Josh Saddler

It would seem to be my birthday today.

For a month and a half now, I've been having health issues. This is on top of my back that's still healing from October 2006, and my neck, which still hasn't fully healed from July's whiplash.

My eyes. They've been not working. Now they're much better, and the left is mostly normal, while the right still isn't as good as it should be. See, I've been battling chronic conjunctivitis. It's gone from unbearable pain and being unable to stand any light to almost normal. Bright sunlight still doesn't feel all that nice, nor am I allowed to read or do anything on computers/TVs for extended periods. Per doctor's orders. Which means that (unfortunately) I do exactly the opposite when I'm at work, as everything I do at the library is visual. And under constant fluorescent lights no less, which are only slightly better than sunlight.

Really, I'm probably at 75 - 80%, at least. The big worry for me is that I still have conjunctivitis, and in addition to growing discomfort as I do certain tasks longer and longer (computers at work, or reading at home), the vision in my right eye is still much worse. I think that may end up being permanent. This stupid conjunctivitis has kicked up the astigmatism, and to a degree, the nearsightedness in that eye. It's . . . difficult. Difficult to not be able to do much. I do everything at work as usual, because I have to. Home is different, though the last two weeks have had some noticeable improvement, to the point that I'm now regularly overstressing my eyes because I keep thinking I'm well enough. Well enough to indulge in reading several books, or even trying to check email and do Gentoo-related tasks.

Ah yes, about Gentoo. I've been on devaway for a little while now by necessity, and am slowly easing back in to the work. Fortunately, there hasn't been a lot happening on the docs front; nothing too pressing. Nothing too pressing in terms of needs to get done right now, but I've already started thinking ahead to the 2007.1 release, currently slated for November. It's never very far from my mind.

And, well, I still have 4 documents I was writing when the eye problems hit. I've got a blas-lapack document to edit/rewrite, the Alpha-diet proposal to edit, the proposed framebuffer guide to outline, and the handbook release howto I've created. Need to finish up the last one first, unless the others are easier/quicker. It's hard to tell what will be what; everything is hard to do with my eyes the way they are.

Anyway, I'm still not officially "back" yet, much as I try. It will just take more time before I'll be up to the usual levels of productivity.