Been Home Too Long? Cabin Fever???

Cabin fever is an idiomatic term for a claustrophobic reaction that takes place when a person or group is isolated and/or shut in, for an extended period. Symptoms include restlessness, irritability, forgetfulness, laughter, and excessive sleeping. The phrase is also used humorously to indicate simple boredom from being home alone.





I've been doing more so naturally I'm more tired. I'm finally able to get myself in and out of bed and the car with minimal assistance. It's so physically daunting, heck even getting dressed is difficult. Even with mom's help, it's still a 30 minute production to get underwear and pants on. lol. An atrophied body is just an insult to injury. I'm trying to get out more because being at home can get boring. and it's better than physical therapy. You can only watch so many movies whether they're on cable or on dvd. In the hospital there were about 20 cable channels consisting of mostly reality shows, reruns of movies and paid programming. It became a guilty pleasure to watch these shows, but I'm now recovered and watch more comedy and science just so I can improve my snapple-cap knowledge. I do love some cable shows like Dexter, U.S. of Tara and a new fave, Nurse Jackie. I love anime so I've been catching up on 3 months of my beloved anime. This love, along with an interest in Japanese food/culture, makes me want to learn the Japanese language so I've got a few books, some beginner cds to play "listen and learn", and my brother's friend who teaches English in Japan to students which would be an AWESOME AWESOME job. While visiting my coworkers last Tuesday, I met a new tech named Yuki who speaks Japanese so I'm going to coerce him to teach me a little too, but it'll take awhile because learning Nihongo is not easy! lol.

My friend has been unemployed for just over 5 months and is going through some of the same anxieties, and feelings of "dumbing down", a.k.a. cabin fever, as I have. For me, a lack of sleep combined with online amusements such as gaming, Facebooking, shopping, and blogging pretty much tire out my eyes making it difficult to read so I'm trying to alternate hobbies in order to be more regimented. I've even reorganized my entire I-tunes library, about 10,000 songs.

Going back to paid programming/programas pagadas, it's so ridiculous that sometimes my friend and I will call each other to briefly discuss pros and cons of a currently running infomercial or an item on QVC, and it usually worsens when the content consists of skin care products because we're both big on taking care of our faces, hence we end up buying something. We both love makeup as well so if we see sales online for products that we'd consider using, we email or text each other and consult on how great a deal it is, or if we're behaving we'll discourage each other from purchasing something we don't need with money we don't have. Ah, victims of capitalism and marketing.

I love to shop and am thrilled by a good sale, heck, I'm Filipino! I find several reasons to shop and because I'm not getting out as much yet, I shop online. I find medical/household items that I need, gifts for birthdays, and usually get sidetracked on Ebay, Amazon, or Slickdeals by good deals. I make an excuse that I'm treating myself to something small and have to contain myself because I know how easy it is to get into debt, bad. On a good note, I'm almost done paying off one of my credit cards. One down and one to go. Woo hoo!

Here's a story to finish this blog.

The friend I mentioned above had ordered a skin care product from an infomercial. Murad stuff, I couldn't blame her (bad friend, BAD friend). She was called from the intercom system on the front door of the building. Someone said they had a package for her which caused her to worry because her package wasn't expected for about 3-5 days. Her mind got the best of her and she panicked thinking it could've been some maniac scamming his way into the building to attack women. So as the "delivery person" made his way up, she went into self-defense mode and planned whatever she could to protect herself from this "psycho". She grabbed a pair of sharp scissors and tucked them into the waist line in the back of her jeans and firmly planted her foot behind the peek hole-less front door because it opened inward and just in case this "maniac" tried to overtake her by thrusting the door open, she would be ready. As the approaching footsteps got louder, she got nervous. Her self-defense training came back and she knew that she would open the door enough to see the person with one eye, plant her foot behind it to prevent an intrusion, and have a hand on her scissors in case she had to defend herself.....
As it turns out, her skin care products were delivered ahead of schedule and she averted a crisis which mentally escalated to a "code red" status due to cabin fever and probably several lifetime movies.

The end.