Tag: chihayafuru

Shelter-in-Place: Day 134

I had another low point recently. I was in the middle of it when I wrote my last update on Sunday, and then it got worse. I came out of it on Tuesday the 21st, and this week has actually been pretty good: I got a lot accomplished at work and ended the work week on a high note.

I was telling Sean last night that I’m still not sure if there’s something that kicks these lows off, or if they’re just something that happen to me. I don’t really know what to measure in order to look for a cause. There are so many potential variables: food, my period, how much physical activity I’ve had, stress from work, stress from the state of the world, etc. Just the thought of tracking the depressive periods themselves is daunting; I’ve never been good at maintaining a daily log of anything. (I’m a free spirit!)

This blog has a long archive of my depressive periods; I wondered about them back in 2016 when I hit what seemed to be a permanent low. Things have gotten better since then. I found medication that mostly works and I have a good therapist. But the lows do still come, even if they don’t last as long as they used to. It seems like all I can really do is try to wait them out.

Anyway, I’m feeling better now.

I finished Chihayafuru season 3 and oof. I didn’t realize it would be cliffhangery. It apparently took nearly 6 years for this season to come out, and it ran from last October to this March, so it will probably be some time before we get a resolution, if we get one at all. Maybe that’s for the best, though; I can pretend Chihaya and Taichi and Arata live happily ever after as a triad.

My uncle Steve went to the hospital recently and is now in a care center, working to get well enough to go home. (It’s not coronavirus.) He’s not dying necessarily but he could, so that’s been on my mind. Uncle Steve is Dad’s younger brother, though not the youngest. He and Mom are the same age (they’ll be 72 this year) and they get along really well. They have this cute kind of sibling relationship. So she has been checking in on him and watching over his care, which as a former nurse she is highly qualified to do. Uncle Jeff (the youngest Aubrey boy) is also checking in on him frequently. AJ has been visiting Uncle Steve regularly for a long time now and I’m sure he’ll keep that up. I worry about all this, what with coronavirus, but I also know that Uncle Steve needs people right now. It’s a hard time for him. So while I worry, I’m really glad he has everyone.

As a side note, I really admire how much AJ does for his loved ones. He does what he can to take care of everyone: visits, cooking, organizing parties/camping trips, mowing lawns, and building things (he has some serious carpentry skills). I’m so glad Mom has him to look after the house and yard. I’m also glad he’s such a good example for Connor and Logan and all their friends, and Krystal’s kids too. He’s just good with kids in general. He wasn’t always, but he is now and it’s great to see.

Anyway, aside from all the bad things happening generally and specifically…it was a pretty decent day. I had Shane’s for lunch and sushi for dinner. Can’t go wrong there. I also did a fair bit of writing, which was great, since I’ve been in a bit of a lull since before the depressive period hit. I hope to write more tomorrow, and I think I should probably also get outside some to get some fresh air and vitamin D and hopefully avoid getting down in the dumps. For now, though, bed!

Shelter-in-Place: Day 128

Days seem interminable now. Work is exhausting. Going on virtual walks and playing trivia with coworkers has helped break the tedium a bit. I wish I could have someone come stay with us for a while, just to have a different person around.

I’ve had several days recently where I just could not bring myself to cook dinner. Sean has been very sweet on those days. He is always very sweet, despite my extreme moodiness. I hope if he is feeling bad that he has an outlet. I try to be as sweet as possible to him too.

I’m tired of bras. I am not comfortable going completely bra-less outside the home, but I would love there to be some sort of compromise. Something in the middle that’s supportive enough but not as painful. Like…a half bra. I don’t know. In desperation I bought some of those sticky things that are supposed to hold your boobs up without a bra, but I don’t like them at all. My breasts don’t look right with them on and it hurts to take them off.

Just Shoot Me has gotten kind of obnoxious, with most of the characters being selfish jerks. Usually there needs to be something redeemable about a character for me to care about them. Sean is tired of it too.

I watched the first two Back to the Future movies last weekend and Part III Friday night. I love III, but I was feeling terrible, so really it just sort of averaged out to “meh”.

I’m trying to nip some writing insecurity in the bud by simply…not thinking about it too much, but as I haven’t really had the brainpower to write at all this week, thoughts keep coming back about how I don’t compare to others. There, that’s the thought acknowledged. Now I’m going to let it pass through me and begone.

Playing Wii Sports Resort has been nice. I have totally lost my ability to play Frisbee Dog, which sucks, but my bowling and table tennis games are getting better. Someday I’ll reach my old high scores in all of them…it’ll just take awhile.

I’ve also been playing Zuma again, but I started where I left off years ago, which means I was at a pretty high difficulty level. Yesterday I was in the 9s and I kept losing a certain round over and over again until I was finally out of lives. Sigh. At least I can start from the beginning and work my way back up, I guess.

The third game I’ve been playing a lot is Words with Friends with my mom. I decline all other challengers and I wish I could turn off all the other challenges and whatnot. I just want to play with Mom and that’s it.

For a while there I was playing a game called The Arcana, which is more like a Choose Your Own Adventure book than a game really. It’s lovely and has great music and the story is intriguing, but it’s also very expensive, and so I stopped playing it even though I haven’t seen all the possible storylines. I really can’t justify regularly paying $40 for in-game coins. (You can technically play without using coins at all, but you won’t get to see some of the story paths, and you also won’t be able to collect all the nice picture cards.)

I still haven’t put the LED strips in the china cabinet, but I did frame those three art prints I ordered custom mats for. They look great. I think I will hang them in the office; for now I just have them lying on the guest bed below the wall where they will probably go.

Continue reading Shelter-in-Place: Day 128