Champagne and Socks

This is the end of my third day of sick leave. I took Friday off feeling really awful. I’d spent the week struggling on with a Crohn’s flareup that was making eating things I can generally tolerate quite unbearable. I had a mild asthma attack and used the nebuliser a couple of nights. And then Friday I woke up in agony – with some kind of head cold that never eventuated but my jaw drama had been slowly spreading to my neck which was losing mobility and causing me a searing headache. It was the last of these that had me admitting defeat and calling in sick.

I feel like I’m still in burnout and my body lacks robustness, knock me and I fall over. Work has been stressful since the beginning of July and shows no sign of abating. And that’s a problem.

On Monday I emailed in sick and my boss said I needed a medical certificate because it was the second consecutive day. I was kinda annoyed because really, I just needed to stay in bed and would have crawled in the day after. Turns out though, that he did me a favour because my doctor not only gave me yesterday and today off and would have given me tomorrow as well but I thought that excessive (I know, but I have deadlines and meetings later this week) but she also gave me drugs! To help! And had I not schlepped my arse 1.25 hours to the doctor and 1.25 hours back, I would have just pressed on and probably been no better for it next week and wanting just a day to catch my breath again.

I got chill pills. Looooottts of chill pills. I dunno that they’ll help the causes but at least they’re helping with the symptoms. And it turns out, if you’ve been under stress for a long period of time, it takes time for the effects of that to ebb away. So she wasn’t surprised and just nodded and so on. And she said “of course your Crohn’s is flaring up” and so on. So she gave me A LOT of chill pills. Really, they seem to be overkill. But … they’re good. They’re a combo of painkillers and muscle relaxants. And they’ll help my body to feel less stressed and clenched, which is how it feels. And you know, as I said, I would have dragged myself in to work again because, stress, you don’t do anything about that, do you? But … I didn’t realise til the pain stopped just how much pain I was in. And the label says “for severe pain” and I’m not sure that’s what it is, apart from the earache from the jaw clenching, but there’s chronic pain, and that all goes away for 6 beautiful hours at a time. And comes back on cue right when the next drugs are due.

I’m still not sure that the doctor …well last time I was there for the earache she made a comment about “all those lazy people who come in for medical certificates”  – and that’s totally why I didn’t take the third day! And I’m all still, you think she was being really sympathetic or fake sympathetic? But she’s usually pretty stingy with the drugs, every other time I’ve been there. And she’s given me like hundreds of days worth of painkillers here. I hope that’s not how long the pain is going to last.

1. The consensus seems to be that I should sell the damn washing machine already. Feedback has been received in multiple formats, including in real life and also my mother, and uh, yeah, everyone thinks I should get the hell over it already. Though I love that the TV is apparently a different story. Noone has voted for me to get rid of the TV.

You know what it is, and this is horrible to admit but, I don’t believe that I get to be happy. I think that’s why I’ve stayed in bad relationships and let people treat me badly, in the past. So I’m having trouble giving in and actually allowing myself to be happy. I feel like I should question it – not C, never C – but the bit where I get to have what I really want. Or that I would be tempting fate or my luck. But it’s just a freaking washing machine. And two rice cookers. And maybe a slow cooker. And … whatever. But as Kathryn said to me today, it’s not just that C is different (and not my ex) but I’m different too. And that’s important.

2. I read a book yesterday. A whole book. I stayed up to finish it. I haven’t done that in a very very long time.

3. The book was The Hunger Games. I rushed out and bought books 2 and 3 today even though Tansy said I shouldn’t read Mockingjay. It took me ages to get to sleep last night and then I dreamed I was in the Hunger Games. I didn’t like that so much.

4. I came home tonight after running around all day and C had soup on the stove. My favourite soup – he’d made it since I can’t seem to find cans of it in the shops anymore (why do Coles and Woolworths keep reducing the choice in their lines?). He made me sweetcorn soup. It’s my favourite. And it was delicious. Afterwards we went on a junk food run for Saturday night TV and he said to me, “You love me more now, cause of the soup.” And I said, “Yeah, just a little bit.” Cause like … he made me my favourite soup!

5. It blows me away that someone can really see me. Like, *really see me*. And not only love me but want me to be happy. See point number 1 and then point number 4. I think that’s mostly because people don’t ever really look that hard normally and also think you will be more happy if you were the person they think they see, with all that not looking really carefully.  So it’s weird to find someone who gets all my random references – like for odd songs, weird old musicals, random books, Shakespeare, stuff. Not only that but gets my jokes. And makes jokes that *I* think are funny. Like clicking a lock, just so, every other key *almost* a fit but slightly off. We just fit. He likes all the random food I like that noone ever usually likes – like licorice, olives, stuff. And normally I don’t have to share that stuff. But I *like* sharing it with him. Weird.

And the big one. Here I am on a Saturday night doing something I actually really love to do on a Saturday night in winter – curl up on my comfy couch and watch romcom TV shows or whatever, slouch about and potter around. I kinda like the quiet time to myself. Tonight, C is tired and sleepy and went to bed at 7.30. (OMG I am such a night owl and he is so not one. At all. Who goes to bed at 7.30?) So. Here I am with the best of both worlds – I’m having a girl’s night in by myself (the puppy has finally stopped being a pain), watching girlie TV and eating bad food and slouching. And then I get to hop into bed with my perfect guy. It’s, dare I say it, perfect?

6. You can order hot chocolate online – like real chocolate powder. It arrived in the mail today – hot chocolate and chilli. Yum. I love the future.

7. This year has really been about home truths. And no matter how horrible they are to realise, the result still ends up being liberating. Which is weird.

8. I’m gonna watch New Who.

9. Well, it’s on a list of TV shows I have that I think I should work through. That I have a list, and feel I need to work through them, and haven’t watched them yet, stresses me out. Also, that TV shows are addictive, you get immersed in them and when you’re on a bender, there’s no time for reading.

10. I’m currently on a reading bender. After not reading 5 books a year for a good 5 years or more, I’m reading 5 books a week. and it’s AWESOME. I love it. It feels like I was rusty on this and now after a few warm ups, I’m getting back my reading fitness. I’m reading books in 1 to 2 sittings. OMG. I love it. I feel like I have a chance to get on top of my out of control reading queue (though for one book read yesterday, I bought two more today … that’s probably bad accounting). And I want to keep this up.

But. It turns out, you need a lot of time to inhale a lot of books. To read 4 books a week. So I’m on a book bender, to the exclusion of almost everything else aka crafting and TV. And I feel guilty or bad or worried about it. Actually, mostly, secretly, I’m worried that it’s one or the other. And that if I try and pick up crafting and get involved in a new TV show, then I might prefer that, or get immersed in that, and leave the reading behind again. I really do stress about this kind of thing. It keeps me up at night.

(Though. Ahem. We decided not to have a TV in the bedroom. Which I *guess* I can see as a good idea. Besides I have my laptop if I really want to watch a DVD in bed. And so I’ve been working on this new bedtime thing where I read a bit in bed before bed. To like, destress and stuff. And also, to make time to do this before I’m sleepy and to get to bed and sleep earlier than my preferred time. To get more sleep blah blah blah. And so yeah, that could also a) help with the getting back into reading and b) maintain the habit asides)

ETA: I’ve spent the evening mainlining a TV show and not reading much at all.

EPISODE 38 Shownotes

In which none of your fearless podcasters are impregnated by mysterious aliens for the duration of a single episode, nor do any of us experience a rapidly accelerated pregnancy or give birth to an otherworldly demon/alien/vampire. Also: Batgirl, Bujold and a cranky feminist rant or two.

News

Cordwainer Smith Rediscovery Award – given to a living writer for the first time, Katherine MacLean.

Mythopoeic Awards

World Fantasy, of course!

World SF Travel Fund raising money to send Charles A Tan to WFC

The Mystical Pregnancy trope - torture porn? Reproductive terrorism, exploiting women for being female.
Violent degradation of women’s bodies for plot.

Vote For Top-100 Science Fiction, Fantasy Titles
Swedish Writing Fairy crunches the numbers

Andromeda’s Offering Issue 1 – new fanzine to “open up new female voices in SF, raise the awareness of female SF writers and share ideas.”
(you can find them on Facebook apparently)

Where are the women in the new DC Comics?
newsy report
proper interview with Batgirl crusader

SF Signal Episode 70 – 6 men talk about their favourite podcasts and illustrate what we mean by gender disparity in SF gatekeeping
Alisa makes reference to recent Mind Meld

What Culture Have we Consumed?

Alisa – Passage by Connie Willis; Red Glove by Holly Black; The Lifecycle of Software Objects by Ted Chiang;
Alex - Diplomatic Immunity and Cryoburn, Bujold; Chicks Dig Time Lords, ed. Lynne Thomas; The Sparrow, Mary Doria Russell; Shades of Milk and Honey, Mary Robinette Kowal (http://wp.me/p11HLi-Nf); Songs of the Earth, Elspeth Cooper (abandoned). SF Squeecast.
Tansy – Glenda Larke-Stormlord Rising; Malinda Lo-Huntress; Penni Russon-Only, Ever, Always

Feedback
lovely review at Hoyden About Town

Please send feedback to us at galacticsuburbia@gmail.com, follow us on Twitter at @galacticsuburbs, check out Galactic Suburbia Podcast on Facebook and don’t forget to leave a review on iTunes if you love us!

Here is a really awesome project and a chance for us to give back/pay it forward.

With a Board tasked with selecting future candidates and composed of Lauren Beukes, Aliette de Bodard, Ekaterina Sedia, Cheryl Morgan and Lavie Tidhar, the World SF Travel Fund has set up a Peerbackers Project with the hope of raising $6000, enabling two years of running.

The first recipient of the fund is genre blogger and activist Charles Tan, from the Philippines. Charles is a tireless promoter of speculative fiction. Besides his own Bibliophile Stalker blog, he contributes to the Nebula Awards blog, the Shirley Jackson Award blog, SF Signal and The World SF Blog. He also edited two online anthologies of speculative fiction from the Philippines. Charles is highly regarded in the SF scene both in the USA and internationally. The Fund’s intention is to facilitate Charles’ travel to World Fantasy Con 2011 in San Diego, California.

Charles is nominated in the Special Achievement Non Professional category for his promotion and celebration of speculative fiction. He is a good friend of mine and he has been a large part of the promotion of Twelfth Planet Press internationally.

Living in the Philippines, where wages are far lower than in the West, Charles would be otherwise unable to ever attend a major convention. The Fund’s purpose is to make such a trip possible, for the benefit not only of the recipient but for creating and extending dialogue in the wider world of speculative fiction.

You can help through some change in the kitty and grab some cool rewards over at Peerbackers. He’s 18% of the way there already. There are 26 days to go.

My sincere apologies to readers who read this blog via my RSS Feed. I am going to follow Tehani, (she is usually the one who ventures forth first testing new things), and import my Livejournal into this WordPress account.

I’m so sad to admit it but Livejournal is dying and I don’t want to wake up and find my whole journal gone and irretrievable. I’m not going to stop the crosspost to LJ though. Not til the bitter end, anyway.