Category: covid-19

8:31pm on Day 12

I would like to say that my new camera lens and I are going out shooting in the morning, but I have the double whammy of still being positive for Covid-19 and a terrible weather forecast to deal with. Maybe Sunday? If I test negative tomorrow maybe I’ll mask up and chase the sunrise on Sunday. Or maybe I’ll finally spend golden hour in Boston. Who knows. I will say that I ain’t goin’ nowhere without a negative test.

My wife and I ordered take out from the 99 Restaurant tonight. Door Dash. My gastric bypassed little baby stomach pouch and I ordered chicken fingers off the kids meal. That’s a thing I do now. It came with a side of mashed potato. The whole thing was delicious, but the last few bites refused to play nicely and I have spent some time praying to the proverbial porcelain god. It’s not a bad thing. I am fine. It took an hour to clear itself, but this is not me complaining or struggling or anything negative. This is just me being thankful that my stomach did not have any episodes like this while the Covid was at it’s worse. It’s almost like how I drove us home from Florida, 1200 miles over three days, and didn’t have a single Covid symptom until after we got home. It’s almost like my body knows what it’s up against and adjusts itself accordingly. It’s almost like the human brain and the human immune system can do really amazing, fantastic things. Know what I mean?

As far as Covid goes, I feel really well tonight. I’m tired again, and I was really beat after my work day ended. I would be surprised if I tested negative tomorrow. I might not be that surprised if I were to test negative the day after tomorrow though. Damn, that would be awesome.

Here’s hoping.

12:11pm on Day 12

I have successfully stopped myself from taking a Covid test today. I know it would be positive so why waste the test? I feel about the same today as I did yesterday. Better overall. I might be a little better than yesterday, but not enough to think I would have a negative test. I might test tomorrow. If not, I will test the day after tomorrow, Sunday. We will see.

I’m back to the waking up at 4:00am thing again. I did that for the first few days of Covid-Land and now I’ve done it two days in a row again. It was okay two nights ago because I went to sleep before 10:00pm and had a solid six hours of sleep before popping awake. Last night I didn’t get to sleep until almost midnight so 4:00am came quickly. Both nights I was able to get back to sleep. Here’s hoping I got enough sleep overall last night that I don’t have fatigue issues this afternoon.

We’ve been using Instacart to get our grocery shopping done while we’re both testing positive. They keep bringing the wrong things. It is the risk you take when you ask some one else to do your shopping for you, but it still makes me sad. They keep bringing me the wrong gastric bypass related stuff. I ask for sugar free, because I can’t tolerate sugar anymore, and they bring me sugar full. Like I said, it’s sad. It makes me nostalgic for the days when I could eat things with sugar. Not really. I’m being overly dramatic. I’ve lost 200+ pounds in a year and a half. I don’t miss sugar at all. I just need to be vigilant. Just like Mad-Eye Moody used to say. Constant vigilance babie!

(Mostly) Daily (silly) Haiku for You #42

Today’s haiku for you is inspired by the imminent arrival of the weekend! Bring it on! Oh… wait… I still have Covid. Shit.

It’s Friday, babie!
The weekend is almost here!
Covid screws it up.

9:40pm on Day 11

I’m feeling a little better tonight. Is the Covid-19 virus finally losing it’s fight with my immune system? I seriously hope so.

I’m still a little sniffly. I still have a bit of a cough. I am still tired. I am better in every aspect though. I spoke to my father on the phone and he said I sounded better. I agreed. Jen sounds better tonight too. Here’s hoping we’re turning that corner in our fight with the plague of the 21st century. Pandemic be damned and piss right the hell off, asshole!

Part of me wants to take a Covid test in the morning, but part of me wants to wait at least another day. I don’t want to rush it, I’ll likely wait until Saturday, but maybe I should even wait longer and hold out until Sunday. I doubt if I test tomorrow (Friday) I’ll be negative. I just don’t see that as a likely outcome. Saturday, maybe. Sunday, if I keep improving at this rate? That could be a negative. Here’s hoping.

For now though, let’s have a good nights sleep and more improvement tomorrow. Fingers emphatically crossed. Cautious optimism.

4:50pm on Day Ten

I am toast. I don’t know that I have ever felt this exhausted in my entire life. I haven’t been physically active today, but I have been “on” mentally all day. I had a 2 hours and 15 minute meeting this morning followed by a 1 hour and 15 minute meeting followed by a very quick lunch followed by a 1 hour and 45 minute meeting and all time in between those meetings was spent catching up on the piles of messages that built up while I was otherwise occupied. My Covid brain has been reduced to the mushiest of mush.

I feel like I could punch out at 5:30 and go right to bed. Sweet Christmas has today been taxing. I would have been worn out without having Covid on top of everything else, but this is just nuts.

The plan for tonight is to make dinner for me and my beloved, nothing special just some chicken in the air fryer and some instant mashed potatoes, then maybe fall asleep in the comfy chair in the living room while pretending to watch 90210 with Jen or, if Jen wants to go to her computer and play some World of Warcraft, then fall asleep in the comfy chair while pretending to watch the Red Sox get trounced by the Devil Rays. Either option would be acceptable to my mushy brain.

7:50am on Day Ten

The relapse is in full swing. Sort of.

I definitely feel worse than yesterday, but I’m still much better than I was at the worst of this Covid-19 experience. Obviously I’d prefer to be all better, but if I have to slide back a bit, here’s hoping it doesn’t get much worse than this. Fingers crossed.

We let ourselves oversleep a bit this morning. Maybe an hour or so for me. Will that help? Probably not, but it was worth a shot. I have a super busy work day scheduled so a little extra rest before kicking things off will hopefully be a good thing.

My nose is stuffier than it was last night. Not too much, just a little. I’m also coughing more than I was yesterday. It’s a wet, phlegmy cough where it used to be a dry cough. Does that make a difference? Who knows.

Okay then, I have had my morning vitamins and 16 ounces of water (Crystal Light Lemonade, to be precise), and I’ve had a protein bar breakfast. It’s time to get the day rolling on. Wish me luck, it’s going to be a tough one.

7:28pm on Day Nine

I am exhausted. I had a decent night’s sleep last night. Six hours without interruption. It didn’t help though, by the time I got to my lunch break today I was 100% wiped out. I am also coughing more tonight and my head is a little stuffy again. I feel like my symptoms are back-sliding and getting worse. I am very unhappy about all of this.

I called my father tonight to see how he was handling my mother’s birthday. He’s doing okay, but he immediately noticed that I sound worse than I did yesterday. It’s bad enough that dad could tell just by my voice.

Tomorrow is going to be a tough day. I am in meetings for five of the eight hours including one meeting that covers my entire usual lunch break. I’m going to be exhausted to the core of my soul by the time the work day ends. It’s going to be brutal. Here’s hoping I manage a better night’s sleep tonight to prepare for it. Wish me luck.

9:09am on Day Nine

Oh for crying out loud.

Another day, another positive test. Give me a break. I need this bullshit to be over.

I should have gone into the office today but due to The ‘Rona I am staying home. Same deal tomorrow. I was planning on working from Foxborough both days but now I am working from home while my staff works from Foxborough. I feel like I am cheating.

The symptoms are the same as yesterday. A little stuffy. A cough once every couple of hours. Generally tired. I made it through the work day yesterday but it was tough in the afternoon. I expect more of the same today.

Any time this asshole of a virus wants to piss off and leave is fine with me.

9:10am on Day Eight

I want to test again but I know it will still be positive. It would be nice to know for sure, but wasteful given how certain I am of the results. We only have a few more tests in the house so I will wait until tomorrow.

Most of my Covid symptoms are gone. I still have a bit of a stuffy nose, but I am not blowing my nose every five seconds and I am not coughing every four seconds. I’m still tired but not nearly as bad as I was a few days ago. I am working this morning and I fully intend to make it through the full day.

I’m still not 100% but I am better than I was yesterday.

I have to say that I am really tired of all of this crap. I want to go out again, even if it’s something silly like grocery shopping. I just want to leave the house. Of course it’s been raining for three days straight so even if I could go out, the weather is crap and I wouldn’t want to go out. What I really want is to get our four days in Disney World back again. That would be nice.

Also, while I absolutely do not want anyone else to catch Covid ever again, I would like to see another wordpress.com user use the tag “live blogging covid”. As of last check (a couple of days ago) I am literally the only user adding it to their posts. Oh well.

What Comes Next

I was really hoping that Covid would be behind me by today. Nope. I’m still dealing with it. I do feel a lot better though. I feel well enough that I can start thinking of what comes next.

I haven’t exercised in over a week. I haven’t closed my calorie ring on the activity app once in over a week. Do I start tomorrow? I am planning to work a full day so maybe I should skip the exercising in the morning for a few more days. I don’t want to wear myself out before the work day even starts. That’s not ideal, but it is safe.

What about music? There are six days left in the 50 songs in 90 days challenge. There is no way I will finish 50 songs, but I could get myself a whole lot closer than I am. I was looking at my Trello board and I think I could get into the low 40s without killing myself. Do I want to record some guitar parts in the morning? I could probably manage that. I don’t want to do a car vocals until I test negative. I know I wouldn’t run into any human creatures, but why risk it? I will stay home until I test negative and then after that I will mask up if I do anything out of the house. That also means no photography fun outside of the house for at least a few more days.

As for tonight, my water goal is done, my vitamins are done, my protein goal is… almost done. Five grams or so still to go. I can get that easily. I am a bit full now but in 30 minutes or so I’ll be ready to finish that off. I am hoping I will catch the new episode of The Walking Dead: Daryl Dixon tonight before I go to sleep. If I can sneak in a little more Doctor Who before I sleep that would be nice too. I think I’ve blown through more than three seasons (or was it four?) during my quarantine. So very much Who.

Next weekend the plan is to clean the house from top to bottom. I want the house to be covid-residue free before we invite anyone over. Safety first, right? After that I want to push to travel again. Maybe just a road trip, or possibly an overnight somewhere. I don’t want us to lose our covid nerve. We’ve fallen off the horse and I want to make sure we get back on as soon as possible. Does that make sense? We locked down so hard that feeling up to leaving the house took a lot of effort. Then to have us catch the plague for the first time during a vacation? I don’t want us to be afraid to travel again. I want us to go somewhere as soon as possible. It’s Fall now, so maybe in a few weeks it will be time for leaf peeping. Maybe an overnight to Manhattan would be a good destination too. I also want us to rebook our long weekend in Disney World. The trip that went bust on us was an experiment to see if it was worth it to fly all the way there for a 3-4 day visit. The answer to that question is still up in the air and we definitely have to do the research. The question is, when? Maybe around Christmas? We’ll have to look into the options.

So there are a few things I am thinking about for the near future. The real question is, do I set my alarm clock for 5:00am tomorrow, or 6:00am. I won’t have an answer until I actually lay down to sleep. Until then…