annafdd

Last night while driving back from Alex's I listened to some politics stuff, and quite apart from getting a tiny bit worked up, I reflected that I know far more about UK politics than Italian politics at this point. Also, when I ask myself where my vote could be more useful, the answer at this particular juncture is "the UK".

So today, changing my mind, I filled out the form for voting here for the European Elections, and a good thing it was too, because the deadline for registration is tomorrow. So I filled up the form, printed out a Next Day Delivery envelope, went to the post office to get a tracking number for it.

Now of course the problem is choosing who to vote for come June 4. I am tempted by the Green, this being a proportional election. Then again, seeing as Labour will get a right royal rollocking, one asks oneself: what will they do? What will they conclude from the results? Well, that they need to move to the right, OF COURSE. Isn't that the usual answer?

So, as much as it disgusts me, the best thing to do would probably to vote for Labour, because they will only listen to the "we are not voting for you any longer" part of the message and not the "we are voting for a party farther left". They never do.

Alternatively, and this disgusts me even more, I could vote Tory. I was seriously considering it - better them than the BNP - when I heard that they moved from the EPP group to the group where the Czech and the Polish right are. You know, a merry bunch of climate change denialists and homophobes. Which means, no fucking way I'm voting for you guys, and, that would be the new cuddly right, yes? The one that is, bar some miracle, sure to win the next elections?

We're so fucked.

(And yes, I am thinking about the LD too, but not with great enthusiasm I must say.)

Anyway, that was result number one.

Then I went to Boots and got my medication (I turn out to be Ms Dal for them, which is a new one. Usually I am Ms Dan.) I also grabbed a small first aid kit to keep in the kitchen, and put the first aid stuff for burns in the same drawer, because running around the house wondering where the first aid stuff is in an emergency is never a good thing. I also bought some artificial tears and some omega-3 capsules, because I have concluded that my blepharospasm* and my tearing eyes are both a result of dry eyes. I've also got a small program that reminds me to take eye breaks and stretching breaks. Let's see how all of this works.

I then went to have my blood taken for the celiac antibodies test. The doctor recommended eating lots of gluten over the weekend, which is what I did. Let's see how that goes.

Later today I have my visit to the agency. I am really, really nervous about this.

* Isn't that a great word? Just saying it makes me feel so much better. It's one thing to say, "my eyelid twitches" and another to have a nice Greek word for it.

My laptop is still dead. It is actually awaiting a very nice BIG HARD DRIVE* in the mail, and the exciting moment when I will install it, but in the meanwhile it is a very stylish paperweight on my coffee table.

This wouldn't be so bad if my main desktop computer hadn't decided that he was cross with my network and wasn't exchanging more than monosyllables with it. I rebooted it, everything seemed the same, I dragged the router a little closer, while still in the other room, and something or other must have solved the problem because I have now access again, but I had a very intensely irritating evening yesterday.

But most importantly, there are some things that I just can't do on this computer. I don't know why. Writing is one of them. Writing is done on the sofa with music playing loudly. Here, it just ain't happenin'.

In other news, I am very upset with my body. I have the very strong feeling that something is wrong with me, but I can't put my finger on it. Last night I had one of those moments of terrible hypocondria - I became convinced that my pee had a funny smell. I did what every geek does in this cases and googled "pee smell", but no useful diagnostic indication emerged. Same with "urine smell" and "piss smells funny". Every website insisted in telling me that I was dehydrated or had eaten some smelly stuff.

By googling selectively, I managed to convince myself that I have diabetes. Or if I don't have it, that it is a matter of days until I do. Drowsiness? Check. Weight gain? check. Thirst? check. Blurry vision? Check.

I wasn't as relieved at having arrived at a late-night wikidiagnosis as I should have been. Diabetes is not curable and the treatment seems to be "lose weight", "eat right and exercise", as if I hadn't been trying to to all three of these things for the last three years and more.

This morning I convinced myself that I was dehydrated and also I had eaten lots of kale yesterday and that was the smell. But the disquiet didn't go away. I am still feeling that there is something wrong, especially in the fact that I am ALWAYS SO FUCKING TIRED. I know that people who meet me around don't have that impression, but the truth is that I don't nearly enough energy to do the things that once I used to do.

Today for example I woke up horribly late (after a very disturbed night, ok). Got up, ambled around trying to wake up. Woke up. Watched some tv. Tried doing the translation test. Halfway decided I needed to eat. Ate. Did other half of translation test - for a huge whopping total of 250 words, mind you. Went to bed in front of tv. Slept. Woke up. Watched more tv. Decided to go out running for five minutes. Did. Came back a little more awake but with funny back. Now feel drowsy again.

This is ridicolous. I am drowsy after napping for an hour and having ingested 200mg of modafinil!

Also, there is the issue of the assorted aches and pains. My back, as I said, is not happy even with a little exercise. This really kills me because if I managed either to lose weight or at least to improve my muscle tone, I wouldn't be so fucking ridicolously tired moving around. But if I try to exercise, my back seizes up. And there is the TMJ ache. That seems to be going a trifle better since I have the mouth guard, but is still there. And, occasionally, a killer headache arrives and slams me back to bed. I can kill the pain with painkillers, but it still leaves me weak and stupid.

This is SO FUCKING ANNOYING. I am just 43. People twice my age are in better condition. OK granted, not many. But there are. A lot of them in my family, at least on the Feruglio side. And the maddening thing is that I am a pretty tough and strong and healthy person. My fever never ever goes over 37.5. I get over infections quickly. I can lift and carry heavy objects. I am even in a good mood and a whole lot less stressed than I used to be - so why oh why do I end up dozing on the sofa in front of Zoo Babies?

In other news, last Saturday I went to a party at my friend and former boss Paolo. Most of the people there were my office colleagues, and I was surprised at how happy I was to see them. Most of all, I was happy to see them as other human beings, which I had never managed to do before. I laughed, I teased, I made very inappropriate jokes, and I told everybody that I have never been as happy as I am since I lost the job. Frankly, often I had the urge to tell them, "What are you waiting for?"

But of course I know - I myself didn't let go of my miserable rock until I was forcibly detached.

The following day I realized something that I hadn't so far: that since I lost my job my self-esteem has improved immensely. I am now, in every social interaction I encounter, a clever, competent, educated, smart, likable person. I make people laugh, I tell interesting stories, I can do stuff that a lot of people can't like replacing a hard drive (well, not yet, actually). On the job, I was nothing and nobody. I had no identity whatsoever. Even my friend in the office were only my friends in the cracks, the pauses from the job.

Back at the publisher, the last workplace I was in before coming to London, we communicated both as private persons and as editors (me of course in a very humble and small editorial position, but still). The fiction editor genuinely liked my reports, and trusted my judgement. People would ask me things and the conversations we had were part of the identity and nature of the publisher.

I am nervous about my future in this: that I am in no hurry to find another job, because deep down, I am convinced that the alternative to staying at home is going back to a situation like that. I know this is not true, of course, but the idea of, for example, going back to my agency and asking if they have any open position is deeply revolting.

For now, I am happy to stay at home and invest energies in learning things for my future: if I can do some technical translation work, that is potentially a decently paid work that could increase with time. I could go back and do some fiction translation, although I would have to switch back my Italian brain for that. I am doing stuff in InDesign and dabbling in web development and so on. And writing. Who knows, some money could even come from the writing.

* I will resist any punning temptation, thankyouverymuch. No matter how great.

This evening, feeling thoroughly miserable, I tried the Universal Panacea:

CUP OF TEA!

Believe it or not, it worked. Amazing. I felt so much better than I went on with the cataloguing of my books. They are currently stashed on the shelves in no particular order, but at least, gradually, I get to know where they are.

I've done the almost empty cabinet near the bed for Books To Be Read Real Soon Now (ah!), and two out of eight shelves of the niche in the living room, plus almost all the Lecco bookshop next to the window, for a total of 512 books.

The main problem is that I am using Delicious Library and I have found no way to import my Italian books. LibraryThing is not much better - there are several Italian databases but they don't seem to find any of my Italian books. This is very, very vexing.

I am uploading my new books to LibraryThing, just so I can have a backup, but I think I will also look into other cataloguing programs, one never knows.

So, yesterday's news: my mom is apparently being molested by her physiotherapist. She started telling me cackling how this old guy sat beside her on the gurney and while he was reading her doctor's referral letter started caressing her knee and thighs. It was pretty obvious that she was upset but she was trying to put a "funny" spin on it. I was not amused. I felt sick, angry and helpless. She doesn't want to make a fuss about it, doesn't want to complain, the best I could get from her is that if she'll see how things go next time and in case she will ask for another therapist.

I am quite upset about this.

I went to see the psychiatrist yesterday. She listened to me very sympathetically, told me again that I am "articulate", "very psychologically minded", "well informed" and all the rest. She told me that she thinks I need to go on lithium. She's the second one to have this opinion, my other psychiatrist, in Italy, long ago, also thought I needed lithium. At the time I just ignored him, but this time I have no choice. She prescribed a course of tests I am to take, and then we'll see.

So I went to my practice, because their phone was always engaged. No appointments for today with any doctor. Tomorrow they are closed. I showed them the tests, and they said that a nurse can do them - first early morning appointment, 22 June. My follow-up with the psychiatrist is on the 21st. I insisted and they booked me an appointment for next wednesday, at midday. I will have to remember to fast.

Coming away I collected this leaflet about cuts to Brent Council medical services. Apparently, contraception is being cut 40%, physiotherapy is only for acute cases, podiatry (i.e. cutting old people's toenails when they can't do it so that they don't become bedridden) is going away, and so is adult mental health - oh, and alcohol services.

All things for which people can easily go private, of course. Alcoholists, adult schizophrenic and bedridden old geezers all have good medical insurance. And/or cash to spare.

I listen to "Today in Parliament" every night going to work, so I had happened to have listened to Patricia Hewitt telling everybody in her schoolmistressy voice how glorious were the advances of the NHS the other day, and consequently came home shaking with fury.

I came home and phoned my parents and learned that my uncle Carlo died this morning, in his bed. He was alone with my aunt Lio, who apparently knows who the one to rely on in my family is, and called my mom. My mom went there (good thing that she has recently started walking again) and helped out.

She instructed me to call aunt Lio, who is my godmother. We are not really close, in fact I hardly know her, but the truth is, I really, really am not in a good place for a condolences phone call right now. I told my mom and she got angry at me - as usual, she thought I was trying to be excused, while I was only asking for support and help. (My mom also reacted to my very, very censored account of Wiscon with "You asked for it" and to the news that I got late to the Ton last night and most people had already gone with "But you always do!")

She asked me what plans I had for the weekend. I couldn't very well tell her Bjorn The Swede is in town, so I mumbled something. Truth is, I may well be too tired for Bjorn the Swede anyway.

Stayed up until stupid o'clock last night to finish Alison Bechdel's Fun Home. Slept four hours. Voice slowly going, going, going. Throat hurts.

Considering paracetamol (acetaminophen for you Yanks). Pondering pros and cons of fighting inflammation.

My immune system is on strike, apparently.

I need a long holiday somewhere sunny, balmy, with long white beaches.

I am considering Ireland. Because I just know I would be bored to tears if I had to spend a week on a deckchair on some beach in Mauritius.

Back when my love life was all nice and rosy and peachy, my love kept suggesting that I might, in the future, move to San Francisco. I think it was more fantasy than anything else, but I seriously considered it. Well, I seriously considered, then thought "health care", shuddered, and thought, no way. NO WAY.

All the same, every time I read something like this I am seized by incontrollable fury. Hell, I may not live there, but lots of my friends do.

My husband is fighting pneumonia at $25 an antibiotic pill right now because we're uninsured and have to pay cash. If he has to go into the hospital we'll run a real risk of ending up homeless as well.

And the sad schadenfreunde of:

"My health insurer has just notified me, in a brief form letter, that my monthly premiums are to rise from $472.33 to $857.00 on January 1st. That's an increase of 81 percent. ***E*I*G*H*T*Y*-*O*N*E* *P*E*R*C*E*N*T*** Can they do that? I called them. They sound pretty confident they can. Ye gods!"

Damned if I know why. It feels like migraine but without headache - or flu without fever, which is completely possible because I never develop much of a fever anyway, and I have had my flu shots before I left Italy, so this could be a bug trying its best and failing miserably.

I dragged myself out, and in my vulnerable state was foolish enough to enter first into Borders, leaving with four books, New Scientist and the latest issue of Interzone (grrr), and then into Marks and Spencer where I left forty quids but I have now a well-stocked freezer that should see me eating regularly and skipping the junk food in the future.

Buying books had a wonderful effect on me, and now I feel a bit better. Not terribly much, though. I managed to iron most of my stuff today watching "Vera Drake", and wash half the dishes. I hope to wash the other half later on, but for now it's time for a lay-down.

After watching Vera Drake, I feel the irresistible urge to like tea. Unfortunately, despite enjoying the occasional cup now and then, I don't get the magical physical, emotional and moral restorative effects that the British seem to get from it. Sigh. Besides, I keep forgetting the bag or leaves in it and when I get to drink it it's an acidic vile lukewarm liquid.

I have to get better at this tea business if I want to get the citizenship. I'm sure they test you about it.