Plaidophile

It's been a while since a self-indulgent blog post about my ongoing woes, and seeing as how that's the whole reason to have a blog anyway, I'd might as well update the three of you who still bother to read it.

Wrists

Still terrible. I got a couple of Logitech K300 keyboards which are a lot more comfortable than my previous ones, aside from the bizarre placement of the home/end/pgup/pgdn keys. I've gotten surprisingly used to them anyway. I also ordered a Wacom Bamboo Touch as a replacement mouse (it's actually something an ergonomist recommended which I'd forgotten about until the much-more-expensive and much-less-suitable Apple Magic Trackpad came out yesterday). The Bamboo Touch was only $35 (shipping included) so it's not a huge risk if it turns out to suck, and if I like it I'll buy another one so I'll have one at home and at work. (Or I might get a Pen & Touch so I can have a stylus input at work again.)

Stomach

Nothing came up on the endoscopy or ultrasound, and after eating a couple of cookies enhanced with a certain herbal extract the pain went away for two weeks. Now the pain is coming back, slowly, but it's much more localized to just the little spot right below my sternum, so I think if I just get good about taking omeprazole again I should be fine.

American Healthcare FUCKING SUCKS

So, St. Luke's Hospital (where I went for the various procedures, as well as the ER a few months ago) isn't in-network for my health insurance, but my health insurance claims to cover out-of-network at the same rate as in-network stuff. However, the way they go about the coverage is asinine: the hospital bills my insurance, the insurance tells the hospital what the contracted rate is, and then they send me a check to pay the hospital with. So I've gotten about $1500 in checks from my insurance but no actual bills from the hospital, until the other day when I got a bill for $6500, with the only item being "balance forward." I haven't had a chance to call them because of being busy with work, but today's a code freeze and that's in effect until Monday (critical fixes only) so tomorrow morning I can hopefully spend a few hours debating with them about this.

Dizziness

Lately I've been feeling fairly dizzy much of the time. It's especially bad when I walk or drive, but even sitting at my computer I sometimes feel a wave of dizziness. When I drive I also feel a surge of disorientation sometimes. It's quite disturbing. But I hate my doctor and I hate dealing with insurance crap so I'm hoping it's just a mild inner ear infection which will clear up on its own and not, like, a brain tumor or something. (I haven't had any other brain tumor symptoms, at least.)

Sometimes it's also accompanied with a very brief but painful headache, though, so I really should get it checked out.

Moles and other fun skin stuff

I really need to see a dermatologist. Although I suspect I just need a haircut and a switch back to oily-hair shampoo.

What the hell is wrong with me, anyway? (Part 192 in a series)

I have come to the realization I am probably more than a little obsessive-compulsive. I have also come to the realization this is probably where my greatest strengths come from, and I think I can live with that.

Ennui

A few weeks ago I was exploding with ideas for what to do after Planetfall, but now that it's finished I can't be bothered to work on comics at all. Even though I sketched a bunch of them out. I'm just not feeling it. I'm just... apathetic to drawing and storytelling right now. I think I might just be burnt out and I need to take another hiatus (which I hate doing, but meh).

I've also been spending more time roleplaying on MUCKs again, although I can't really get into that most of the time either. It's all just a bunch of blah-blah-blah drama and whatever. But I've been building a couple new environments and such, even though I don't really feel like I'm doing that very well either.

I guess I just kind of feel disconnected from everything I care about right now. I've had a lot of stress due to work-related conflicts (now mostly resolved) and Song Fight! Live (now long-over) so hopefully I'll be feeling up to things again soon, because right now I feel awfully unproductive and I don't even know where all my time is going.