Archive | Covid19 RSS feed for this section

Cat vs. Ear

29 May

A couple weeks ago, maybe a month now (wow, time really has lost all meaning hasn’t it?), I got my ears pierced. Yes, I know, it is a thing most women have done when they are kids so it is simultaneously weird and strangely interesting to friends that I have done it now. I did get them pierced when I was a kid, I begged and pleaded and harassed my mother until she took me to get them pierced. It was horrible. Everyone said it doesn’t hurt, it did. Not knowing back then getting your ears pierced with a gun is a bad option. The person doing the piercing did not do a good job. The result was blood, pain, the piercings not healing, and lots of scar tissue in my ear lobes.

Why do people do this?

After all that I thought I was someone who couldn’t have pierced ears, since I had such a bad reaction to it. As an adult I googled a couple times to see if there was a way to get them pierced despite the scar tissue in my ear lobes and the results I found said I’d have to have a dermatologist surgically remove the scar tissue, wait for it to heal, then have the dermatologist pierce the ears. All that meant to me was a lot of money to get decorations on my ears, so I again dismissed pierced ears as a thing I couldn’t have.

I started thinking about it during 2020, the pandemic gave me way more thinking time so I looked into it, again. I found a piercer who said they could work around the scar tissue, and that it should be fine. I mean, they said more than that but I highly doubt you want a verbatim recounting of the conversation.

End result, I got them pierced. Experience went really well. It was done properly, with a needle, by a trained professional. Yay, right? Well, yeah, yay, but omg the healing process is a whole thing I was not expecting.

My work peeps said they would take a week to heal, and with all the questions I asked the piercer none of them were “how long is the healing process” so after a week when they weren’t hurting but were uncomfortable I reached out and asked her and she was all “a week? yeah right!” healing time for my ears, as an adult woman, is 4 months. Four months!! That is…commitment.

So there I am, cleaning my piercings three times a day, tending to them as instructed, actively having to ignore all the “advice” friends are giving me because they got their piercings as children and go figure things have changed since then when the cat goes and does something that put me on a whole new path for healing.

I was sleeping on my back, the cat is sleeping all snuggled up next to me, he stretched his front murder mittens out, towards my face, claws slightly extended and while one paw landed on my face the other got my ear and yanked on the piercing. It felt as if one of the claws actually got in the hole. So ya know, woke up to pain, lots of pain. I grabbed the cat’s murder mittens, held them in one hand, while breathing through the pain and telling him what he did is not ok, and do you know what he did? He started purring. Apparently he liked my holding his murder mittens all snugly like that and thought we were cuddling. Yes, this is how I discipline the cat, super effective huh?

That was a Saturday, I remember because I got up, cleaned the now very painful ear, then dealt with the pain all day, grateful I didn’t have to be at work. The next morning when I was cleaning my ears there was blood, the first blood there had been during this whole experience. Me being me I immediately jumped to “I’m gonna lose the piercing” dramatics and started searching things on YouTube and Google to see what to do. FYI, don’t do that, unpleasant things come up.

Since then I have been babying the right ear, trying my best to keep it happy and claw free. It was doing alright when Striker and I were playing and my ear got smashed, again, and when I put my hand to it in reflex I hit the lobe, causing even more pain. Like, wtf, my poor ear!

So here I am, I think a month in to healing, and there is a noticeable difference between my left and right ear. My left ear, which has had no claws, or hands, or anything bashing it, is healing well. The right ear is a constant flux between no pain, to discomfort, to pain. All it takes is a little touch on some days for full on pain, and yet, other days it gets touched and it seems ok, which gets my hopes up that it will eventually heal, and be fine, and I’ll be able to wear something beside these starter hoops that the piercer put in. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t hate the hoops, I just am hoping for a day I can change my earrings out, without pain and easily, so what I’m wearing can better reflect my mood, or personality, or whatever. I say this knowing that all my friends with pierced ears tend to wear the same earrings every day, every week, every month, every year, so maybe I’ll end up that way also? Let’s just hope the right ear lobe heals well enough for me to find out!

Advertisement

Tags: , , , , , , ,

It Has Been A Year

19 Mar

A year ago today I was in a two week isolation period because I was exposed to someone who had come back from the states and didn’t quarantine and my full-time job said “nope, you can’t come here for two weeks”. There was a lot we didn’t know about Covid back then, and while we know quite a bit more now there is still a lot we don’t know. Testing for the general public wasn’t a thing then so the only course of action was to act like everything was normal and potentially spread Covid to others or be extra cautious (some back then called it paranoid) and isolate yourself.

I don’t have horrible memories of those two weeks. I repotted plants, I organized my pantry, I worked on random projects in my place. I couldn’t work on larger ones because I couldn’t go to the stores to buy supplies and there were not as many delivery options back then as there are now.

I remember my InstaCart person couldn’t find eggs or flour, remember all the panic buying? A friend of mine found both those items at her local store and brought them over. That was my first sample of social distancing when with a friend, she handed the items over then we both stepped back and talked from what felt like an unnatural distance. It was a fun convo but I felt like a jerk for not being able to invite her in. Now, if I stand closer than 6 feet with someone I feel uncomfortable and want more space, and I’m perfectly fine not inviting people in to my place.

I also remember back at the beginning of all this being a bit pouty on a Friday night because nothing was open, you couldn’t go anywhere, there was no real fun to be had. Not like I was in a partying phase when this all started, but I did hang out with friends and go do things. This past Friday evening as I was finishing my last load of laundry, while wearing sweats, and wondering what movie to put on Netflix I realized that I don’t even notice that I can’t go out anymore, because it is normal now to be inside on my own when not at work. Going out and doing something, on those rare occasions that happens, always has me feeling a bit uncomfortable, like I shouldn’t be doing whatever it is I am doing. Just to be clear, I am not doing anything that breaks the Health Authority’s rules, it just feels wrong to me, it isn’t actually legally wrong.

I can’t say that I’ve accomplished anything impressive over this past year. I watched on social media as people went through bread making phases, and plant phases, and knitting phases, and realizing how important teachers are phases, oh so many phases. I saw them, dipped a toe in here and there, but didn’t really participate because after that two weeks of isolation in March 2020 I was working full-time, I was classified as an essential worker (I work with seniors) and I was working my regular shifts. I also, for a chunk of last year, worked my part-time job, it transitioned so I could work from home and I liked the change. I was dressed for work from the waist up and in pajamas from the waist down, I could sleep in a bit, I sat wrapped in a blanket with a hot water bottle on my lap (my apartment is a basement suite and always cold), and basically I wished I had a full-time job that could transition to working from home because it was great. Eventually the company I worked for part-time started struggling and I got laid off, so now I am down to one job and oh boy does that hurt the budget, sigh.

I got my vaccine two Tuesday ago and immediately started having side effects. I wasn’t surprised, I react badly to vaccines and a lot of medicines, and my body very much believes in an all or none attitude. Either I seem to get all (or almost all) the side effects from something, or I get none. Wednesday I was sick, I mean not actually sick, just side effects sick, so I stayed home. I went to work Thursday and got sent home because what if my side effects weren’t actual side effects and I had Covid? Friday and Saturday were my normal days off and I still wasn’t feeling great so I rested. Sunday morning I got a text from my manager saying don’t come in, get tested and wait until you have a negative result to come to work. Sigh. So off I went for my sixth Covid test, my poor nose!

I appreciate that now, if I am exposed, or have symptoms, I can go get tested and know within 24 hours if I have Covid or not. It takes away the need for 14 days of isolation, which is good. It does mean having that swab up my nose each time, which isn’t awesome, but it could be worse…least it isn’t a needle!

So many things have changed in one year. Every time new rules are issued I get used to the new normal and go about my daily life and then randomly it hits me how much has changed. Some days I am mad at the changes, or one new change pushes me past my tolerance level for that day (or week) and I get angry and exhausted and even more stressed. I don’t stop following the Health Authority’s rules because I’m not that big of a jerk, but I am angered by them. Then I adapt to the new change, remember that it is not there to restrict my life but to keep as many of us safe as possible, and I once again go about my daily life. I think it’s better to adapt to the changes than be mad at them, isn’t there enough going on right now without holding onto anger? I don’t know about you but I just don’t have time for that.

Tags: , ,

Licence Renewal During Plague Times

13 Dec

Once again it is time to renew my driver’s licence, fun times right? 😉

The only reason I don’t care for renewing it is because I tend to like my driver’s licence picture and I worry the new one won’t look as good. I know it seems a silly thing to think about but you’re stuck with it for five years, and depending on the person working you may get a chance to retake it or may not. Five years is a long time to be stuck with a bad picture that a lot of people get to see.

This year, thanks to the pandemic, the process has changed a bit. Normally you just show up and expect to lose a large part of your day to waiting in line but now you have to book an appointment in advance, show up no more than ten minutes prior to your appointment, and then be prepared to lose who knows how much of your day to the process.

I got there ten minutes prior to my appointment and was not impressed with the long line of people waiting outside. Normally I don’t care about lines but it was pouring rain and I didn’t want my hair to frizz before getting that all important picture taken. In that moment I very much missed getting to wait inside.

As I stood in line, huddled under my umbrella, thinking there is no way I’ll be inside by my appointment time one of the people mid line got out of line and went with a person who had walked out of the building to a car, her two friends calling words of encouragement to her as she left. Turns out they weren’t in line, they were huddled under the over hang of the building waiting because one of them was going for her road test. Which was great for me because I skipped ahead of where they were standing and got a bit closer to the door.

Then a gentleman came over and said he thought a lot of the people standing under the over hang were not in line and I should check, that most were waiting to take road tests. So I start walking past people and heading to the door and yeah, turns out all the people outside were waiting for road tests, or for the person they came with to finish their road test. They were standing where the arrows indicated to stand for the line to go inside but that is because it was the only area protected from the rain. Sigh. So I stood in a line, that wasn’t a line, when I didn’t need to. Thank goodness for that guy letting me know!

I get inside, tell the guy working at the information desk, which is of course surrounded by plexiglass, making him look like he is in a hamster ball, why I am there, he gives me a ticket with a number on it and directs me to the left. Inside the building, not including staff, there were four customers, myself included, in this big space. Chairs were blocked off so you could only sit in every third chair, hand sanitizing stations were placed in multiple locations, and of course, plexiglass everywhere. Oh, and masks, masks on everyone. I think of all the errands I have run during the pandemic this was the safest building I’ve been in.

This was the first time renewing my licence since my eye surgery so I got an eye test done, I was handed the disinfecting wipe so I could clean it myself, and was also the one to get the machine into position. Which I was fine with, I trust me more than a stranger, even if she was perfectly nice and would probably have sanitized everything just fine. I answered questions, signed stuff, paid $75 (ouch!), and was done in I dunno, ten minutes maybe?

A lot of jokes are made about long lines and waiting times for places like this but for right now, those lines and wait times seem to be a thing of the past. I gotta say, I think making an appointment is a way better system than just showing up and hoping it isn’t busy.

I remember the last time I renewed my licence, I forgot I didn’t have photo ID when I went to fly a week later, my new licence hadn’t shown up in the mail yet so all I had was that temporary paper they give you. So there I was, with the cat, at the airport, and the only card I had on me with a photo was my Costco card. That was an interesting checking in experience…

Tags: , , ,

December Has Arrived!

1 Dec

Finally! December is here! It feels like it has been the longest and the shortest year all at once. Part of me is all “How in the world is it already December 1st?” while the other part is screaming “How the hell is this year not over yet? Who is responsible for this?”

So ya know, a tad conflicted about how time is passing, but otherwise totally normal over here. Yup, super normal. 😉

We did some Christmas stuff at work today, can’t tell what, it’s a secret! What I can share is the adorably dorky head piece I got to wear, and continued wearing long after all others had taken off their Christmas accessories.

Not the best lighting but whatcha gonna do? Well, I suppose use a filter but meh, can’t be bothered. I know, I know, such a lazy blogger am I!

I am that person who loves wearing silly things on their head for holidays. Canada Day? You can bet I have the Canadian flag on a headband. St. Patrick’s Day? Four leaf clovers of course! Easter? I make the cutest bunny. I could keep going but I’m sure you get the picture. So when I was offered the Christmas bow for the rest of the month I definitely said yes! I wore it for a chunk of the day, but did eventually have to take it off because weirdly enough these things tend to be sized for a child’s head and my head is not the size of a child’s head. sigh. The hardships we must endure to wear silly things on our head.

My Christmas activity for today was watching The Christmas Chronicles Part 2 when I got home. Have you seen it yet? Part 1 came out in 2018 and it only took them 2 years to bring out a sequel, which meant they could use the same actors and not have it look strange.

It was a classic Christmas story of a villain who isn’t really all that bad trying to ruin Christmas because their feelings are hurt and Santa, with the help of some kids, beating the villain while teaching a life lesson to the children, and the villain. We did almost lose Dasher to a fight with a Yule cat, but I refuse to discuss that, too traumatic. 😉

We did get this fun little musical number randomly in the middle…

I thought to start my month with a new Christmas movie, of course I’ll watch a bunch of the classics, but it’s good to bring some change in to the season, right? Sure, change by way of a new Christmas movie, that has some of the same characters as the first part from two years ago, isn’t exactly creating waves of shock in my world, but there are a lot of big changes happening around me, so I decided to make a little change. One guaranteed to work out…or as close to a guarantee as you can get with a sequel! And hey, whatta know, it worked out!

Tags: , , , , ,

The Beginning of Christmas

30 Nov

When does your holiday season start? For me it starts right after boxing day sales end, not kidding, I start my countdown then! However, I do wait to express my crazy to the world until closer to the actual time of year Christmas happens.

Doesn’t stop me from casually telling people how many days until Christmas at random times during the year, especially on hot summer days, but that is neither here nor there.

Normally I don’t decorate for Christmas, I go home to my family for Christmas and enjoy the decorations there. This year, as we all know, is a weird one, and I am not travelling home for Christmas, so it will be the cat and I making our own little traditions.

Step one was decorating!

My bestie Nicole years and years ago, when I moved away, mailed me a present in November. When I opened it I found a table top Christmas tree and all the lights and decorations for it. She knew I hadn’t brought any decorations with me when I moved and being a poor student couldn’t afford to go buy any, so she surprised me with them. Talk about thoughtful!

This year I pulled the tree out of the box, tried not to jump when a dead spider fell out of the tree when I was fluffing it out, and decorated it, all under the supervision of Striker, The Cat Overlord. That is his new title by the way, he gave it to himself earlier this year.

It’s beautiful and I love it!

Lucky for me Striker (the Cat Overlord) does not care even one little bit about the tree, even though he jumps up beside it to get to the windowsill. Apparently the tree is beneath his dignity to bother with.

Sometimes I think I have the least cat-like cat out there…

I also took a mini tree to work for my office, because why not?

I have a set of 3 baby Groots and thought I’d use the mini tree to make hair for one of them. Random? Sure. But it makes me smile so who cares?

Continuing with my enjoying the beginning of the season I watched my first holiday themed thing today, actually no, that is a lie, my bad. I watched Rise of the Guardians the other day and while it isn’t technically a “Christmas” movie, I think of it as one so I guess that was my first seasonal type thing to watch.

This evening after work I channeled the inner child in me and watched the Disney Holiday Sing Along. It is basically a bunch of celebrities singing various Christmas songs, but never the entire song, just a snippet, accompanied by Disney clips interspersed with their performance. I’ve never watched it before so don’t know if it is normally this format. It wasn’t amazing, and this is coming from a person who loves (1) Disney, (2) Christmas, and (3) singing when alone and no one can hear me.

I mean c’mon, if anyone was poised to enjoy this it was me, but alas, ’twas not meant to be.

The lovely sushi dinner I ordered in for myself, to get this season off to a yummy start was great though! I suppose if one of the things had to be not up to expectations better it was the show and not my dinner!

What do you start your holiday off with? Decorating? Shows? Food? We all do the holidays different, and this year we will all be doing them different than our usual traditions, but I hope yours gets off to a happy start, and continues to be happy all the way through! 🙂

Tags: , , , , , ,

Staycation 2020

29 Nov

Oddly enough I had a bunch of unused vacation days and with the year quickly coming to an end my work wanted me to use them. I wasn’t so psyched on the idea, I mean, I can’t go anywhere, so what is the point? Turns out there didn’t have to be a point, just a strong nudge towards picking some days to take off.

I picked a random week in November and tried to get excited for it. I decided I’d do at least one all day hike, and hopefully more smaller ones, I’d paint the apartment, hang with friends (in a socially distant way), maybe do a day trip somewhere, and just use the time to live a relaxed life.

In keeping with the theme of 2020 the week I chose ended up being one of a two week time period where we went in to tighter restrictions in an effort to stop our Covid numbers from rising. This meant I wasn’t allowed to go anywhere unless it was an essential trip, so no hikes, no hanging with friends, no day trips out of town, no random fun shopping errands or days out doing whatever I wanted (within reason of course!).

Want to know what I was left with? Painting. The one thing on my list the tighter rules couldn’t take away, in fact, Dr. Bonnie Henry probably would have loved it. A human, alone in their apartment, for 9 days, with a project to keep them busy, she probably wishes all of us in BC would do that.

I will admit I didn’t start vacation with a great mindset, I was feeling like I was being grounded, even though I have been following all of the rules, and I was a bit cranky about it.

Vacation, to me anyways, means travel of some sort, at least one activity that gets my adrenaline going and has the potential for death, and I dunno, excitement. These 9 days weren’t looking to have any of that. In fact, they were going to be…productive. Who has a productive vacation?!

In true me fashion I did manage some entertaining moments, entertaining in a face palm kind of way that is. See, I was painting part of my bedroom, living room, and kitchen, and I was working on all the walls at the same time, none of this work in the bedroom, get it finished, then move on to the next room. Why be organized like that? So every room in my apartment was in chaos. Furniture moved to the middle of rooms, things draped with tarps, my dry food packed up so I could move the pantry, you know the drill.

One of the days, fairly early on, I stopped for lunch and realized that I couldn’t access my food. The dry stuff I packed away was completely inaccessible, somewhere in the middle of the living room hidden by furniture. My fridge, well, I could get to it, but was only able to open it a little wider than a jar of mayo. So not super wide. I thought about ordering take-out but had also blocked my door, and wasn’t sure if I asked the delivery driver to hand the food to me through the window if they’d go for it. This meant I had to find something in the apartment I could reach, and eat without cooking. I had buns on the counter already and with a lot of stretching was able to reach the shredded cheese and the mayo, so my meal that day was mayo and cheese on a bun, with a mini can of Fanta and also a cup of tea.

On the plus side, I’d forgotten how much I like mayo and cheese on a bun, it is super simple but enjoyable. On the not quite a plus side, it was the only meal I was able to put together for days because it took that long to be able to move things so I could open the fridge door wider. Oh, another plus would be I lost weight during the 9 days, thanks to manual labour and limited access to food lol.

In the end, I’m not upset the walls got painted, or my furniture rearranged, or that I worked on the apartment. And because I wasn’t doing anything but working in the apartment on my vacation I extended the areas I was painting and did more than intended, making it look even better.

Am I still a little salty I didn’t get to do one hike or day trip? Well sure, I’m human after all. But I console myself with the reminder it rained all that week so I wouldn’t have wanted to hike in that weather anyways, and not doing a day trip out of town saved me money, and the place does look a lot nicer now.

I guess my lesson learned is that a productive vacation isn’t all bad, it is just different than what I am used to, and adjusting to something different than what I am used to is basically the theme of 2020. I got used to masks, and social distancing, and virtual concerts, so I guess it isn’t much of a stretch to get used to a different kind of vacation…right?

I thought I’d share some pictures to show the changes in paint colour. The first slide show is from my bedroom, the wall in there is a weird wood paneling that is a super smooth texture. Originally I was just doing the wood panel wall but extended it out to both sides of the little hall that leads in to my room and the closet area. The colour I chose was a grey-blue but it turned out more blue than I anticipated. I don’t hate it, and if you think I’m going through all the work to paint over it just to get a slightly different colour than you need to find a therapist to bring you back to reality my friend.

The next slideshow is the living room and kitchen. The wood paneling there was more textured, grainy, like actual wood and not a shiny panel. I only took a before picture of the living room but that wood wall went all along the living room wall, over the door frame, and extended down the kitchen wall. I picked a white with tinge of grey because no way would I be able to match perfectly the white in the rest of the space and I was well aware of my limits and that I wouldn’t be able to paint the entire living room and kitchen. So I wanted a neutral that was obviously intentionally a different white than the rest of the walls but not shockingly different. The darkness of the walls underneath the paint, plus the texture of them, gives the area a different look than I anticipated, but I’m liking it. I haven’t put any art up on the walls yet, I’m still sorting out what I want to put up, but I’ll get there eventually. In the kitchen I was originally stopping where that wall juts out but I ended up moving the shelf unit and painting all the way to the door.

I removed the bedroom door, I never closed it anyways, and that really opened up the space, now that I don’t have it blocking a chunk of the living room wall. I still have to pick covers for the light switches and plugs, the ones I took off were dark brown, so they matched to the wood, but I don’t want them against the paler colours, so I’m taking a look for which ones I want. Oh, and I need knobs for the closet doors, which fyi, I accidentally painted shut and had to fight to get them to open again…but that’s a story for another day lol.

Tags: , , , , ,

Voting During Plague Times

17 Oct

I live in BC and a snap election was called, that is an election that was called earlier than the normally scheduled one. Basically, it is when someone gets all “hmm, if I call for an election right now I have better odds of winning than if I waited for the normal election date, so let’s giver a go!”. Or in other words, it is someone calling an election not because it is for the good of the people they are supposed to be representing but because it is beneficial to them.

Can you tell I am not impressed with snap elections? 😉

It isn’t voting day yet, but we can vote early at a variety of locations and I figured better to go early than wait for the day. I keep hearing stories of long lines, it taking ages, stuff like that, and I thought better to go to an early voting site and risk losing a bunch of time on my day off than trying to squeeze it in on a day I work and not being able to make it.

Voting was the top of my list of errands to do today, assuming it would take a long time I had my ear buds so I could listen to music in line, a protein bar if I got hungry, and a diet coke to quench potential thirst. I was ready! And it was all unnecessary.

The only people at the site when I got there were the people working. The whole thing took maybe 4 minutes and 2 of those minutes were walking to the correct door since they had made the doors one direction and I parked nearer the exit than the entrance.

The guy who greeted me at the door had gloves, mask, and face shield on, he let me know which table to go to. The person at the table (at all the tables) was wearing a mask and gloves, and was sitting behind plexiglass.

The barcode on my voting card was scanned through the plexiglass and I had to hold my license up to the plexiglass so he could get a good look at it. Then he handed my ballot to me by sticking one hand around the edge of the plexiglass and directed me to the little cardboard wall deal that you stand behind to vote. So I voted, went back to the guy, and he had me tear the top off my ballot. The top went in to an envelope that was attached to the front of the plexiglass, it was quite full which makes me believe others are early voting also and I just happened to arrive in a quiet moment. Then I put my ballot in the box, was shown where to put my voting card for recycling and that was it. I had voted.

On the way out a person opened the door for me so I didn’t have to touch it and there was hand sanitizer by the door, which I appreciated since I had touched a pen who knows how many other people had touched.

Also, turns out the one way door system worked out to be a good thing cause the exit led directly to the parking lot and if there had been a long line and I was tired after finishing a grueling experience to vote I would have been glad to exit right where my car was.

The whole thing made barely a dent in my day, which was an unexpected perk as I was planning to stay there as long as was needed. Makes me feel bad for people going to vote in unsafe conditions though, long lines that aren’t socially distanced, high levels of sick or potentially sick people, no masks…having to be in line under those conditions would be scary, and unsafe.

I know my voting experience won’t be what everyone has, you may go on a day that is busier than today, or you may go to a smaller location so people can be less spaced out, or maybe other voters who are there at the same time as you don’t wear masks or use sanitizer, it is all up to chance what the voting location you go to will be like, I hope it is like how mine was, clean, quiet, and fast, but even if it isn’t, even if you have to stand in a long line, or be the person taking a step back because someone else isn’t distancing properly, I hope you still vote.

Your voice is important and deserves a chance to be heard.

Tags: , , ,

Plague Time Dentist Visit

26 Sep

I go around thinking I’ve got this new way of living figured out and can’t be phased by things any longer then something happens and it makes me realize all over again just how much things have changed. Does that happen to you?

Yesterday I had a dental appointment, nothing major, just my regular cleaning. It was cancelled when most everything was shut down and they eventually got around to rescheduling me. I wasn’t upset they took this long to get to me and would have been fine if they took a tad longer, though I’m glad to have gone before the second wave hits.

They phoned me two days prior to my appointment and went through the questions you would come across on a disclosure statement, making sure I had no symptoms, hadn’t been in certain areas, or traveled, or been near people who had tested positive. I fill out a similar form every day for work so not a big deal.

I got to the office and of course there were plexi glass barriers all around the reception area, they were definitely in a little bubble. They were also masked and gloved. Its interesting trying to talk with someone through my mask, and the plexi glass, and then hear them through their mask and the plexi glass. We all need to learn sign language.

I was asked to come around to a side area, I was still separated from them by the plexi glass and was told I had to use the hand sanitizer, which of course I did. Next they took my temperature by putting one arm around the plexi glass to aim the thermometer at my forehead. Then they handed me a form and a pen and asked me to answer all the questions on the form. It was basically the written version of the disclaimer I had answered over the phone two days prior.

After all of that I was allowed to sit down, in one of two chairs that were spaced far apart from each other. It felt very much like a “sit there, don’t touch anything, don’t move” type of thing.

Once my hygienist came and got me I was taken to the little area where the evil dental work is done and shown a hook I could hang my purse and jacket on. Next step was washing my hands with a hand soap you usually only see in doctor’s offices, there was a foot pedal to get the water running so I wouldn’t have to touch the tap. Or rather, so I wouldn’t touch the tap and then they would have to sanitize it lol

I thought that was it but nope. There was a pre-measured portion of mouth wash I had to swish in my mouth while the hygenist timed me. She said it is strong, I can’t remember what she said was in it, but it is known to kill, I dunno, everything? Basically, swish it around and it helps lower the chance of my exhales spreading Covid if I happen to have it and not know.

So I used a hand sanitizer, then a strong hand soap, then something super strong as mouth wash. Nice and shiny clean at this point!

The check-up and cleaning for the most part were normal except there are certain things they don’t do now unless absolutely medically completely and totally necessary, because they are considered an unneeded risk. This means there was no teeth polishing, which is sorta the point of the twice yearly cleaning is it not? Oh, and there was something else she mentioned that doesn’t get done now but I can’t remember what.

You still have them poke around and scrape your teeth and gums with the pointy metal tools though, that didn’t go away.

I think the biggest thing that shocked me was what my dentist was wearing. He always used to wear business pants, a button up long sleeved shirt, and a tie. This time he was in scrubs. I know it seems silly that is the thing that stuck with me the most but it is. I’m assuming he wears the scrubs now so his own clothes don’t potentially get exposed to Covid, the man has quite the wardrobe, makes sense he’d want to protect it, but it was still weird seeing him dressed like that. Wasn’t at all upset at getting to see his biceps though… 😉

So there ya have it, if you go to the dentist during Covid plague times you may not get some procedures done, you may have a few more sanitizing steps to go through before anyone will touch you, and you may see more of your dentist’s biceps. You can decide how you feel about all of that. 😀

Tags: , , ,

Annoyed By Consciousness

20 Sep

I find that if I don’t have somewhere I absolutely have to be on a Friday I sleep in, and it is glorious. I actually try to give myself one day a week where I don’t check my messages, or email, or go on social media, and I just sleep in and be lazy all day. Having that day off from the world helps me function better during the other 6 days of the week. However, sometimes I take that day of rest a tad too far.

This past Friday I slept in, to be fair I didn’t go to bed until around 4am, but still, I slept in. When I woke and saw it was around 1pm I briefly thought I should get up, but I was so incredibly exhausted I rolled over and went back to sleep. The cat, who was sleeping on the bed, also rolled over and went back to sleep. We are in sync like that lol.

The next time I woke up dusk was approaching. Yes, you read that right, I slept through all the daylight hours. It was about 4:45pm, dusk comes early now.

Even though I still felt tired I figured I should probably get up, sigh. As I got up so did the cat, though he didn’t look impressed to be awake. We went to the kitchen, I got Striker food and water, turned on the kettle, went to the washroom, and when I got out of the washroom Striker was sitting waiting for me. As soon as he saw me he meowed then walked in to the bedroom. I followed him of course, I am nothing if not well trained.

What does Striker do when he gets in to the bedroom? Jumps on the bed, lays down, and looks ready to go back to sleep!

Not gonna lie, I wanted to curl up with him for a cuddle but felt that if I did that I’d never end up getting dressed and being upright for any decent length of time that day. So I told him no, I had to stay up and get dressed. He looked completely unimpressed by my getting dressed instead of laying back down. But then again, he often looks unimpressed by things I do.

I went back to the kitchen, made tea and a bite to eat, then settled on the living room chair. Striker came out of the bedroom gave me a dirty look, then jumped on my lap, stretched out, and went back to sleep.

Apparently sleep was the only acceptable activity he approved of for the day and I ruined things by waking up and getting up.

I guess I’m not that well trained after all.

He spent the rest of the day, or should I say evening and night, randomly waking up to glare at me before rolling back over to sleep.

Normally I would wonder what the hell I was doing sleeping an entire day away but these are not normal times and I figure if after a long week at work with a lot of emotional ups and downs my body decides it wants to deal with that by being unconscious for a long time, well, I’m gonna let it. Sometimes we heal by activity, or by motion, or by being with others, and other times we heal by having solitude, and sleep, and giving ourselves permission to not be productive for a while. You do what you need to do, I will do what I need to do, and lets have the only ones judging us be our pets, we know they are doing it anyways! 😉

Blep!
Pretending he didn’t blep.

Tags: , , ,

Pandemic Diet Tip

16 Sep

I was out walking on a trail near where I live the other day and started contemplating what I was going to have for dinner. My options were something from my kitchen, that I had already paid for and was the logical choice, or once off the trail head over to where there are a bunch of restaurants and pick something up.

Because buying food when I already have food at home is the less brilliant choice I of course went with that one. *rolls eyes*

However, as I was leaving the trail and getting back in to the neighbourhood I started thinking about the logistics of going to buy something.

First, do I have money, or something I can tap?

Second, has my face gone so bright red from working out I look like I may pass out?

Third, where do I want to go?

Four, am I forgetting anything?

My answers started off just fine. I had my phone which I could tap to pay. I took a look using my camera and my face wasn’t so incredibly red I didn’t want to be seen in public. I still had walking time to choose between my food options.

And then it hit me…my mask. Because I had gone out to a trail that is not overly populated, was not going to be gasping for breath thanks to my decision to not run during the poor air quality day that it was, and I was intending to go home soon as I was done, I had not taken my mask.

Well crap.

I take my mask everywhere. I choose to not go in to stores if I don’t have my mask on, whether or not the store has a sign about needing to wear a mask in order to enter or not. And there I was, without my mask.

Now maybe, maaaaaybe, I might’ve gone in somewhere without my mask on if I got there and nobody else was inside but! you never know which stores will have a sign up saying a mask is mandatory and I am just that lazy that I am not going to risk walking all the way to where the restaurants are and then not be allowed in because my mask was at home.

So there you have it, my first diet tip of the pandemic, forget your mask so you can’t follow the impulse to buy dinner instead of going home and making something healthier…that you already paid for…really, it is a bit of a financial tip also if you think about it lol.

Tags: ,

← Older Entries

%d bloggers like this: