Day Five of Utter Hell

Day One: Friday. I felt a cough coming on. Figured, oh well, better take come cough medicine.

Day Two: Saturday. I woke up in intense pain all over my body. I was coughing more and had an alternately stuffy/runny nose and some chest congestion, but I could withstand those symptoms. But the back pain was blinding. I took some cold medicine with painkillers.

Day Three: Sunday. I felt like I couldn’t move. I felt incredibly weak all over. Bright lights hurt my eyes. I was so cold and unable to get warm, even in bed with the electric blanket cranked all the way up. I took the hottest bath I had even taken in my life because my skin was so cold. I got out of the tub and almost passed out. Instead, I just lay on the floor for a while with the towel around me, wondering if I could yell loudly enough to get Seppo’s attention. After several minutes of whimpering on the floor, I realized that I was getting colder again and somehow got myself dressed and back into bed. My head spun and I felt so weak. I felt like I understood for the first time how harsh the flu can be on old people and on children. I was alternating between being too cold and breaking out into a sweat all day.

Day Four: Monday. Luckily, I had Monday off, so I didn’t have to worry about missing work. I woke up on Monday feeling tons better. I felt my body kicking back in its ability to generate some body heat on its own sometime during the night. I woke up and I was able to get out of bed and answer the phone. I was able to make breakfast for Seppo and me. (Seppo and I had been alternating who was taking care of whom based on who felt crappier at the time; he had almost fully recovered by Friday, but had a relapse.) I even went outside to pick some mint for honey-mint tea. I felt like I was gonne be 100% by Tuesday. The worst symptom I had was sinus pressure and pain from congested nasal passages, but some other cold medicine took care of that.

Day Five: Tuesday. I woke up and it was like Saturday all over again. Arg. Maybe yesterday was like Seppo’s false recovery on Friday.

And of course, there are things I really must get done for work, so I am working from home today. I just hope I can focus enough.

useless talent

I have quite the talent for getting sick over weekends and long weekends, in particular. This being a long weekend, I of course got sick. It allows me to feel wrecked for all of the weekend then return to work a pitiful mess. Yay! Not yay.

Seppo has been sick for days, and just last night, I started to feel ill. I started the all-too-familiar cough. This morning, I woke up and sounded like ass on a stick. Actually, I don’t have any idea what that sounds like, but I had a good time saying it, unlike the un-good time I having right now.

The worst of it seems to be my intense backpain. I can bear the scratchy throat, the chest congestion, the itchy roof-of-mouth, the plugged up nose — and the drugs seem to be working reasonably well for those symptoms — but I can’t bear the backpain. Ow. It really, really hurts. It especially hurts when I cough. If I lay perfectly still after a dose of cough medicine, I can keep from coughing, but the backpain doesn’t go away, even though the drugs I’m taking all have huge doses of painkillers.

Yar.

Book Review: My Sister’s Keeper, by Jodi Picoult

WARNING: I am told (by Holly in the comments) that the Amazon reviews have spoilers in them. Be careful!

I just finished reading this book late Monday night. I should just be honest and admit it was early Tuesday morning.

I like books that make me feel emotions I’m unfamiliar with. I like books that challenge my assumptions. This book did those things. I would give it a 4 out of 5, with the last point deducted for having a couple of side stories that seemed to detract from the plot (or add nothing) and having one character that didn’t feel fully fleshed out.

In summary, the book is about a thirteen year old girl Anna who files a lawsuit to be granted medical emancipation from her parents. She was conceived to be a perfect cord blood donor to her older sister Kate, who suffers from a rare form of leukemia. She has spent all of her life acting as donor in increasingly invasive and dangerous procedures for her sister. The latest thing she’s asked to do is to donate her kidney t oher sister, for whom the chances of yet another recovery look slim.

Given the controversial topic, this book could easily have been extremely trite and manipulative, squeezing the plot for people acting in shocking and scandalous ways. But instead, the author crafted a story full of real, flawed characters that have complex motivations and personalities. The relationship between the main characters and her parents and her sister vividly show that it’s not a simple case of her family treating her like she’s just a donor and that it’s not a case of her just wanting to be seen as a person. The pain and empathy between each set of characters is palpable, and it was unclear how the story would wrap up.

If you want to be challenged by the difficult decisions people make and struggle with your own sense of what’s right, I would recommend this book. Setting up some characters as “good” and “bad” in the story within the first few chapters became meaningless as I continued with the story because they simply became people who were trying their best with something they had never faced before. If you don’t like books that make you sad, stay far from this book.

The author’s prose flows quite easily, being simple and straightforward, rather than overly flowerly or overwraught. The use of multiple first-person views (each chapter is from a different character’s perspective) covering a two week period (with some flashbacks) was pretty good, although some character’s voices were not as distinct as others.

This is my second Jodi Picoult book. I’d also read The Pact a couple of years ago. It was also very well-written and has stayed with me ever since.

breathing out of sheer desperation*

*Title of blog entry stolen from a friend’s blog.

Seppo and I have been talking about b.o. as a result of A_B’s post about how much people stink and don’t know it. Somehow, it segued to my morning breath (everyone has it! stop looking at me!) which then made me wonder if the intensity is related to the fact that when I sleep, I generally breathe through my mouth because I have a hard time breathing through my nose while sleeping. Seriously, it sucks. I wake up every single morning feeling like my nose is so stuffy that I feel like I’m fighting for my breath. It doesn’t seem to be a lung issue because I feel fine when I breathe through my mouth.

Anyway, my conjecture is that sleeping with a slightly open mouth leads to greater overnight bacterial growth then sleeping with a fully closed mouth, because active saliva flow acts as a bacterial deterrent. Sleeping with my mouth slightly open gives bacteria the perfect breeding ground: wet, moist, and aerated.

To test this hypothesis, we purchased a box of clear nasal strips (the regular, non-mentholated, non-vapor kind) last night:

Whoa. When I put that on right before bed, I had this overwhelming feeling like I was taking my first good breath of the last… um… well, for as long as I can actively remember. Wow. Man.

This morning, I woke up and realized that I hadn’t woken up in the middle of the night last night, as I have for the last I-have-no-idea-how-long. Every night, I wake up a good three or four times and I wake up feeling so tired, so matter how many hours I had spent in bed. This morning, I won’t say I didn’t feel tired, but at least I had slept through the night! Woo!

As to the hypothesis, Seppo thought my morning breath was less stinky than usual. Certainly, my throat felt less dry than usual, as a result of not having to breathe through my mouth. I am gonna use these every night, yo.

When I took off the little strip, it felt like I was submerging myself under water. Maybe since I’m working from home today, I’ll just put one on while I work.

Romance Novel Rant

Related to my last post, one of my pet peeves is people who think romance novel == stupid fluff (and the corollary to that, that romance novel reader == stupid bimbo). Outlander is not a romance novel, but I’ve certainly devoured more than my fair share of romance novels.

Here is a new flash: romance novels range from absolute trite nonsense to brilliant works of literature just like any other genre. Shocking. Just as in other maligned literary genres (such as sci-fi, fantasy, graphic novel, suspense), there is a lot of dross to wade through before hitting gold. In each genre, there is a certain focus or theme that makes the genre what it is, and in the case of romance, the focus is on relationships, whether that means people falling in love for the first time or people examining their evolving relationship over a course of decades.

My two favorite “comfort reading” genres are historical romance novels and British cozies (term for murder mysteries that take place in tiny quiet British towns). Historical romance novels are interesting to me because unlike many other historical fiction, they spend a lot of time also covering tidbits like local customs, social hierarchies, and styles of dress, rather than focusing solely on politics.

Ok, so now we’re cooking with rambling! 😀 Anyway, the second point I was going to make is that even if you are hung up over the idea that something called a romance novel must be shallow fluff, the books of the Outlander series were seriously miscategorized anyway. They were originally published under romance, but got moved to historical fiction, then moved again to literary fiction, then again to romance, then for a bit to paranormal. I think it depends on your bookstore. My feeling is that it belongs in historical fiction because so much of the stories is about the major historical events and politics and how they impacted the people involved. The book also deals with love, relationships, and sex, which is why it is/was in the romance section.

One of the elements that I love the most (aside from the detailed descriptions of 1700s medical practices) is that it’s like real life: there is laughter, there is pain. Really bad things happen to good people and you hope they get through them. Some do, some don’t. But it’s all written in an engaging way. Some you root for. Some you hope never get mentioned again in the stories. There is moral ambiguity, questions of honor, loyalty, oaths, merciful killings? The stories are full of grit of the daily routine of life. I hate books that are just one-note: all suspenseful or all serious or all humor. They feel so lifeless to me.

Blah blah blah.

Book Review: A Breath of Snow and Ashes, by Diana Gabaldon

I just finished reading “A Breath of Snow and Ashes”, by Diana Gabaldon. I am not sure what I want to write here as I don’t want to give any spoilers, but I definitely liked it more than “The Fiery Cross”. I would rank the books as follows:

1. Outlander (1st book)
2. Voyager (3rd book)
3. Dragonfly in Amber (2nd book)
4. A Breath of Snow and Ashes (6th book)
5. Drums of Autumn (4th book)
6. The Fiery Cross (5th book)

Seppo asked me if I thought this would be the last book in the series. It was originally planned to be, but then again, so were the 3rd, 4th, and 5th books. What I’ve heard is that as the author writes her story, she finds that there is too much material before the “end” for her to cram into the current book, so she simply leaves it for the next book. However, this book did really feel like there were a lot of things being wrapped up, a lot of looming questions that had been answered.

All in all, it was a really satisfying experience. If I ever take an extended period of time off from work or something, I hope to be able to read all the books back-to-back again, which will take a considerable amount of time as each book averages around 1000 pages. The worst part is that the stories are so compelling that it is hard to put the books down to go to sleep once you start.

Hopefully, the following information will not be spoiler-y. (Click on this link to see my comments.)This book takes place between 1774-1776 in a colonial settlement in North Carolina, beginning with the seeds of rumblings of the American Revolution.

The story finds Jamie and Claire settled on Fraser’s Ridge, with their daughter Brianna, her husband Roger, and their child Jemmy residing in a cabin nearby. They’ve helped settle a group of Scottish immigrants in the area, people Jamie had known during Culloden.

Hmm. You know, I think I am going to give too much information. I am going to have to switch to my reactions and impressions rather than what happens in the story.

Ok, then. If you are a fan of the Outlander series, you will be extremely happy to know that a lot of the common open questions we have had over the years have come to reasonable, satisfying conclusions. The writing feels somewhat more fast-paced than the last book, and once in a while, I felt like it was really too much happening too fast. But that’s not necessarily a complaint, as it tries to convey the difficulty of living in colonial America, where everyday tragedies were, well, frequent.

Each character, many of them existing characters with a small set of newer characters, has a life of his or her own. You can see the person and understand each person’s motivations as things happen, and it makes sense. And yet, the plot unfolds in a way that keeps you in suspense, even knowing that the American Revolution is coming and that the Americans will win.

Eh. Just go out and get the book if you are a fan. It’s better than the last one, as I said. If you are not a fan, for the love of monkey, read Outlander first. I’ll even buy you a copy if you show any interest. Seriously. Leave me a comment and I’ll get you a copy.

resolutions

Another new year, another set of resolutions.

Last year, Seppo and I came through on setting a date for the wedding and starting the planning. I lost some weight. I wrote my second NaNoWriMo novel.

This year, I’d like to do the following:

• Health:
1. Finish my weight loss goal and ensure that there is a corresponding body fat percentage loss. Continue to grow more aware of the nutritional value of the food I intake. Try to eat only things I enjoy instead of cramming my gullet with general crap out of habit.
2. Work up to do a 5K run for my birthday? I want to evaluate my current running capability before committing to this. I suppose if I am really unable to run it, I could just walk it but it would make me feel really wussy. Haha.
• Work:
1. Figure out what I want to do with my long term career. Vague, but it would be good for me to stare at this goal everyday.
• Relationships:
1. Call my mom every week and don’t be a snot when I’m on the phone with her.
2. Go see my family at least twice a year, once they are all in the same place. I should really get it through my head that short trips are ok if it means that I can see them more often.
3. Email and call old friends regularly.
4. See local friends more regularly.
5. Really live out the idea that each action and each word can be a supporting brick in the foundation of my relationships, or it can be a separating brick in the wall between me and the people I love. Add to the foundation.
6. Take Mobi to more fun places and think of rainy-day activities for him to do.
7. Finish planning and get married. Haha.
• Home:
1. Learn habits to decrease clutter.
2. Learn habits to keep clutter out.
• Self-improvement and time management:
1. Learn one new major skill.
2. Limit tv to one hour max per weekday. If someone else starts watching tv that I wasn’t going to watch, go do something else.
3. Limit tv to three hours max over the weekend.
4. Limit book buying to maximum of one per three owned-but-not-yet-read book I finish.
5. Write a little blurb about each book and movie I watch.
6. No more dvds this year.
7. Unless I am instant messaging with my sister in Korea, no personal computer time after 8:30pm (except quick forays to look up map/movie/etc info).