There are a hundred little ways which the pandemic has changed our lives, often without us noticing. For example: despite being at home, work now dominates my life in a way which isn’t conventionally true. Although I’ve been pretty-religious about keeping to an eight hour schedule at regular times outside of these times, for quite a long period, there wasn’t much else to do, to get engaged with. The only rhythm left was the work.
The past two weeks of holiday have really hammered this home to me. I’ve always been someone who spends the first few days of holiday fretting about work: there is always something which has been forgotten or which I didn’t have time to finish, always some kind of loose end, and I spend those early days thinking about it and worrying. It’s ridiculous and unhealthy, but after a couple of days I’m fine.
Not this time – it took basically the whole first week – and I’m convinced it’s because the pandemic has made things worse.
We actually went out to a pub to meet people on Thursday, which meant I got drunk on two pints and very drunk on four. That was psychologically weird. Part of me didn’t want to go, and I have no idea why. Fear of the unknown.
In other COVID-related news, I was tested to see if I could donate convalescent plasma. And it turns out that my antibody levels were too low to be of any use. The actual result is just negative or positive: if it’s negative, it doesn’t mean you haven’t had COVID, it just means it’s below a set number, so it could be zero or it could be “quite a lot but not enough”. As five months have elapsed since I had the bug (I think – there were no tests available then) it was always likely that my antibody levels would have declined.
There’s also a 30% chance of a false negative. The parameters are set pretty high because taking plasma is a complex and expensive process so it’s better, as my dad would have said, to be safe than sorry.
I’m slightly glad that I now don’t have to have my own blood taken from me, filtered, and put back in – but on the other hand, I wish that I had been of some use.
Stuff I’ve been reading
There’s an interesting concept of your present-self and future-self at work in this post. It’s worth reading.
Related: Obsessions with self improvement aren't always healthy. Sometimes it's just good to let yourself be:
The urges are not based on anything meaningful. They come from reading a magazine, or someone’s blog, and thinking, “Oh, that would be cool!” I read lists of things I should do someday, places I should go, achievements others have done … and the idea pops into my head that I should do them. Hey cool, let’s suddenly pursue a new goal! But this new fantasy in my head isn’t based on anything that matters, just a cool image that I have in my head about how awesome my life will be once I achieve this goal.
BRB moving to Switzerland
Lunchtime is sacred time in Switzerland. When I was on maternity leave, my husband came home for lunch to help me care for our daughter. This strengthened our marriage. Many families still reunite during weekdays over the lunch hour.
https://www.vox.com/2015/7/21/8974435/switzerland-work-life-balance
The planet is fucked, redux
The madness of airline elite status:
The costliest manifestations of GS-MAD are unnecessary year-end trips, called “mileage runs” in the frequent-flier community, which are cousins to the flights Walter Kirn’s protagonist in “Up in the Air” takes to meet his goal of a million lifetime miles. I asked around to find the highest amount anyone had heard of being spent on mileage runs: the winner was fifteen thousand dollars, by a friend of a friend, in a month.
I know someone who constantly berated those of us who bought a car because we didn’t live in an urban centre with adequate public transport while flying enough air miles every year to maintain the highest tier of frequent flier class on his chosen airline. One of the flights they take has enough carbon emissions attached to run a family car for a year.
Everyone has their blindspots about the environment, and this is just one example. There’s the concerned parent that complains about air quality around their school while driving their child there in an SUV, just the two of them. There’s pretty much anyone who understands the impact of meat and dairy farming on global warming but doesn’t become vegan.
But those who travel the globe to speak and attend conferences, flying long haul more than once a year? Yeah. Those ones annoy me more than most.
