— चार हजार सात सौ सत्रह —

A strange thing happened yesterday, where I suddenly reverted back to a much more characteristic self, capable of making the best of a bad situation and having some fun. Seemingly out of nowhere, I was in a great mood, after more than three weeks of being emotionally off kilter, feeling regular waves of loneliness, fear and worry, just like millions of others. I don't know if it was just that enough time of this new reality had passed where even my subconscious was like, "fuck it," or I was influenced by the cautious optimism that Washington State has already crested "the curve" in terms of infections, resource use and deaths. Maybe it was a mixture of both.

We still have plenty long to go and it would be moronic to ease up on restrictions prematurely. I keep thinking about how Washington State will handle being near the end of the first wave of infections while other regions are still in the midst of theirs: do we allow Washingtonians to start returning to work, but still restrict travel? How do we keep the infectious from other areas from bring it back into our area again? If nothing else, in another couple of months a whole hell of a lot more data will have been gathered to help inform those sorts of decisions. (I will still be astonished if Seattle Pride in any form actually happens at the end of June.)

Anyway. The weather was really nice yesterday, sunny and into the low sixties, which is perfect April weather in my opinion. I didn't even care that much that I had nowhere to go beyond the building I live in; I felt blessed just to have a balcony to go out onto for a minute. I also cranked the Kesha music I was playing and danced in my bedroom for a few minutes. This was between the time I finished working and when Shobhit got home. That picture I took of myself out on the balcony was taken just minutes before Shobhit got home from work.

I was in such a great mood, as a matter of fact, that when I had been in the kitchen at the moment Shobhit came through the door, I literally hopped out to reveal myself to him. He chuckled and asked if I'd had a drink. Nope!

— चार हजार सात सौ सत्रह —

— चार हजार सात सौ सत्रह —

He brought home burritos and French fries he'd gotten as take-out from places in the strip mall where the Big 5 he works at is located. The burritos—of which I saved half of mine to have for lunch today—were from Taco Del Mar and the fries, surprisingly crispy and good, were from Gyro Hut just next door. It's the first restaurant food we've had at all since returning from Australia, and certainly since before dine-in was shut down at all restaurants and bars. I would imagine pretty much any and all restaurants still open for takeout are still making only a fraction of what they made before, and I had been wanting to spend some money at at least some restaurant soon. Neither of these places are local companies by any means, which I would prefer, but whatever; it still supports local workers to some degree. We're being smart about our finances given the global situation but I also don't really want to feel like I'm hoarding.

I was also thrilled not to have to work on any part of cooking dinner for once. Shobhit loves to cook but I can get tired of it.

Speaking of Australia, another thing done before Shobhit got home: I finally finished captioning all 1,044 photos from that trip. It only took me four weeks! It would have taken me so much longer—like, exponentially longer—if not for the "stay at home" order being in place. So that made me feel productive. I did not realize until I was done, though, that it would also leave me feeling like a sort of hole was left in my life: what project do I have to work on in my much greater amount of free time now? I suppose I could start actually picking up a book and reading again.

Once Shobhit was home, we spent the rest of the evening watching TV. After hiatuses in both cases last week, presumably with producers trying to come up with alternate plans for how to broadcast, both Last Week Tonight and Real Time with Bill Maher released new episodes over the weekend, I only discovered yesterday, so we watched both of them. They both broadcast from their homes, Bill Maher making his own backyard his backdrop. In his case he clearly had a handheld camera operator though and I kept wondering who that was and if it was someone self-isolating with him?

After that we watched this week's episode of Westworld, which was both largely confusing as usual and more exciting than previous episodes had been. Then I went to bed.

— चार हजार सात सौ सत्रह —

[posted 12:24 pm]