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As some of you know, about a month before the pandemic started, I was in the planning phases of a small home renovation. The first step was going to hire an electrician to put in a new baseboard heater in my living room. That obviously did not happen.

Now that I’ve had my first vaccine shot, I am now looking into finally get this plan going again. Having my first shot protects me and protect any potential worker who has to come into my apartment. We will no doubt still have protocols in place, but knowing I have some biological protection makes feel safer about the whole thing.

Almost a year and a half late, I am eager to start this project.

Up until probably a month ago, I hadn’t used my dishwasher for well over a year. Like any good Asian household, I use the dishwasher rack to dry my hand-washed dishes.

Last month, I used the dishwasher just so that all the parts and motors could be run again. I didn’t want the appliance to get into a bad state just because I didn’t use it. I’ve run twice again since then. The most recent time was just tonight. I didn’t have a lot of dirty dishes but I had used up all my clean bowls and I was just so tired tonight, I didn’t feel like hand-washing.

I gotta admit, it’s way more convenient to let the machine do the dirty work.

Comedian and actor Jimmy O. Yang is back in Vancouver to film Space Force season two for Netflix. For some reason, he’s quarantining in Burnaby, right next to Metrotown. In this video, he tries Hon’s Wonton House, sampling an array of dishes. I like Hon’s myself. It’s simple and authentic. I just wish there was a location closer to where I live.

On Thursday evening, I wrote that I felt some very minor side effects from my first AstraZeneca vaccine. I was feeling some muscle aches in my arms and that was pretty much it. About ten minutes after I hit “Publish” button for that post, things went downhill very quickly.

I had planned on going to sleep anyways after I wrote my post but as I crawled into bed, the muscle aches had expanded to all parts of my body. I also started to feel the chills come on. I began to shiver ever so slightly, even as I was under the covers. I was feeling very uncomfortable and it came on lightning quick. Thirty minutes ago, I was feeling normal. It caught me by surprise at how quickly I felt ill.

Oddly, I was feeling like my intestinal muscles were cramping. It’s hard to explain, but I knew it wasn’t because I had ate something bad. It’s like if your leg muscle cramping, except this was some of my intestinal muscle. Those cramps came in waves and it was quite painful. So I had that to deal with, along with the chills, and the whole body aching.

With all that going on, I found it very difficult to sleep. I just didn’t see how my body and mind was going to relax enough in that state to let myself fall asleep. I had several people warn me during the day to stay hydrated after the shot. I took their advice and was drinking water all day and throughout the evening. I brought some water with me to bed. Even while I was taking a turn for the worse, I forced myself to continue to drink water.

The area where the shot was administered, which had been pain-free all day, all of a sudden became very sore and painful to the touch (much like the rest of my body). It was like my body had gone to battlestations. I guess that’s exactly what it should have been doing.

I was in this first stage of discomfort for who knows how long. It must have been two or three hours. Sleep did not come at all. I’m not sure what came next. I think it was the headache. A painful headache developed. It made tossing and turning painful.

My chills gave way to a fever, probably around 5am. I got hot, my body ached, my head was pounding, and I was just feeling miserable. I had to pee and it was an ordeal to even muster the strength and endure the pain of getting up to go to the bathroom. I didn’t really have any choice other than pee in my bed.

After urinating and getting back into bed, I thought that I couldn’t even remember that last time I felt ill, even just a quarter as bad as this. Since the pandemic began, with physical distancing, mask wearing, avoiding crowds and public transit, I had been successful at avoiding a single cold or flu. Now, lying in bed, I felt just awful. Yet, this was a good sign that my body was creating antibodies in response to the vaccine.

Friday morning was a bit of a blur, I may have fell asleep for about ten minutes here or there. I do remember feeling very hot and sweating. I also somehow gathered enough strength to send out an e-mail to work saying I was going to take a sick day. My headache had not subsided all this time.

I believe around 11am, I decided to take an Advil. I would have taken one earlier but I was hoping I wouldn’t need to and wanted to just let my body do its thing with the vaccine. I had, however, been without sleep all night and was feeling the worse I’ve felt in probably three or four years.

After I took the Advil, about an hour later, I got really hot again, felt like I was sweating through my PJs and my sheets. The only thing I could do was just lie there and let it happen. The suddenly, I realized my headache was almost gone and my fever had gone down significantly. I wasn’t feeling hot anymore and I stopped sweating. I’m not sure if it was the Advil but if it was, it had done an amazing job.

By this time it was about 12 or 1pm and I felt good enough that getting up from bed didn’t feel like agony. This allowed me to make some food and a coffee. I was starting to feel much better. I didn’t do too much for the rest of the afternoon. I went back to bed, drank water, and I was able to fall asleep for about an hour in the late afternoon.

My condition remained the same throughout the evening, though just before bed, I felt the tiniest of all over muscle aches and a bit of a chill. I was able to sleep normally on Friday night. I woke up feeling ok on Saturday morning. It was almost like nothing had happened the day before. The only thing that seemed out of place was that I felt hot and sweaty doing less strenuous things than normal. Not sure if it was because it was sorta sunny on Saturday or if I still had a bit of fever. I also got tired quickly. I had to nap in the afternoon.

On Sunday, I felt completely normal again, with the exception of the injection site, which remains sore, like someone had punched my arm real hard.

As an adult, I’ve had several flu shots and I’ve had the hepatitis vaccine but nothing has come close to what I’ve experienced with this one. It really did a number on me but that’s ok. It means it worked and that’s the important thing.

Approximately thirteen hours ago I received my first AstraZeneca vaccine shot at a local pharmacy. I felt fine the entire day and evening. In the last hour or so, I started detecting a bit of a muscle ache in my arms. Not sure if that’s because I’ve been gaming on my PC for the last hour or so. As for the rest of my body, I am definitely feeling something. It’s very minor, like something is a little bit off. Maybe I’m just tired. No headache, no fever, and no chills so far.

We’ll see how sleep goes.

I nearly pooped my pants today. I made some salmon for lunch and did it sous vide style. Who knows, maybe I the temperature a tad too low and it was undercooked.

All I know is that later in day, I was at the grocery store and without warning, my stomach made one huge gurgle. I instantly knew something was wrong because I felt my insides shifting like my gastrointestinal system was a water slide. Except it wasn’t water making its way through.

i quickly finished up my shopping and headed home. Luckily, I live close and after that initial gurgle, I was still in control. Nothing felt imminent just yet.

Things got real intense once I got into the apartment. I dropped off my bags and immediately took off my coat and headed to the bathroom. In the time it took me to walk to bathroom, the situation went from to zero to nuclear detonation. I didn’t realize how badly I had to go. As I struggled with my belt, I felt the most powerful urge to poop that I’ve ever experienced before. Words fail to describe what I was going through. I can only say it felt like a bomb had gone off in my colon and the pressure needed to be relieved through my butthole.

I had to clench my anus muscles to prevent a torrent of sadness from soiling myself. I wasn’t sure if I was fully successful but after an eternity, I finally got my pants and underwear off. My butt wasn’t even fully on the seat before I let go. I felt a mixture of both sweet relief and horror. It came out with shocking force, a violent expulsion, like it was angry. My colon spasmed probably three times in total before I was empty. It lasted probably less ten seconds in total.

Once I felt I was done, I checked my underwear for damage. It was free of soiling to my surprise. I then cleaned my butt up as best as I could. This was one of those situations that called for an immediate shower afterwards.

What a short but intense ordeal that was.

For several days now, since Friday, I had a confirmed booking for my first vaccine shot at a local pharmacy. I was scheduled to get my shot tomorrow at 3pm.

This afternoon, I was napping in bed and I had fallen asleep with my phone in my hand. I was woken up by my phone ringing. I looked and call display showed the number of the pharmacy. I answered the phone, thinking they were just confirming my appointment. No, it was actually quite the opposite. The gentlemen who called me wanted to know if I had booked an appointment for tomorrow at 3pm. I said yes. He then informed me that the pharmacy was all out of doses of vaccine and they wouldn’t be able to honour my appointment. How did they just run out of doses? Why would they even make appointments available if they didn’t have the doses to back it up?

I understand I don’t have all the information behind the missing doses but it does seem odd to send out confirmation e-mails when the pharmacy couldn’t actually confirm the booking. Maybe they were depending on a new batch arriving for tomorrow and the batch wasn’t delivered and it was out of their control.

Not all was lost though. The gentleman on the phone said that they would have more shots on Thursday and Friday of this week and I could re-schedule for then. I asked if he could re-schedule me but he said he couldn’t. If I wanted a new time slot, I’d have to book again through the pharmacy web site. He even told me to hurry as he said that he was the one that just pushed the button to open up the available slots on Thursday and Friday. I thanked him and luckily I had the link to the booking site available on my computer. I rolled out of bed and got to work to book myself for an 11:30am appointment on Thursday.

I’m hoping this appointment won’t get cancelled as well but who knows. The vaccine supply situation in Canada is constantly in flux. I’ve wait for well over a year for a vaccine shot, so I guess another 48 hours isn’t so bad. In the meantime, I need to continue to be safe and smart.

On Friday evening, I wanted to have some fried chicken for dinner. In my part of town, Korean fried chicken places are very popular. I decided to try one of the places close to me but that I had not ordered from before.

I looked at their menu and along with fried chicken, they had a “delicacies” section. One of the items listed in that section was “pupa soup“. “Pupa” as in insects? I did some quick Googling and yeah, that’s what it is. As strange as consuming a soup made with insects sounded, I didn’t see any pictures beforehand and life is about trying new things, so I ordered it, along with my fried chicken.

When I got my food order home, I admit I ate a lot of fried chicken first before opening the container of pupa soup. It was in a Styrofoam container which was sealed with a plastic bag. I opened all that stuff up and when I took the top off the Styrofoam container, I was met with the pungent odour that Google had warned me about. It smelled like a woodsy decaying smell, as strong and as distinctive as the Internet had warned me. While the smell was unique and strong, it looked like a normal broth that any Asian soup could look like. That’s when I got a spoon and to dig up the contents at the bottom of the container.

As you can see above, that’s what greeted me. The restaurant did not skimp on giving me the silkworm pupae. There were lots of them. There was also some onion and slices of jalapeno peppers. While this particular soup was odd, I wasn’t put off from it. I really wanted to try it. I cautiously spooned up one pupa, along with some of the soup. It all went into my mouth.

The soup itself was bitter. The decaying woodsy smell was now in my mouth, strong, bitter and spicy because of the peppers. I then bit into the pupa. It wasn’t crunchy. It sorta had a thin and chewy outer skin and I could tell there was a soft fleshy part inside of it, I guess that was the pupa insides. It did not taste great. It was bitter in a different way that the soup was. The spiciness of the soup made everything a bit more palatable for some reason.

I took sometime to process all the flavours and textures. I decided I needed to try more of this, that one spoonful of soup and one pupa was not enough to fully experience it all. So, I spooned up three large pupae with some soup and took it all in. It was more of the same, just with a larger concentration of the chewy pupa skin and more of the pupa guts.

I went back to the well about two more times before I decided it was enough of this soup for this time. I had a lot leftover but I didn’t need try any more of this.

Would I order it again? Maybe. Do I regret ordering it? No, not all. It expanded my horizons and that’s never a bad thing.

I just want to say that at the moment, I have no idea when I’ll be getting my first vaccine shot. AZ is now available to people in my age group but the supply of it in this province has essentially dried up. The province won’t be getting more of it anytime soon is my understanding. The next available chance now is for my age group to be made eligible for Moderna or Pfizer. Unfortunately, British Columbia is still stuck at vaccinating 60+ with those vaccines. I’ll have to wait for the 50s to be cleared before it gets to me. I’ll be lucky to get my shot in May.