Friday, Jul. 09, 2021 - 5:49 pm.
Hello. Once again I'm writing during working hours, but it's Friday and I'm wiped. I'm too tired to do any more work and, hell, I've done plenty today. Actually, the work I do is never enough, and there's always something else. The healthiest thing to do is to agree that all that can wait until Monday.
Things do happen to me over the week, but by this day and time I've forgotten about it or it seems too irrelevant. I still spend my days in the apartment, bouncing from bedroom to kitchen to living/dining room to office to bedroom again. I'm not bored, though.
I will forever think that the lockdown life I'm living right now is a privilege. I get to work from home, I'm good at being home. It's a comfortable place, and Andrew and the cats are the best company one could ask for. Well, with the cats, as much as cats behave; they can get desperately annoying sometimes, but they're also fluffy and cuddly.
We did go out one of these days, Andrew and I. I had to spend money from the project on office supplies, which is such a joy; he tagged along and also bought some office supplies for our home. I'm still a little nervous about handling research funding, and I'm positive I have dyscalculia, but I enjoy keeping tracks of expenses to a ridiculous extent.
Speaking of my project, I've reached the number of participants that I require for this first year of it! I'm so fucking excited. My thesis students have worked hard with their projects and data collection, and now comes the best part: analyzing data, getting results and sharing them with the public.
The research center I work at has noticed this. They've noticed my work kicks ass, and that my thesis students are part of this. This puts me at risk of being exploited, though, they can get very demanding. I'm not a fan of how this research center works, but getting involved with it is also part of the academic game, especially for a researcher like me who's just starting.
I'm the token LGBTI researcher and my thesis students are currently the golden children of this research center. I don't say this because they're under my wing, but they indeed make the best presentations, and are generally pretty awesome at what they do. Part of it is my training, but a lot of it is their own thing, so I got lucky with these brilliant students.
On another front, my girlfriend brought up the subject of coming to visit me. I have yet to have a serious conversation with Andrew about this, but personally I got excited about it. She'd stay for less than a week, she's obviously not coming to do any sightseeing, she knows it's not that safe yet. I think this sucks, and I'd hate for her to fly across the whole fucking American continent to spend four days holed up in an apartment, but she insists on coming to see me.
We'll see about that, though. She mentioned coming between September and November, but every time there appears to be progress with the virus, we quickly go back two steps.
Not due to the virus, but to fascism: I get more and more fearful for the people in my home country, and angrier and angrier at those who support the current governement, including my parents. My dad is rewriting his memoirs for the nth time and has me designing the cover, also for the nth time. I don't want to, first because I'd much rather dedicate my time to my own comic strip and other shenaningans, but most importantly, because I'm pretty sure he's rewriting his memoirs with a twisted historical revisionism to uplift the current authoritarian government.
I can't stand my parents anymore, I'm sorry. I still like my mom, whenever I'm not reminded of how rigid and conservative she can be. I've seen enough harm caused by the type of mindset that my parents hold, and I'm not going to excuse it. I love them and I'm grateful to them for a lot of things, but I'd stop talking to them if I had a stronger spine.
Anyway! Before I get any more cheerful, I'll end this little update. We have a friend coming over later for dinner. He was Andrew's best friend growing up, and he came out a couple of years ago (or one year ago? What is time anymore). This means that neither of the three people who will be sitting at our table tonight will be heterosexual. God bless the way that we keep coming out, eh.
Hang in there, stay safe, take care of yourself.
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