Right now

Right now...* 

*(an occasional (mostly monthly) meme, alternating from time to time with "The Current"). (Explanation of how this started & my inspirations in my first "Right now" post, here. Also my first "The Current" post, here.)

Pandemic diary/update: August was Month #29 (going on #30 -- the 2.5-year mark) of living with the COVID-19 pandemic. 

Our provincial government continues to take the attitude of "move along, nothing to see here." Early in August, Ontario's Chief Medical Officer of Health declared that Wave #7 had peaked.  Yesterday (a full month later), he admitted that Wave #7 is still ongoing, but it has plateaued. He also admitted the province can expect to see more cases in the fall (duh) -- school is starting (no masks required), boosters for children aged 5-11 were only announced yesterday, colder weather is on the way, and once it arrives, we'll be moving back indoors. 

Not helping matters: nearly all restrictions are gone. Fewer and fewer masks are being worn voluntarily wherever we go. Also announced yesterday: the province is dropping the mandatory five-day isolation guideline for people who test positive for covid. You "should" stay home until you're feeling better, and wear a mask for 10 days, but nobody's going to be enforcing this. 

The province's COVID-19 Science Advisory Table -- a volunteer group of independent scientific and public health experts who advise the government on its response to the pandemic (and who have repeatedly urged the government to take the pandemic more seriously) -- is being disbanded as of Sept. 6th, along with its covid information dashboard, which includes readings of virus levels in the province's wastewater. These readings are one of the very few concrete, non-anecdotal measurements left to tell us just how much covid virus is circulating in the community (and thus help people assess their personal risk levels). (This opinion piece by Bruce Arthur of the Toronto Star -- written before the official announcement was made -- provides some background and analysis. Here's another good piece by Andre Picard of The Globe & Mail.) 

Meanwhile, hospitals have been swamped and understaffed all summer long, emergency rooms have been forced to close, and we continue to hear about friends, relatives and friends of friends getting covid, many for the first time. (A University of Toronto epidemiologist I follow on Twitter noted that "covid hospitalizations in children < 10, and in elders over 70, are currently far higher than they were in summer of 2020, or summer 2021.")  

But sure... the pandemic is over...  :(   ("It's just a cold," one of dh's cousins breezily assured me when we saw her recently....) 

As of June 16th, the government has been reporting covid data weekly (on Thursdays) instead of daily, making it even harder to tell just what's going on. :(  The Toronto Star (my main source of covid data) has started a brand-new weekly stats tracking page -- but not all data categories that were previously reported are still being disclosed there. :(   If you look at the charts for the past two months/over the course of the summer (they start on July 1st), most of the categories tracked either show an increase in numbers, or have remained more or less the same over the course of the summer ( = there has not been significant improvement). 

Among the latest stats (last updated Aug. 25th): 

• New case numbers & test positivity rates are no longer reported (on the Star's page, anyway -- not that they've been very accurate anyway, since PCR testing was limited/cut back at the peak of the Omicron outbreak in late December/early January). 

• Hospitalizations (people in hospitals testing positive for covid) decreased slightly over the month, from 1,433 on July 1st to 1,354 on Aug. 25th (up 1.3% over the previous week). Peak was 1,498 on Aug. 3rd.  
• There were 150 patients with COVID-19 in Ontario's ICUs testing positive for COVID-19 or there for COVID-19 related illness on Aug. 1st, and 146 on Aug. 25th, up 6.6% over the previous week. Peak was 154 on Aug. 2nd. 
• There were 0 deaths on Aug. 1st and 19 on Aug.25th. Peak was 33 on Aug. 4th. The 7-day average was 12.7, up 58.9% over the previous week. (Total pandemic deaths reported: 13,958.) 
• On Aug. 25th, 86.8% of Ontario's total population has had at least one vaccine, 83.5% had at least two, but just 51.2% had received a third dose. (No stats provided for fourth doses, which only became available to adults under age 60 in mid-July.)  These numbers have hardly budged over the past couple of months. 

With a population of just over 14 million, Ontario has logged 1,39360 (officially counted) cases of covid and 13,828 deaths (the Star reported 13,958). For Canada as a whole (population 38 million), those numbers are 4,143,709 cases and 43,617 deaths. (These numbers are from The Globe & Mail, as of Aug. 25th.) 

On the personal pandemic front: Despite the almost complete lack of both mask mandates and voluntary masking hereabouts, dh & I continue to wear masks when out in public, and have remained (mostly) socially distanced -- particularly while recovering from my eye surgery on July 25th, and before/after my gallbladder removal surgery on Aug. 15th.  On top of dh's weekly (masked) trips to the supermarket for groceries and for occasional takeout lunches & dinners: 

• We visited SIL & Little Great-Nephew at BIL & SIL's house 3 times, including once to stay with LGN for an hour while SIL had an appointment. He continues to be such a joy...! 
• We returned to our Old Community on Aug. 3rd to see our family doctor about prescription renewals and visit our Katie at the cemetery, in advance of "her" day on Aug. 7th. 
• We went through the drive-through at Dairy Queen on Aug. 7th, then sat in the car in the parking lot and toasted Katie with Blizzards (Skor for me, Oreo for dh -- a traditional activity/food for us on this day/weekend, lol).  
• We were back at a downtown hospital the next morning (Aug. 4th) to check how my right eye is healing, post-July 25th surgery (superficial keratectomy), and back again for another checkup on Aug. 25th. 
• En route home on the 4th, we stopped at our usual local drugstore to fill my new prescriptions and pick up a few sundries. 
• We walked to a lab near our condo building on Aug. 11th for bloodwork for our family doctor. 
• My gallbladder removal surgery was on Aug. 15th at a new hospital close to where we live. 
• We had coffee at BIL & SIL's house with them, BIL & dh's aunt, her two daughters (dh & BIL's cousins) and their husbands (Saturday, Aug. 20th). 
• We had haircut appointments back in our Old Community on Aug. 26th, and stopped at the drugstore on our way back home to pick up some prescriptions and other things. 
• BIL & SIL had lunch at Younger Nephew & his wife's townhouse last Saturday (Aug. 27th), and they called us over for coffee & dessert. We walked -- it's less than 10 minutes away.  :)  
• On Aug. 30th, we went for gelato, browsed in the (very busy) bookstore (where, aside from another couple in line for the checkout, we were the only people wearing masks), and stopped at the drugstore. 

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Also right now:  

Reading: I finished 5 books in August (all reviewed on this blog, as well as Goodreads, & tagged  "2022 books").  Not bad, especially considering that I have been rather preoccupied over the past month or two, and the vision in my right eye, for several weeks post-surgery (on July 25th), was less than optimal!  

• "Exit" by Belinda Bauer (the Gateway/Lighthouse Women book club's August pick; discussed at our Aug. 21st Zoom meeting).  (My review.) 
• "Arrow Through the Heart: The Biography of Andy Gibb" by Matthew Hild. (My review.) 
• "Don't Stop Believin'"  by Olivia Newton-John. (My review.) 
• "Anna and her Daughters" by D.E. Stevenson (summer read for my D.E. Stevenson fan group). (My review.) 
• "Sarah Morris Remembers" by D.E. Stevenson (for my upcoming D.E. Stevenson group discussion in September. I'll count this as a re-read once our group read is done). (My review.) 

This brings me to 36 books read so far in 2022, which brings me to 80% of my 2022 Goodreads Reading Challenge goal of 45 books. I am (for the moment, anyway) 7 books ahead of schedule. :)  

Current read(s): 

• "Tales of the City" by Armistead Maupin (the Gateway/Lighthouse Women book club pick for September). 
• "The Menopause Manifesto" by Dr. Jen Gunter. 

Coming up: 

Most of my book groups have their next reads plotted out for a few months in advance -- and listing them here helps me keep track of what I should be reading next. ;)  

• For the Gateway/Lighthouse Women book club: 
• "Bewildered" by Laura Waters (October) 
• Within the private online Gateway Women (now called Lighthouse Women) community, we have two groups discussing Jody Day's book, "Living the Life Unexpected" -- one group that's more conducive to UK/European/Australasian time zones, and mine, which is mostly North Americans. Since January, we've been meeting on Zoom to discuss one chapter per month. I missed our seventh call, on July 17th, to discuss Chapter 7, and we'll be discussing Chapter 8 in mid-September. If/when we complete the full 12 chapters, I'll count it as another re-read. :)  

A few recently purchased titles (in digital format, mostly discounted ($5.99 or less) or purchased with points): 

• "Great Circle" by Maggie Shipstead 
• "This Will Not Pass" by Jonathan Martin & Alex Burns 
• "Everything I Need I Get From You" by Kaitlyn Tiffany 
• "The Marlow Murder Club" by Robert Thorogood 
• "Crying in H Mart" by Michelle Zauner
• "Madam Speaker" by Susan Page 
• "Bright Burning Things" by Lisa Harding 
• "The Palace Papers" by Tina Brown 
• "Bittersweet" by Susan Cain 
• "All In" by Billie Jean King 
• "The Hollow Sea" by Annie Kirby 

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Watching: A whole lot of reruns...!  (Not much on TV lately...! and I just can't seem to get in the habit of using our Netflix subscription...) 

(Still) Waiting for season 2 of "Stanley Tucci: Searching for Italy" to resume on CNN on Sunday nights... 

Listening: I never got into Wordle, but I've been having fun with the daily Heardle challenge!  I am pretty good at identifying anything from the 1960s through 1980s (and maybe even some of the 1990s), but I suck when it comes to anything past the year 2000, lol -- which, unfortunately, has been the bulk of featured songs lately. (Although I did get Carrie Underwood "Before He Cheats" with just two clues a while back, and I correctly guessed that it might be Billie Eilish last week, although I couldn't name one of her songs to save my life.)  

Curiously, I have different stats, depending on whether I look at my laptop or my cellphone??  On my laptop: my current streak stats are 7/25 or 28% correct (maximum streak: 0:2). On the phone, I'm at 10/30 or 33.3% correct, and my maximum streak is 0:3 (as of Aug. 31st).  

Eating:  Theoretically, I should be able to eat anything I want now (post-gallbladder surgery) -- although the nurse I spoke with, pre-operation, warned me that most people find that fast food "goes right through them," at least at first, until their body adjusts to the absence of the gallbladder. (And of course, having lost about 18 pounds over the past year as I coped with all my various medical issues, I am reluctant to put any of it back on again...!)  

I've been trying not to tempt fate too much yet, but we had takeout fish & chips on Saturday night, and that went well. I'm hoping to slowly start adding some of my former favourites back into my diet, at least occasionally -- like crockpot roast beef, casseroles with ground beef and onions, hamburgers and french fries from our favourite local fast-food joint, and cheese!  

Drinking:  Not much lately (in terms of alcohol anyway!), because of my surgeries and all the various medications I've been using.  

I know the pumpkin spice lattes are available now at Starbucks. I've never quite "got" the appeal. Personally, I've been craving an iced mochaccino lately, lol.  Maybe on our way out of the bookstore next time we're there...? (Haven't indulged in a Starbucks since the pandemic began.)  

Buying (besides books, lol):  Plane tickets to see my family in October!  (And crossing: all crossables that we don't experience any problems...!)  

I haven't been doing much shopping lately, in store or online. I did pick up a couple of necklaces and a pair of earrings in an Instagram sale by my favourite sterling silver jewelry artisan this month. 

Wearing: Loose, comfortable clothing that doesn't irritate my incisions, including drawstring shorts and yoga pants. NOT wearing: a bra!! (lol)  (The band would sit uncomfortably close to my largest incision, so I'm using that excuse for a few weeks! ;)  ) 

Noticing:  The back-to-school photos seem to start earlier and earlier every year... I was seeing some in my social media feeds in early August! and I know they won't stop until sometime in mid-September. The dragged-out timeline makes it harder, I think... 

Appreciating:  My dh, who has thoroughly spoiled me over the past month before and after my surgeries :)  (as if he doesn't spoil me most of the time anyway!  lol).  ;)  

Enjoying:  Not having to constantly put drops in my eye anymore! (Just regular over-the-counter drops, four times a day.)  

Wanting: A few more gelato outings before the cold weather sets in. :)  

Hoping:  To get out and about a little more and enjoy what's left of the summer, now that my medical procedures are done!  

Prioritizing: My recovery, even though I'm feeling pretty good now, and trying not to overdo things for another few weeks yet. (I was told no lifting anything more than 20 pounds, etc., for at least four weeks post-surgery, which would bring me to mid-September.) 

Waiting: For my follow-up in mid-September with the surgeon who removed my gallbladder; for my other follow-up with my optometrist (also in mid-September); for our cottage weekend with BIL, SIL and dh & BIL's cousin & his wife (scheduled for late September);  and for Canadian Thanksgiving in October and a long-awaited trip "home" to see my parents & sister!  

Wondering: Whether I can fit everything I want/need for my trip home into a carry-on?? (to decrease the odds of losing our luggage...!).  Theoretically, I should be able to do it -- we're only staying for a week, and I will have Mom's washer & dryer at our disposal, plus I already keep a stash of toiletries there, so I won't have to stretch my carry-in liquid limits too much...  

Loving: Those rare days lately when the heat & humidity subside enough that we can open the balcony door and let in some fresh air! 

Feeling: Relieved to have my summer surgeries behind me (and that they both went well). Sad that they consumed almost my entire summer. :p  Grateful that my recovery to date has been pretty good. Looking forward to seeing my parents & sister in a few weeks' time!