This, to the best of my knowledge, is Universal Good Advice.

Here is another piece of Universal Good Advice (UGA) from yrs truly: don’t listen too much to other people’s advice. Instead, figure things out for yourself.

To some, this directive may be threatening — in particular to lawyers and to a certain class of therapists. Historically, hackers and lawyers have a relationship that is at best glancing and at worst adversarial. Based on what do I make this generalization? Life experience.

What does it actually mean to be a hacker? Check pdxlocal.net for a few thoughts relevant to that topic. They’re in there. Along with about a million other topics relevant to me personally, and fitting what I saw as the dominant Portland ethos ’round about the last time that I lived there.

Which was some time ago. Depending how you measure time.

I helped my parents sell my apartment — a sweet condo in the fashionable but still, shall we say “edgy” neighborhood known as St. John’s — in June 2023. Anyway, that was when the deal closed. But I’ve been back to the city a fair amount since. Rented an Airbnb for a month there in May of 2024, trying to make up my mind whether to return there permanently. Finding a place to live would not have been a problem but I passed at that time, for several reasons.

The two most significant:

– Severe Repetitive Strain Injury (RSI) made me feel antsy about my chances of completing the Computer Science Postbac program that would have prepared me to get a Master’s in CS. True confession: I was an English major and only took one programming course before graduating. I need an advanced degree in order to be able to teach, even at the high school level. And also because, well, you don’t know what you don’t know until it comes up and bites you in the You Know Where.

– I am a rape survivor. To the best of my knowledge, the man who raped me still lives in Portland. More about that another time. Seriously, it can wait.

Anyway, what I wanted to talk about was what to do if you have a respiratory infection that just won’t go away. Such as COVID. Or RSV. Or whatever it is I’ve had, off and on, since the Spring of 2023.

I am still not sure but staying warm does seem to help. And we all know about drinking fluids.

Found out recently I had COVID. This was surprising to me because it seems like I’ve been tested for everything under the sun, in inpatient settings and out of them.

Was denied Paxlovid, because of a complication with another medication that I’m taking. Actually had a scheduled doctor’s appointment last Tuesday at my local primary care office to talk about my problems breathing, but he cancelled it after I showed up early in the waiting room  and told the receptionist I had COVID. I didn’t mind. There were also children in that waiting room. The advice on my electronic chart when I returned home was all too familiar. You guessed it: rest and stay hydrated.

Am still a bit concerned, especially since I’m still running a fever — more than a week after the test came back positive from the Urgent Care Center.

I may be immunocompromised due to the loss of a uterus in September 2022 (if you don’t know what fibroids are, look it up or read my account from earlier that same year). Or maybe for some other reason. I am 49 years old. I get tested regularly for STI’s/STD’s.

About those test results…

I had a strange experience last February. I was wearing an olive green monokini and sunning myself in a deck chair. The guy in the chair next to me looked me up and down and asked if I’d had breast cancer? I said no. I volunteered that I was HIV-negative. He seemed elated by this news. He volunteered that he was of Kurdish descent, and now lived in Philadelphia. He told me he worked in the building trades. I noticed he was wearing a rather unusual baseball cap — one that I have seen elsewhere. It was a flag similar to the Stars and Stripes, but grayed out. I asked if he could find me a safe house in Philadelphia. He said no, but offered to get me some of the free punch that was being served by the pool and then invited me to dinner.

All of this transpired in Miami Beach, Florida. Why I was there and not sheltering at home in the gloomy, mist-ridden Oregon Coast? Business, actually. Ironically enough, a healthcare startup. Had a cofounder in South Florida.

I did ask for a doctor’s advice — different doctor than the one at the family practice — about whether I was safe to fly, but never heard back from him. Had to leave a message at the reception desk. No idea if he even got it. I reasoned that heading some place warm and lying out in the sun was what any doctor would have done, so I made my way to the airport and never looked back.

A fateful decision, and probably not the right one.