Wow!I am ashamed of making fun of what at this remove I now consider a rather brilliant, grand and gnarly name. :/
― Li'l Brexit (Tracer Hand), Tuesday, 31 March 2020 21:41 (three years ago) link
Also if that be he, he is clearly A Dude
And he is claiming extraterrestrial origins of coronaviruses to this day.
Unfortunate joke. I was reminded of how, 25-30 years ago, when my friends and I came across someone with an unwieldy name we would exclaim "Gesundheit!" As kids this just seemed silly, but now I have to wonder if it ever came across as racist.
― ☮️ (peace, man), Wednesday, 1 April 2020 10:51 (three years ago) link
pigs! in! space!
― mark s, Wednesday, 1 April 2020 11:03 (three years ago) link
Wednesday 1 AprilBest night yet. I didn’t need my emergency paracetemol.
Two massive naps today. Worryingly, Paul comes down with a 103F fever and sleeps for hours as well.
Mission Impossible: Rogue Nation on the teevee with the kids. Goodness me what a movie. The opera scene. The ‘water torus’ scene. The car chase in Morocco. Kidnaping the Prime Minister. The final cat-and-mouse shootout / knife fight among the foggy alleyways of Tower Hill. The delicious conclusion. Best MI hands down imo.
Appetite still good (though still no sense of smell) and breathing still fine.
Thursday 2 AprilRocky night. However Paul has woken up in a great mood, and no fever.
Went for a longish walk today with the lovaly Emma B. Made avologmeno for lunch and was then attacked by a headache the ferocity of which I have probably never felt before in my life. It wasn’t all-encompassing like a migraine but it somehow felt worse - it was sudden, implacable, vice-like, a heavy boot holding me down. Utterly defenseless. Slept three hours in the afternoon and the boot was still there when I woke up.
Managed to rouse myself for dinner, read to the kids before bed.
In some ways this is maybe the worst day so far. Just flattened. Currently watching Pitch Perfect, which is exactly my speed. Head still throbbing. I’ve heard that people can really take a nose-dive in the second week and I hope this isn’t the beginning of that.
― Li'l Brexit (Tracer Hand), Thursday, 2 April 2020 20:55 (three years ago) link
fingers crosse tracer, i hadnt seen migraine as a common symptom but i have where possible just been avoiding too much of that reporting tbh
heartened that yr MI taste is back, that is indeed the best of them
― ole uncle tiktok (darraghmac), Thursday, 2 April 2020 21:03 (three years ago) link
Sorry you’re going through this!
― rob, Thursday, 2 April 2020 21:03 (three years ago) link
Thanks for keeping everyone informed, I'm sure it's a struggle.
― clemenza, Thursday, 2 April 2020 21:11 (three years ago) link
best wishes to you both
― reggae mike love (polyphonic), Thursday, 2 April 2020 21:12 (three years ago) link
Best wishes to you both.
― American Fear of Pranksterism (Ed), Thursday, 2 April 2020 21:30 (three years ago) link
<3 <3 <3 <3
― maura, Thursday, 2 April 2020 21:36 (three years ago) link
<<<<3333
― karmic blowback for dissing pip and jane baker (Autumn Almanac), Thursday, 2 April 2020 21:36 (three years ago) link
Damn Tracer, hang in there.
― Why, I would make a fantastic Nero! (PBKR), Friday, 3 April 2020 02:00 (three years ago) link
,
fuck, tracer. get well soon. and thanks for keeping us updated here - this sort of thing really helpful (and dare i say it interesting)
― Fizzles, Friday, 3 April 2020 06:19 (three years ago) link
Get well soon. Hope it does mean you can't get it again at least.
― Stevolende, Friday, 3 April 2020 06:55 (three years ago) link
<3 Tracer all the best to you and family. thanks for posting your updates. what fizzles just said.
― lefal junglist platton (wtev), Friday, 3 April 2020 07:08 (three years ago) link
Hold tight Tracer. Honestly this sounds like a real motherfucker, something especially cruel about the way it seems to trick everyone into thinking they're improving for a bit before finding new and more horrific ways to brutalise them.
― Matt DC, Friday, 3 April 2020 14:16 (three years ago) link
following, and wishing both of you the best
― sleeve, Friday, 3 April 2020 14:19 (three years ago) link
Thanks all. Feeling much better today. 8-y-o’s fever came back in the middle of the night. When I went down for my pee he was calling out that he couldn’t go back to sleep. So I calpol’ed him up and today he’s.... fine. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
― Li'l Brexit (Tracer Hand), Friday, 3 April 2020 14:34 (three years ago) link
sending love; fight through.
― Fuck the NRA (ulysses), Friday, 3 April 2020 15:44 (three years ago) link
Friday 3 AprilLast night decided to watch 'View From The Top' (Paltrow, Ruffalo, 2003). A more hallucinatorily bad movie I may have never seen. Everything is so airless and off about it, it's just bananas.
The Lovely Emma B's sleep anxiety has decided to return, which is unhelpful. Paul's fever came back in the night. Some Calpol took care of it.
For the first time in a long time none of us went outside at all. It just felt like too much.
Something I haven't noted yet, but which has ben a feature of the last week, is a ringing in my ears. It's not overwhelming but it's pretty much always there. I notice it particularly in the mornings. Which throws another log on the fire of the feeling that every day I'm somehow paying for Hunter S Thompson's sins. Head pains, metallic taste, burnt out lungs, just a general charred aspect to life. And ringing ears like I've been to a thrash metal show.
Felt pretty okay today. Didn't take any naps. Like an idiot checked work email and found out I'd been taken off a project "indefinitely" that I'd been looking forward to for a long time, and which is one of the main things motivating me to get back in the saddle. Started boiling inside. Instantly fired off about 4 pissed off texts and was reassured pretty much straight away that no, it's a misunderstanding - I'm still on the project. Sometimes you have to throw a strategic stink. I've been watching Larry Sanders. I know how this shit goes. The second your back is turned the fucking jackals come out.
My sister keeps texting me ancient newspaper clippings of distant ancestors who died of the the Spanish flu. i.e. 'This was your great-uncle Carl'. Thanks?
Another texting buddy warns of a 'spike on day 10' so i guess I've got that to look forward to.
Ordered pizza and watched Major League. Kids and wife all now asleep. The latter will surely wake at some point soon, at which point I am armed with what have become the most precious objects in my household bar none: 2x 500mg paracetemol tablets.
― Li'l Brexit (Tracer Hand), Friday, 3 April 2020 20:47 (three years ago) link
<3
― mookieproof, Friday, 3 April 2020 20:49 (three years ago) link
LOL
― Bridge Over Thorley Waters (Tom D.), Friday, 3 April 2020 20:52 (three years ago) link
thank u ulysses
― Li'l Brexit (Tracer Hand), Friday, 3 April 2020 20:59 (three years ago) link
hugs tracer and thx for writing this up :)
― mark s, Friday, 3 April 2020 21:12 (three years ago) link
thinking of u tracer & the whole hand familyi have avoided reading most firsthand accounts of this scourge aside from this one
― weird woman in a bar (La Lechera), Friday, 3 April 2020 21:34 (three years ago) link
Maybe the ringing ears is just coincidental arrival of tinnitus? There's a thread on that. Great choice with Larry Sanders. A show filled mostly with venal characters seems perfect.
― clemenza, Friday, 3 April 2020 21:39 (three years ago) link
I have mild tinnitus which I mostly don't notice unless I think about it, but sometimes when I have a cold it gets a lot worse/harder to ignore, and stays that way for a week or two after all the other symptoms have gone
obv the 'rona is not just a cold, but maybe something similar going on physiologically? not that I know what that is, exactly
thanks for your updates - glad you felt a bit better today and fought for your place on the project! hope you get better soon, and your kid too; it's good that he's mostly not been too bothered by symptoms so I hope it stays that way
― a passing spacecadet, Friday, 3 April 2020 22:03 (three years ago) link
this sounds proper shit, tracer. hope you and your family are on the mend soon
― COVID and the Gang (jim in vancouver), Friday, 3 April 2020 22:04 (three years ago) link
thanks for your reports tracer
― lefal junglist platton (wtev), Friday, 3 April 2020 22:47 (three years ago) link
you're welcome! thank you all for the good wishes. i hope this doesn't feel indulgent. obviously many have it worse than me so far.
― Li'l Brexit (Tracer Hand), Friday, 3 April 2020 23:03 (three years ago) link
It's not indulgent at all. We all really want to read this. Thank you for doing it.
― kraudive, Friday, 3 April 2020 23:17 (three years ago) link
^^ agreed, this is really helpful and (so far) relatively reassuring info.
hoping we hear from stet soon as well.
― sleeve, Friday, 3 April 2020 23:19 (three years ago) link
I take it you're in Australia Tracer Hand, so you wouldn't know CNN's Chris Cuomo. (If you're in, like, Hoboken, New Jersey, just pretend I didn't say that.) Similar to your posts, he's still going on and doing his show every night from his basement. First-hand accounts are enormously helpful to people like me who are living in perpetual fear of this.
― clemenza, Friday, 3 April 2020 23:30 (three years ago) link
tracer is an American who lives in London
― COVID and the Gang (jim in vancouver), Friday, 3 April 2020 23:32 (three years ago) link
according to my xls
The grand ILX tapestry is a mystery to me. I piece it together as best I can.
― clemenza, Friday, 3 April 2020 23:36 (three years ago) link
Trayce is in Australia.
― Bridge Over Thorley Waters (Tom D.), Friday, 3 April 2020 23:41 (three years ago) link
my wife’s had an elevated temp since Friday and generally been feeling duff - felt a little worse today, called 111 and the doc said ‘yeah, probably a touch of the ‘rona, what are you gonna do 🤷♂️, call back if your symptoms get more severe’if only there was some type of, like, test or something that could tell you if you had it
― force ghost bg (bizarro gazzara), Wednesday, 8 April 2020 14:58 (three years ago) link
fingers x-ed for the best bg :(
― mark s, Wednesday, 8 April 2020 15:00 (three years ago) link
oh shit, good luck to you both
― Boris the Spreader (NickB), Wednesday, 8 April 2020 15:02 (three years ago) link
Good luck Mr and Mrs Gazzara.
― Matt DC, Wednesday, 8 April 2020 15:02 (three years ago) link
best to you BG.
Has Tracer posted anywhere recently?
― Fuck the NRA (ulysses), Wednesday, 8 April 2020 15:10 (three years ago) link
good luck to your wife and of course yourself and the whole family! not fun to have when you have a young'un to attend to :(
(er, unless my .xlsx is faulty)
― a passing spacecadet, Wednesday, 8 April 2020 15:11 (three years ago) link
tracer posted here earlier today (phones and kids) and on one of my whatsapps
― mark s, Wednesday, 8 April 2020 15:13 (three years ago) link
Good luck bg
― xyzzzz__, Wednesday, 8 April 2020 15:16 (three years ago) link
yeah, we’ve got a 21-month-old - challenging enough keeping her entertained without the possibility of a visit from the ‘ronamy eyes have been super-itchy today and i’m knackered but that could just as easily be the start of hay fever season and being run down from being cooped up for three weekstime will tell i guess - if my wife has been ill with it since the end of last week it’s been pretty mild so far, thankfully
― force ghost bg (bizarro gazzara), Wednesday, 8 April 2020 15:18 (three years ago) link
This is a good thread. am wishing all the rona-touched a recovery and some solace thru what sounds like a lot of frightening misery.
― i am a horse girl (map), Wednesday, 8 April 2020 15:19 (three years ago) link
Best to youse BG <3
― Hey, let me drunkenly animate yr boats in about 25 to 60 days! (Le Bateau Ivre), Wednesday, 8 April 2020 15:29 (three years ago) link
Mom has COVID. And bronchitis and a sinus infection!
Yay.
Weirdly doc didn't give Paxlovid. He thought it might be false positive but it's not. Second test at home confirmed. She has antibiotics for the other stuff
I'm negative but we'll see if it lasts.
― Neanderthal, Tuesday, 13 February 2024 23:55 (one month ago) link
I may make mom get the Paxlovid tho
I'll be isolating of course. Just hoping mom feels better. She seems beat but oxygen and blood pressure fine.
― Neanderthal, Tuesday, 13 February 2024 23:56 (one month ago) link
mom still not doing well, but only on second full day of antibiotics for bronchitis and sinus infection. she was sick all the way back to last Tuesday with minor symptoms and wasn't testing positive then, so we think possibly she got sinus infection -> bronchitis first, then COVID.
still testing negative here. once last week, three times across two days this week. i've stayed at home and mostly kept my distance and masking in house. they didn't prescribe mom Paxlovid and I asked her if she wanted me to fill out the Walgreens form to get it yesterday and she seemed reluctant, thinking she's too far along in her infection, and also dreading the metallic aftertaste. I think we're still in the window to get it so I may persuade her again.
definitely not a false positive for her, it popped bright red immediately today for her
― CEO Greedwagon (Neanderthal), Thursday, 15 February 2024 16:58 (one month ago) link
Good luck, man!
― poppers fueled buttsex crescendo (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Thursday, 15 February 2024 17:06 (one month ago) link
Damn Neando, that's a lot! Sending good vibes and hopes that it's all mild for her.
― Maxmillion D. Boosted (jon /via/ chi 2.0), Thursday, 15 February 2024 17:07 (one month ago) link
hoping so too. she had a coughing fit that freaked me out a little in the night, but then I remembered that's what bronchitis essentially does.
if antibiotics don't do anything and it doesn't improve, I might suggest an ER visit just to get looked at.
bummer is dad's birthday is Sunday and we had a dinner planned, mom, my brother, and I, to celebrate his memory - which we'll probably have to postpone now now. but as I pointed out - we can celebrate him on that day no matter where we're at, and do something more formal when we're all healthy.
― CEO Greedwagon (Neanderthal), Thursday, 15 February 2024 17:18 (one month ago) link
She's really lucky to have you in her life Neando, that's for sure.
― Maxmillion D. Boosted (jon /via/ chi 2.0), Thursday, 15 February 2024 17:19 (one month ago) link
A lot of people underestimate how long it takes lung stuff to heal. Coughs, even regular coughs, can linger for weeks. If antibiotics don't take it out, might be worth checking for pneumonia.
I don't know why, but I've heard lots of stories (or at least, more than one) of doctors not prescribing Paxlovid even when the patient is right in the bullseye: covid, older, more at risk, etc. Granted, the medicine supposedly works best very early on in the diagnosis, and also interferes with a few medications that many older people often take (blood pressure?), but other than that, I'm not sure there are any real downsides. When I had covid in July, my primary doc didn't prescribe it, so I just immediately contacted a Teledoc right after and she prescribed it with no hesitation.
dreading the metallic aftertaste.
This I don't get. Yeah, it wasn't the best taste, but it wasn't terrible, no medicine tastes good, and it's only temporary. I can see dreading a colonoscopy or dreading getting a filling, but medicine that tastes weird for a couple of days? That's not worthy of dread, imo. You can tell your mom I said so.
― Josh in Chicago, Thursday, 15 February 2024 17:21 (one month ago) link
Here's more fun long covid stuff
https://wapo.st/3UDglOd
Gift link
― fleetwood macrame (Ye Mad Puffin), Thursday, 15 February 2024 17:23 (one month ago) link
xpost yeah and it's easy enough to get at Walgreens so I might just tell her 'come on, what's one more pill'
― CEO Greedwagon (Neanderthal), Thursday, 15 February 2024 17:24 (one month ago) link
tbf, it's a lot of pills!
― Josh in Chicago, Thursday, 15 February 2024 17:36 (one month ago) link
oh she has like 12-15 already lol
― CEO Greedwagon (Neanderthal), Thursday, 15 February 2024 17:52 (one month ago) link
mom improving. me, still nothing, no symptoms, no positive test.
and now i've been isolating, whereas before we knew we had basically been sharing a lot of the same air.
may get lucky.
― CEO Greedwagon (Neanderthal), Friday, 16 February 2024 23:21 (one month ago) link
isolating from mom that is in my own room. and a KN95
Good thoughts, that's a lot. Hope improvement continues.
― a man often referred to in the news media as the Duke of Saxony (tipsy mothra), Friday, 16 February 2024 23:29 (one month ago) link
the big improvement is in her cough, thankfully. suggests that the bronchitis might indeed be separate bacterial infection and that antibiotics are working.
― CEO Greedwagon (Neanderthal), Friday, 16 February 2024 23:30 (one month ago) link
mom has essentially beaten the bronchitis and sinus infection and just has residual gunk from the bronchitis.
still testing positive, but line has gotten fainter finally.
I continue to test negative and feel absolutely fine, and if mom is negative soon, I might completely luck out again. especially since we're basically in separate rooms and masking when in the same room.
― CEO Greedwagon (Neanderthal), Monday, 19 February 2024 21:29 (one month ago) link