hope you’ve been well

I feel like this has become a common opener in emails in recent times. Hello, hope you’ve been well… Usually it’s work emails to/from other companies, and usually it’s a supplier that I need to ask about something, and I haven’t corresponded with them in a while. Sometimes the supplier is interstate, in a state that has recently had severe weather or a wave of virus, or some other event that has made the headlines.

It just seems polite to show some concern. My usual contacts also use it when starting a new correspondence with me, so it goes two ways. But I’m pretty sure people didn’t always do this. Or maybe they did, but it didn’t mean as much as it does now. Maybe the pandemic made people more compassionate or something.

For the record, yes, I have been well. I have been very absent from this blog, and I’ve been keeping busy with other things, but I always intended to come back.

April was always going to be a bit hectic at work because of all the public holidays, one week after another. While it’s great having extra time off, it also means that our work essentially gets condensed into the remaining work days. Add to that one of our pharmacists being away isolating for a week, the senior technician being away on holidays for a fortnight, still trying to train a new person, and the ongoing supply issues with everything… and it’s been more than a bit challenging.

But we got through it, so whatever. I think I’ve worked there long enough to know that we get through everything, no matter what (…Famous last words?)

Apart from resting and recovering from work, I’ve also finished the epic quest that is Dragon Age: Inquisition. It’s a role-play, fantasy-based computer game that I initially didn’t expect to like as much as Dragon Age 2, but it surprised me, and I think I got quite invested in the game somewhere in the middle of it. (But I guess you don’t spend hours and hours playing a game, and not get invested in it.)

The “role-play” part of it basically means that you create your own character, and you make decisions throughout the game that affect the outcomes of the overall story. It’s basically interactive story-telling, and this seems to be the genre that I enjoy most.

Meanwhile, I’ve also been reading Dostoyevsky’s Crime and Punishment because it’s just one of those books that I’ve wanted to read for a long time. The only trouble is that the copy I have is an older edition, bought second-hand, so I’m not sure if the translation is very good. Some parts sound a bit clumsy, and some of the characters seem really weird. Sometimes I wonder if something got lost in translation or, conversely, if the translator took some liberty with dramatisation, but then I remind myself that not all Russian authors write like Tolstoy.

Anyway, I’ve learnt from reading this particular translation that “crikey” is not just a word that Steve Irwin said a lot, but actually originated in 19th Century England as a euphemism for “Christ”. And that’s why a character says “crikey” in my copy of Crime and Punishment, which was presumably translated by an English person. (I looked it up because “crikey” seemed really out of place in a Russian novel.)

I’ve also been expanding my appreciation of coffee recently. When I first started drinking coffee sometime in my uni days, I never intended or believed that I would become a regular coffee drinker. It was more of a rare treat, and usually in the form of commercially bottled iced coffee that the companies would occasionally hand out for free on campus to promote their products. You know, the stuff that’s more like coffee-flavoured milk with a caffeine hit.

I also never expected to enjoy coffee as much as I do now. I only fairly recently (maybe in the last year or so) learnt about different blends of coffee, different methods of brewing, and the immense range of flavours and tastes that can be achieved. As it turns out, I actually quite enjoy a light roast with citrus notes. Yes, citrus in coffee (if done well) is actually very pleasant and refreshing. My favourite of this category so far is a Black Sheep blend that used limes and hops somewhere in the roasting/fermentation process to create a coffee that I think is best described as “bright”.

Anyway, hope you’ve all been well. I’ll be back soon hopefully.

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