helen-louise's journal

You are probably wondering why I haven't written anything on Dreamwidth for a while, and the answer is that I have either been too busy or stressed to write anything, or too busy recovering from being busy/stressed. I had a particularly unpleasant run-in with some friends a couple of weeks ago which necessitated the writing of a very detailed email, which used up about a month's worth of Coherent Writing Spoons.

This week has been particularly stressful because I am getting ready to go and visit my Grant. Monday involved a massive list of chores:( Read more... )

On Tuesday, I collapsed in a heap.

Yesterday, I had some social media work to do for UESP. 15 minutes before the new Elder Scrolls Online expansion was due to be announced live on Twitch, I heard a strange sound and discovered we had, quite literally, piss water pouring through our kitchen ceiling. This isn't the first time we've had a bathroom leak which became a kitchen ceiling leak, but it is the first time that it's been grey water rather than clean. A minor domestic might have ensued, due to my despair that our plumbing had been fucked for 10 days and Richard hadn't made it a priority because of work, combined with Richard's belief that I use too much toilet roll. (TMI, I'm sure, but I can't just shake myself dry! I'm not sure anyone with my type of anatomy can!)

We finally figured out that I could call Thames Water's 24-hour emergency line and sit through all the being on hold, and then pass the phone to Richard to speak to the actual Thames Water person using proper engineering language. Also we set up the camping toilet. I was not coping and had a raging headache just above my left eye. It didn't help that we were OUT OF CAKE and Richard had managed to leave the cake that he'd bought me in Wagamama when I phoned to say that the drains had become critical.

A friend asked just why our house drains are so evil. They're about 30-40 years old, ceramic, and they've started to crack in the soil. As a result, soiled water leaks into the ground, making our weeds in the back garden grow like crazy. Meanwhile, any solid effluent gets stuck in the pipes without any liquid to push it along.

We had the drain under our house, which is our responsibility, relined in October for the grand total of £100 because our insurance company paid the rest. However, the drain outside our house, which is Thames Water's responsibility, has never been repaired. They only ever come along and hose it out when there's a problem. From experience, about 75% of the workmen at Thames Water's contractor Lanes are lazy buggers who don't want to work.

Lanes called Richard today at 17:18 saying that an engineer would be dispatched and he would call when en route. Said engineer turned up at 18:20 or so without calling while I was in an old, holey pair of pyjamas. It was too late to access the appropriate manhole, being the one at the end of our garden just outside our property border, because the MOT garage there shuts up about 6pm. He said he would check with the neighbours to see if it was possible to clear the blockage from there, and then disappeared. About 18:45 or so my mother was leaving the house and she asked where the guy from Thames Water had parked. I said "Just up the road, why?" and she said "I'm sure I just saw the van leaving". Lo and behold, I checked with our neighbour and the workman had indeed done a runner.

This is a complete and utter Lanes "special". The engineers turn up, look at the problem, fail to believe anything I say, and then bugger off without a word to me. I literally cannot BELIEVE that he didn't call my phone or knock on the door to say he was leaving. I am PISSED OFF. We have no functioning toilet other than the camping toilet, which is a bucket with a seat, and not really suitable for Number Twos.

Meanwhile, I'm supposed to go and get on a plane tomorrow morning. I have done the online check-in for my flight tomorrow, I have told 2 x banks that I am going abroad, and I've updated my travel insurance because it runs out during my trip. I have also called Lanes and had a good moan, and we have an appointment booked tomorrow between 10am and 12 noon.

I wish I felt excited about going to see Grant. He's excited because he's lonely and touch-starved, and he's going to get me for over 3 weeks. I feel guilty because I'm running off and leaving Richard with a house with a backed-up drain, a squeaky bathroom sink tap, and some sort of alarming leak in the bathroom which is soaking the tiles and running down to the kitchen ceiling. It doesn't seem fair to leave one of my primary partners dealing with a WHOLE LOAD of plumbing problems while I'm off enjoying myself with the other one. I really should be here to support Richard while he works on it - but I can't afford to reschedule my flight.

It's just frustrating and upsetting and not what you need before a holiday.

In the process of importing my livejournal. Hoping it won't take forever because 2001-most of 2013 is already here. Wondering about some of my communities (the two or three that I really care about) because I haven't been back to lj to "agree" to their TOS and mark my entire journal as Not Suitable For Children yet. Mostly due to lack of time.

In the meantime, if you want to be added to my Fiends List and use a different username here, please comment. I do so like Dreamwidth's separation of "Subscribe" and "Grants Access".

I am currently in Rochester, New York, USA visiting my partner Grant. Here are some pictures from Monday:


( And two more! )

I haven't had much energy for livejournal (or indeed, any sort of extended writing) the past few weeks. Today I was planning to write about what we did with Grant while he was here, but I got caught up in chatting on irc and have burned through my communication spoons. Urgh.

So have some more pictures:

The three of us on the 37th Floor of the Sky Garden at 20 Fenchurch Street, London. 2016-02-21


Here is a another picture taken at the same time in which I exhibit a seriously smug face.

( We found the Poly lift! )

I'm pretty certain I have flu. This is despite having had a flu jab in October. I've been ill since Friday night with a temperature that stays over 38.0 deg C (about 100 deg F) despite taking paracetamol/acetaminophen to bring it down. I am coughing, sneezing, and aching all over, and over the weekend I also had nausea, vomiting, and diarrhoea. The digestive issues have mostly settled down now, but everything else is still present.

Woke up this morning with a temperature of 39.7 deg C (103.5 deg F) and considered calling the doctor or pharmacist because I was so very out of it that I felt scared. But half an hour after taking paracetamol, my temperature was a 'mere' 39.2, so clearly paracetamol was still managing to be antipyretic. I woke up later feeling absolutely freezing and was convinced that my fever had broken, but it was still 38.3 deg C. Eww.

The problem with paracetamol is that it's hepatotoxic enough that you can only take 4 doses a day; which considering it wears off after 5 to 5.5 hours, doesn't cover the entire 24 hour day too well. If I could take NSAIDs then I'd alternate paracetamol with ibuprofen, but NSAIDs make me stop breathing, which would likely be worse than having a fever :P

Have texted my parents and Tim & Peter to cancel Christmas. Apparently flu is contagious for 7 days after symptoms start, or longer if you have a bad immune system, so I will still be contagious on Friday. And frankly, I don't wish this on anyone. I'm nowhere near as ill as I would have been if I hadn't had the vaccination, but I still feel worse than I typically do for a cold - ill enough that I wish I could just sleep until it's gone.

At this point, I am actually glad that Grant is having to work all over Christmas and New Year, since it would be horrible to have him visiting while I'm this bloody sick. I just hope that Richard doesn't catch it. He's coughing his lungs out, but then he's been coughing since the last cold he had about a month ago.

Back from the Download Festival which was literally a washout. Saw quite a few good bands, missed quite a few more due to the weather. Proper review later.

Yesterday's Happy Poly Moment: Husband taking "sexy" pictures of me to send to Boyfriend. I was wearing new clothes bought at Download - a t-shirt supporting the Sophie Lancaster Foundation, a gothic top with lace and roses, a dress which is so figure-hugging that it's definitely only for good self-esteem days. Pictures will also be posted here later - don't have time to resize and crop them right now (the internet does not need to see the mess of my bedroom/house!).

Yesterday's Not Sure How to Categorise Poly Moment: After I had a argument with Boyfriend, Husband contacted him over Skype to explain a few things. It's good that Richard felt able to talk to Shifty directly, but bad that we had an epic misunderstanding in the first place.

Currently working. Stressed. Annoyed with supervisor for not responding to emails. Going to talk to Disability Mentor in an hour or so.

Issues:
xoJane: Fat kids and formerly fat kids are at significant risk of eating disorders, yet are more likely to go undiagnosed and untreated. Something that I only really thought about based on the experience of a friend, but it should seem obvious once you think about it.

Slate.com: How would American media report on the Government shutdown if it were happening in another country?. A bit out-of-date now, but certainly interesting.

Society's New Rules (According to the Internet)

Adorable:
Not Always Romantic: Three is a Crowd, but also Allowed. The last line just makes it.

Amusement:
The 50 Most Perfectly Timed Photos Ever.

IKEA or Death? Does that shouty Scandinavian name belong to an IKEA product or a death metal band?

Knitted nautilidae!

Snakes Wearing Tiny Hats.

Pet snake playing Pokemon X/Y.

Life is strange at the moment. Still not on the right dose of carbamazepine because I am an idiot. I called the surgery last Wednesday to ask when the earliest telephone appointment with my doctor would be, and they said 11am tomorrow... so I didn't take it because I thought I'd be capable of getting into the surgery to see any old doctor before that. Duh. What I should have done was take the telephone appointment, and then if I did manage to see someone else, cancel it. It's not as if an appointment with my impossible-to-see doctor would have gone unfilled for very long.

So my head is in a strange place, and my sex drive is ratcheting up, and my moods are really quite unstable. And my concentration span is going all over the place - sometimes good, sometimes non-existant.

I'm also thinking that I need to do some serious thinking about my various relationships. Essentially, though I never thought it would be - my PhD is like a new primary partnership. I thought it would be more like a new job - it hadn't occurred to me just how life-filling (in the sense of "expanding to more than fill the time available") it would be. Let alone the fact it's always with me, financially-entwined, and of highest priority in my life. Really, it's a lot like a relationship, which is odd considering there's only one person in it. (Well, three, if I include my supervisors, but that just feels weird). I haven't had time for proper quality time with my other partners in months, but I don't want to split up with either of them because I really care about them, but my balance of time and spoons available are all out of whack. It's confusing.

It would really help with the feeling more in control of my life if I didn't live in an absolute fecking tip. I've no idea how we're going to get the house sorted out when I'm too tired during the week to do housework, and Richard keeps going away at the weekends for paintball events. What we need is to get it tidied up enough that we can get a cleaner. But we have too much random crap, and too much stuff that is actually quite important but looks like crap.

I'd quite like to play my bass guitar sometime, and go out to see bands, and have time to read books for pleasure, and fit in extra research that is non-essential but useful background reading. And I don't know how I can get it all in because going up to college three days a week eats too many of my spoons.

Don't actually want advice, by the way. This is more of an "everything is confusing and in flux" post than a "help, I don't know what to do" post. I am wondering just how much better my spoon levels will get when I finally get my Mac and can work from home instead of having to keep physically going to college. Might be that's all I need? :S

Just posted at great length about my Shiny dino experiment. Do read it if you're interested in things that are important to me (but aren't also important to the world-in-general). And yes, you're not missing anything - that really was my first post in over a week.

Still absolutely exhausted. Have spent most of the past week sleeping. Apparently 4 hours of dancing + a minute running outside to catch kasson as he was driving away = 6 nights of 12-15 hours sleep + back and hip pain + physical weakness (currently wearing a wrist support on my left hand WHICH I HATE) + general "glandiness". A good tradeoff? Yes! This is my life, and they're my damn spoons to spend. I only wish that it didn't cost me so many spoons to do things that other people my age would take for granted.

The only exciting thing that has happened this week is that I went to Brighton on Saturday to give Ludy her birthday presents (including this print). Missed all of Brighton Pride because I was too damned tired to get there during the day, and knew that my ability to walk was sorely limited. Did however meet L & her other partners oilrig and softfruit and have nice food with them, including cake. Had a strange experience at Brighton station featuring a rather drunk young girlie who insisted that I had been sitting next to her on the train down from Bognor that morning. Couldn't shake her off even after I showed her my ticket, which said clearly NORBITON not BOGNOR REGIS. Can't decide whether she was trying to scam me, fancied me, or was simply the worst pickpocket in the world. Eventually explained that I was going to meet my girlfriend who would not be impressed at my having another person along (did not mention my girlfriend's other girlfriend or boyfriend - occasionally, the default monocentric view of the world is useful!) and made a loud phone call in which I said I was going to The George. I then let drunk girlie wander off to talk to some other strangers, before diving into an alleyway in North Laine when she wasn't looking. Last time I saw her, she was asking for directions to The George (easy to identify when out of earshot, as it involved pointing further down the same street she was already in). Hopefully, she found someone with more spoons than me there to buy her some black coffee and put her on a train back home. Me, I managed less than two hours of socialising with people I already knew before going home with a headache from hell. 

I'm not going to BiCon. I officially can't afford it. Yes, there is a Helping Hand fund, but it is intended for people who can't afford to go to BiCon because they don't have money at all, not because they had money and spent it all on going to another continent to see their favourite band. Also I just paid my tax which was due on July 31st. ( Cut for mention of moneys. ). Blah.

Today Ludy & I went to see quatlet, who is now visible outside the uterus, much to the delight of thekumquat! He was born on 12th September and is currently very small. I can report that he has the normal number of arms, legs, heads etc. expected for humans, although as one of his parents is conflux, he may actually be part-elf. He has pointy ears, likes being sung to, and started crying when Ludy said he was going to grow up to be human. As far as newborn baby humans go, he is on the attractive side - not pink and blobby, has some hair, and does not look like Winston Churchill. Unfortunately he currently has a pointy head with a big scab on it from delivery, but it has already improved and should continue to do so. Hooray! ailbhe's advice on "things to bring a new mother stuck in the hospital" was spot on, thank you!

I don't think I have any right to Announce what quatlet's official name is, but I can probably tell you that one name combination was rejected because it would have made his initials FAF, and we bi poly types do quite enough faffing already, thankyouverymuch.

xanna and Jacob were also there for most of the time we were, and asrana turned up as we were leaving. Apparently she has been a star at kicking hospital administrative butt. The hospital itself was far too pink, and had at least one utterly disgusting visitor toilet. I took a photo of it to, um, send to the local newspaper or something. (I did want to check on its status later, but it was occupied and we were in a hurry due to spoon shortage.) The visitor toilets downstairs were very shiny and clean though.

Also, I swear that when I was waiting outside the room because of possible remaining lurgy plus $too_many_visitors, a random new father was chatting me up. Um... hello, I know we do non-monogamy, but I hadn't told him that, and his poor wife had only just given birth! Let her have the right to consent first, please!

Slightly strange polyamory questionnaire, linked by mactavish. For people who are poly and monogamous partners of poly people. Apparently, preliminary results will be shared at the Society for the Scientific Study of Sexuality Meeting in San Diego on April 11, 2008. The principle (sic) investigator for this project is Anthropologist/Sexologist Dr. Leanna Wolfe who is based at Los Angeles Valley College. She may be contacted at LAWolfe@aol.com.

It only took me about 5 minutes to fill in. It doesn't really ask for identifying information. Some of the questions made me growl and gnash my teeth, but 'tis the way of things.