Vaccine Time

So I have officially gotten vaccinated, both doses.

After the first shot, my arm was just sore for about a day afterward. I couldn’t sleep on my favorite side, but that was the most inconvenienced I was.

After the second dose, I got some chills a few hours later. I went to bed and ended up waking up in the middle of the night with a heavy head and achy limbs. I struggled to go back to sleep and woke up the next morning feeling more or less the same way. I took a dose of children’s Tylenol (I’m a terrible pill-swallower), and my symptoms almost immediately cleared up and did not return.

Getting the vaccine has felt totally unreal. It’s been this talked-of thing for the longest time, and the rollout felt like it would take years. Never have I felt a vaccine was so important.

I mean, I’ve gotten the annual flu shot every once in a while, but this felt serious on an almost Contagion level of seriousness.

Side note: This is the perfect time to watch Contagion. Watching it back in March 2020 was a bit of a mistake for me. I was riddled with anxiety and horror for a few days after.

I feel safer after getting vaccinated, but my relief stems mostly from having my mom’s safety ensured. She got vaccinated, and I got vaccinated. My biggest fear has been passing something on to her, which is why I shut myself in most thoroughly last year.

It’s strange to live in such times, but I’m sure that is something everyone who has ever lived has thought at some point.

A Short Trip to My Sister

If I could only pick one thing that the pandemic has outrageously stolen from me, I’d say it was time with my sister. Normally, during an average year, I spend months with my sister. Our time spent together during this past year can be counted using days as a metric.

A few days ago, my mother and I planned to go visit my sister. For a single weekend. That’s a ten-hour drive there and back again.

And to make matters more difficult, work was a killer the week before we were set to go. It was a veritable hell week. I was working from 8 in the morning to 7 at night; I was glued to my laptop at practically all hours of the day. That’s not to say I didn’t enjoy the work.

But oofs, I was burning up.

The Friday before we were set to leave, I woke up especially early to get the final bits of my work completed before the weekend. I was running on about 5 hours of sleep.

As soon as I was done, my mother and I packed ourselves into a rental car and drove over to my sister’s.

When we got there, Alya had creamy tomato soup and bread pieces waiting for us. We ate it outside on her back patio, which is easily one of the best back patios I’ve ever had the privilege to relax in.

I also got to see Ushi again!

I have missed her so much! And not being able to see her as much during the pandemic has gutted me. She’s getting a bit up there in doggie years, and it feels like the pandemic stole my time with her too.

Plus, look at that face!

After eating soup, my sister and I sang some Beatles songs together just for the heck of it, and we stayed up past midnight talking and asking each other questions. It was easily one of the best nights of my life.

I had a bit of a troubled sleep later on though, since not only had I been drinking coffee during my convo with Alya, but the pillows in the guest room are squishier than I’m used to.

I woke up to Ushi and more coffee, which made me feel better.

That morning, my mother, my sister, her husband, and I decided to take Ushi to both PetSmart and Petco. We let her pick out toys she wanted, bought her a water bowl that she actually needed, and selected some choice bones for her monching pleasure.

We went back to Alya’s house, and we gorged on Hot Cheetos Puffs while watching Muppet Treasure Island. It’s a movie we used to watch all the time as kids, and it’s only gotten better over the years.

We ordered in Chinese food for dinner and stuffed ourselves some more. Then we went to bed.

I slept terribly once again, and before the sun was even up, my mom was brightly telling me it was time to go. (At this point, I think I’ve only slept 6 hours in total while at Alya’s house.)

And just like that we were gone.

But it was worth it.

It was an incredibly short visit, so much so that it reminded me and Alya of the long ones I used to make. It sharpened our need to hang out with each other, so we’re currently planning a lengthier trip. Alya already has the vaccine since she is a teacher, and I’m in a damn-the-consequences-I-want-to-be-with-my-sister kind of mood.

She’s the one person who knows me inside and out, and you should always want to spend time with people who get you like that.

I think I passed out for the whole day after I came back. But even with practically no sleep under my belt, I’d do it all again to be with Alya.

D&Ding Online

The pandemic is still affecting our lives in dramatic ways, and it sucks to think that many of us are approaching the one-year mark of social distancing and quarantining and mask-wearing.

If you do anything long enough, you kind of get used to it, but not being able to see my friends in person is something I don’t want to get used to. Smart social distancing means that I haven’t hung out with any of my friends, including my Dungeons & Dragons group, since March of last year.

My D&D buddies and I used to meet up once a week, every Sunday, to play about six-hour long sessions of adventuring. We’d all gather around a table with carefully drawn diagrams on graph paper, miniature figurines denoting our characters placed on the paper, and role-play and roll dice to our hearts’ content.

2020 changed that set-up. We use online spaces to keep the game going, and it’s functioned fairly well for us.

We use Discord for all our audio needs. We have a private server run by our DM extraordinaire, and we still log on every Sunday to chat and play. We even use Discord to watch movies together-apart. We’ll pick something to watch on Netflix (a streaming service we all have), then press play at the same time.

Side note: And, of course, we’ve also played Among Us together using Discord. I’m a terrible liar, but it turns out I’m also a terrible truther. I have yet to play as Impostor, but no one ever believes me when I say I’m innocent. I have the voice of a guilty person. It majorly sucks, and I’m thinking the next time I play, I’ll speak in a monotone the entire time.

To make up for not having an actual tabletop, we use Roll20, a site that specifically caters to those playing D&D games online. We can recreate graph spaces for our characters to move around in, and Roll20 even comes complete with online dice to use. Most of us still prefer to use our real dice anyways, though.

Playing Dungeons & Dragons online serves its purpose, but it does not feel as great as playing in person. Internet connection issues can wreck a session. RPing through a computer is not nearly as entertaining as doing it face-to-face. (Plus, if you’re speaking as a brutish half-orc into your computer and people in your household happen to be around, crippling embarrassment can detract from your performance. Yes, I’m saying this from experience.)

Personally, I also dislike playing D&D online because it ties me to my laptop for another six hours. Since I work from home, I spend a lot of time on my computer. A lot. And even though D&D can be an enjoyable pastime, when it keeps me glued to this computer, it starts to share that work vibe.

Don’t get me wrong. I’d rather play D&D online than not play D&D at all. Playing online during the pandemic is like using a crutch to walk when you have a limp. The crutch helps you get from point A to point B; you need the crutch. But that wouldn’t stop you from wishing the limp would go away so you could just walk like you normally do.

It’s just not the same.

The Abandoned Mall

Two weeks ago, I went to the mall to get a gift for my boyfriend’s mother. While I was there, I decided to take a look around the building. I was curious. I had not been to the mall since March, back when the stay-at-home order was enacted where I live. And prior to these COVID-19 restrictions, I had visited the local mall fairly regularly. It was a go-to place for me and my friends. (In my defense, it had the nicest movie theater attached to it.)

I live in a teeny tiny town, okay? The mall is the only place to go.

So I took it upon myself to walk through the whole thing once, just to see how things have changed.

It was depressing.

I should have expected it to be a distressing sight. I should have known that changes would have occurred over the seven months I had been sheltering in my home.

But staying at home with my video games, books, puzzles, and pillows blinded me to everything that was going on outside my front door. And given the state of my town, state, country, continent, and world at large, can you blame me for hunkering down and taking enjoyment from stories and distractions?

Walking around that shell of a mall was a rude alarm clock of an awakening.

There were very few people wandering around, and they could be categorized into two types: those who rushed around trying to do their business as quickly as possible and those who lingered at stores trying to act as if nothing had changed.

A quarter of the stores were closed. Others were just gone. The Disney Store, with its Mickey Mouse-shaped entrance, had disappeared entirely. My pretzel place was closed. Ramshackle antibacterial gel stations were placed in front of stores like Forever 21, Victoria’s Secret, and Bath & Body Works. Store employees manned these plastic tables, looking desperate to entice scared customers to step inside.

My favorite smoothie place in the whole world was open, but I didn’t buy my usual strawberry-banana smoothie. I was barreling though the place in dismay.

The haircut place was gone. As of this writing, I know of only one local place open where I could potentially get my hair cut.

The GameStop was also gone, windowed walls plastered over. That hurt a bit more than the haircut place.

But what hurt the most was walking into the food court. All the tables and chairs were piled in a mass by the inactive merry-go-round. Only two of the food stalls were open. And unfortunately, the one that sells my all-time favorite noodles was closed. I mean, I know that stir fry on an open stove is not a hot commodity right now. But that was my favorite thing to eat in the whole world. And there is a very real possibility, if that business doesn’t stay afloat, I will never eat them again.

I rushed out of the mall after that with a pit in my stomach.

Social distancing and wearing a mask need to happen. I know and understand that.

But I still feel sad at how much has changed.

I’ve Got Mask Mania

Okay, I’ve gone on poetic diatribes about why people should be wearing masks and social distancing during a pandemic, but can I just take a moment to talk about how much I actually love masks? It sucks if you don’t enjoy wearing one, but holy hell, I’m having so much fun with my masks. There are just so many reasons for me to wear a mask, that I thought I’d spend today sharing with you, my Above Average readers, why I, your Below Average Blogger, think they’re awesome.

It Makes Me Feel Like a Costumed Vigilante

Granted, a lot of super heroes don’t actually wear face coverings, such as Superman with his perfectly chiseled features and piercing blue eyes.

But a lot of stellar heroes do wear masks, like Spider-Man, The Question, and Sister Night. And even though I’m nowhere near them in terms of coolness, wearing a mask makes me feel like I could (in theory) be a hero.

Is this childish?

Heck yes.

Do I care?

Not in the slightest.

Masks Hide My Least Favorite Features

I’m honestly not too fond of my face.

You know how sometimes hearing your voice recorded and played back to you is thoroughly off-putting?

That’s what it feels like to see my face sometimes.

Just as my voice sounds like it doesn’t belong in my throat, I occasionally don’t really connect with the face I see in the mirror. It’s me, but it doesn’t look like me.

Side note: This is incredibly strange to actually type out. It makes me sound a tad psychotic. Don’t worry. I’m perfectly fine. These are just errant thoughts I occasionally get. (Oh geez, that sounds exactly like what a psychotic person would say to explain this away.)

A mask covers the majority of my face, leaving only my eyes to stare out. (Which is fine by me. My eyes are below average and good-humored, which totally jives with how I perceive myself.)

It’s a Gracious Gesture Toward Others

Lately, I’ve been working on my bows, so that I can perfect a pandemic-era salutation. It’s actually harder than it sounds. You want to come across as gracious, while not looking like you’re being abysmally subservient.

And a mask is the perfect thing to complement my courtesy in bowing.

See, what a lot of people don’t seem to get is that masks aren’t intended to protect you from getting sick. Masks are intended to protect others. When I wear a mask, I’m wearing it on the off chance I’m an asymptomatic carrier. It is a symbol of my respect and regard for others around me.

And that kind of civility really appeals to me.

I Get To Look Like Richard Nixon

Okay, Nixon is definitely not my favorite US president. In fact, he’s somewhere near the bottom in a ranking of every president that ever took the Presidential Oath of Office.

But I do enjoy coming back inside after a summer walk with my mask (I live in a place with temperatures consistently 100 degrees Fahrenheit or hotter), taking off my mask in front of the bathroom mirror, staring at the slick sheen of sweat on my upper lip, and then caustically muttering, “Well, when the president does it, that means it is not illegal” like Frank Langella from Frost/Nixon.

It’s funny.

They Come in Different Colors

Personally, I did not go on a mask spending-spree when social distancing was put into effect in March.

However, both my mother and her sisters went absolutely nuts buying a bunch of masks, of all colors and types.

My mother got me some homemade ones from a friend of hers, and those come in navy blue, light blue with rainbow flowers, light grey with white spirals, and black. She also got a few from some stores, including a plain white and a bright red.

My tias (aunts), always looking at the heights of fashion, got me silk and cotton masks made by designer Johnny Was.

Fucking silk.

I didn’t know who the heck Johnny Was was, but he makes some damn fine masks. I feel uber cool wearing his pleated and floral wares.

If you find yourself traveling during this time, be sure to do yourself and others a favor by wearing a mask when out in public. It is not only the decent thing to do, but it is the fun thing to do, too.

I think I’m going to keep on wearing masks in the future. I’ve grown rather fond of it.

I mean, clearly, since I just wrote an entire blog post about it.

Finally, Some Sister Time

I’ve missed my sister immensely.

People don’t always understand how close I am to my sister. Alya and I have been each other’s best friends for my entire life, and there is no shaking that kind of connection.

We’re so close, we’ve laughed at the demonstrations of sisterly affection in Frozen. Elsa and Anna are nowhere near our levels of closeness, and both Alya and I know this for a fact. “I mean,” Alya has said, “I think I love you so much, I would not be able to stop hanging out with you even if I found out I had ice powers and it might get you hurt.”

This particular analogy got tested during the pandemic.

Suddenly, both Alya and I were faced with the very real possibility that hanging out with each other could hurt us.

We held out for a good solid five months. Then, after assessing the risk and deciding we wanted to see each other more than we worried about getting sick and potentially dying, we arranged for me to stay with her for a week.

Side note: Yeah, we were hysterically morbid, about the whole thing.

I’ve been quarantining far more than Alya, so she got tested right before I arrived. That didn’t stop us from being nervous on the car drive over to her house. We asked each other about how comfortable we were wearing masks, what we should expect in the next few days, and a few other precautions.

That’s when “Bohemian Rhapsody” came on the radio.

I mean…were we just supposed to not sing it?

We belted out the lyrics with gusto, spraying who knows how much spit into the car, and we finally relaxed.

When we got back to her house, we were just engrossed with each other. I swear, it was like Christmas. I woke up in my specially made-up guest room every day excited to hang out with Alya. I spent every waking moment of my visit with her.

We exercised on her elliptical together, listening to the ultimate bop-master, TheFatRat the entire time. We drank coffee in the mornings and hung out in her backyard while her adorable pupsters, Ushi, lay down on the sidewalk next to us. We watched The Lord of The Rings, the extended editions, through to completion, quoting it at every turn and, if it was evening, taking a drink every time Sam said “Mister Frodo.” We tried reenacting the dance number from the “Genghis Khan” music video, only to find to our dismay that they actually used professional dancers in it and we couldn’t faithfully replicate their moves. We ate inadvisable amounts of Hot Cheetos Puffs with white wine in the evening. We drank Sauvignon Blanc and spent a few minutes trying to say it in exaggerated French accents. We cuddled with Ushi and gave her a bath in the middle of the day. And (suckily) we attended to our respective work schedules, too.

Ushi and I are best buds. Clearly.

That single week was seriously one of the best of my life. The threat of potentially getting sick hung over my head for the first few days, but the opportunity of just spending time with my sister (in the house, never out and about, mind you) was obliteratingly positive. Unbeknownst to me, a knot of anxiety had slowly been building up inside of me while Alya and I were apart. But when we were together, it’s like she just pulled and poked the knot away.

Upon arriving back home, it felt like I was missing something.

We have made plans for the future, a joint birthday party to which no one is invited except us and Halloween dress-up plans to look like Merry and Pippin. I look forward to seeing her again.

At the time of this writing, I just got tested for COVID-19. It felt like the smart thing to do after returning home, and I’m currently waiting for my results. I feel fine. And honestly, the test wasn’t that bad. I think my unnaturally large nasal cavities (thanks to my grotesque schnozz) have given me the capacity to have giant Q-Tips stuck in them and twirled around for samples without much discomfort.

I think people should be careful when planning visits to their family and friends at this point, as the pandemic still looms over all our heads, but I have no leg to stand on when it comes to restricting travel. I had to see Alya. However, communication is key. Be open and honest with comfort levels and risk assessments.

And I sincerely hope that everyone gets the chance to feel as happy as I did that week.

Murder Hornets and More: 2020 Is Apparently the Year That Keeps On Giving

Murder hornets.

Seriously?

Murder hornets?

Ugh.

I schedule my posts way in advance, so I’m typing this right as Murder Hornets have become relevant in current news. For all I know, by the time this post is published in a few weeks, maybe they’ll have all flown away.

Yeah. Right.

So just in case you haven’t heard, a type of Asian hornet has somehow made it to North American shores, and it’s just another dump on the shit-heap of stuff that has happened this year. Vespa mandarinia is considered the largest hornet in the world, and it is absolutely savage in how it takes apart bees. That’s how it earned the “Murder Hornet” moniker. It rips their heads off.

These hornets are not really out to target humans (though their sting purportedly hurts a ton), but our agricultural honeybees are in danger. I mean, they’re in more danger than they used to be. Honeybees have a hard life anyway, what with vanishing colonies and all.

The last thing the bees need are Murder Hornets.

Goddamn Murder Hornets. Could they have been named something a little less foreboding? A little less apropos?

It’s not just me that’s feeling like 2020 is shaping up to be a very shitty year, is it? Normally, bad years are highly individual things. 2016 was a terrible year for me personally, but I had a phenomenal 2019. It’s all a matter of personal experience and perspective.

But I think everyone can agree that 2020 is a globally shitty year.

I’ve been keeping to routines, trying to help out family and friends who are more anxious than me, but current events are starting to wear me down.

Especially now with flubbing Murder Hornets all over my news feed.

Sometimes, on my walks that I take around the neighborhood, I imagine how these times will be talked about in the future. How everything will go down in history. It’s strange to think that I’m a part of it. I’m living through history right now. We all are.

It’s nice conceptually, but damn fucking unpleasant to actually experience.

My friend Mia, whenever we play Dungeons & Dragons with our party, she plays the cautious and practical character. And she swears up and down that the worst curse you can lay on someone’s doorstep is “May you live in interesting times.”

I’m really understanding her point now.

Of Pandemic Proportions

Hey, guys.

So as you might have noticed, there’s a bit of a global pandemic going on. COVID-19 is running rampant, and societies across the globe are doing their best to try and halt its progress.

Quite frankly, it’s a little overwhelming.

Numbers are being thrown in my face every day by news outlets. Not an hour goes by that my phone doesn’t receive some kind of alert, be it from social media, a news app, or my email, regarding the coronavirus. Some of my more…anxious…family members are not handling the situation well at all.

And even though my lifestyle is more than well-suited to being in quarantine, the word itself inspires discomfort and a tiny degree of terror.

That said, I’m doing okay.

I’m looking on the bright side, and this whole social distancing thing isn’t all that bad.

I’m spending way more time with my beloved bird, Froley. My writing output has never been higher. My walks feel more special because they are the only times I leave the house now. In order to mark this self-imposed isolation, I’ve taken to doing puzzles, and the practice is quite relaxing. (Except for that one time when I knocked the table I was working on with my knee, and I lost a good chunk of the puzzle. That was traumatizing.) Playing video games feels like I’m performing a civic duty now that going out to socialize is frowned upon.

All in all, it could be worse.

And I know that for some families, with loved ones suffering from the illness, it is worse.

If you’re feeling overwhelmed by the whole thing, you’ve come to the right place. I’m here if you just want to talk (about anything) or vent (about mostly anything).

I’m a Below Average writer, gamer, person, you name it, I suck at it.

But I do want you to know that I’m a slightly above average listener.

And if you feel alone, I’m here for you.

Remotely.

But you know what I mean.