Post-flu thoughts: Future-proofing?

I was hit by a flu bug a little over a week ago.

It came after a period of sleep anxiety, the effects of which I still feel every now and then. My immune system was probably pretty low after a few days of non-sleep, thanks to an inconsiderate neighbour from upstairs. Despite multiple attempts to communicate, they continue walking like elephants and randomly dropping items on the floor at all hours of the day and night, and early in the morning.

This isn’t going to turn into a rant about inconsiderate neighbours, as much as I’d like it to be.

I just wanted to write some of my thoughts down while I was ill.

I still had to go to work, though for 1.5 days, when the fever finally showed up, I couldn’t anymore.

Because of the vast amounts and varieties of remedies, the symptoms (apart from the fever) were very mild. Even the dreaded post-cough rarely comes up. I usually suffer from a post-infection cough for at least another week or two.

I was reminded, during the illness, that, though my colleagues were mostly understanding and tried to help, I cannot stay in a state of work responsibility forever.

I would certainly hope that I stay in good health for the rest of my life - and should probably be more proactive in ensuring that this is the case.

That said, there is an increasing urge to work in a less-stressful up-and-down way.

I actually asked an AI platform to analyse and make suggestions based on my preferences, skills, and limitations. Some of the suggestions are extremely useful. I intend to follow at least some of them.

Because I have not fully pondered and considered all the information, I’ll delay talking about it until a future post. This one is just an update - a much-needed one.

Being the Curious Kid Taught Me Many Things. Some Good, Some Not so Good.

I was the curious kid in school.

Not just in terms of wanting to explore and find out more, but also in the other sense - a bit of an oddball and, though some find interesting, most find difficult to understand or relate to.

It never really bothered me that people didn't "get" me, because I didn't really "get" people either.

I remember writing (in a now-lost exercise book) that I found it frustrating to be unable to discuss things with my peers. I can't remember the exact words, but I recall something about nuclear fusion and the future of human civilisation and energy use.

And that being pre-Internet days, it took a lot of effort to find information in the library.

The good thing was that I learned to refine search terms.

It was an old search system (was it a Dynix?), and our libraries had an octopus mascot on the welcome page. Not sure if anyone else remembers this. It was quite similar to the picture attached to this post.

And when the Internet became widespread, the search term practice I've had since I was a kid turned out to be incredibly useful.

Instead of learning to communicate with people, I somehow learned to communicate with computer systems instead.

And today, with AI and machine learning, more and more people are learning to communicate with computer systems.

Who would've thunk?

Of course, I eventually learned to communicate better with people, but that's a story for another time. Though I say so myself, it's a pretty interesting one.