stoned

I’m Not Stoned (Much)

/ Diane Henders / 58 Comments

Many thanks to everyone who’s dropped me a line to see why I haven’t posted lately — I appreciate your support and concern! The last couple of months have been… interesting. I’ve been struggling with dizziness and nausea that really take the fun out of computer work, so I’ve been snarfing anti-nausea pills, anti-vertigo pills, and Tylenol for the headaches. I thought being stoned would be a lot more fun — I must be doing it wrong. 😉

In an attempt to mimic normal brain function (or as normal as I ever get), I’ve taken to jotting cryptic reminders to myself. They make sense at the time; but a day later, they only make me question my mental competence. For instance:

Run cold for tea!

Our household water comes from a well, so once a year we add chlorine bleach to the system to make sure nothing’s growing in the water lines on the “safe” side of our UV sterilizer. After we purge the lines, the hot water always smells like a public swimming pool for a few days. No big deal if you’re showering in it, but making tea? BLECH!

Normally I’d only gulp one mouthful that tasted like the dregs of a well-used hot tub, and then I’d remember ever afterward to only run cold water into the kettle. But apparently not when I’m on drugs. Hence the note.

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Appointment at (fill in the blank)!

You’d think this would be a fairly useful and self-explanatory note. It wasn’t.

Whenever I’m making an appointment, I enter the date and time in my calendar and then read it back to the receptionist. I did that, so I’m not quite sure how wires got crossed. But my physiotherapist’s office also sends an automated email reminder; so I knew I’d be fine even if I forgot to look at my calendar.

The morning of the appointment I checked my calendar: Appointment at 11:20 AM. Fine.

An hour before the appointment, I double-checked the email reminder. Appointment at 11:00 AM. Yikes, I had to leave right away! As I hurried out the door, I wondered vaguely why I was having so much trouble keeping the appointment time in my head; but whatever.

Halfway there, my car threw a ‘Low Tire Pressure’ warning. I pulled over to check the tires, worrying that it would make me late. But as I got back in the car, my phone chimed: Half an hour to my appointment. Even with the delay, I was going to be 20 minutes early! I gave my head a shake, thinking I must be a lot more stoned than I felt. (And clearly I was, because normally at that point I would have figured out that something was fishy.)

But no; I finished my leisurely drive, then sat waiting in the car until my appointment time.

Yep, you guessed it: I had arrived on time for my 11:00 appointment; but I wasted it all, waiting in the parking lot until 11:20.

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The good news is I’m finally feeling a bit better. I’ve been reducing the drugs, and my brain is working fine again. Which reminds me… Note to self: Remember to worzel the fimblegurb!

Book 18 progress: Intensive keyboarding still isn’t my friend, but I had lots of time to think while lying down with my eyes closed. Plotting is complete(ish) and this week I’ll start putting words on the page!

…And I Missed It.

/ Diane Henders / 31 Comments

Update Jan. 23/22: Just a heads-up — I didn’t mean to scare anybody off the booster shot, and I’m sorry if I did. I’m just a freak, and I’ve reacted hard to ALL the shots, including the booster. Meanwhile, Hubby and all my friends just breezed through it. So don’t be afraid — if your first two shots went fine, your booster should, too. 🙂

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Well, it’s been an interesting couple of weeks… as far as I know. To be honest, I was stoned and I missed it.

I knew in advance that I wasn’t going to enjoy my COVID booster shot. My second shot had made me feel as though somebody had thumped me in the back for a day, and my arm hurt for three days. So when I woke up at midnight feeling like I’d been repeatedly kicked in the armpit with a pointy-toed shoe, I wasn’t surprised. I took an acetaminophen and went back to bed to tough it out. Next came pain in every joint. Then fever. For the next twenty-four hours, I watched the clock and gulped acetaminophen at the exact minute my next dose was allowed.

I almost never take acetaminophen, and I was surprised at how dopey it made me. I guess it wasn’t a bad thing in retrospect: I was miserable, but at least I was stoned. I didn’t even bother trying to work that day; just lay around and binge-read. After four books and most of the day, the fever subsided and I went to bed knowing the worst was over.

The next day I was fine, except that somebody had apparently sneaked into our bedroom overnight and replaced my armpit lymph nodes with red-hot pebbles. Painful, but an improvement overall.

Until the insanely itchy rash appeared.

No good ever came from a conversation that begins with “Let me tell you about my rash”, so I won’t. But it turns out that antihistamines make me even dopier than acetaminophen. For most of the day, I stayed in the kitchen baking because I had to stay on my feet. If I stopped moving, my eyelids dropped shut. And I read the recipes VERY CAREFULLY. Over and over. Even though I’ve been making them at least once a month for the past couple of decades. Yes, I was that stoned.

But I’m pretty sure I was doing it wrong, because these guys look like they were having ’way more fun than me:

(I’ll have what they’re having, please.)

Anyhow, I’m finally back to normal; or as normal as I ever get. So, hmmm… I wonder what I should do for a high this week?

Marijuana is legal here, so I guess I could try that; but I’ve heard it causes the munchies. I have a permanent case of the munchies even when I’m stone-cold sober, so that could get scary. If my next post contains nothing but a photo of me nesting in a pile of empty Doritos bags with a beatific smile and crumbs all over my face, you’ll know what happened.

Actually, y’know what? Maybe I’ll skip the weed and go straight to guacamole corn chips. And Cheezies. And sour-and-cream-and-onion potato chips… Mmmm… now that’s my kind of high!

What’s your “food drug” of choice?

Book 17 update: Despite my ongoing back problems and my chemically-altered downtime, I still managed to make a bit of writing progress. I’m on Chapter 12, and charming liar Ian Rand has just messed with Aydan… again.