Weekend Update

[rowyn]

 I played a lot of Yohoho! Puzzle Pirates this weekend, and didn't do a whole lot else. Y!PP released a new Steam-only ocean with some metagame changes, but it's mostly the same PP I knew and loved and may be hooked on again. I did cave and buy the DLC that keeps you from being nickle-and-dimed for various things. Although I may wind up nickle-and-dimed for Poker, but I dunno. Poker was a good way for me to make in-game currency many years ago, but (a) poker is boring and (b) they took away the high-stakes table and it's hard to make enough profit at the lower ones to justify the time and (c) you only really need in-game currency for the meta game and looks, neither of which I care about much. (To be honest, I care about dressing up my avatar more than I care about the metagame.)

 

Lut pointed out  that I was very successful In Y!PP at brutal PvP pillaging, but it was all at the poker table, not on the seas. This is ... very apt. It's not that I am particularly good at poker, it's more that most Y!PP players don't really understand how the odds work in Hold 'Em, and I have a high risk tolerance.

 

On Saturday, Lut and I went to Costco so we could try all the samples and because Lut hasn't gone to Costco in several years. (I got a Costco membership again because I have a car, but we cancelled the old one ages ago.) This was Lut's first shopping expedition in four months or so. He did pretty well! But I took him straight home after we left the store.

 

On Sunday, I spent some time on the phone, talking to my parents and to friends. John called, and it was good to hear from him again. I also wrote a thousand words of new material for book two of my duology, to expand one of the denouement scenes that I felt was kind of phoned-in. I got some more Puzzle Pirates in, too. Book Two is basically done at this point. Alinsa hasn't really started Book One layout, though, so there's no big rush to kick Book Two out the door. I will read my expanded scene one more time before I pronounce it done. Probably not gonna do anything else with it, though.

 

Feels weird to finish the second book so easily, when I struggled so long with editing the first. But the second book is a lot shorter, so there was (a) less to edit and (b) no pressure to find words to cut wherever I could.

 

Monday was All The Errands. I am officially a Reduced Hours employee at the bank, meaning I work 30-35 hours a week, instead of 36-40. My current schedule is Tue-Fri, 8 hours a day, with Mondays off because Lut has chemo then.

 

So my Monday was:

 

8:00: Call Disability folks, because they sent a letter asking us to and this is the only time Lut and I are both available at the hours specified. Leave message.
8:10: Call Disability again after realizing they stapled an unrelated person's notice to Lut's. Leave another message.  
9:30: leave house with Lut
9:40: stop at McDonald's for Lut's breakfast
10: Wait with Lut at cancer treatment center
10:15: Watch Lut get blood drawn
10:30: Go back with Lut to talk to nurse
11:00: Talk to oncologist with Lut. White blood cell count is high enough that he can get chemo, yay!
11:25: Leav Lut to get actual chemo. Go to DMV to get form for handicap placard for car.
11:50 Hang out at Panera with my Surface, and edit The Sun Etherium.
12:45: Go back to cancer center.
12:55: Drop off handicap placard form for doctor to sign. Wait for Lut to finish treatment.
1:15: Stop by Walmart to get frozen veggies for me and baby asprin for Lut, because his next-step chemo treatment has a side effect of blood clots, so they want him to take a blood thinner.  
1:30: Stop for frozen custard.
1:40: Look in vain for a place that will sell me a replacement recycling bin because the  one we currently have is disintegrating.
2:10: Get home, chat with Lut about various things, put away groceries.  
3:00 sit down at computer.
3:15: doctor's office calls that DMV form is ready.
3:20: Get DMV form, go back to DMV, get in wrong line, get in right line, get called up. "Er ... Sorry, we can't accept the form without the disabled person being present, unless you're their spouse. But! Here's a form he can sign and then we don't need him."  
4:15 Get home. Fill out form, have Lut sign, and put it in mail, since it doesn't need to be done in person at all.
4:30-10; strip bed, do five loads of laundry, make bed, put away clean clothes. Also make dinner in there somewhere.

 

Doing laundry didn't take all of those last five and a half hours, but it definitely took a chunk out of them.

 

Tuesday, I got home to find yet more paperwork, including a ginormous form that Lut and I already filled out a month ago. The other form was from a law firm for my insurer, who wanted to sue someone so my insurer could get out of paying Lut's hospital bills. I wrote "none" on it a lot. SORRY INSURANCE COMPANY BUT YOU CAN'T SUE CANCER. I also swore disproportionately, because I am just really tired of dealing with bureaucracy plus cancer. Guys, I got to the end of my rope six weeks ago and it's just flailing and cursing now.

 

I started to fill out the ginormous form again with Lut, and quit after thirty minutes because guh. I figured I could finish it Wednesday night. I also got a request for a big packet of stuff to send for a book thing next month and it's like a ten day deadline and ahhhhhhh.

 

Oh, and I checked Lut's voice mail and he had a message from his neurologist's office that he needed a follow-up. Which I'd been wondering about. 

 

Wednesday morning, I called Disability again, and this time they answered! And didn't even tell me "we need to talk to Lut not you"!

 

Me: Hi, you sent a letter that we needed to call?
Social Worker: Oh, yes, we haven't gotten any of the forms back from you yet.
Me: ... I sent in everything, what are you missing?
SW: *pause* Oh, so you did.
Me: ... so do you still need us to fill out this ginormous form you mailed two days after the other letter?
SW: No, we got that. We just need stuff from the cancer center and the rehab place. I'll call them. Thanks!
Me: ... you're welcome? 

 

So I am not super-reassured but I'll go with it, I guess?

 

So I can just worry about assembling stuff for the book thing, which is cool, I promise, and I will tell you all more about it when I know more myself.

 

I also called neurologist's office:

 

Them: "we can see him this afternoon!"
Me: "... can I have a little more notice than that?"
Them:"Howabout Friday afternoon?"
Me: "Okay."

 

So I got that approved by my boss and told Lut.

 

Things are happening and I am getting stuff done on many fronts, almost as if I were a real adult and not an obvious imposter.

 

I had, briefly, lost my "fake adult" feeling while commuting twice daily to the hospital, but apparently it grows back. My brain keeps reminding me of all the things I haven't gotten done yet and I want to tell it JUST LET ME HAVE THIS OKAY?

 

Okay.

Comments

[archangelbeth]

You have been adulting like a champ more than should be necessary.

...insurance company, how do you see "cancer" and think "can we sue it?" *shakes head*

[3rdragon]

. . . maybe working in a high-risk industry? Though that still seems like kind of an outside bet.

Also, yes, I agree that you've been adulting like a champ. I am so impressed by your adulting, and I caved a couple of years ago and decided that I must be an adult now.

Also, I don't know what your recycling bin is like or what your local shopping options are, but when I need a recycling bin I usually get it from the hardware store.

[rowyn]

My area partnered with a particular grocery store and a particular hardware store, and you can only get recycling bins from them. And it turns out it has to be the right version of the grocery store now: you can't just go to any Price Chopper, it has to be a Cosentino's Price Chopper. O_o

Per Google, the nearest location looks like a hardware store 10 minutes away, so I'll go there this weekend to get one.

Adulting! \o/

I really felt like I was champion-adulting when Lut was in the hospital, but now that he's out I feel like a slacker again. -_-

[3rdragon]

I tend to find that whenever I'm doing something very stressful, I usually handle it pretty well while it's happening, but after it's done I need to recover for a while. This may mean vegging on the couch with books and crossword puzzles if it's personal life, or meandering around to coworker's offices and/or wandering twitter and poking at email instead of settling down to really get work done if it's my job, but I almost always need some sort of recharge period.

[rowyn]

Yeah, that makes sense. I am not as good at giving myself a break as I once was. Which has good points (now I actually accomplish things I want to do with my life, like writing books) and bad points. -_-

[rowyn]

My guess is that my insurance company has some automated system that tells the law firm whenever a patient has a fracture. "Hey, all broken bones are caused by accident or assault THERE MUST BE SOMEONE WE CAN SUE." And it doesn't look any farther than that. -_-

Edit: wow, the mail-to-reply did not work well on this comment. O_O

[archangelbeth]

Huh. The email thing I sent... didn't show up here. Weird. Did I not click Send?

[rowyn]

I only saw the replies that are on the post, so I dunno what happened to it. O_o

[archangelbeth]

This computer doesn't know what SMTP server to use today, APPARENTLY...

Let's see if I can make THIS one send.

[archangelbeth]

laugh Yeah, I was amused...

...Let's see if email reply works on this one. (It usually works great on my iPhone! I mean, the "written on my iPhone" trailer shows, but I figure that's fair warning that AutoCorrupt might've gotten at things. >_> )

[terrycloth]

Ugh... so much hassle. >.

[rowyn]

Medical professionals do an astonishing amount of the hassle for you, to my surprise. But there's always some bits they can't catch. -_-

[catofalltrades]

*hugs for you* <3 you are adulting like a boss! *snuggles*

[rowyn]

who knew there was so much adulting to do? O_O

[tuftears]

*hugs and yays for successful rolls on adulting*

5 loads of laundry is a lot!

[rowyn]

But all the laundry is done now!

... well, except what we got dirty since Tuesday, anyway ...

[filkferengi]

All the Adulting! Yay, you [& Lut, too]!