Chaos Attraction

The Meme Is Certainly Different This Year

2020-12-31, 5:22 p.m.

Vacation, Day 13:
Hours of sleep: Seven. Why am I up an hour early? Why?
Exercise: I went back to walking for 90 minutes again today. Did not remember to do the weights, oh well. But at least I moved again. My watch thinks I did 6000 steps. Good job, me.
Projects:
Patchwork sweater: Have been happily working on sewing this since I got up. I realized that I needed to reconfigure the squares--the sleeves came out sadly 2 squares too long, so I had to remove sixteen of them and reposition them elsewhere. I added two "secret pockets" to the fronts and added the rest of the squares to the bottom to make the sweater longer.

Other Activities: Honestly, I don't feel like doing any. I feel like if I sign up for anything online they're all interactive and I'm not really in the mood to get interactive with strangers tonight. I wish I was seeing people I know. Oh well. Probably just gonna watch more movies.
It's been a year since I last hugged my mom today. Last year I just skipped off to Meg's today like life was normal, and had been wanking about whether or not to try to see if Scott went to karaoke on New Year's Eve (probably not). Hahahahahah on all of that shit now.

GOOD RIDDANCE, 2020, FUCK YOU VERY MUCH.

I'm going to skip "Today's Viewing" today (more Lifetime, more Hallmark anyway) because today is Same Old New Year's Eve Meme Day.


Updating the same meme again every year. But hoo boy, DOES THIS YEAR HAVE DIFFERENT ANSWERS.

1. What did you do in 2020 that you’d never done before?

First pandemic. Good god, I hope it’s the last. It probably won’t be.
Auditioned for online shows, got into most of the ones I auditioned for!
Did online plays! Nine of them this year!
Went to some online conferences.
Started working from home.
Became more or less agoraphobic (sigh).

2. Did you keep your new year’s resolutions, and will you make more for next year?

From last year:
This year: get on stage as much as I can, hopefully getting others to let me on there. I’d like to do at least the dinner theater, Shakespeare, and Christmas shows again since I think those have enough large casts that I can get into those and those directors like me.

This actually worked out, despite this year. The dinner theater show was going to be Robin Hood and I ended up in that. I did a lot of Shakespeare. And the “Christmas” show I was in (Charlotte’s Web) was different, but I was in something!

This year: GET VACCINATED. That’s really the only goal to have this year or that anyone should have this year. Oh yeah, and "don't get the virus."
Beyond that, I hope to get into more online plays, though I’m not sure how much of a thing that is going to be once more people get vaccinated. Sadly, according to the NYT I am dead last in line demographically, so I will be indoors for most of 2021 at least. I'd love to be able to see humans at close range safely again, but that may be too much to ask for the world.

3. Did anyone close to you give birth? No.

4. Did anyone close to you die? No, the closest we got to that was my cousin’s cousin’s mother, who I didn’t know super well but was very nice.

5. What countries did you visit? None, as usual.

6. What would you like to have in 2021 that you lacked in 2020?

VACCINATION. Being able to leave my house safetly without having to always be bloody worrying. Being able to get near to and hug people again. Being able to live a “normal” beforetimes life again.

7. What dates from 2020 will remain etched upon your memory, and why?

March 10: the last day of normalcy before the pandemic was announced.
March 11-12: pandemic (plus poor Scott’s birthday happening RIGHT then)
March 17: the day we were allowed to work from home.
March 18: first day of officially quarantining.

8. What was your biggest achievement of the year?

I got into NINE shows!
I did not get fired even though I honestly really, really deserve to be fired.
I did not get Covid-19.

9. What was your biggest failure?

I was having a nervous breakdown at work for months on end. I still do not get, comprehend, or understand the special crap at work I got forced to take over.

10. Did you suffer illness or injury?

I got barfingly sick in February (no, not Covid, definitely not those symptoms), but thankfully, that was about it.

11. What was the best thing you bought?

New laptop, Baby Yoda merch, yarn.

12. Whose behavior merited celebration?

Directors, for letting me be in shows. My new online friends. My new coworkers.

13. Whose behavior made you appalled and depressed?

A lot of people in politics. Every motherfucking goddamned idiot that refuses to wear a mask or take precautions, goes out partying or seeing relatives, comes down with it, and then is all “How did I do do that?”

14. Where did most of your money go?

Online grocery deliveries.

15. What did you get really, really, really excited about?

Online theater and making new friends.

16. What song will always remind you of 2020?

I want to say “no song,” really, because this has not been a musical year, but this incident did happen before everything bad did. It gives me something to hold on to.

17. Compared to this time last year, are you:
a) happier or sadder? Sadder, obviously.
b) thinner or fatter? No idea, I don’t have a scale in here and I refuse to wear pants with zippers any more.
c) richer or poorer? Actually richer because when you don’t go out much, you don’t spend as much money.

18. What do you wish you’d done more of?

Leaving the house before March.

19. What do you wish you’d done less of?

Crying.

20. How did you spend Christmas?

Alone, watching movies and knitting. Same thing I did on literally every other holiday after February.

21. Did you fall in love in 2020?

I will cite my answer from last year since it still applies:

I don’t think he’s “in love” with me as yet and as long as everything is officially platonic indefinitely, I don’t want to go there myself. I ain’t going whole hog on this as long as things currently stand as they are because what would be the point?

I was really hoping that was gonna improve in 2020, but alas, it’s probably worse and who knows if it can get better in 2021 or not. Maybe if we can do a Christmas show together in person next year, there might be more luck. I dunno. Or never. Who knows.

22. How many one-night stands? Yeah, RIGHT. Also, who actually answers this question?

23: What was your favorite TV program?

Still Good Place and Legends of Tomorrow, and Zoey’s Extraordinary Playlist. I also got ridiculously addicted to “Signed, Sealed, Delivered” recently.

24. Do you hate anyone now that you didn’t hate this time last year? No, same as last year.

25. What was the best book you read?

I don’t have a lot of books I completed reading this year, sigh.

5 star reviews: Supernova.

4.5 star reviews: Dying With Her Cheer Pants On, You Deserve Each Other, The Last Emperox, The Relentless Moon, Network Effect, Miss Wonderful, Red, White and Royal Blue, Tuesday Mooney Talks To Ghosts, and City of Girls.

New authors discovered this year that stood out: Susannah Nix.

26. What was your greatest musical discovery? None. This was not a musical year. I continue to like Dua Lipa’s new stuff. Mostly I just found myself listing to coronavirus-themed songs a lot, sigh.

27. What did you want and get? Books, a fake robot cat, yarn, Baby Yoda stuff.

28. What did you want and not get?

A boyfriend. The robot Baby Yoda (still in transit until January). I wanted another anti-affirmations calendar--I’ve had a lot of fun with the one I got for 2020--but just ended up ordering it myself. Oh yeah, and FREEDOM TO LIVE LIFE WITHOUT RISK OF SEVERE ILLNESS, PERMANENT DISABLEMENT OR DEATH.

29. What was your favorite film of this year? Palm Springs.

30. What did you do on your birthday, and how old were you?

Turned 42 and had an online gaming birthday party, followed by musical watching online.

31. What one thing would have made your year immeasurably more satisfying? NOT HAVING A PANDEMIC.

32. How would you describe your personal fashion concept in 2020?

Living in pajamas, sweats, my bathrobe, and/or workout clothes every day, for probably at least half a week or a week before changing clothes, because I can’t leave the house and WHAT IS THE POINT. Life has no meaning any more.

This is a depressing answer, but it is everybody’s answer.

33. What kept you sane? Yarn and the Internet and a lot of YouTubeing.

34. Which celebrity/public figure did you fancy the most? Who the fuck cares any more? (I know, most people say Fauci.)

35. What political issue stirred you the most? Coronavirus, duh.

36. Who did you miss? EVERYBODY. LITERALLY EVERYBODY.

37. Who was the best new person you met?

Claire, Shanna, Kelly, and Eva, all folks I met online and hit it off with right away and it‘s been awesome.

38. Tell us a valuable life lesson you learned in 2020:

Don’t leave home unless you absolutely have to.
Don’t get near other human beings, you may die.
Wash your hands and/or use sanitizer constantly.
Try not to touch things, but it’s fucking impossible to not touch things.
If at all possible, just don’t touch anything that comes into the house for 3 days. Do I need this level of paranoia? I HONESTLY DON’T KNOW ANY MORE but I’d rather just let stuff sit in the hall for three days than have the paranoia about wipedowns, washing, etc. kick in.
Wear a mask if you are getting even remotely near other people.
The over-the-ears masks don’t work on your head, you have to get the ones that tie on.
Use a filter in your mask. Maybe wear more than one mask at times.
Breathe carefully and shallowly while wearing a mask. Don’t do big sighs.
It is impossible for you to wear a mask and your glasses at the same time once the temperature goes below 50 degrees, they steam up instantly. Even indoors, which is ridiculous.

39. Quote a song lyric that sums up your year. I can’t even think of anything except “Fuck You” by Lily Allen.

This sums up 2020 for me.


2019 was the best year of my life, followed by the worst (pretty sure 2020 is everyone alive's worst year). It could have been worse. I have been very fortunate and almost everyone I know has been very fortunate. I haven't caught it yet. So far I only know one person IRL and a few online that caught the virus and all of those people are fine now. No one's gotten long-term Covid or died. Somehow my coworkers have managed to dodge it despite going off to see their families and going on fun trips. I can quarantine at home and most of the time don't have to leave much. Other than having months of nervous breakdowns and crying and cruising towards getting fired at work yet again but even worse than usual, I've been fine compared to everyone else. It could have been a lot worse.

On the "bad shit happening" side, my mom lost her job (but is otherwise fine and has enough money to be retired now since she doesn't have an option not to be any more) and Scott's house burned down. My therapist has had it the worst of anybody I know (husband lost his job, mother has cancer, got a kidney stone, mother caused a house fire, has to live across the country from her husband due to her mother). I feel like I really shouldn't be a whiny brat compared to all of that.

I have had made some new friends and did a lot of online shows, which is miraculous, and I got a lot of crafting done. I sadly didn't get that much writing done and while I did some storytelling workshops and did well there, I didn't do any storytelling shows online. I've been feeling uninspired on that front of late, probably because I'm not exactly getting a lot of stimulus for new things. I was going to work on writing projects during vacation and I just am not feeling it. Oh well. Maybe in 2021 or 2022.

On the one hand: at least half of 2021 is going to continue to suck with massive death every day and being trapped indoors.
On the other hand, we have four pieces of good news:
(a) Trump is out of office as of January 20, whether he likes it or not. The new administration has to be a vast improvement. Whatever I think of Biden (previously: "ehhhhhhh"), literally anyone except Elon Musk or Kanye West would be an improvement, and he's got plans to improve and do good things, and there's Kamala Harris. So politically things cannot be as bad as they were this year or the three before that.
(b) We have a vaccine!
(c) We have another vaccine! That's two of them! Even if I am at the dead bottom of the priority list, according to the NYT, and will have to spend almost all of 2021 indoors waiting for it, there's hope. There is finally hope.
(d) Nobody set the Gavle Goat on fire or otherwise destroyed him or his brother this year. Thank you, potential vandals, for for once not making the year shittier. This year, it would not have been comedy gold.
(e) If you're reading this after December 31, 2020, CONGRATUATIONS! YOU SURVIVED 2020! IT DID NOT MURDER YOU! I haven't quite decided if I'm going to buy "I survived 2020" merch off Etsy or not, but I am damn well not ordering it until after midnight if I do!

No matter what other horrible shit goes down in 2021 that is similar to 2020, at least the change in administration and working vaccines WILL MAKE THIS AT LEAST SOMEWHAT BETTER. I say this as a pessimist: there's hope. Maybe by this time next year things won't be godawful. And hopefully we'll all be alive. Let's hope.


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