Reports of My Death Have Been Greatly Exaggerated

I've been relatively quiet here lately, and that's for quite a few good reasons. Most of them are health-related. My wife/hero has multiple sclerosis, and I'm relatively difficult to keep alive thanks to winning the genetic lottery. So, on top of the regular problems that come along with those things, we both caught COVID and have been fighting that off at the slower rate we deal with infections.

None of that's what I'd complain about. No, no, no. That's reserved for the nose tampon.

See, the COVID got things inflamed in my nasal passages, like you might expect, and then something back in there just ripped it wide open. And it bled. And bled. And bled.

I'll spare you the gory details, but suffice it to say that it just wouldn't stop. It was one of those visits to my doctor where the physician's response to me was, "Why are you even here? Leave for the ER right now." At said emergency room, they couldn't find the source of the bleeding, so they fixed it with the nose tampon.

If you've never had one of these installed, let me explain how it works. They take this little tampon about three or so inches long, then they shove it in your nose. All the way, mind you, as you can see in the picture here. But do you see that little tube hanging out and taped to my face? That's what they hook up to a syringe so they can INFLATE it to plug everything up completely.

Yeah, this sucks as much as it sounds.

Even worse is that I started bleeding again the second day, went back to my doctor, and they inflated me more. You know, to stop the bleeding. It did, thankfully, but it didn't feel great, to put it mildly. It hurt to do nothing, but it hurt even more to do demanding tasks like talking or chewing. While this was happening, of course, I was still sick with COVID. So, one nostril was plugged up with a tampon and the other was plugged up with congestion. When I wanted to drink something, it felt like I was drowning.

As is the nature of the human body, I healed with time. A visit to a specialist after about a week saw the tampon get removed, and y'all, it was so much relief to actually feel air in that nostril again. To speak without pain. To actually eat solid food. It was almost cathartic enough to counteract the week that proceeded it.

I'm better now, but still not well. COVID hits my hero harder than me because of the MS, so between work and caregiving, I didn't have a lot of time to convalesce myself. Regardless, I'm well enough to get back to a mostly normal routine, including this blog post to explain my absence.

For an actual website update, I've been working on a prototype of a game that I'd love for you to try out! You can find Endless Encounters here on the site for now while I work out the game systems, then my intent is to make an app out of it. Yes, it's currently using AI art as a placeholder, but I promise that if I ever make money off of it, the first dollars will to to a real artist to make real art. Until then, Doc Gobbo gets made by a toaster.

If you got the toaster reference there, give yourself +5 points.