurt my baby, but I need to discourage mice from living in my house. Soon I’ll spray some peppermint under the house to try to get them out. I don’t want to kill them, I just want them out of my space.

Finished skimming the reading for this task in my business ethics class (SO DRY AND BORING) and am going to start building the assignment tomorrow.

Did a lot of DS9 watching, mostly instead of doing classwork/chores. I’ve watched the series before so it should be background material, but I just get so invested in everything.

Turnip’s doctor hasn’t approved his second shipment of special food, so in the morning I am going to have to give him Friskie’s. Still wet food so it should help with his urine balance (high concentration due to not enough water), but it won’t help with dissolving those blasted bladder stones.

Gave Athena one of the yarn ball poof things, sprayed with a few liquid catnip doses, and remembered that she does in fact like it. I need to find a way to get her more active, maybe some catnip toys that she likes will give her some more physical activity. She chonky. Even with less than half the recommended amount of food. I need to find a way to get her moving more instead of just sleeping all day. When she stands on me, being less chonk would be great. She has tiny feet, and 15 pound of chonk in one spot HURTS LIKE HELL.

My GM is holding a call on Friday about the closure, so most of the day I’ve been freaking out about the virus and what that means for the hospitality industry.
Sorry to make this not a very interesting post, today has been weird in a mental health kind of way.

Turnip is still loving his yarn ball poof thing and will slam headfirst into a cardboard box to attack it, no additional catnip spray required. So there’s an adorable thing that keeps happening. It’s the little things.

That’s it for me today, please enjoy this GIF and I’ll scream into the abyss tomorrow.

Usually, at least for an introvert like me, staying home and doing nothing is all the respite needed to recharge. That all goes out the window when you’re stuck at home with nobody to talk to but the cats.

Did a little more reading for my business ethics class, vacuumed a spider that violated our peace treaty, and got myself sucked into Facebook. A little after 2 I realized I was running extremely low on some supplies. After a little more time-wasting online I started getting ready to leave. Got a Marco Polo from my best friend, so we chatted for a little bit. We usually meet up once a week and go shopping, it’s been almost a month since we last did that. We decided we were going to go shopping together but apart. Athena was being adorable and kept trying to steal my shoes by their laces under the door, so I had to let that play all the way out.

The Foodening

My friend and I met up in our respective vehicles, rolled down the windows, and tried to figure out where we wanted to eat. We’re both so tired of making our own meals. I was craving Hawaiian or a hamburger, we decided on Hawaiian. Went to the best Hawaiian restaurant in town; I got my favorite plate: teri chicken, teri beef, noodles, and rice. I usually get mac salad instead of rice, but I’ve been eating a lot of mac salad lately. Next time.

After we picked up food, we went to Fred Meyer. We pulled our cars next to each other and rolled down the windows again so we could talk and eat. It’s kind of our thing. We did the responsible thing and made sure we were physically at least 6 feet apart. We may have needed to do our normal routine, but no need to be irresponsible.

The Shopping

We both feel the same way: shopping in the current situation creates a lot of anxiety. Fred Meyer was a lot less crowded than it usually would be (though my frame of reference is a weeknight, not midday) but there was still way more people there than either of us felt comfortable with. Once cool thing was that there was an associate at the door with the carts and he told us that all the carts had been sanitized so there was no need to wipe it down again. Super cool, good job Freddies!

We were able to stay 6 feet away from each other, that wasn’t very hard. It was keeping everyone else away from us that proved difficult. I saw a few people with masks, and I’ll admit I was a little jealous. I grabbed a container of pre-cut watermelon, because I’m worth it. It took us about 3 tries to get to the spaghetti, every time we went by that aisle it was PACKED. Finally got everything we needed, sans toilet paper still, and headed to check out. Self check was wrapped all the way to the Starbucks kiosk, and if you stand in line for any of the others you have people who have to walk within a couple feet of you to get past. Not ideal.

The Unwinding

Since it’s been raining/snowing and will for the next week or so, we decided to go to the parking garage downtown. Since its construction we’ve always gone to the top level to hang out, but with the rain and the fact we have to be in separate vehicles, we opted to go one level down. Talked for over an hour, catching up on everything. I was able to convince her to start doing the podcast over Discord since we have to shelter, so we should hopefully have our first episode up very soon.

I think that with us talking at the parking garage like we’ve done for the last 12 years gave us the sense of normalcy that we both needed. We were physically apart, but for an hour back together.

Respite.

Home

Thankfully, I have a can of Lysol so I sprayed a bunch of things down. The store in the village is small and sparsely occupied, while Freddies had so many people. It just felt like the safer thing to do.

Turnip has all but destroyed his mouse toy, so I bought him some catnip yarn poof things. He wanted nothing to do with it at first, but then I sprayed it with some more catnip and now he’ll suddenly run across the room and fling it around. Little asshole is an asshole and then does all this cute shit. So I can’t really hate him too much.

Some of my leftover Hawaiian deliciousness, and continuing my Deep Space 9 marathon.

Respite.

Reflections

I’m not really sure why, but it feels like my entire day consisted of this trip to town vs. the village. It could have been the time-suck that is Facebook making my time not in town was much shorter, or it could be the stress of going where there’s more people. I’ve been home for 5 hours now, am a couple glasses of wine with watermelon in, and I’m just now barely starting to calm down.

These are the times we live in, and we just have to do our level best to get through them.

I’m just gonna add some random GIFs that I like.

Oh my goodness, look at the time! It’s almost 11pm (when I started writing this) and I’m only starting to write this up at almost 11! Zoinks!

I kind of feel like I”m dating myself with that opening couple sentences. Zoinks means I watched Scooby Doo growing up, and “oh my goodness” means that I’m secretly an old lady. For the record: I’m a 28 year old man.

Not going to lie, today was also pretty unproductive. I ordered Turnip’s prescription food, worked on the last couple hours of the event mine in my stupid game, have watched almost all of season 3 of Deep Space 9, and got about halfway through a paragraph in my school text.
That’s a typo… I got halfway through the chapter.
What makes that typo funnier is I’m working on a business ethics course right now. It’s just SO DRY… I struggled with my Linux+ classes since I don’t use it regularly enough, but that at least was slightly interesting. How I yearn for the listings of all the different flags for dpkg… *sigh*

Beyond all this excitingness that is my life in isolation, heated up some leftover homemade Salisbury steak (aka mini-meatloaf) with some mac salad, heartburn, don’t have Tums, then looked at the clock and here we are with my “zoinks” and my “oh my goodness”.

Maybe an introvert blogging during a pandemic doesn’t make for the most interesting content.
Oh well. It is what it is. If you have topics, I’m all ears in the comments below.

Let’s be honest here for a second, the first seven days have been rough creatively. Trying to come up with interesting content every day of the shutdown, since that was my personal goal, is a lot more difficult than I thought. Especially since I’m sheltering in place due to the virus. There’s only so much interesting stuff that happens in Casa JoDrRe. So for today here’s some random thoughts and semi-productive things.

The Semi-Productivity

I took a shower today before 4. That was a feat in itself. I cleaned the kitchen, cooked, and had my first actual meal in two days ready by 6.

Though I didn’t have all the ingredients for Salisbury steak, and the gravy was nonexistent (fun fact: low-fat hamburger doesn’t leave a lot left in the pan, and you really should have beef stock on hand), it tasted great and was almost like a mini-meatloaf.

I also sent an important email that I hope helps get a thing resolved soon, even though I received the notice 3 weeks ago. Accidentally forgot to send this email because of all the stress of the last couple weeks. Almost adulting is still adulting, right?

The Random Thoughts

I have an SEO tool installed to help with SEO-stuff-that-I-don’t-understand since I eventually want to add ads and hopefully eventually make this a revenue stream (HOW?!?!) and I just can’t come up with anything to link internally/externally that would give a green smiley face so I don’t even care. This can be an off day. Whatever.

Today for the most part I’ve been playing my mobile games (TIME SUCK) and having my own marathon of Star Trek: Deep Space 9. I know Quark is supposed to be mostly hateable, but damn that fashion. Could I rock that?

I can’t wait for the warmer weather to come. I just want to sit on my deck with a cup of coffee and read the news and listen to the cheeseburger birds. I had hoped it would be this coming week, but looks like that may be a while longer.

I posted on Facebook that I’m looking for an espresso machine. Got a targeted ad today for a knockoff, so if you have me on Facebook let me know of any machines you’d recommend. I really only need to pull shots, price under $100, not a big deal if there’s no steam wand (right now just want iced lattes, but could make hot lattes if it would heat the water on a schedule).

Reflections

Sorry for not being very interesting today. Also sorry for not posting on the same day. I noticed early on that I was doing recaps of the previous day and I was losing some of the details. I feel that if I finish up the post as I go to bed (late since I have no job to go to right now) I can finish my thoughts until I head to bed.

While I have a vast library of memes saved, this is one of my all-time favorites. Please enjoy.

The top-front of my mouth (the little piece of skin above your front teeth that connects to your top lip) has hurt for the last two days, and I’ve been very runny-nose-y. Think it’s just the changing seasons or sleeping weird. No fever so I’m sure I’m fine. Everything feels better around midday (except my mouth, which is annoying), so when I go to town tomorrow for supplies I just need to make sure to wipe down carts and surfaces before and after I touch them.

Be well, all, and do your best to protect your community members who cannot protect themselves.

Shopping List

+ Litter Genie cartridge
Athena has one of those and ran out a couple weeks ago; I have to take Turnip’s waste in a trash bag through the house and add her waste to it. Gross. Too much kitty germs.

+ Potatoes
I have a few left, but the bag I got mostly has a bunch of bad spots in each spud. A lot of the food I’m making right now pairs great with mashed potatoes, so I’m going through those pretty fast.

+ Peppermint essential oil
Motherfuckin’ mice. Need to spray a peppermint solution under the house, maybe they’ll leave and stop waking me up in the middle of the night.

+ Coffee beans
If I can find a self-grinding coffee machine, would be nice to have some whole coffee beans. Nothing beats fresh-ground coffee. #baristalife

Turnip, aka “Turneeeep,” aka “Monsieur Turneeeep,” aka “Demon,” aka “Asshole” has been with me now for two years. Technically, two years ago yesterday, but we didn’t get back from Idaho until very late so we’re going to say it was 26 March.

Our Relationship

Turnip and I have clashed from Day 1. He picks on Athena, he screams at me, and thankfully we finally got past the peeing everywhere stage. However, he will lay on his back and point his toes, makes the most adorable little chirp noises when you poke him, and for some reason loves the stupid games I play. “Where’s Turnip?!” is my favorite, it’s when I put a blanket over him and say, “Where’s Turnip?!” and then he finds his way out. There’s also “Squeesh” which is when he is sitting between my feet on my footrest and I just squeesh him.

The Vet

A little over a month ago he started peeing in the guest bathroom’s sink and tub, and some other places, and it had a little bit of blood in it. I figured it was because he had some stale water (stopped drinking as much so I didn’t pay much mind that it hadn’t been a while since I last changed it out), so I made extra sure to make sure he had fresh water. The problem went away for a week or two, and then returned. Since it came back, I became extra concerned and took him to the vet the next day. To be clear, it wasn’t a lot of blood and he didn’t seem to be in pain so I hoped to be able to take care of it myself.

His vet was very nice. His exam went well, but they wanted to hold him for testing to see what was going on. When they called for me to come pick him back up they said he was extremely well-behaved, at which point I audibly laughed. There’s no way this demon was well-behaved in a strange environment! But it’s true: during the exam he was absolutely ENAMORED with the tech and the vet… and that’s just what I was there to see!

The Damage

Long story short, he had a UTI (possibly from the stale water, the vet was hesitant to blame me even though I knew I had slacked in my responsibilities), concentrated urine, and bladder stones. She prescribed him some antibiotics for the UTI and a special wet food to help dissolve the bladder stones since I didn’t want to put him through surgery.

The entire time I was talking with the vet I was extremely nervous and could barely make coherent sentences. It was at that point that I knew I loved this furry little asshole, despite our differences.

The Turneeeep

So, with all that said, happy Turneeeep Day! Have some photos of my adorable little asshole.

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

Mental health! It’s important! We all know this! But a lot of us are sheltering in place! That’s rough! More exclamations!!!

Full disclaimer: I am an introvert who lives alone so I already love living my hermit life. I am also not a mental health professional, the thoughts below are what are helping me (plus some silliness), but if you need it I will always urge you to seek professional guidance. Always take care of yourself.

Another disclaimer, today was Turnip and I’s two-year anniversary of being together, but let’s be honest it’s the anniversary of me making a 13 hour drive with him screaming in the car. Tomorrow we’ll do a Turnip post, that also gives me more time to gather pictures. Cats make the Internet go ’round.

Anyway, here’s some things that I’m doing to help keep my mental health game strong during this trying time (seriously, don’t try to hand me an egg).

Take a shower! Regularly!

I don’t know if it’s just me and I’m just an oily sunuvabitch, but my hair gets nasty after a day. To the point where if I don’t shower for a couple days I can put up my fauxhawk. Nasty.

It’s easy to fall into the sneaky despair spiral. Don’t fall into the spiral, take a shower! If you live with someone, they’ll thank you. Even though I live alone and far enough from neighbors, the shower is the only place that I’ll full-on sing along to music, or even really listen to music, period, now that I’m not driving around in my mobile karaoke studio.

I guess this tip is a toss-up between feeling clean makes you feel better or singing along to your favorite songs is good for mental health. How about both?!

Open the windows!

If you’re like me, once it gets dark you close the blinds so peeps walking by can’t peep ya. In the morning, though, you need to open them blinds so your peepers can peep some things.

Since my job involves staring at a screen all day, one of the things they say to help reduce eye strain is for every 20 minutes of screen time look out the window in the distance for 20 seconds. For me, the same thing applies to keeping things interesting. I have a lot of squirrels and birds that run by my house, it’s always interesting to see things that are going on that aren’t on a screen.

Plus sometimes you’ll see some epic stuff. Like one time I watched two squirrels fighting and chasing each other across my yard. One gets chased to the top of this tall tree, goes to jump to another nearby tree and misses. Falls like 20 feet. Audible thud, thought he died. He gets up a couple seconds later, gives a cartoon head shake, and just runs off to do other squirrel stuff.

Chat with people!

I think this is the most important tip I can give right now. We’re all in isolation, it gets lonely, humans are social creatures. We actually need to interact with other humans, it’s just how we are. I’m an introvert and thrive in being alone, but every once in a while I just need some interaction.

Thankfully, we’re in the golden age of technology! If you’re working remotely I’m sure you’re using something like Zoom, GoToMeeting, BlueJeans, Skype/Teams, etc. for meetings and stuff. Do the same thing with your friends! Skype, FaceTime, Zoom, Facebook Messenger, Marco Polo… the options are plentiful. I actually had a Facebook Messenger video call today with a friend who was testing options so they could play D&D with their other friends remotely.

If you don’t want to do the video thing (or can’t), voice chat has been doing the trick for me! When I play Apex with friends, being able to just talk in the party chat is great with reconnecting to fellow humans. Call loved ones on the phone, video game chats, tin cans on a string… any way to regularly reach out to someone will do wonders.

And before you try to tell me to have a conversation with my cats, it’s not the same. They absolutely will not be able to respond in any meaningful way, don’t listen to their lies, they just want treats.

Reflections

I know there’s a lot more things you can do for your mental health. Unfortunately, it’s getting late and I want this up before midnight. These are the ones that I’m doing right now to keep up my mental health, and I’m sure as time goes on I’ll find more! We’re not even out of the first week, folks!

We’ll get through this together, it’s going to suck, but we’ll get through it.