Week 34

 Short update today.

 Health-wise, I'm doing pretty good. My second week back at work went OK. I didn't burn out completely on any of the four days. I'm still struggling with "stressing out by habit" but I've managed to recognize that and am finding ways to deal. 

 Life-wise, this week was shit. Our cat of many years passed away. HR continues to be flaming a-holes and the outsourced company who are supposed to be handling my ADA request are proving just as incompetent and obstructionist as the disability insurance people. 

 The stress from life is not playing well with my health. You'd think I'd just crash, but I'm actually doing the opposite. The stress holds me up and pushes me along like a wave... until it runs out and then I crash.

 I believe I have made it perfectly clear to HR and the ADA people that I am not putting up with their crap any more. Now I just need to make it clear to myself. 

 Let's see what next week brings, shall we...

Week 33

 So, I went back to work last week. That's a thing.

 Actually it wasn't too bad. I didn't managed to do 4 hours a day, every day, though. Most days I burned out after 2, but managed to keep going by laying down with my work laptop and doing something light. One day, I just had to stop after 2 hours and go to bed. Meetings are really, REALLY draining. Still, on the whole, my manager and I are calling it a success. HR are still being a--holes, but that's another story.

 The weekend was weird because I've gotten used to basically doing the same thing every day. So, I spent some of Saturday morning thinking I ought to go to work. I spent a brief moment on Sunday afternoon stressing about work until I realized that that I appear to have an old habit of stressing about work on Sunday's. Literally nothing at work to stress about anyway, so once I realized what I was doing I was able to work on shutting it down. (I'm getting better at that, which is good.)

 Finally, I evidently picked a good week to come back because we got today (Monday, Presidents Day) off... so my first week ended in a three day weekend. 

 On the whole, not bad. A lot more draining that I'd hoped but still not bad. I continue to take things one day at a time, so we'll see how next week goes.

Week 32

 Honestly, this is a "not much and quite a lot" kind of report today.

 Health wise, I'm still hovering around 4 hours functional time each day and my non-functional time is actually not as bad as it has been in the past. That's not really progress though. I've been like this about two weeks now. Recovery seems to have hit a plateau.

 Work wise, I'm going back next week (starting Monday) for 4 hours a day. Unfortunately, HR are being controlling bastards about this. I finally declared them as creating a "hostile work environment" ... which frankly they have been. These are the people who threatened to fire me for being sick a couple years back. They have not improved. They're actively making my coming back to work harder than it needs to be. In declaring their actions as harassment, I'm telling them that I'm not going to take it anymore.

 Returning to health, my new medication from the neurologist actually is having some side effects. For days I've been waking up in the middle night and also remembering my dreams (which I used to do only rarely). It turns out nighttime wakefulness and vivid dreaming are side effects of the medication. I say bring it on! These vivid dreams are awesome and I'm actually starting to have lucid dreams... I'm dreaming, I know I'm dreaming and I can shape the dream.

 All in all, a good week (HR notwithstanding). I'll let you know how next week goes. It should be "interesting" going back to work.

Week 31

 Had my monthly Doctor's visit today, hence the slightly later update.

 After a good month, we've agreed that I can finally get back to work. I honestly have some mixed feelings about that. It will be nice to have an income again. It will be nice to have some tasks and things to do "outside" the house again. At the same time. let's face it, working myself to death and stressing out about work made me sick in the first place. I need to find a new balance and not do that to myself again.

 Still, I want to be focusing on the good here (which I part of finding that balance really). I am feeling a *lot* better than I did before. I am able to start interacting with the world again. I'm not 100%, not even close but I'm so greatly improved it's staggering.

All in all, a good week.

Week 30

 Well, another week gone by.

 I actually feel like I'm making real, serious progress. OK, I'm still averaging about three to four hours up but this past week I've noticed an interesting trend. I have days where I don't really get up and do much, and I can managed six or even seven hours without crashing. Then the very next day, I manage about three hours no matter what. I've decided that I'm going to get up and try to do things every day. Sure, it lowers my total "up time" but it looks like I'm going to deal with that anyway. So I may as well get things done.

 Other than that, not much to report. I got the official response to my complaint about the insurance company. This mostly consisted of the insurance company's version of events and a letter giving my an opportunity to offer a rebuttal. I did. I mean, it's clear that the insurance company has a lawyer writing these things. It takes professional training to lie with the truth quite that well. Unfortunately for them, I also have professional training in presenting information (lawyer vs librarian, live on pay-per-view). I actually found it fun. I don't really expect that state to be able to do anything, but at least I'm getting the truth out.

 Finally, I've done some painting (one of these days I'm going to get around to posting pictures of my minis on this blog) and even managed to get a little bit of writing in. Nothing worthwhile yet but it's a start. 

 All in all, it was a pretty good week.

Week 29

 OK, first... seriously? Week 29. I've been sick for 29 weeks? 

 That aside, this has been a pretty normal week measured against the current standard. I'm finally on a new medication that isn't causing anxiety or depression. Not sure if it's actually helping with the migraines yet, but my head hasn't hurt much in past couple of days, so that's probably a good sign. 

 Other than that, I seem to be at point where I'm getting a pretty solid three hours of activity a day in before I wear out (touch wood). That may not sounds great for an normal, human perspective but from a "week 29" perspective I feel pretty good about it. 

 I've managed to paint some minis and get a little bit of gaming in (just Juno and I). It's something anyway.

Downton Abbey, the Movie

 First, let me say that I am a Downton Abbey fan.

 Like Tony Stark says of Happy Hogan "That's his show, he thinks it's elegant" (Also - just to show you how much of a Downton Abbey fan I really am -  the episode of Downton Abbey which appears in Iron Man 3 when Tony says that is after the one which appears when Happy wakes up.)

 So, it's probably surprising that it's taken me this long to get around to watching the Downton Abbey movie. Well, the simple reason is that I'm the only Downton Abbey fan in my house, sadly, so I haven't much chance (Also, I've been sick. :) ) but finally I've watched it.

 I loved it. 

 Let me say, if you are not a Downton Abbey fan, you probably won't. It isn't the kind of movie which introduces the characters and the story. If you don't already know and love them, you won't get it and you probably won't care. The movie is, quite simply, a letter to fans like me... to people who do love that strange rambling house and it's cast of strange, often pompous but charming characters. More, I think it is the "happily ever after" from the series. 

 A reviewer, who I think was not a fan, apparently wrote of it: "What the film lacks is any sense of real jeopardy. As we found out from the trailer, the big plot-line is this: the King and Queen are coming to dinner and Downton must be made perfect! But that simple story is stretched out to a full two hours of incredibly low-stakes, predictable drama with an overabundance of sub-plots". 

 What this reviewer fails to understand that, far from being a condemnation of the movie this is praise. This isn't a story of high stakes, of drama and tension. It's the story of our beloved characters having their happily ever after.

 It is, in a word, elegant.