Viral illness and a novel

I went from okay to bad to worse in a few hours last night. In hindsight, it was a bad idea to share the bed with someone who had a different viral flu from what you have, especially when that someone is coughing droplet bullets at an alarmingly consistent rate. The attack by the mosquitoes didn’t help much either.

Eventually, I decided to sleep in the living room, on a mattress that has been in place since the time I came back home after the surgery. I struggled to get to sleep even after in the new bed. Eventually, when I woke up, the worst I had felt since the illness came down.

This was a full-on laryngo-pharyngitis, and I couldn’t even make meaningful sounds to trigger the Alexa speakers in the morning. While I struggled to make a coffee and take my paracetamol/antihistamine cocktail, I called in sick to work. My second straight day of missing out at work, especially with today being a big day at work with an important meeting.

It was a good idea indeed because I got enough time to rest and recover using some comfort “recovery” food that I have grown up recovering from flus and viral illnesses with. I’m talking about the red-rick kanji with achar, which I made with finely chopped ginger to give it a kick. Turns out that Jay liked it a lot too.

But that did allow me enough time to finish Deception Point (by Dan Brown, for those not in the know-how). Phew! One-hundred and thirty-three chapters (1 to 5 pages long mostly) of whirlwind action, mostly taking place in the span of 24 hours. The typical Dan Brown formula.

Like I felt at the halfway point, the book feels a bit dated in the tropes that it leans on, which were exaggerated by the double-turns at the end of the book. The obvious romantic coupling at the end was also very predictable.

The good things. It was hard to put down, especially with the scientific, geologic, meteorologic, and xenobiotic angles. I have to say that I like the way he does research. Plus, regarding pacing, I think the Dan Brown way of splitting each scene into chapters with a hook at the end will get people to read.

“Deception Point” on a topsy-turvy day

I don’t often read paperback thrillers, but when do, I find them hard to put down.

At the end of a topsy-turvy day, during which I tried to plug all the little holes with a chapter or two of Deception Point by Dan Brown, I find myself engrossed in the plot but feel a bit exhausted by the tropes in these books.

Powerful, womanizing men playing power games with their peers using all their resources, while the middle-aged, mercurial (otherwise middle-of-the-road) scientists try to save the world. Also, the research is top-notch, and the expositions are intentional and well-placed, often presented as a conversation where the noob gets schooled by a pro.

This is my little break before I start a bunch of books in March, some of which I have to finish in March itself.

By the way, the tipsy-turviness of the day was because Jay wasn’t feeling better until he did. In fact, there was a looming threat of him needing hospitalization, considering which I took an emergency leave to be on stand-by.

Well, thankfully, the GP that he consults finally prescribed a syrup that would help bring out the sputum instead of trying to suppress it, and hence Jay is breathing a lot more and wheezing less.

The GP also recommended that Jay get some “fresh air” and leave the city to get better. My apartment is considerably away from the worst parts of the city, and we decided that it was a better idea for him to come over for convalescence.

We’re back to being how we were during the lockdown.

Worrisome times

Jay hasn’t had much of symptomatic improvement, and to be honest, last night’s wheezing cough episodes were alarming and prevented both of us from having sufficient rest.

I have become worse, with pretty much all the symptoms that Jay has, but much milder. My help has also had to take leave, which leaves Blu in charge of me. That’s why I have had to come back home for the night.

Tomorrow morning, we’ll decide on whether to hospitalize Jay.

Relationships and illnesses

The depths of relationships maybe rediscovered in the way those involved behave in times of illness. It is one of the foundations of evolution of the human race and societies, and it continues to thrive at much smaller levels, including the absolute base where romantically affiliated couples find themselves.

Usually, one of the two—-the less non-sick one—-assumes the role of the caretaker of the sick one. When both parties find themselves sick, it becomes murkier. One supposes that the less-sick one assumes the non-sick role, but what if the more-sick one enjoys performing some roles (e.g., the cook) even during sickness. What should the less-sick one do?

This morning I found myself packing hastily, as the less-sick one, to get to the more-sick one downtown. I have a milder flu with a later onset, while Jay has a more conventional upper respiratory infection (likely viral) with an earlier onset. We hadn’t met for a week because of his symptoms, but we had to change our strategy considering the coughing fits that he has been having at nights, preventing himself from getting a good night’s sleep.

I spent time thinking about whether Jay would need hospitalization. Thankfully, he seemed to gain some strength with my mere presence, and the addition of a supplementary anti-allergy/inflammatory medication by the GP also helped. As I write this, we have had dinner and are about to get to bed after our showers, and things look like they won’t get any worse.

A few minutes ago, as I paused my drafting to ruthlessly murder mosquitoes that seemed to drift in through the Jay’s kitchen window, trying to escape the crowd at a birthday party in the garden behind his building, he came up to the little table that I’m sitting at and hugged me. I kissed him gently on the chest, and we held each other for a moment, before he headed to the shower. It’s my turn now.

PS: I just finished the 2022 Booker Prize-winning “The Seven Moons of Maali Almeida” by Shehan Karunatilaka. Lots of dark humor. Wonderful insights on the Sri Lankan Civil War. Highly recommend it!

Just your imagination

Imagine you are me. You have a schedule to stick to, and if you don’t, you get to drown in the guilt. Not to say that the schedule is not enjoyable or anything, but it does take its toll.

Now imagine you’re ill. Nothing terminal. Just a flu, something that is going around town. Pollution they say, but you don’t want to believe it. Gotta be the good ol’ virus, not unlike coronavirus, you hear?

Now imagine that you needed to sing. Because that’s what’s on your schedule. Not to an audience or anything, especially if you exclude the damn cat. Just on the song that you have been making slow progress on.

Progress, you say? That’s progress! Because there’s hardly any in the therapy thing that you do every Friday morning. The therapist is trying hard to find ways to break down that three-foot deep steel wall that has been erected.

For self-protection, your classical coping strategy. Masterfully prevents you from feeling anything while you try remember how you must have felt. Instead you fictionalize your memory.

Sweet. Because why not? Everyone must have a traumatic autobiography written before they can plan their funerals.

The good news is that you are not me. In fact you don’t even need to imagine you are me. Just wish me a good night’s sleep.

Not too hard, is it? Not if you are not me. Imagine that.

Watts, Peter – an incredible writer

Mr. Watts has done me in for good.

Consuming Blindsight, The Colonel, and Echopraxia in a stretch is highly recommended for any conscientious human. Not just once, but many times.

Okay, okay. At least twice.

Vampires, p-zombies, hive minds, transhumanism, posthumanism, consciousness, sentience, religion, philosophy, evolutionary biology, neuroscience, bioprosthetics, and what not.

I have never thought so much about what I think I know about what it is to live, to think, and to be aware. I have never been even more aware of how fragile our reality is.

Everything could change at any second. Every thought, every feeling, and every sensation rewires you and changes you. Our brains are (im)perceptibly different now than when they were a second ago.

The best thing is that you don’t even have to be awake for it to happen. Don’t even need to be aware that it is happening. This will continue for the rest of our living lives.

We’re all just waiting for the next discovery that’ll throw us over the edge. Maybe it has already happened, but we are not yet aware of it.

Everything Everywhere All At Once

High expectations. You should never go anywhere with them, for you’ll be let down even if you hadn’t. Because we are stupid little people who are bad at everything, and nothing matters.

The paragraph above is both my review and a valid interpretation of the movie.

I think this was one of those movies that I have had to consider walking out of the theater while watching it. A few did. The gags were repetitive and the movie could have had a tighter run time. Great acting though and imaginative direction.

Could have done less of buttplugs and dildos though.

The Fabelmans

It’s a show later than the usual early ones, at the nearest multiplex, in its tiniest screen, with godawful interiors meant to be appealing to the juveniles. The auditorium is quarter packed, which in numbers is five times that for Elvis yesterday. It’s starting and I’m writing this. Time to watch. Later.

At the interval, the film had made me forget that it was being screened in an atrocity. It had caught me by surprise a few times in the unexpected ways the story would unfold and in unpredictable ways that the characters would behave. Precogitation, primed by a few table-spreads in scenes, made me get my usual fill of samosas and coffee.

The interval advertisements tried their best to dissuade the audience from ever wanting to be at the cinema, despite them being caught in the middle of marvelous movie making. I, along with a very respectful audience, continued to be entertainingly misled all the way to the end of the movie, which would likely leave most discerning viewers be wary of where the horizon is in every frame they were made aware of viewing.

Steven Spielberg, thank you, once again.

Elvis and the power of song

A famous theater chain is holding its Oscar week, and you bet I’m not going to miss out on much. Today was Elvis.

I feel inspired and educated just like how I felt after Rocketman (but not after Bohemian Rhapsody, interestingly). I guess I’m much more into rock and roll and soul than I’d imagined myself to be.

These two Elvis quotes featured in the movie are representative of these feelings for me.

Elvis Presley : A reverend once told me, “When things that are too dangerous to say, sing.”

Elvis Presley: I learned very early in life that: ‘Without a song, the day would never end; without a song, a man ain’t got a friend; without a song, the road would never bend – without a song. ‘ So I keep singing a song.

There is something about the power of the human voice. The power of a committed chorus. The power of unbound expression.

This scene from the movie is how I’d like to spend my life.

Sunday evening

The first thing that I noticed when I sat down at the bench facing the central lawn of the park was that I felt different.

No anxiety to speak of. Instead, the comfort of knowing that I was there without the need of being there, not needing to do any particular thing when I was there, not needing to worry about getting to somewhere else when I was there.

The thought that this must be what most of the world must be experiencing every day passed me by, until the sense of misplaced privilege overwrote it. It was past the bottom of the hour, and I had more than an hour until I expected the mosquitoes to start bothering me.

I reached out into my bag for my Kindle. Then I thought, why do what I thought I should. The sketchbook and the pencil came out, and after a few minutes of a difficult but rewarding perspective exercise, with hardly anything to show for it, I reached for the Kindle again.

Once again, I changed my decision. This time I went for my phone and clicked a couple of snaps—one of the perspective shot, so I have a reference if I ever wanted to try it again and a selfie as evidence of my presence. The photos went to Jay, with a tinge of pride at me pulling off a quite remarkable effort to break the usual routines.

Finally, the Kindle got grabbed, which in turn grabbed me with the fascinating narrative unfolding in Echopraxia. Every now and then, my eyes would drift off from the screen and latch on to somersaulting children, faces darkened by a lifetime of worries, and pariahs barking at their peers.

The mosquitoes surfaced around five to six, I made a round of the walking path, before heading home, where a much quieter and breezier corner awaited me.