It was Sunday, and I was walking in the sunshine to my former place of work to collect the files that were sitting on the work computer. These were all of my book files; both completed and in progress.
The building was quiet and dark, and still there were people on my floor. Towards the end of my stay, I heard doors slam open and closed, and elevators dinging. Each time, it made my heart jump at little. It was almost like being in the middle of a zombie movie; the day after the whole thing went down. Things were strewn about, but ultimately still in good nick.
The walk there was nothing like a zombie movie. The air was bright and cool, the sun warm and cheery, and there were so many people walking around outside. Very few of them had face masks. Before you ask, yes, I did. I didn't wear it the entire time I was walking outside as the first part of the walk had few people. It was when I hit the Glebe that there were tonnes of folks, and I put the mask on.
Side note: here's the thing about masks. They won't protect you. That's not their purpose. You wear a mask not for yourself, but to protect others from you, from the possibility that you might unknowingly infect them. So for all those folks who feel like wearing a mask is weakness, all I can say is this:
Defending others is not weakness.
Wear the fucking mask.
Anyway, I remained in the office longer than I wanted or intended to. The work computer, you see, is a refurbished pile of rubbish that can barely handle a simple word processing programme. When I plugged in my USB stick, it failed to recognise it, and any attempts to update the driver failed spectacularly. Aggravated, I decided to try and upload the files to my cloud drive, which was already straining it's limits. Because this computer has all the processing powers of a potato, that took hours.
Literally, hours.
Then, when I only had a third of the upload to go, the USB magically worked all of a sudden (it was, like, the 6th time I plugged the thing in). LW messaged me via my Facebook page to help troubleshoot, and so I plugged the thing in to follow the steps, and it magically started working. WTF. So, I transferred the files. That went quicker than trying to upload them.
I stayed until the upload completed all the same, because having a backup could not hurt.
So, thanks so much, LW, for helping out. Apparently just the offer of help was enough to make the computer behave.
Not having my writing with me was stressing me out a great deal. It was a latent, lingering stress that was hovering over me as I numbly went through the motions during the pandemic. Now I have the files, in two, easily accessible places, and that's one stress I no longer need to worry about.
Now it's just joblessness and general malaise that bothers me.
The relief of that stress left me with a headache I couldn't shake. It wasn't quite a migraine, but it was approaching those levels of pain. There was nausea. I went to bed at the usual time, after a scalding hot shower.
This morning, after the cat calmed down enough to be cute and snuggly, I managed to have a glorious, much-needed sleep-in. The cat was curled up on my right side, sleeping with his head on mine. It was really very sweet, and almost made up the waking me at 4:30am for no goddamned reason.
Today, I started everything much later than I should have, since I'm trying to keep a schedule. But I don't mind. I have a lingering headache, but it's nowhere near as terrible as yesterday, so I decided to take it easy. Besides, it's technically a public holiday here in Canada today. That doesn't mean anything to me anymore, as I'm currently unemployed, but it does give me an excuse to not do all the work I usually do.
There is still some work I have to get done. I have to write a blog post for Black Gate Magazine today. I have no idea what to write about yet. I really should do my French homework, and there was some editing I was hoping to have gotten done yesterday, but didn't, so I should catch up on that. Maybe, if I'm really lucky, I'll be done all of this by this evening, and can relax a bit before bed.
Right, I've got a lot on my plate, even if it's a holiday. I should get to it.
But first:
30 Day Song Challenge - Day 18
Ciao!