Discolor Online

Argh. I had a nice day of hanging out, playing old-school D&D, eating "pan Asian" and generally goofing off. Unfortunately, I've given myself a red wine headache. I was going to blog but I only want to crawl into bed and try to fall asleep so my head stops hurting.

I love red wine but sometimes it just doesn't love me back.

Labels: headache

I'm beginning to think that riding the bus is aggravating my TMJ, which is then triggering headaches. Again last night, after a fine and relaxing evening, I rode the bus home and after my bus ride started to feel a headache creeping up on me. By the time I went to bed, I definitely had a headache but hoped that I could sleep it off. (No such luck: was awake tossing and turning in pain between 3:00am and 4:00am.) When it came time to get up for the day I was in full headache mode, moving in slow motion to avoid jostling myself, hyper-aware of noise and light and just generally miserable. I could definitely feel the tension in my neck and jaw this time, now that I was trying to be aware. Finally around 2:00 everything had subsided, but that was over 12 hours of lifestyle disrupting headache pain, and that's just no good.

I'm looking at replacing my pillows to see if I can get some relief that way. I'm also going to start tracking my headache-to-bus ratio to see if that's just my imagination or what. My current theory is that the bouncing and jostling of the bus (especially the drivers that start and stop so abruptly and really jerk the passengers around) might be enough to push me over the edge at those times when I'm already on the verge: not sleeping soundly, clenching my teeth in my sleep, spending a lot of time sitting in front of the computer (or even driving), etc.

Labels: headache, health

I've been off and on useless today. Headaches, though not full-on nausea-inducing migraine headaches, thankfully. I fear I may be clenching my teeth in my sleep again and that I'm having TMJ related headaches. Probably time for me to go in and get checked out medically again either way. Bleh, I hate that. Why must my feeble body betray me?

Labels: headache, health

Yesterday I was vaguely dizzy all say. I get that sometimes with sinus pressure or other things affecting my inner ear. It's not falling down, room spinning dizzy, just a sense of being slightly off-kilter. I hate the sensation but it's not debilitating.

This morning I awoke both with the dizziness AND with one of my headaches, though, and that's much worse. Because of course I'm up against the wall and intensely busy. The ALA Midwinter meeting begins tonight and I have to go down to the convention center where I will, by myself, be setting up Green Ronin's booth, hauling boxes of product and all the manual physical labor that goes into getting ready for a show. Then, I don't even get to hang around and enjoy the opening ceremonies and reception because I have to spend several hours in the car driving Kate to her dad's for the weekend.

I need to take something for this headache but I also need to eat something first and I can't even face getting up to eat something. I have no idea how I'm going to face getting down to the convention center and all that awaits me there.

Labels: ALA, headache

Ah, preconvention prep. How I loathe it.

I need to get my badge requests in for GenCon. The California bureaucratic body that issues the seller's permits for Comic Con has not deigned to get back to me with my permit, so I need to sort that out as well. Have to arrange to ship the convention display, which means making sure the kit is together and ready to go. The new graphics have not been put together yet, so we probably won't have those for Origins. Managed to find people to give the eulogies for Chris Bledsoe, Paul Randles, and Sid Sackson, and hopefully we will have the Hall of Fame inductees on hand to accept their inductions. Made arrangements for our late-running June release to ship directly to Origins so we can have some on hand for the convention. Sent the proofs back for another project today, while confirming with the printer that two cases of our reprint should come here to Seattle, and what quantities we want printed on the other two books they have the files for. Tried to track down an order for a book placed by a prisoner who hasn't received it, prompting me to once again work on the webstore so that I can offer several different options for shipping (including UPS and Priority Mail with Delivery Confirmation) that aren't so easily lost or mangled. Eventually had to give up in frustration for the day, as none of the modules would load correctly (even though they were downloaded and installed from the shopping cart company's website as per their posted directions). Still have to make GenCon and DragonCon flight arrangements, plus pay for the booth and the hotel for DragonCon too.

Somewhere around 2:00pm I felt a headache coming on. I tried heading it off by having a beer and taking some over the counter migraine pills, but no dice. Driving around in the hot car did not help; I definitely had light sensitivity happening, and of course it was a warm, beautiful, sunny day. Stopped at Fed Ex, drove down to the PO Box, and stopped at the store where I got everything for tonight's dinner but the fresh mussels I wanted. Tried another store, but no luck there either. Substituted frozen scallops and went ahead with the recipe, but by the time I'd cooked dinner, my headache was bad enough that I didn't feel like eating anything at all.

Need to put Kate in the bath and get her to bed. She'll definitely want me to read the Series of Unfortunate Events book we're mid-way through. Can't wait until I can lay down, but I really need to type up the code of conduct and How You Earn Points materials for my demo volunteers.

Oh, and as is typical, technology hates me again today. My Palm is having fatal errors and the G3 won't recognize the firewire external hard disk I bought to back up the company files, or the CD burner. Need to get all those things sorted out before convention season gets into full swing, or I won't get back to them until October. And I can't live without my Palm until October!

Labels: anti-technology, game industry, headache

Have a headache today. Very grumpy. Woke up well, but found a note from Kate's teacher requesting a conference about her behavior. She's not a bad kid, but she is over-sensitive and dramatic and breaks down in tears over some little thing every single day at school, sometimes multiple times a day. Her teachers have become very concerned and it's clear that my theory of letting her mature and make friends over this year has not worked. Made an appointment with her pediatrician for an evaluation. Not much else I can do until that's out of the way.

Spent the afternoon making oxtail stew, but now that it's finished, Kate doesn't want any and I feel sick from the headache. Woohoo. I hope it's good when I have some tomorrow.

Broke up a fight with some neighborhood immigrant teens who were screaming at each other and threatening to start throwing rocks in front of my house. My rep as the crazy/annoying neighbor lady remains intact. I told them that I didn't care who called whose mama a bitch, they were going to disperse in separate directions or I was calling the police. They were nearly old enough that my adultness didn't intimidate them, but backed up by the police threat, they finally left. Probably best for my temper that I don't speak whatever language they were screaming in, or I'm sure I would have heard a few choice descriptions of myself as well.

Going to lay down until this headache goes away.

Labels: headache, personal

I've been prone to incapacitating headaches since my early teens. I often went in for headache screenings with my general practitioner back before MRIs and migraine specialists were available, and I never received much in the way of a diagnosis. I was told that I probably didn't have migraines, because I didn't see auras or throw up. My doctor didn't appreciate my generally high pain tolerance.

After a few years of blessed relief from most headaches, the really bad ones seem to be back with a vengeance. During a weekend-long meeting we hosted here at the house I spent most of the time in bed, in a dark room, in pain. It hit suddenly, without warning, behind my right eye and though the pain decreased a few times over the weekend (enough for me to get up and participate in life a little) it took three or four days to fully go away.

Last night I was suddenly hit by another of these incapacitating headaches. It is the worst headache in recent memory. I might have had one to rival it in my teens or early twenties, but this was one that truly incapacitated me. I feared that I was going to vomit several times, and lay in bed just whimpering from the pain until I finally fell asleep. Awful.

If I had better health insurance, I'd go in to have it checked. Our insurance is more of the "Oh my god, I broke something!" variety and since the sum diagnosis of my headaches in the past has been "Yep, you sure do have headaches." I'm reluctant to spend the time or the money to hear once again there's little to be done. Of course, I occasionally twinge with worry that it's a tumor [cue Arnold "It's not a toomah!" ] and by not going to the doctor to be checked out I'm risking my life, but I've been waved off so many times it's hard to overcome my conditioning.

I hope that whatever is currently going on with my body will ebb again and I'll go back to the relatively headache-free state I've enjoyed for the last couple of years.

Labels: headache, health