Finished reading: The Deep Places: A Memoir of Illness and Discovery by Ross Douthat 📚Excellent book. I liked how much the author let us into his head in terms of living with chronic illness and pain. It helped me with insight and even more compassion for my Long COVID brother.
I’m going all-in on Apple Fitness+. I’ve been using a different app for strength training along with occasional sessions with the trainer who customizes that app for me. But I said goodbye to her, with some sadness, because the attraction of Fitness+ is too big.
Currently reading: Convenience Store Woman: A Novel by Sayaka Murata 📚
I’m bummed that Racket is switching away from the 9-minute web recording concept to 99-second iOS-only recording. Their email said “no traction” from the web and that they’re seeing rapid growth with the 99-second concept. Another case where I’m not the target audience.
Currently reading: Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë 📚
Currently reading: Ghostwritten by David Mitchell 📚
Finished reading: What Could Be Saved: A Novel by Liese O’Halloran Schwarz 📚I loved it and I hated it. Child abuse, and in general, adults behaving badly. Deeply felt descriptions of siblings and how they relate. Protagonist exactly my age, DC and foreign service in common.
Currently reading: The Deep Places: A Memoir of Illness and Discovery by Ross Douthat 📚
Finished reading: Black Swan Green by David Mitchell 📚There’s a quote on the cover from Pub Weekly saying something like “the best memories of boyhood!” No, that is not what this book is. It’s beautiful with gorgeous characters but it’s a lot about how badly we treat each other.
Our general store made tarts and they made the mincemeat from scratch!
Currently reading: What Could Be Saved: A Novel by Liese O’Halloran Schwarz 📚
Finished reading: The 7 ½ Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle by Stuart Turton 📚I don’t know what genre to put this in. Mystery? Fantasy? It’s elegantly crafted and in a way is about writing: what does it mean to be in a character’s head? I liked it.
Weirdly warm, misty afternoon for a long walk
Long covid is destroying careers, leaving economic distress in its wake
Good article, but this statement makes it sound way too easy to recover: “Employers and patients need to understand that many long haulers should return to work on a limited, part-time basis, perhaps working from home, while they slowly work on building strength, he said.” In my brother’s experience, there’s no way to “slowly work on building strength.”
I deleted TikTok on my phone. Yay, me! It’s unbelievable what a time suck it had become. “I’m too old for TikTok!” “I won’t spend more than two minutes looking at TikTok!” Yeah, right. The only way to protect myself is to completely remove the temptation.
Currently reading: Black Swan Green by David Mitchell 📚
Finished reading: Akata Warrior by Nnedi Okorafor 📚I enjoyed it just as much as the first one in this series. A teenage “witch” growing up in Nigeria, fighting evil and developing self-awareness.
Currently reading: The 7 ½ Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle by Stuart Turton 📚
I forgot my Apple Watch today for the first time in years. So what’s the point of exercising since I won’t get credit for it? 😂
Good podcast about chronic illness in general
Long COVID and the Blind Spots of American Medicine
I basically got nothing done today but I did buy these nifty winter boots. That metal plate is a mini-crampon that can be flipped out when I need more traction here in the land of ice and snow.
Currently reading: The 7 ½ Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle by Stuart Turton 📚
Currently reading: Akata Warrior by Nnedi Okorafor 📚
Finished reading: Slade House by David Mitchell 📚Loved it, even though it verges on horror. I had the experience that happens to the characters – losing myself in time while the story/orison was told, but luckily the author didn’t steal my soul, I think.