health – Page 4 – dangermouse.net

Almost over COVID?

Last night during my ethics classes I was still coughing a little bit. I had three more classes tonight, and I don’t think I coughed once during them. It’s slowly been improving day by day, but has always been worse later in the day, and also when I’m talking a lot. So to get through classes in the evening without having a coughing fit was really good, and I’m taking it as a good sign. I do still feel a little clogged in the sinuses though and slightly muzzy-headed, which makes it a little difficult to concentrate on things, but I think that’s also improving.

Today I went out with my wife and Scully for lunch. We did a bit of a drive across a few suburbs to a nice park where Scully can run around. It’s usually empty on a weekday at lunchtime, when I’ve taken her there before, but I forgot it’s school holidays and there were several kids playing various types of football and basketball and also exercising dogs. Scully’s always a bit nervous around strange dogs, but they were far away enough that she could chase a ball and not get too close, so she got some good exercise.

Apart from that I’ve really just done a bit of comics work and taken it easy kind of goofing off and browsing stuff on the net in a time-wastey sort of way.

New content today:

Cough is still very annoying

This post-COVID cough is really lingering and being annoying. It’s better in the mornings but gets worse in the evening. A neighbour was telling me this evening that he and his partner had coughs for weeks afterwards.

I went for another 2.5k run today, hoping to improve my time from yesterday, but I ended up recording exactly the same time. Which is a good 15-20 seconds slower than what I was doing before COVID. I feel like it would have been difficult to do much better in my current state. Hopefully things will improve as I shake off the lingering remnants.

Other than that I worked on building up more buffer for Darths & Droids today. And I decided we should go out for dinner to the local pizza place – our first dinner out since having COVID – since it’s the night before the Easter long weekend, and nothing will be open tomorrow.

New content today:

Anaesthetic-free dentistry

I had an appointment with my dentist first thing this morning. I had a tooth filled back in January because it was giving me some pain when eating. The dentist then said that one of the old fillings was flexing, and he replaced it. It was fine up until last week when I chipped the tooth while eating, so I made the appointment for this morning. I thought it might have been the filling again, but the dentist took one look and said with relief, “Oh! It’s not my filling, it’s the tooth that broke! I feel a lot better now!”

Then he said he’d try to repair the chipped area without anaesthesia, and to just let him know if it hurt. Then he started drilling. In fairness, there wasn’t much drilling and indeed it didn’t hurt much – there were a couple of quick twinges, but nothing horrible. The whole thing only took about 5 or 6 minutes. So overall, avoiding having an anaesthetic was a plus. And as a bonus he didn’t charge me for the quick repair work since it was a follow-up on a tooth he’d fixed recently.

From the dentist’s office, I walked over to my wife’s work to pick up Scully and take her home. We went a long way, doing a 6 km loop via the Naremburn bakery, where I grabbed a croissant for energy to walk home again.

With no teaching today, I concentrated on writing and making Darths & Droids comics. At lunch time I took Scully for a drive, to the Drummoyne Bakehouse, which is not too far and has nice meat pies. I had a chicken bourguignon and a Mexican beef pie, and a small ricotta tart as a dessert. I got Scully to run around the park near the bakery for a bit before we drove home. She had a lot of exercise today and slept much of the rest of the afternoon.

Here’s a photo!

For dinner tonight I made calzones, filled with spinach and ricotta, with a hot tomato sauce to pour over the top.

New content today:

COVID day 9

Feeling mostly better from COVID, I did another rapid antigen test today, expecting it to be clear. But, lo… it tested positive. Apparently my body is fighting it off nicely, but hasn’t vanquished the foe fully yet.

This morning I felt well enough to go on a 2.5k run. I felt like I took it a bit easy, not wanting to strain myself, but I ended up recording exactly the same time as my last pre-COVID run. Although in hindsight, that was probably during the incubation period, before I’d started noticing any symptoms, so I might have been a bit affected then, too.

After the run, I did a housecleaning, since I missed it last weekend due to being sick. Washed the bathroom and shower, vacuumed everywhere, emptied and refilled the damp absorbers.

Also did a long walk with Scully and my wife (who is still home sick from work, of course). And a shorter one in the early evening, when I took the chance to pop into the small local supermarket to buy some biscuits and mascarpone to make myself some pseudo-tiramisu for dessert, since we’re out of any other sort of sweets. I made a variation of this recipe for peanut butter and jam tiramisu. I made it with hot chocolate instead of coffee, because I don’t eat/drink coffee. They’re in the fridge chilling, and I’m looking forward to trying one later this evening.

New content today:

COVID day 7

I feel mostly better today, after a better night’s sleep. The last thing is this lingering throat tightness and coughing, which is pretty bad. It’s difficult talking for long without breaking into coughing.

Today I did some real work though. I had to write a report on the ISO Photography Standards meeting I attended in February, for Standards Australia, ahead of our follow-up national meeting on Friday. I’d intended to write it last week, but got cut short by COVID. The meeting was to be held in person in the city, but the project manager contacted me to suggest moving it to Zoom, which I agreed to.

In between writing parts of that report, I went for a walk with my wife (who is feeling a bit better today too) and Scully, trying to beat the heavy rain that fell most of the afternoon.

New content today:

Mending from COVID

I’m definitely on the upswing from my COVID infection. Last night was the best night’s sleep I had since last Wednesday, although unfortunately my wife had a restless one. I think her symptoms are a bit less severe than mine overall. But she’s a few days behind me, and today I felt mostly okay except for sinus congestion and coughing, milder than yesterday.

Today I worked on some Darths & Droids comics, and did some planning for the next Dungeons & Dragons game session with my friends, which will be on 21 April.

I’ve also been spending some time migrating notes from OneNote into Obsidian. I’m deep into a lot of the roleplaying game material now, and reorganising it more logically as I go. Over the years I’ve collected a lot of ideas and tips for running games, writing adventures, house rules, random tables of stuff, and miscellaneous bits and pieces. And migrating them is making me look at them all one by one, and simulating lots of creative ideas in my mind…

New content today:

Scully’s 5th birthday!

Today was the Big 5 for Scully! (Not the big 5-0, just the big 5 🤣) She got a wrapped gift from our neighbours, which she had fun tearing the paper off, revealing a… llamacorn. Yeah, a rainbow coloured llama-unicorn toy. She got into it and gave it a good chew so that was a hit.

I slept poorly during the night. The COVID has moved up to resemble a bad head cold, with blocked sinuses and dripping nose. I could lie on my back without my nose running, but I’m a side sleeper and don’t feel comfortable lying on my back and can’t fall asleep that way. But whenever I rolled into a comfortable positions on my side, my nose would start running within a few seconds and I had to jump out of bed, grab some tissues, and blow my nose. Rinse, repeat.

The annoying thing is I don’t feel especially sick – under the weather certainly, but not a complete mess – but I just can’t get a restful sleep. I haven’t had a proper night’s sleep since I first noticed symptoms on Wednesday. Today I didn’t have any more feverish spells or hot sweats, so I think things are on the mend. I’m hoping I can really conk out and sleep soundly tonight. My sinuses are still badly clogged, but hopefully not as runny as last night.

I decided to cancel ethics classes tomorrow, and also for Tuesday and Wednesday, because now I’ve cancelled more than half a week, so I figured I should just go ahead and cancel a full week’s worth, and shuffle my topics forward a week so none of the students actually miss out on any of the topics. I’m almost certain I won’t be able to go into the university tomorrow to teach Data Engineering there either.

New content today:

COVID day 4

Still feeling pretty miserable, though the symptoms are at least an ever-changing cavalcade of new sensations. Today I woke up with my sinuses and ears blocked. The throat doesn’t feel as gluggy, overtaken by sniffling, nose-blowing, and a general stuffy head. Again the morning was easier, but I developed feverish chills and aching muscles again in the late afternoon. Definitely not a pleasant disease, this.

Today was the New South Wales State election. Fortunately I’d gone up with my wife on Wednesday to a pre-polling station and cast my vote then, so I didn’t have to go do it today. We’ve had a conservative government here for the past 12 years, and looking at the very early results being counted as I type, it looks like a foregone conclusion that they’ll be voted out.

I took Scully for a short walk in the morning while my wife went out to pick up an item she’d ordered. She didn’t tell me about this until she got home with it: It’s a gift for Scully for her 5th birthday, which is tomorrow. It’s a new dog bed sewn out of some of my wife’s old clothes.

The idea is that her scent is all over it, so it’ll be familiar and comfortable for Scully to snuggle on.

Tonight we ordered some Indian food for dinner. We almost never order food delivered, but seeing as I can’t go out to a restaurant and didn’t feel too enthused about cooking myself, we decided it would be a good idea tonight.

New content today:

COVID day 3

Again my symptoms eased off overnight and I felt not too bad in the morning, but they’ve gotten worse again this evening. The main thing is alternating feverish chills with goosebumps and hot flushes with lots of sweating. My throat feels clogged with something like really thick phlegm. I’m coughing occasionally, but too badly, but it doesn’t help the clogged feeling much. I’m glad I don’t have a worse cough. Honestly, I’d rather have a fever than a persistent cough – I hate uncontrollable coughing.

Yesterday I’d cancelled all today’s ethics classes, and I’m glad I did. Teaching kids in this state would have been extremely mentally taxing. I took Scully for a walk a few times. I felt well enough to do that, making sure I didn’t go near anyone while outside. And apart from a little bit of comic writing, I’ve been relaxing and watching some TV.

I started watching the Netflix series Marianne, which is a French horror series. I have the English dub and the English subtitles on, since occasionally a train goes past and it becomes difficult to hear the dialogue for a few seconds. I’ve noticed that the English dialogue and the subtitles are wildly different. Not just a different word here and there, but whole different sentences. Sometimes the dub mentions something while the subtitles leave it out, and vice versa. And I noticed one occasion where the subtitles actually said the exact opposite of what the dialogue said. It’s actually somewhat entertaining to watch just to see the differences.

New content today:

Well, it finally happened

The night was pretty bad with my suspected flu. I was fevery and shivery for a few hours, than got hot. I’m not sure if I slept at all. By this morning I actually felt better. I did two ethics classes, hoping the worst was over. But it crept back over the course of the day.

I just did another COVID RAT test… and it’s positive. I’ve avoided it up until now. I was hoping my streak would continue, but it’s come to an end.

I cancelled tomorrow’s ethics classes, because if I feel like this tomorrow it’ll be a serious struggle.

New content today: