Looks like that brush with Covid will have some consequences after all. As for the illness itself, I didn't even feel it. In fact, I don't even know WHEN I had it - just before G or just after. The tests showed hints of infection, but I didn't even sneeze. 

       And yet ... two weeks later, I am still so tired. My muscles feel like old chewed-up spat-out gum. I am sleepy, uninspired, I need red bull just to gain the ambition to work. I go jogging every day, but every day it's like beating a dead horse. When I eat chocolate, it tastes like someone who was a smoker kept it in their hand for a while. When I drink my cocoa, it tastes spoilt. Most of everything else, it tastes like ghosts, like hints of flavor and fragrance. I can tell it's there, but through a thin foil. 

       Body, buddy, snap out of it. It's almost April. I need to get my mojo on. I want to jog and feel jumpy. For the first time in ages I saw my reflection in a store window and thought: whoa, okay, I actually have really good legs! I need to be ready for the puppy. Two more months and we should be getting it, love love love

I continue to generate a little bit of body dysmorphia, hating my stomach and hating the size of my boobs, resulting in an eating disorder. But just a little. I had been coming down with a gross cold for the past two days, and yesterday on my way to a salad bar, I veered into McDonalds, murdering a Chicken burger and small fries: the body was so short on salt, I was starting to get dizzy on top of everything bad I'm feeling (totally stiff shoulders and back, coughing, sneezing, sniffles, headache, acid reflux and peeing all the time.). I test myself twice a day, but I don't have Covid, just a cold. The General, whom I haven't seen since Saturday, as he is self-isolating on the other side of the apartment, does have the 'Rona, and is experiencing a crappy flu. Man flu. It's, like, the worst flu anyone has ever had. 

On the plus news, I've bought myself running shoes. Not sure I ever had running shoes before, always trekking, and they are so fluffy! There was a little bit of a need for practical investigation, as I need a) a super comfy toe box and b) a bouncy sole. And the size needs to be two numbers up. Ironically, the coolest-looking pair, and the most costly, wasn't at all as comfortable as I was expecting it will be. Ultimately the cute colours had to be sacrificed for the practical aspects and, well, now I own a pair of running shoes. All I need now is another two energetic dogs to drag me, as Lyra no longer falls for my promises of dull dry biscuits if she helps me uphill... 

March

 Hello, diary. How goes?

I am more or less great. It's still bleak and wintery, minus the snow, so I do miss the sunlight, but I've been compensating by going to my gym extra, keeping warm. The weather lady says any day now :))

The fun part was, I was getting really nervous, edgy, jittery, and kinda worried all the time - I even invented a new way to manifest my anxiety: I've been scratching the inside of my ear!! Only when I mentioned this to G, puzzled, he replied: You haven't eaten in eight days. 

Oh. Right. We're on our March diet. It's not that we're not eating, it's just that we are eating waaaaaaay less - in my case, I drink organic vegan cocoa twice a day and then have either a little salad or seeds/nuts/granola mix. I do feel better, and energized, but I also feel insane. These diets are like a mental illness. I'm scratching my poor ear raw. 

Concerning work, I was locked for a bit, but now I started working and it's going well - haven't published anything new yet; I've given myself until the 10th. Twelve new paints so far. Can easily make ten or so more...  Not to jinx it.

Concerning karate: every time I learn something new and something more and something better.  Benefits of having five instructors, I suppose. Took me five months to realize what I'm doing wrong with my kicking. Turns out, I can actually kick fairly well. Since we've been sparring with G, I can also defend myself fairly well. But it's not really possible to punch through his defenses. Yes, I can murder a small child with a punch, but a grown, 6'6 270 pound man... not so much. His arms are twice as long as mine. Plus, usually in life, one doesn't get into fights with small children. G has been communicating with the hot instructor, giving him the green light to beat the bedid Jesus out of me if I don't behave. Good thing this instructor is also the most skilled and can paint a self-portrait with his kicking foot, but isn't rough. Several teenage boys in the club are rough as fuck. But he, who is by far the strongest and fastest, never harmed me once, yet. Then again I'll assume he's seen a naked woman by now and knows that big boobs are very sensitive. Teenage boys don't. 

Concerning stamps... I KNOW I swore no more stamps, but ... those beautiful bastards sent me a catalog. I am so screwed.... O.O