Yo - I haven't updated this thing in ages.

So I'm still off work with depression. Almost four months now (and counting - I'm going to be surprised if I get back to work this year). Weirdly, I'm not stressing about it as much as I was this time last year; I know that it will go, eventually, and this is kind of another step towards figuring out where I need to be, even though it kind of sucks right now.

My phone's still off. I'm thinking about maybe doing a thing where I keep it on, but find a way of making calls go straight to voicemail. That will mean that I have some idea when there's a message, and also that people will be able to text me.

I signed up for a Open University course, with the idea that it would stimulate my mind and that might help me. Right now, I'm not doing much of anything on it, and so far the material that I've looked at isn't very challenging. But I've given myself permission to be crap at it, and I shall hand in my assignments, even if they're rubbish because I haven't done enough work. The idea is to be engaged to whatever point I feel able.

And there have been more fits of madness.

I've booked a trip to California at the beginning of December. This is because my favourite guru/mentor, Havi Brooks, is running a one-day class there which I really, really want to attend. So I've booked onto it. But I once tried going to Georgia for a wedding, and I was well then and it killed me - so I'm not travelling to California for a single day! I'm going to be there for eight days.

I'm going to need a lot of hand-holding and support and love and stuff to get me on the plane and get me through it, I think, but I really want to go. I think it will probably be enormously good for me. I hope so anyway.

After much dithering, I finally signed up for Make the Yuletide Gay (which is the popslash secret santa challenge). I'm not convinced of my ability to write anything at all, because I haven't written much in the way of popslash, or anything at all, since the same challenge ran last year. But I wanted to participate, mostly because to not take part in this challenge is essentially to remove yourself from the fandom and I don't want to do that!

I also signed up for NaNo. God knows what, if anything, I'll write. But maybe it'll be good for me to do something other than play World of Warcraft. (It's good to have WoW to rely on, honestly, for non-threatening social contact and amusement and "stuff to get done"; but it also kind of eats my head and I want to spend less time doing it, if I can.)

I've also done stuff like buy Lego - I kind of love the putting stuff together with my hands - and I'm trying to mess around with drawing and painting and stuff. Though I haven't got much further with that than "buying the materials and looking at them a lot".

I think that when I've written my first OU assignment (due this Tuesday! But it's only 750 words so I'm not too worried) I might celebrate by getting out the paints and mixing some colours or painting something ridiculously abstract. Mixing colours is fun!

As you can see, I'm doing a lot of play at the moment. Play and rest. It's really good to have the time to just switch off - even though I'm living at my parents', and that means a certain amount of trying to help them out, 'cause they are quite elderly. But they are looking after me, too, so it all kind of works.

At the moment I'm 100% homebody, it seems to be a rare-ish day that I actually leave the house. I do seem to feel a bit more positive when I do, though.

I think it's probably time for me to try and get some sleep now!