Health Update

It's been a bit over a year since my body betrayed me with all of my various composite bits staging seemingly independent but actually interconnected rebellions, and since then we seem to have arrived at a truce.

As a result of my immune system and other various bits agreeing to end the strike combined with the healthy eating habits and sheer amount of walking I've incorporated into my life, I feel pretty normal for the most part and consider myself to be exceptionally lucky.

Recently, I've had another round of blood tests and the news is decent.

Various scores that were up and shouldn't have been are continuing to head downwards in an orderly fashion, and are almost where they should be, and the most important score has taken a step in the right direction so I'm no longer right on the borderline where relapsing into an inflammatory condition seemed like a question of which way the wind was blowing.

Of course, the most important score is the one my doctor has warned me may never completely recover. She described it as being like a marker that shows something has happened to me, much like an X-ray will show a healed fracture.
As a result, barring some Wolverine-esque recovery it looks like I'm a teetotaller and decaf drinker.

I'd be more upset about that if I hadn't decided right from the start to treat the situation as if it were permanent.
That way if I was wrong, rejoicing!
And if I was right, well then, I'd be used to it.

I don't have to miss coffee and tea too much as I've found some tasty decaf versions and have a whole range of hippy-dippy herbal teas available to me.

I know carob in no way replaces chocolate but I've always had a bit of a Stockholm Syndrome for carob thanks to my primary school canteen and I've recently discovered that you can get caffeine-free chocolate, no idea what it tastes like yet but we'll see.

So the big'un is alcohol. Alcohol-removed wine smells like wine but mostly tastes like grape juice so it's not the replacement that decaf coffee/tea is. I can cook with alcohol as when you cook things properly the alcohol evaporates off leaving you with tasty foods.
Of course, considering I didn't start drinking until I was 19, I was late to the game and leaving it just makes it feel like a phase I was going through :-P

I do miss alcohol and chocolate but thanks to my scare I have absolutely NO TEMPTATION to have any because if I got sick again I'd probably get RSI kicking myself at which point I would hire other people to kick me. Forever.

A lucky feature of my weird memory and my adaptive personality is that it's been a year since my last drink and I just about can't remember what being drunk/tipsy feels like. I have this vague impression but it just doesn't seem to actually have anything to do with me. Booze still smells delicious but as far as taste* and effect go it's almost like thinking about something that I've read about but never experienced.
Thanks, weirdo brain! That's actually a huge help!

I'm going to keep taking care of myself and appreciate every day that I feel good because worrying about what might happen later down the track is just a waste of what I have now and I am certainly not about to take that for granted.

All in all, things are going well, so hooray for that!



*As long as I don't actually stick my nose in a glass or bottle of something and take a big sniff at which point my tastebuds start excitedly explaining how they remember it tasting and getting nostalgic.

Don't Mind If I Do

Looking at myself in the bathroom mirror as I wash my hands, I can't at first work out what is bothering me about this outfit and then it hits me.

This hoodie makes me look like a Jedi.

It is at least three sizes too big and is of a manly cut for manly shoulders so it drapes like a cowl and draws closed like robes.

And I have no idea where it came from.

I mean, I know where I got it from but before that the trail gets a little muddy.

I'm not making any sense, let me try again.

The universe gives me jackets.

It does.

On no less than three and no more than five occasions, friends or colleagues have approached me holding out a jacket and said "You left this behind."

I didn't, it isn't mine.

I tell them this and they shrug and say something to the effect of "Whatever, it's been sitting here for over a month, you want it?"

And what the hell, sure, why not, free jacket.

They're invariably at least a size too big but always incredibly warm and cosy and no-one has ever, ever come looking for them again.

I've checked periodically for months afterward if anyone has come looking for their jacket until I am gripped firmly by the shoulders by an exasperated acquaintance who requests very, very politely that I please, for the love of God, stop asking. Just. Keep. The. Damn. Jacket.

Seeing as this is a very odd thing to happen to somebody more than once and definitely a strange thing to happen almost a half dozen times I've decided to go the egocentric route and take this as a sign that the universe wants me to be warm.

This means one of two things.

Option 1: I am inherently important.

Option 2: The universe is in cahoots with my mother who never thinks that I dress warmly enough.

Seeing as the universe hasn't started randomly handing me babies* or sending me baby magazines like it did to Lucy Knisley (see 6pm), it is obviously Option 1.

So if you feel obligated to pay me tribute I wouldn't be averse to that.

I expect it to arrive in the form of jackets.



*Mum never used to be like that but in the last five years she's gotten very 'Oh look at the babies!'
It's... disconcerting...