Weekly thread: Your Ongoing Crises + Chat News!
YOU can now start chat threads, yay!
First things first: Exciting chat news!!!!! Substack has just opened up chat on the web, so you aren’t limited to chatting via the Substack app anymore, AND paid subscribers can now start threads!! I’m so excited about this new feature, because you all are extremely wise and awesome and I am excited for you to get to know each other, ask questions of each other, vent, share silly stories, etc.
(Note that if you’re on your phone and you click the chat link, it will still try to direct you to chat on the app — but if you’re on a computer, the link should take you to a web version. I hope! Still figuring this out.)
Okay, so. It’s been a heck of a week over here because of the insane winter (spring?! Why, weather gods, why) storm that hit us yesterday. School was canceled on Tuesday, and then we lost power for most of today and our generator broke, which meant we had no running water (we have a well) and it was negative 800 degrees in the house. And then my dog pooped everywhere and rolled around in it and I couldn’t wash my hands after cleaning it up, and then our local coffee shop was unexpectedly closed when I drove there in a panic for coffee (it’s not okay for power outages to result in the inability to make coffee), and also my husband is in Colorado all week so I have done a lot more snow shoveling than I ever thought I could and my forearms are about to fall off.
BUT!!! The crisis has ended, I think. Our power is back as of this evening, somehow my dog doesn’t smell like poop, my hands are clean and I am done shoveling.
I’m sure many of you are going through your own mini-crises (and maxi-crises) right now, so I want to give you a chance to share them here because PHEW, it felt good to tell you about my week. What’s going on in your life that you’d like to unload?
Please share in the thread OR in the chat! Or, heck, both.
My two year old's new nighttime trick is to pretend to be a ghost. He slams his nursery room door shut... then silence... no movement... when I sit up on the bed trying to figure out what's happening, he has silently creeped into the corner of our room, and stand there like a statue in his white sleep sack, two eyeballs glowing in the dark. I call his name and he doesn't say anything. Eventually he replies "Mamaa?" but each night this week he changes his spot freaking the living daylight of me, as I never know where he is after the door bang.
I’m in my first year of grad school for cell and molecular bio and last week I had my first spring break since 2008...and I spent it sick! I started feeling cold symptoms around March 2, but all my COVID tests remained negative. Then this last weekend I took another nose dive and spiked a fever and tested positive. My first time getting COVID and it was a doozy. So not only did I not get to enjoy spring break, I’ve also missed a week of classes which is really hard to make up. I am finding grad school actually less understanding and accommodating than any of my old jobs. Honestly I think I would’ve missed 10 days of work this month had I been in my old job, and they wouldn’t have loved it but would’ve understood. Grad school has been not very supportive or helpful, even though I’m struggling with a virus we know is circulating and needs to be taken seriously. Sign. Venting over. Fortunately my toddler and spouse are still testing negative so hopefully they avoided the infection this round!