2020... What a time to be alive!
I know... The year is still starting as it's only May, but wow. This year has turned into a gong show because of the COVID-19 issue. First it hit China, which affected a lot of productions our business was involved with, so I was able to see how they handled it and their responses to it. They were locked down from January 15th-April 15th, some of that time was because their Chinese New Year started on January 15th, which I think made the situation worse. Then, like all pandemics do, it spread around the world. Not that I blame China for it. It was just first noticed there. Pandemics spread by wild animal to farm animal to people, and wild animals don't know about "borders", so it would have spread worldwide regardless of border closures or travel restrictions. Everyone should watch Netflix's Pandemic mini-series. They predicted this happening a year before it hit, although they thought it was going to be influenza, but turned into a coronavirus.
I live in BC, and it hit here around March 15th. My work started cutting down hours even more (see previous blog post...) First, to 2.5 days a week, then down so we could qualify for CERB, which for me would be roughly 2 3/4 days per pay period. I'm working 2 days a week as the workload has started getting busy again, so some of that time I'm working for free. This time of year is always crazy at work, but due to the disease, many of our customers are either closed or cutting back on ordering and only ordering "essentials". That doesn't mean we don't have work though. Now is the time that we get bombarded with work for the Summer/Fall rush, which is for Back to School/Christmas shopping. Currently, we are to be working the reduced hours until July 31st and re-assessed after that time to see what's happening. Because BC was quick to act on implementing social distancing guidelines and there were quite a few people who joined in (not perfect but better than most places), they are now talking about opening up a couple of other services or allowing more groups of people to gather in a couple of weeks or so.
Honestly, this is one of those occasions that makes me proud and happy I live in Canada. Our government is helping those of us who have either been laid off due to COVID-19, had to stay home with the kids due to school closures, or, like me, reduced hours. Many see that as a government hand-out, but it really isn't. We supply the government money through taxes, so technically it's our own money we are getting back. That's what taxes are for, anyways. Not for bailing our Big Oil or other Big Corporations, but to help the people when it's needed. Watching the chaos happening in the United States daily makes me scratch my head and wonder how people can be that stupid. Then again, they did elect Trump, so I guess if the shoe fits...
Working the reduced hours has made it challenging for me to keep up with my work pile. I wanted something creative to do as well at work. First, I was assigned working on Social Media, then they decided to shoot videos, and I was once again pushed to the side on yet another creative project. Now I have been assigned the website. It's been awhile since I had to do HTML/CSS and I'm certainly not up to date with web design (I have no idea what BOOTCAMP even is...), but I really want this to be my baby. My pet project. Something no one can take away from me.
I decided I was going to open purchase a back-up external drive, copy my MacBook Air's files onto that drive, clean it out, update the OS and apps, and use it to work on the website from home on my own time. With my library card, I have access to Lynda.com, so I can easily learn web design from there. There are 2 reasons I want to do this on my own:
I don't want the website to be outsourced and taken away from me as I get busy with work during work hours, and...
I want to prove I want to work here and hopefully get back to full-time status again.
One thing this COVID-19 situation taught me was the value of having a 5 days a week job. Now my schedule is the opposite. I work Mondays and Tuesdays, and have a 5 day weekend. You would think I'd use this extra time to clean and organize my house, but alas, no. Netflix and other streaming devices have taken up most of my time. I really want to prove I'm worthy enough to work full-time again once we turn back to normal, whatever that will look like.
Anyways, the plan was to use my laptop, but sadly something seriously wrong happened with the hard drive and it's no longer functional. I think I just let it go way too long without recharging so maybe the battery got corroded or stopped working, or perhaps it's one of those Apple sabotaging their older equipment issues. In either case, it put a serious damper on my well-thoughtout plan. There is nowhere in Richmond that is open currently that can repair my MacBook, so I had 3 options:
Forget about the plan.
Get a new laptop.
Get a new computer.
I didn't want to give up on the plan. I still want to do this so badly. I never get to do anything creative at work anymore. Just copy and paste translated text, or prepare files for pre-press to send to the computers. Zero creativity. I know most people would wonder why that's important, but I went to art college for a reason. I want a creative job. I want to be excited about working and solve creative problems (like re-learning web design). So the first option was a no-go.
I started checking around stores to see prices on computers, both MacBooks and iMacs. I noticed an iMac was about the same price as a MacBook Pro, so I thought I'd get an iMac. After the previous battery issue, I don't want to deal with another potential problem down the line. So I pre-arranged an order pick-up with Best Buy (as they are mostly closed with only pick-up or delivery options due to the virus) and purchased it last Saturday. I was a little scared my credit card wouldn't go through, but it did, so now I have a brand new, shiny, iMac, so compact it can easily fit on my TV tray in my living room yet it is a fully functioning computer. I spent most of the day yesterday updating software and installing the Adobe programs. Now I'm ready to work from home. I still want to see if I can get my laptop repaired later once things open up again, as many files are on there and I didn't get a chance to back them up.
I know there are many out there that can't stand Macs, but I love them. Back in the day when computers were mostly DOS, the first time I used a Mac was in a High School computer lab. I think it was a Mac IIe. Even back then, I thought it was so much easier than having to learn how to be a computer programmer just to run a program. College was all taught on Macs for art and design programs, Quark, Illustrator and Photoshop at the time, with a little work on Adobe Premiere. My first computer was a Ruby Red iMac, which was like a small cube TV but curvier, and one of the first computers to have the hard drive and monitor all-in-one. Most of the places I've worked have used Macs. I am really comfortable on them. I love their keyboard shortcuts. It's super easy and the graphics are amazing. Whenever I use PCs, I feel weird and always want to use the Command key, but of course, their's is the Control key, which is very rarely used in Macs and in such an odd location.
Anyways, I'm all set for starting this website design next week.
As mentioned earlier, I have been struggling with doing simple household chores. Look at me right now, typing a blog post when I should be cleaning the kitchen and doing my dishes. I did manage to get the living room, and bedroom done this past week, but Sundays I always manage to get lazy and just go meh...
Although I am getting better than I was the last 2 months. So I think lazy time is finally starting to go away. I'll get it all done and organized eventually. I still plan on doing the Konmari method of organizing. But one thing at a time, I guess. Building a better work relationship is my top priority this year, so I hope this initiative I am taking on my own time/dime will help to prove to my employer that I really want to be here and given another chance.
Health-wise, my life is the same as usual. I am prone to eating badly when stressed and binge eat unhealthy food. This is a particularly stressful time for most of us, so has been happening a lot lately. Then add the Easter chocolate mini-eggs into the picture... It's been bad. But... and here's the weird thing... I keep losing weight. I weighed in this morning and discovered I lost a pound, so now I'm down to 185 lbs. I seriously thought I must have gained 10 pounds in 2 months with the bad diet, but no. It might be because I'm home more. I don't eat the 3 meals a day, as I mostly sleep in and eat only twice, snacking not included. So perhaps my metabolism has adapted to the metformin, or... I don't know. I'm not a doctor. I'm not complaining, but it is just so weird after so many years of being stuck at 218-224 and trying so hard to get that to go away, that now I'm literally making no efforts and have lost weight. The only difference has been taking that Binge Eating course. Recognizing my hunger/full queues. I might still struggle with the hunger ones, but can see the full queues quite clearly.
At least I have the living room cleaned. I wanted to get that done so I could start going back to exercising this week. Starting tomorrow, Richard Simmons Project H.O.P.E. comes back in, right after I get home from work. I want to see if I add in intentional exercise if I will finally hit my goal weight. I've lost 33 lbs so far. Now I want to lose another 40. Wish me luck!
Anyways, I guess I should wrap this up for now. Thanks for reading, for those who do.
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