KIRKUS REVIEW: HOW NICE OF YOU....

 THIS FROM KIRKUS! 

About time for a new book?

I'm starting to feel a bit more like myself after 2.5 years with Long COVID. I still haven't exercised, but I will soon have published a memoir in essays (November 15th 2022). So, there's that. I will post a retrospective of all the rejections I received before getting it published.  It's a little delayed due to circumstances beyond the publisher's control like health crises.  Keep an eye out for it, yes? 

Bloomberg News Needs to Work On Titles That Don't Freak Me Out, Please.

So this little pretty was published at Bloomberg News about brain shrinkage in long Covid, titled "COVID Can Shrink the Brain as Much as a Decade of Aging, Study Finds." The New York Times titled the story a bit more calmly, though still slightly alarming:"COVID May Cause Changes in the Brain, New Study Finds." The actual article in Nature is titled even more accurately, noting that this is an observation from banked bio-data in the UK:  "SARS-CoV-2 is Associated with Changes in Brain Structure in UK Biobank."  

Decide for yourself.  

It might just be that I'm a little touchy on the matter of not having the brain power I had before long COVID.

Published A Teensy Piece about Long COVID Clinical Trial

Temporary LROD Closure Due to Long COVID

I'm closing down LROD—temporarily (I hope)—due to the fact that I am still struggling with long COVID. Instead of literary matters (other than I still am at some level a writer), I plan to write about the crazy efforts I'm making to get better.  It's not exactly snake oil, but it is:   low dose Naltrexone, Nitric Oxide Drops (the kind weightlifters take to increase blood flow to their muscles after pumping iron: to be clear, I'm not lifting weights, I'm lying in bed, trying to find ways to exercise without making myself worse), flavonoids, Chinese herbs, vitamins (D, B, C, E), fish oil (fractionated), Co-Q10, Ginseng, CBD, Tylenol (for muscle pain, though again, I'm mostly lying in bed), probiotics, acupuncture.  I'm also in a long COVID clinical trial at a local university.  Guess what that entails.  After a barrage of baseline testing (e.g., glucose tolerance, MRIs, body-fat indices, blood tests, swallowing a body temperature sensor), I will be strapping on scuba-like pants that will circulate heat to my lower body 5 days a week for 8 weeks: 40 minutes sessions of heat therapy.  I keep asking the study coordinator if the other four people who've completed the study report feeling any better. After pressing her for weeks, she finally gave a definitive answer.  "Feeling better is really very subjective."  

     This is how desperate I am to get better.

     Very desperate.

     So far, though: no luck.