Honestly, not doing very well with my health right now, and I’m just trying to distract myself with the gods, and games and stuff since I’m on fall break.
Heading back to the doctor for the second time sometime this week to see if we can get an actual diagnosis on what’s going on with my lungs. Last time I was just given meds with no explanation or diagnosis, and I didn’t think to ask (the doctor was kind of rude.) Finished the meds, and I’m not really any better, even with taking breathing treatments ever few hours.
I’ve been trying to get perfect attendance at school. And 6 days into the school year, I get Covid.
This sucks ass, but it makes sense. I’m autoimmune and I had contact with someone who tested positive. (I didn’t know they were positive at the time)
But this is a daily reminder that Covid still exists and is still dangerous. Just because we aren’t required to wear masks, doesn’t mean you can’t be safe.
So right after I wrote that long ass post about all the shit going on lately...
I still have the $200 extra Google Store dollars sitting in my account and I’m highly tempted to fucking buy something with it just to see if it fucks everything up again. Because I’m chaotic neutral like that.
And then last Thursday night I became very very ill. To the point where I thought I was crying because I didn’t want to die and thought I might.
My fever spiked to 102.7 F in four hours. Full body aches, chills, uncontrollable shivering. Tylenol brought the fever down but I had to take that shit like clock work and keep track of how much I’d taken to make sure I didn’t OD on it. The worst was Friday morning when my fever hit 103.1. Out of fear of having COVID-19, my husband and I had worked together to isolate me in our bedroom the previous night. He moved some of his stuff to the guest bed/bath (I am forever grateful and fully acknowledge the privilege I have to own such a large house) to protect himself and our daughter.
He made a phone call appointment with my primary care physician (which was the only appointments they’re taking right now, no in-person) and at the time she said there wasn’t much that could be done. She prescribed me an antibiotic for the same damn sinus infection I’ve had for what seems like ten years now that I can’t shake.
I need to back up a step. Wednesday I felt fine. Like, good, even, for the first time in a few days. I’d had a lot of sinus crud going on from the snow melt and had gone back to the ENT on Tuesday for another look at my nose. All he did was prescribe me a saline rinse. Which, whatever, it’s... sort of helping. But by Wednesday the worst of the sinus symptoms cleared up (burning sinuses). Still had a lot of green snot but... that’s normal for me (which I realize is really fucking awful but no doctor I’ve gone to thus far knows what the hell to do about it).
So, Wednesday I’m fine. Liz, however, could not get to sleep or stay asleep if she did fall asleep. She was up until about 11. Which meant I didn’t sleep a wink after that. I was terrified for her. Because I hadn’t slept and I’d woken up with a swollen gland in my throat and was generally feeling run down, I was going to take Thursday off. I have PTO. I’m fucking lucky right now.
My project manager really pestered me into making it to some phone calls that we had scheduled that day. Basically, I ended up working all day, talking most of the time. That did my throat and swollen gland no favors.
I thought the gland was a blocked salivary duct. I even looked in my throat and thought I saw the polyp that had it blocked (too far back to reach it). It eventually lead to a nasty headache. By 10 pm Thursday night, I had the 102.7 degree fever.
Saturday morning at 2 am I woke up with a busting migraine and the swollen gland was now on both sides of my throat. This was no blocked duct. I figured then that I had strep. My fever had crept back up a bit, so I took another Tylenol and passed back out.
I woke up again at 7 am, no fever, aches, or chills. Only a raging headache, like I’d been out drinking all night, and a very swollen throat. Over the course of the day I felt okay except for my throat and headache. By that evening I could hardly eat or drink, so I resolved to call the care line the next day.
8 am Sunday, I called the care line, talked to a nurse eventually, and she said I needed to go in immediately. I took a shower (because I hadn’t in probably five days). Went to one urgent care that is now permanently closed (whoops), went to another one and they’re only seeing people for musculoskeletal issues. But they directed me to a third only a few minutes away that was testing for anything respiratory. Including COVID-19.
Great.
I get to this clinic, and they had a nurse in a full suit, face shield, mask, and goggles standing in the atrium between the two entry doors. They had as much vital-checking equipment in there on bench seats and all the necessary tools to do damn near any kind of quick respiratory test. I told her my symptoms, touched nothing, and she swabbed my throat. I went back out to my car to wait for the results at her behest because they had confirmed cases of COVID-19 in the building.
I noped the fuck out.
My strep result came back positive 10 minutes later. I ran two more errands, picked up my penicillin, and went home.
I feel much better today. Turns out, if you let strep go too long, a complication from it is rheumatic fever. Problem is, I didn’t even know I had it. I had no symptoms until Thursday really, and then I tanked that night.
So that’s been my deal the last few days. I’m still in isolation until tomorrow morning to protect Liz, but she should be good. Today, I’ll be getting back to some tags for some meme type posts.
The scam of “programming challenges” Aka a long warning message from a friend.
Maybe the title sounds very aggressive, but I'm tired of seeing how big companies try to scam young people (omg that means that I am no longer young? Fuck. Hey, I'm not that old), knowing that they have no experience to lie to their faces. A friend warned me about this when I graduated and I want to do the same with you.
Let me be your friend now. Maybe what I say you don’t like it too much, but you need to hear it as I needed it at the time.
So... Hmmm... this is not the type of post that you are going to see in this tumblr, but I feel the need to make a warning because it has landed in my inbox an email with a link that I will add after the keep reading thing.
https://www.zaratalent.com/data-en.html
If you open it you can see that it will take you to a webpage of a big company like Zara (I don't know how popular it will be in your country, but I can tell you that the owner of the company is considered one of the richest people in the world).
Ok, but... What do they ask to do?
Basically they want you to predict a sales result using multiple DataSet that they offer you using a thousand parameters.
I downloaded the file to see exactly how many DataSets we were talking about and... Did I already say that there were multiple datasets?
And they are not especially "small" either.
They want you to use Java for it. Surprise, bitch.
Ok, maybe that has sounded very aggressive. Let me explain:
(This is the image source in case you are curious)
With this image I want to show that they want you to use Java in your challenge because SUSPECTLY everything related to tech stuff is written in that programming language.
They will positively appreciate that you know other programming languages, of course. They hire one (1) engineer and they try to squeeze it out like an orange juice. (The website is not going to be done itself, you know?)
On a side note: I don’t know if you knew, but the best way to handle datasets is using Python. Java is fine, but not optimal.
Omg I'm sounding super passive-aggressive, but this really pisses me off. And this is really going to hurt you if you decide to be part of this "challenge" let me keep talking.
I really couldn’t care less about the absurd shit that they demand to program for FREE in three days. But if they require programming with DataSets, we are talking about a tech specialized in Data Mining. That means that you had to study a computer science degree and then you had to study a master or some shit to specialize in it. And they have the balls of cataloging it as "junior".
Here I leave a small image that explains what is "junior" for those people who do not know (source).
Or maybe you're a fucking genius and you don't need to study any of that to be an expert in Data Mining. In that case... first of all: wow, congrats pal and second: You are nuts and I both admire and fear you. DM me because I wanna be your fucking friend.
I translate it to you: we want someone with experience, but we want to pay you less than shit. Fuck you. (The "fuck you" at the end is important. If you look at it with perspective it is a good summary of what it means to be a junior.)
Let's recap:
They demand a job that would normally cost more than nothing.
That work can only be done by someone who really knows what they are doing, but with a shitty salary.
These people really have to offer something glorious to the winners, right? Maybe even if it's a shitty salary, if it's for a long time and with an permanent contract, I can look for something else while...
BAM. In your fucking face. A contract of 6 fucking months. I don't want to be a bitch that destroys the illusions of people, but I can predict the future and I know that after those months: they're going to fire you, they will read the list of the best in the ranking in the challenge and call the next number. When they run out of people to call, maybe they'll make another challenge.
I'm not making it up. Go back to the official challenge page and watch everything carefully. I've added it to the beginning of the post, but I'll add it here again.
If you do a small search (no more than 5 minutes) you can see that ALL the programming challenges are exactly the same as this one.
Please... I know that you have worked very hard to acquire all that knowledge and I know that you have suffered a lot to get where you are. Please, don't let a couple of entrepreneurs cheat you with this. Learn that your work is valid. Maybe right now you don't have work, but you will have it and you will earn a decent salary.
Please don't work for free.
And please, don’t get angry with me. I'm just telling you because I really care about you. I just wanna be a friendly voice.
I'm tired of all the negative emotions my friend has been putting off.
Yeah, she's been going through some shit times with her family, her boyfriend, and so on, and I tell her I'm there for her if she needs anyone to talk to.
It's not that I don't want to care, it's that I care too much.
I don't expect anything in return, but it would be nice if she genuinely asked me if I was okay, sometimes.
I mean, I'll probably answer with "yes," but I want her to see through the facade in my answer.
I feel like I'm the only one who's encouraging my friends to keep fighting, but it adds up after a while, and I start to crumble.
It's like there's something being taken away from me that can't regenerate as fast.
I just want a friend that'll love me as much as I love them, but I'm not sure if that'll ever happen.
I'm so used to putting others before myself, to take care of people, but that's been hardwired into my brain.
Yeah, I'm an empath. Yeah, I'm intuitive. Yeah, I'm an introvert. Yeah, I have anxiety. Yeah, I have an unresolved childhood trauma, and yeah, I'm the "mom friend."
But I'm depressed, too, and have my own personal shit to deal/cope with.
