the trick is to keep breathing

My body's still busted up.

I've been fighting bronchitis for two weeks now. Some of it is my fault: I came down with it the week the Japanese Overlords were here, so I really didn't want to take sick time off of work and leave my discussions and presentations to someone else; I ended up just taking a lot of drugs and cough drops. I'm also dumb because I continued to run and work out for the first week because I don't like admitting defeat to my own body. When it didn't start to clear up on its own I went to a CVS MinuteClinic and got me some drugs for it, but I think working/working out through it has aggravated it and made it worse. That's mostly my own stupidity, and I probably deserve it, but the bronchitis just had particularly bad timing this year.

I haven't done any kind of cardio (running, swimming, or elliptical) in a week, and I haven't even done weights since last Friday. I've also been sleeping like a goddamned fiend - last Thursday I took the afternoon off sick, took a 4-hour nap, got up and ate and read a little, and basically went back to bed and slept for 10 hours - so it isn't like my body doesn't know something's wrong. I pretty much slept away the entire fucking weekend. At this point I'll probably just rest right on through to the Marathon Relay on Saturday, other than PT today. It's going to be a pretty horrible race for me. :/ I'm sure it will be fun hanging out with everyone, but I'm really just not looking forward to the running bit.

PT doesn't seem to be doing much yet. Every time I seem to think things are improving, it then gets worse. I know from experience that this unidentified friend in my neck works in horrible synergy with the rest of me - so when I'm sick, or when I have really bad insomnia, it's way worse - so for now I don't know whether my bronchitis is compounding the issue by way of general aches and pains, or if it's actually worsening. I just -- I thought PT was supposed to provide some kind of relief (as well as fixing what's broke)? Other than the traction machine (which I may actually propose to) it doesn't really seem to do much in terms of relief.

I just get really depressed when I constantly feel like shit. (surprise, feeling like shit makes you feel like shit?)

I'm really ready to not be coughing and dizzy all the time, and I'm super ready to not have constant pain in my neck/shoulders/back. :/

In marginally less whiny news:

• I've contacted my advisor, I'm trying to pick up my literature search again, and I'll hopefully talk to her and go to some group meetings this month :/ (file under: other things I am not excited about)


• This weekend I somehow managed to pull together a decently respectable Terra costume for NYCC. There's still plenty of things which can be done with it, but it's more or less going a lot better than I expected. It would be nice to have one 'constant' cosplay that I can wear wherever. (file under: upcoming nyc drunk vacation)


• I'm almost finished with a stupid scarf I've been working on for like a year (I lost the pattern okay .___. ) and I have lots of epic plans for scarves and cowls and hats and fun things to knit for the winter. (file under: things i will not end up doing)


• Work is somewhat in a lull right now, which is both nice and epically worrisome. No further developments there right now.

I'm trying to at least enjoy the weather. Autumn is my favorite season, and I love that it's colder out. I love the way the air smells, and I love the colors that are coming out. I just wish I felt better to enjoy it. :/

[edit] also I dyed my hair red. and that's really about it.

In absolutely no order at all:

• Had a pretty good weekend full of friends, fireworks, and drunkenness. Got chased by the cops (yes, we are all 30 years old), did some amazing karaoke with safety_caesars as Edgar and Locke, watched Lithium play an awesome show, and sewed. A lot.


• Finished my Azula costume for our Avatar group at Otakon 2011. The costume's functionally finished - I need to give it a good smoothing over (tightening hems, adding fancier trim, some flashy buttons for fun, etc) but at the moment I could wear it and be okay with it. A good afternoon's attention to the details will make it very awesome. Still to do:
  
  • Wig
  • Bitty Collar (the piece right around her neck; I've done the two more floppy collars already)
  • Ribbon / trim for the boots (I have boots)
  • Fancier gold trim or buttons for the bigger collars; gold trim or fabric paint for the symbols on her ~loincloth~
  • General Smoothing and Touch-Ups


• Made decent headway on my Porom costume (again for Otakon 2011). I have most of the materials in hand; it's mostly just a matter of construction, as it's one of those great costumes which a) defies real-world physics and b) isn't even canonically consistent if you compare the art to the FMV to the sprite. Go Squeenix. You jerks. This costume is going to be really, really hard to pee in.


• Started Dragon Age as a distraction. It is a successful one.


• Realized there are only 12 weeks until the Akron Marathon Relay! At which I would like to be A LOT FASTER >.> So, I have constructed a training plan with the help of SmartCoach on RunnersWorld.com. The plan is pretty interesting!~ It looks very in-depth, telling me pacings for my intervals and tempos and stuff like that, and even though I still hate running I'm kind of excited to try it and see if it works. For $15 I can get a month of access to the "Master Training Plan" on their website, and I am thinking about doing that too, because $15 isn't that much for a month and I could just print it all out at the end of the month. I have really been lazy about running recently, although part of it has been letting this awful tendonitis thing heal itself, so I can't take all of the blame entirely.


• Mostly: yup awesome

How was everyone else's weekend?

Weekend with lassarina in Chicago: Excellent!

Friday night I made really good time... until I made a lazy stop for food and put myself directly in the beginning of rush-hour traffic. Note to self: YOU ARE AN IDIOT; when making good time on the road, don't ruin it! Anyway, after fighting the mobs of traffic, I got the Meglet, we got the Natalie, and then hit Chipotle. We then returned and basically denned for the night weekend, save a trip out to the Cheesecake Factory, because there is not one near me which means I like to go whenever possible (as I am trying to eat every delicious-looking item on their menu one by one!).

We watched the cutscenes from Lost Odyssey; while I'm not sure I have a really firm grasp on the entire game/plotline from the cutscenes, I can probably pick it up with an FAQ or game script. It was pretty and shiny, and had a lot of pretty awesome characters. I also got Persona 3! We started it but didn't get far at all -- I'm looking forward to picking that one up at home.

Edited to add: Also, Meg's cat molested me in my sleep. Trufax!!

Other than that, there was various fic-writing and lots of delicious drinks to be had. Meg and Nat introduced me to raspberry lambic, and as I am just getting involved in the brewing process here (a beginning brewmistress, to be sure) I'm now kind of curiously poking at recipes.

In other news, apparently when there is no traffic, the drive from me to Chicago actually only takes 5.5 hours, including a stop for food and gas. This probably means that I drive WAY too fast*. I blame hilldo for distracting me on the phone for the last hour of the drive, which pretty much flew by. Stay tuned for our awesome future projects, guys. After we beat Secret of Mana, of course. There are vampires and wigs and crime-solving. stfu.

In other news, I am a bit ahead for JanNoWriMo; as I've already failed at the write-every-day goal, it looks like my new goal is just to write as many words as freaking possible. I wrote over 1000 words of Seifer/Irvine at Meglet's alone; as it was over the course of an evening I actually split it up to cover Saturday/Sunday (we were up pretty late on Sunday!) to be fairer.

NOW comes the fun of getting ready for Ohayocon! It looks like I will be unable to join drakonlily this weekend for prep so I am trying to make a list of all the things I need to remember to bring and/or buy myself this weekend in whatever spare time I have. Help me out here, guys (esp Jana, Katy, Drakon, Becky):

( OHAYOCON )

I'm pretty excited for this convention, and also excited to be bringing people back home for the always-awesome Super Bowl party!

Anyway. Another totally crammed beginning-of-the-week for me. I hate my new Mon-Tues-Wed schedule, but hey, what can you do. Other than bitch about it a bit and then just man up.



* meaning 50 miles per hour AND SAFE, of course

BEING OUT SICK IS ALWAYS MADE OF AWESOME, GUYS.

Anyway, here's the Official Otakon Post, made in public in case anybody else wants to meet my crazy ass! Or self. But mostly my ass.

( OTAKON SCHEDULE! )

If you would like to meet me, I am all for this! It would be awesome! I am not going to post my cell phone on the internet, but I DO basically give it out for free (I am a whore for dirty text messages guyz) so just leave a comment or send an email to seventhe.net@gmail.com and we'll figure out a good time to meet. Keep in mind that I will NOT have a car, so I'm gonna have to meet up with you somewhere near the convention center. Also keep in mind I may be fairly intoxicated. And dressed like a robotard.

( Thoughts on my cosplay stuff, plz read guyz )