Continuing adventures in a 3-storey house
Not much is happening at the moment because we’re all still stuck at home, save for food shopping and dog walking. But we’ve had a birthday, bathed the dogs, bathed a cat, and are generally getting used to this house. As much as I would have loved the space of sleeping on the 3rd floor, two flights of stairs are not really doable for me, so Will and me are both in what was probably designed to be a kid’s room, but that’s fine.
We had a good spell of sunny days for a while, which were surprisingly hot for the time of year. But now we’ve got a spell of grey days, which of course bring lower barometric pressure, so I’m sleeping a lot right now, most of the day and night. I’m sure I’ve gone on about it 50 times before, and it sounds like woo, but really air pressure fucks you up. To quote the link above “Changes in barometric pressure can cause expansion and contraction of tendons, muscles, bones and scar tissues, resulting in pain in the tissues that are affected by arthritis. Low temperatures may also increase the thickness of joint fluids, making them stiffer and perhaps more sensitive to pain during movement.” I really do feel it in my bones when it’s gonna rain, and the worst aspect for me is my blood vessels effectively flapping around like empty balloons, making me feel dizzy and tired.
The garden here is smaller but so much more manageable, it’s actually feasible to reach most of it. I’d like the one we buy to be a bit larger and flatter, but really all we need room for is a poultry run, shed, and gazebo.
Something that does annoy me about the house is these weird “4-pin energy saving light fittings.” Apparently new builds need to have 75% energy-saving lighting, although you’d think most lighting was already energy-saving these days.
I have some LED B22 bulbs that I love and I wanted to put them up here, because the existing bulbs are dull and take a while to work, but on the upstairs fittings it can’t be done, because some contraption has been fixed onto the wires and you can only put weird plug-like bulbs in them, and our nice lampshade doesn’t fit over either. Couldn’t use it at the last house because there was a chandelier in every room, and now we can’t use it in this one because of a weird fitting! And a replacement for one of these 4-pin bulbs will set you back about £12, which sounds like some bullshit to me. If the house we buy has this lighting I’ll have it taken out and put normal B22s in.
Now I must announce that I have become . . . a vaper.
Menthol cigarettes are being banned, even though we already left the EU anyway, and while I do love the taste of cigarettes generally, I figured that the consequences of smoking are not worth it if I don’t even get to have my favourite flavour.
So I’ve started using a Juul, because you can still buy nice flavours (although some countries are banning them, because God forbid anything in life has to taste nice), and it is still nicotine but without the smell my husband hates, and other side-effects.
Don’t get me wrong, I still love cigarettes. In fact I miss the taste and smell and the rituals of smoking. If someone brought a pack of cigarettes to me at a BBQ or something I’d definitely still have some. So I’m not a “everyone should switch to vaping because it’s soooooo much better for youuuuu” person.
Each Juul pod is meant to be the equivalent of a 20 pack of cigs, so theoretically, as it’s about £10 for 4 pods, it should save you money compared to cigarettes. However, it’s really easy to go through a pod a day, if not a pod and a half, so I really have to learn to make them last otherwise it’s going to be so much more expensive than smoking! And we’re really trying to put house money away right now because we are so ready to just buy a house together and plant our butts down.
I was sad about not having a use for my plastic cigarette box anymore, but actually, it’s great for holding pods and the charger. I’d definitely have it in my purse at an event where I’d chainsmoke or whatever.
My mother-in-law has been vaping for years now so could tell me a lot about it. She’s got an absolutely gigantic thing though, the liquid is cheaper to refill vs pods but it also seems to get really hot.
I’m sure the pods are where Juul make their money, but surely they could make refillable pods and sell their liquid? I don’t know, someone who knows more about it than I do must have decided that pods are the way to go.
Juul is quite widely available if you are also thinking of switching.
Lockdown looks set to continue for a while longer. I miss everybody and I hope we’ll have some sort of big reunion at some point, as long as we won’t give each other a horrible disease. Worried about how I’m going to pull off Will’s 30th with all his friends, apparently pubs might not open again until Christmas, and I think with so much changing our options were already whittled down to people coming over or going to the pub. And you really can’t fit that many people in this house.
It would be nice if restrictions relaxed enough for Kadek to come over for Eurovision or if we could have a small BBQ in June, but I imagine cases would spike in the summer if everyone started going out again. Apparently it will probably be about 2 years for the virus as we know it to stop circulating. All I can really tell you is Halloween had better not be cancelled. It’s on a Saturday AND it’s our 2nd wedding anniversary. Do not fuck this up, universe.
