I had to go out today for shots. Saw Reggie taking out the trash. Said I was going out for a flu shot. I still had to walk to avoid him and he said his test came back negative. I said I'm happy for him but I haven't been. Also, if you test clear on Day 1 but can still come down with it on Day 2, does the test even prove that you're safe? Literally, is there a point in getting diagnosed as not having it when you can't trust the results?

The flu shot line was pretty quick and they had people standing outside with 6 feet guidelines, but they didn't see to have that many after the first 15 minutes. They didn't make you sign the piece of paper any more, they just have a guy holding up a sign and asking you to verify that you're not sick, you swipe your own card, you get the shot indoors but it's in the entryway and they had some kind of...giant tube thing in there for ventilation, I guess.

The nurses are all back to sitting right there and talking to each other closely in the check in area again, but at least they kept their masks on. They only have FOUR chairs left, at all, in the waiting area at this point, which is even less than before. Wonder what happened with that. I then went in for my second shot and my favorite shot nurse is back! I said I thought she retired and she said she was considering it, but since she wants to travel, there's no point and she might as well sock away the money. She also said that the schools are reopening(!!!) and restaurants got permission to reopen and "yesterday I went to Dos Coyotes for lunch and ate indoors." (!!!!) Obviously it was too late for me to run screaming out after that announcement.

Walking back out, there were suddenly tons of people milling about in line to get in and in the pharmacy and it was the most people I've seen at once in ages and I ran out.

I'd booked two hours to be out getting shots done and I had decided that I'd go by the bookstore at 10 a.m. when they open to get my other book, and I was about done by 9. So I sat in my car reading, went over the mail, I looked at my beautiful purple wig I ordered, and it was like a vacation for an hour. After 40 minutes I drove downtown to stake out a spot to wait for the bookstore to open and watched people walking around living their lives like normal. I would say about 75-80% of people I saw had the masks on (even while driving!), so that's good. On the other hand, this is a straight up hazardous air day (and apparently the landfill has been on fire recently) and people are just....out? Sitting outside drinking coffee like life is normal?

I got the book, went home, did the Silkwood shower, book sits in quarantine until Sunday.

Signs seen: 4 hearts (2 T-shirts, one car sticker, 1 sign). 3 rings in the street.

I seriously wonder sometimes if I'm overly crazy in wanting to stay safe and protect myself. If all these people are just milling about like life is normal, just as long as they have a mask on (hopefully) and somehow they never get it.... But at the same time, I will regret it for the rest of my (possibly very short) life I I let my guard down and go out and have some fun and relax and then get it. I may not be able to recover from the consequences.

On the good news side at work, such as it is, I spent an hour training New Girl on But The Emails, which went well.

Later, I spent an hour dealing with Yet Another International Client. Client owed $40, so their Important Document is on hold until that is paid. Per new management policy, we no longer print them and hope the person pays up in five years, so ID no longer exists, just sitting in the office waiting to be quickly scanned and shipped. Client is in frantic panic wanting ID ASAP. I point out that under current system, that can't be done until end of November. They're all "can you scan it to me?" and I keep saying NO, literally the ID doesn't exist yet until we pay someone to produce it and we can't do that until November, so NO, we can't make your deadline of the end of October under any circumstances. However, you can pay something like $75 to have it rushed, but since all of that process of getting the payment has to go by US snail mail to happen, fuck if I know how fast it's going to be, just probably faster than the end of November. All I can say is, if you're complaining that two months to get it is too slow, the rush might speed it up by about a month. Why on god's green earth can we not get access to the international equivalent of PayPal? I'm told something like that exists....

After all of this drama, they elected not to pay for rush shipping. One of the few benefits of COVID, I guess: I have a lot less rush orders because it's a lot of money for not much rush any more. It's always the Getting Of The Very Large Payment that holds the whole process up, as I can order the things fast and they can get printed fast. But the Snail Mail waiting for the payment...not to mention the arguments I have to have with the clientele over the payments.... and US Mail these days. The arguments ALONE is why we don't advertise rush service on our website: everyone would want it and the arguments and getting the large payments is excruciating.

They asked over and over again how fast. They said over and over again, "You can scan it to me before the end of October, right?" I kept saying NO. This crap is why the international clientele really contributes to my burnout. You have to repeat everything OVER AND OVER AND BLOODY OVER AND OVER AND OVER AND THEY DON'T LISTEN TO YOU AND GAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH. I don't care how many times you say "You can do it, right?", no, that doesn't mean I can whip your Important Document out of my magic hat at home and scan it easy-peasy-life-is-happy-now. It's NOT HERE to do that and that would require MONEY to have happen and REPEATEDLY ASKING DID NOT FIX ANY OF THE ISSUES THAT MEAN I CAN'T DO IT BETWEEN THIS EMAIL AND THE LAST EMAIL YOU ASKED IN, SO STOP BLOODY ASKING.

I ranted about all of this to my boss, like "This has been an hour of my time and seven bloody emails" and "All of this for a matter of $40" (that would force them to pay another $75) and "I agree with the new policy for not printing ID's when they might owe $10k and not ever pay it, but here's exactly where it's a problem that we don't have it here to just scan it," and she agreed and said that getting the hold payment threshold raised was on her list, along with getting electronic documents and getting a payment system that isn't excruciating.

I ordered this wig and I got my mail today, so I got it out and put it on during the yarn club meeting, which looked absolutely lovely and I actually felt good for the first time in...quite awhile, having it on. It's my dream hair, honestly (well, other than wanting rainbow hair). It's supposed to be Mal's hair but to me looks more like Gert's. I love it. It's really beautiful and all these different shades of purple up close.

I also hit quarantine timeout on my Target box, so I got to open it and get my Baby Yoda. He's pretty big, actually. Hard plastic head, beanbag body, comes with his own pram. He's utterly charming.Here is a photo of the two together.

Acme Theater is having another reading fundraiser thing next next Saturday. I signed up! I'm amused they had a screenshot of Robert in the advertisement. This time it's a half marathon and they have themes you can read in, so I signed up for the women-centered plays from 6-9, which is good because the rest of the day is off and on booked. Robert emailed me and Shanna about it, but who knows there. Told them what I signed up for, at least.

I was listening to this podcast today and towards the end of it, they were saying that everyone should get (or make) their own "Dissent" jewelry/collar/whatever. I'm pondering doing it, though I don't like any of the patterns I've seen and really I'd rather the thing look like this rather than all black. Except rainbows aren't dissent-y. I'm pondering if there's something I can tolerate.

Scott's mom sent out a newsletter again.... she got interviewed on the news for having a giant store and still staying in town after a fire. And....they are going to rebuild the house. In the fire zone again. Hoooooo boy. I did crack up at watching said interview because the reporter wouldn't even try saying their last name. To which I was all "okay, fine, I am going to text him, barely, about this because it's funny." He eventually responded saying that's how his whole life goes and he hadn't seen the video. Yeah, clearly I need to just stop trying here. This is "I'm sick of you, go away" behavior, eh? I mean, it might not be personal, but it kinda seems like go away behavior?

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