Quarantine Diary #5

Day 20: Exiled for the Good of the Realm

I have been thoroughly enjoying my daily-ish bike rides on my brilliant beast Orla the Orange.

A well-to-do suburb called Clontarf is not too far away from us, and sports a coast line of sorts. It's a really good place to find a head wind and nearly get taken out by other much speedier cyclists.

Clontarf 'Beach'

I don't think we'll have dolphins swimming here any time soon

I have been playing around with the electric speeds on my bike with assisted pedalling which has been a bit of fun. I feel like I'm still doing a fair amount of hard work, but certainly does battle the head winds quite nicely. I also discovered that it has 5 speeds, not the 3 I thought it did, but 5 saps the battery like nobody's business.

Tail winds are a tricksy phenomenon - I thought that it was just me being boss and super fast, but no. All of a sudden I'd ridden twice as far as intended, and still had 15km or so to go to get home - into a head wind.

Howth Peninsula

Dublin Bay

I couldn't actually tell you what that is in the distance, but mid-ground is North Bull Island, and foreground is low tide at Dublin bay from Bayside

Each day it gets to about 4pm, I've been fart-assing around all day doing yoga cos my back is rooted, and various life admin tasks (Did the rent payment actually go out? Has husband had fruit today? How many dishes can I create for him to wash later? Online Course at Coursera. Order badminton racquet as one broke after 5 mins the other day when we tried to play in our concrete carpark 'garden', and wait in some vain hope that the internet elves are still working.) At 4 pm (Now-ish actually) I have to make a decision of would I like to sleep tonight? And if so, shall I walk or bike to get tired enough for slumber?

At this juncture, Jared's been working since 8am, and I've been sitting here watching him, so I usually get to the can't physically sit down anymore phase and fix that by...sitting down on my bicycle for awhile.

The other day I went to Sandymount...

I got a reminder just as I arrived

That I had book club with my Irish girls in 1 hour

And had just spent 40 mins biking there. So had to high-tail it home.

Back, showered and ready for book club 59 minutes later. Phew!

I quite like making amazing food.

I made some Greek Honey Bread.

Sleep has become elusive as the energy output has certainly not matched the latent energy + energy input.

There's been no coffee since about Day 3. Green tea is as hard as it gets at the moment.

Our flatmate remains in Finland, and so we have the place to ourselves, which is nice. The walls do start closing in on one after awhile though.

I find myself to be a bit skittish and antsy. Trying to settle to anything for more than about 30 minutes is quite hard.

It feels similar to just after my brother died, and your mind is reeling from everything, though much milder. I find the low-grade anxiety makes you the worst extremes of yourself.

Normally I can keep my scatterbrained-ness in check if I try really really hard.

I needed to charge my bike battery the other day, and couldn't get it out to save my life.

I got Jared to come down and help me, and he couldn't get it out either. We tried to wedge keys in between the battery and its holder and just ended up breaking the key.

I left it and resigned myself to having to pedal just that little bit harder tomorrow. I emailed Darren at the bike shop, wondering if anyone was still working and if they could help me fix it.

All he said in reply to my query was: And you were definitely turning the key a?

The key? The key! Fuck.

I hadn't just not been turning the key. I had forgotten that the key existed. The key was not part of my bike equation. They hadn't given me the key when I first bought it. I had figured out I needed it and gone back to get it the next day. I definitely knew about the key. The key hadn't registered.

He chuckled heartily when I informed him of this.

It has been a long while since such a blonde moment. (Or maybe I've just selectively remembered my intellectual prowess?)

Apparently, I'm supposed to be kind with myself and not expect quite so much of myself at this time. I'm not very good at that bit.

I've been in enough of these stay-at-home-with-no-where-to-go situations that I've largely figured out what I need to survive - at least an hour of exercise a day, no caffeine, lots of hugs and lots of writing. I need less sleep, my appetite shrinks and my mind is clearer if I'm sugar-free and alcohol-free. Preferably some life admin goals to tick off. A to-do list to keep me focused, and lots of praise - from either myself or others - for crossing off the most inane of tasks.

I worked all this out while Jared was working from Feb-April last year. When I quit my job at WIS and had summer 2018 to myself clearing out the house ready for renovations while Jared was at work. In 2015 when I was relieving, waiting for a full time teaching job to come up. In 2014 when I was severely burned out from my first teaching job and took a term to myself. Even school holidays kind are an extreme change of pace. There's been a few seasons of calm in the crazy chaos of my life. Just a month or two here or there, but it throws you. It's a completely different formula and timetable than the normal 9-5 (or 7-6 as with teaching.)

Jared needs... I pretty much just work on the premise that whatever I need, he needs the opposite. More sleep, more quiet, more space, less movement and limited bread, coffee and wine.

[Actually talks to Jared about his needs]

He just needs chocolate and hugs, and some PlayStation time....And a personal trainer to whip him into shape because he's not getting his normal 40 mins of walking a day. He doesn't want that last bit though, so it's less of a priority haha.

His appetite has decreased due to lack of moving, so we're down to 2ish meals a day. Less amount of food, less fanciness of food. Which is probably good for both of us.

Other than that we're grand, trucking along in our little groove.

Our win for this month looks like it's going to be paying off our credit card in NZ - sending that home today. That's a HUGE weight off my shoulders, and means that if there are some negative consequences from the Covid-19 crisis, we're in a healthier place financially to deal with it.

I have started inventing things to create meaningful tasks for the day - clean make up and make up case. Polish all boots in the house. Sort out online storage so we don't have 4 duplicates of photos in different folders. Useful, but still feels like not the best use of my down time.  I might be doing that thing where I'm too harsh on myself again though.

It was super lovely to go through Jared and I's 5 years of memories and the last few years of adventures. Here are some photos from times gone by to brighten your day:

Woolfenoot Nov 2018

Brilliant night full of lots of meat and brilliant cakes!

Dad's surprise 60th in Adelaide, Dec 2018

Brendon and I at Anita's wedding, Dec 2018

Dairy Crawl with Jess Julian and whanau, Dec 2018

The Julian whanau

Some lovely ladies at mum's for high tea, Dec 2018

The night we made a blanket fort and got drunk on rum! Hahahaha

Good memories!

What memories are you reminiscing about? How are you creating your isolation schedule? What's changed for you? What have you noticed about your needs/wants at this time? Am I the only one who just wants to eat everything in the house, but also have a decreased appetite? What have you done to be kind to yourself?