Friday night. Yay, I guess.

Three weeks from now is the New Year’s Day. A new year. Nothing much will change with the fundamental reality – this is all purely symbolic, but hey, at least that’s something to look forward to, no matter how fake. If nothing else, there’ll be gradually more sunlight with every passing day: the winter solstice is 10 days away.

I’m still trying to distract myself from weapons-grade boredom and cabin fever that will surely set in the moment I let my guard down. Escapism is fun and all, and I’ve been known to do that for rather long stretches of time (like the time Fallout-3 came out and I played it for 46 hours straight – good times), but doing so deliberately, for months at a time… This sort of deliberate procrastination, especially in more or less total social isolation, is pretty damn hard, eh.

In the US, there was yet another harebrained attempts (with apologies to rabbits) by Republicans to overturn the result of the presidential election. This time, it was Texas’s attorney general who filed a lawsuit claiming there were illegal election procedures in the four states that gave Biden a relatively narrow victory. A couple of dozen other AGs jumped on that lawsuit bandwagon, as well as 126 Republicans elected to the House of Representatives. (Ironically, they’re essentially arguing that they shouldn’t be sworn in in January, there being so much fraud and all. Heh.) The Supreme Court has just thrown out the lawsuit a few hours ago in a unanimous 9-0 decision. It’s still too early to celebrate because that genius brigade will likely get truly desperate now, and there’ll be more strange attempts to rock the boat.

The very precedent this sets is mighty ugly. They might have been shut down this time, but unless there are serious consequences for trying to subvert the outcome of a democratic election, they’ll just try the same thing again in four years. And again, and again, until someday they might succeed. That’s not probable yet that’s possible. And if Trump keeps rage-tweeting that the election was illegitimate – well, there goes the whole “peaceful transfer of power” tradition. Meanwhile, the House and the Senate are fighting over what would go into the long-awaited stimulus bill, which would be just a bit shy of a trillion dollars. It doesn’t help that the government is about to run out of money and needs to have the debt ceiling raised again ASAP. (A charming and uniquely American tradition, that.) One tiny upside here is that the stock market closed in the red, and I managed to spend a little money on heavily discounted stocks. There may be even more discounts on Monday…

The key issue with the stimulus bill is legal liability: Republicans refuse to pass a bill that wouldn’t grant that liability to businesses. That means the meatpacking factories where so many got sick while their managers allegedly placed bets on how many will catch the virus. That means giant stores and businesses that heavily donate to their local congress-critters, etc. That’s what’s been holding back the stimulus for months now: I doubt Mitch McConnell will finally fold at this point, though I wouldn’t mind being surprised.

In covid news, Canada is rolling out the vaccination campaign plans. This article has the high-level summary and a neat chart showing how many will get vaccinated and when. And this 21-page PDF from Canada’s capital is a masterpiece of public-facing communication, covering a lot of topics in great detail. (And it has pictures!)

Now for the bad news… After the first two vaccination phases for those who are most at risk, the vaccination for everyone else (aka phase three) will begin in April. That’s the best-case scenario assuming there are no logistical delays, no angry pitchfork-wielding protester mobs, etc. Given that I’m 34 and healthy as a horse, I will not be in the front of any line. (And that’s good; others need it more.) So, realistically, I’ll probably get my first vaccine shot in May. Since that’ll most likely be a two-shot vaccine, I’d have to wait another three-four weeks. That means there’s a possibility that my solo lockdown will last until June. Not just a stolen year of my life, but a year and a season. (If I’m very, very lucky, I’ll get the first shot in April, with the chaser in May. That’d be a year and two months, then. I’d originally hoped for March.) I parted ways with xgf 201 days ago, and… it hasn’t been going great, which led to my obsession with self-improvement projects. There’s potentially 180 more days of this bullshit. Toward the end of this, I’m probably going to be held together only by the meticulous plans of a legendary month-long vacation/party/hedonism that I’ll embark on after getting the second vaccine shot. Goals and aspirations, eh?

Hang in there, my friends.