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Day #84 of Self-Isolation
Day #84 has me fretting about my blood pressure - which is either high or my gauge is wrong. Honestly, I don't know. Last reading was 143/91. I've been advised not to take more than 100 mg of Losartin (apparently that's the high dosage permitted) and they've prescribed a diuretic - which I'll pick up from the pharmacy tomorrow along with my prescripion of Losartin (I have about a week left). I discussed it with the physician assistant/nurse at NYU Langone - my Doctor's Office. Doctor is off until June 15. The doctor covering for her - proscribed the diuretic. They told me to take it three times, waiting a minute between each. And if I had heart palpitations, dizzyness, vomiting, shortness of breath or tightness in the chest - to go to an emergency room. (I told this to my mother and her response was "oh, they are looking for COVID"). And advised that I could always go to an urgent care facility to get my blood pressure checked. (Eh, it would be through the roof - considering there are no urgent care facilities near me. Getting there will be anxiety inducing.)
So, I'm just lying low and hoping for the best until my doctor's appointment next week.
I'm also struggling with the sinus headache from hell - which refuses to go away completely. It's lurking. I've been feeling off all day. Fullness in the ears, a slight sick headache lurking in the background, balance off, and
an impending sense of motion sickness. I've had them before - that's how I know it's not COVID. It's allergy related. I get them this time of year - at the height of hay-fever/pollan season. Basically the headache is due to fluid pressing against the inner eardrum. I take phrenephyline (decogestant that doesn't cause one to have a heart attack), advil, and antihistimines.
Usually works...lately, not as well - which means the allergens are very high.
No walk today. Instead I attempted some stretching exercises until my headache got the better of me. In addition - menopause may be adding to it.
Still dealing with the period that is just spotting dried blood. Gross? Deal with it. I'm living it - you're not.
Really want the headache to go away and the blood pressure to figure itself out. (I eat all the right things - I know, I checked. Everything on the stupid list - I'm doing. What the fucking hell do they want from me?)
See worried about COVID - because I'm struggling to get my blood pressure under control - and COVID kills people with hypertension aka high blood pressure. Ugga Bugga. That's why I'm afraid of the virus folks. I'm in the category of "high risk" patients.
Managed to get more information from Amazon - yes, there's a promotional credit on my account - I'll see it appear when I check out my next item. (It's only a matter of time - I buy stuff from them constantly.) It took a while though. Buying furniture online is headache inducing.
Also texted niece aka love of my life. She told me to be careful when I go off to my doctor's appointment next week - which will entail braving the subways. I can't quite decide if it would be more stressful getting a cab or taking the subway? I'm guessing the subway is cleaner. Or driving? Considering I have anxiety in regards to driving - it's most likely a toss-up.
New York & Black Lives Matter vs. the Corona Virus and the President of the United States
NY is still fighting the Coronavirus - this time around they've enlisted the services of CORE Foundation to help them with the disadvantaged communities fighting COVID-19. Basically they gave up on the Federal Government helping them, figured out we were pretty much on our own, and realized using the police was a really bad idea, so they reached out to a non-profit organization that assists with disaster relief. Normally FEMA would be doing this - but the idiotic Republicans defunded FEMA. So NY giving up on FEMA, hunted someone else.
CORE (formerly J/P Haitian Relief Organization) founder, Sean Penn, had mobilized a powerful network of doctors, emergency workers, and government officials to take immediate action. We continue to work in Haiti with a team of 150+ Haitian employees working to rebuild and re-imagine communities every day.
Our life-saving programs revolve around building healthier and safer neighborhoods to mitigate the scale of devastation caused by disaster. We see it time and time again, when a crisis strikes it’s the marginalized, vulnerable communities that suffer most—wherever they might be. Whether it’s the Lower Ninth Ward in New Orleans, the underserved neighborhoods of Houston, or the informal settlements of Port-au-Prince or San Juan, low income communities are more likely to suffer in a natural disaster, and are too often left to fend for themselves in recovery.
I kind of think Scean Penn is redeeming himself with CORE. Although a lot of bad press on Penn came from Madonna, who well..I'm not certain is a reliable source of information on anything.
New York is an interesting case study on how to handle a situation - where the people who should be helping and providing Aid, aren't. In an ideal scenario - the Federal Government and the President would be fighting the virus and helping. The Federal Government would be providing guidance on locking down, and when to re-open, and would be providing testing capacity. They'd also been providing outreach to communities. Note - George W. Bush did have things in place, in case of a pandemic, and had funded FEMA, he also put aside parkland for the environment. As did the Presidents before and after, up to Trump and his Republican cronies - who defunded FEMA, defunded CDC, etc. As a result - the Federal Government is useless right now. It's why the US has more cases, more deaths, and civil unrest.
Anyhow, New York dealt with that in an interesting way - it thought outside the box. And took what it could get from the Federal Government, then made deals outside of it. Basically New York has kind of become it's own country.
It's set up deals with other states - a coalition of sorts. It's bartered with other countries for supplies. It's found non-profit organizations to partner with. It's utilized and mobilized its citizens to help. It's basically done what the US Government should be doing and hasn't. And right now, Governor Cuomo is watched more than the President around the world.
President Doofus (who has in a very short period of time managed to make a mockery of the office, which...is really an understatement), has now pissed off the Governor of New York to the point in which the Governor is past being diplomatic and polite and no longer cares. He stated, "I'm too old and I'm past caring at this point - I'll say it, and I do not care if I get yelled at. I can take it - what the President said on Twitter was obnoxious and hit an all new low. He made up his own truths with no basis in facts. None. He should apologize to that poor man who has finally been released from ICU." If if were to the Governor, the police who attacked the protestor, would be in prison right now awaiting prosecution. So too would the President. Oh dear, Cuomo, I love you. I'm so glad you are my Governor, and so glad I voted for you even though at the time I wanted to wring your neck.
Cuomo also stated in his briefing, and I was rather impressed by this, that to elicit true change - you have to do more than reform the police, you have to go after "educational reforms", "healthcare reforms", and "housing reforms". Those three things must be covered.
We're down in new cases. Meanwhile other places in the world are increasing, and it's still running wild in the US - with cases increasing in Texas, Florida, the South, Los Angeles, Wisconsin, and Washington.
On Black Lives Matter front - we're in Day 16 of civil unrest and protests. The longest I've seen in my lifetime. Something feels different about this though. Right now watching the George Floyd funeral on tape - rather Rev Al Sharpton's eulogy. (He's a bit controversial with pretty much everyone.)
I do agree with him that more has to happen, and the people showing up now, need to be there for the long haul. I'm trying to be optimistic, but I feel like I've been here before - on the other hand, this feels different than before - it feels like the Me#Too Movement that came out of the Women's March. But bigger than that. It's bigger - because I saw white women and white people making signs in Kensington stating "Black Lives Matter". And I was watching white people get arrested. I saw a 76 year old Catholic White Man get bludgeoned by police on video protesting. That's what is different.
The realization that we are one people - not separate - and we can only survive - if we are together.
Although, I'm at the point in this story - in which I want more ACTION less speechifying. Legislation. Trump out. Republican Party out.
Equality. Now. Not tomorrow. NOW. I'm impatient. I don't want to wait any longer. I want to snap the racists bigots out of existence and snap equality in. Like THAT. Snap. But alas, the Universe has no sense of time and likes to have things play out. I just wish I knew how - throwing money at it feels like throwing it down a well.
Listening to Sharpton's speech makes me feel guilty for not protesting. But, I have high blood pressure - and...there are other ways I can help. My niece wishes she could too - but there are other things she can do.
I tracked down the Washington Post's detailed video account of Mr. Floyd's death - because I hadn't seen it - just clips. God. Although still not as bad as what they did to Breonna Taylor, who came home from work, with the cops breaking into her house by mistake, and got pummeled by bullets. Breonna - was an EMT worker and guilty of no crime. Or Trevor Martin - who was walking home with groceries and got shot to death.
Too many.
Like I said, I'm at the point in the story in which I want justice.
Miscellaneous
* I was rather impressed with how Daniel Radcliff handled JK Rowling's nasty treats about transgender women. He writes an essay explaining why she is wrong. In calm words. And with logic, kindness and reason.
* Headache has receded. So something worked. Don't know what. But it worked.
* And the light is fading on the horizon, a soft blue emerges fading into a dusky white - with the trees and rooftops shadowed against it. I'm looking at it outside my window as I type.
* I haven't gotten into television much of late. Watching very little.
Shows that I've seen?
- Wolverine and the X-men ( had to give up because all the characters are unrecognizable. Even Wolverine. It's as if they flipped the personalities of Scott Summers and Wolverine. Very jarring. Whomever wrote this thing didn't read the X-men comics that I did.
- Rosewell, New Mexico - it's actually really good this year, far better than last year. And utilizing some favorite actors in a more interesting way. I also really like the characters, far more so than I did in the original Rosewell.
- The Great - I kind of gave up. I may go back to it at some point. I had about five episodes left.
- Burn Notice - I'm rewatching. I missed the last two seasons, so I thought I'd rewatch. And I can't remember it. It's kind of MacGyver meets the Equalizer by way of the CIA. It's funny and well-cast, and aired a long time ago. Also has very strong female characters in Sharon Glass and Gabrielle Anwar. Best thing about it - requires no focus, no emotion, just fun. (I kind of need that right now.) It's on Amazon Prime, along with Farscape, and Babylon 5.
- Tried to watch The Moonspiners on Disney Plus, but midway through I wanted to smack Hayley Mill's heroine. She's so whiny. I gave up. Also tried to watch the live action version of The Lion King - but it gave me a headache.
I may re-watch Black Panther - to comfort myself.
I'll probably go back to Steven Universe at some point. After trying to watch Wolverine and The X-men, not to mention the 1990s X-men cartoon, my appreciation for Steven Universe and its animation kind of sky-rocketed.
Anyhow...I'll leave you with another statue...this round a guy who, I don't know about anyone else, but he seems a tad out of place in the middle of a cemetery.
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Whatever other health issues I may deal with-- and I have mucho empathy for your allergies, mine are awful also at times, and yes, they often cause sinus headaches-- for a 66 year old man, my blood pressure is excellent. So whenever a medical tech or nurse takes a reading with an automated cuff, and the pressure reads higher than I think it should be, I make them re-do it with the traditional, manual one. It never fails to read lower, often by ten points or more!
STAY OFF TWITTER!!! (Just sayin'... ;-)
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I can get a manual - but no clue how to use it. Hesitant to get another electronic version.
Yeah, I've veered away from Twitter. It's not good for my health.
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