Peoply week. Very, very peoply

 This last week has been interesting.  A few weeks back I decided I’d participate in the GISH scavenger hunt [Greatest International Scavenger Hunt] that’s run by some weird guy on the Internet and his friends.  The weird guy is Misha Collins who’s an actor on the TV show Supernatural. 

Okay, so that much was planned.  I knew I couldn’t take time off since I already did that not so long before, but I had weekend time and at least one day during the week.  That would be fine, right?  The Hunt kicked off on last Saturday night.  We had a great time in town on Sunday doing all sorts of weird stuff.  And then I went to see the 50th anniversary screeningn of 2001 in the evening.  I swear, nothing at all happens in my life for weeks, months at a time as a rule!

What wasn’t planned was the event which dropped on my head mid Tuesday.  My mother had a fall at her over-55s residential place and was carted off to hospital with a fractured hip, as it turned out.  That dealt with the rest of Tuesday;  I had to leave work and head down there, where I spent several hours mostly waiting around and wishing I was still being bored at work.

This ended up being much more tiring than work was.  I had other stuff to do on Wednesday, the weather was vile and I had to go back to the hospital on Thursday which scotched some of my plans for the Hunt, though I was still able to perform some of the tasks on my own and upload the results.  Yes.  I sent strange pictures of myself to somebody I don’t know on the Internet.  I don’t yet have clearance to show anyone else some of the pictures, but will do so later.

Friday I went to work.  On Friday night I hit a wall and decided I was going to stay home on Saturday, attend to the tasks which had piled up during the week, try to get some laundry dry and maybe get some extra sleep.  I know there were GISH tasks going on in town but I decided I could not do any more.  So that’s been today.

I’m literally peopled out.  One crowded hospital, one parent in a lot of discomfort and angst – “There are men on this ward!”- and one week attempting to perform and photograph strange tasks with 14 other team members, most in Perth but a couple overseas, none of whom I’d met in person before.  It’s been mind-stretching and interesting and technologically challenging, because apart from using the Internet to journal and other basic things, I don’t get into the social media scene that much.  I don’t Twitter or even own a smartphone, which was a bit of a handicap with the Hunt.

I don’t think my team, the Spiderhawks,  is a high scorer but personally not fussed.  The winners are going to New Zealand this year and I’m already planning to do that in 2020 if NZ gets the Worldcon.  If it was last time when they went to Iceland; then I might be disappointed.  If I play again, I am definitely taking the time off and let’s hope the family disasters stay minimal.

One last note about the weather. For Perth, this is about as bad as it gets in the winter.  There’s been a lot of rain, which is very unusual, and fricking freezing.  It barely got above 13^C today and that wasn’t for long.  Please stop now.  I have to go outside - back to the hospital again - tomorrow and find out how M’s hip surgery went and find out what the f…k happens next and if I have to talk to my brother about M’s continued care.  He’s already said he’s been talking to his wife about what to do, so stuff will happen if it has to, but seriously, hope it doesn’t have to.