I no longer know how to write or what to write or what to even write on. Keeping that in mind, I'm doing a report of a sort. Everyone likes reports. Corporates pay dumbfucks all the fucking time and professionals in the creative fields who are hired by these corporates are forced to do the same. Everyone has to report. Well, mostly everyone.

I got published! Double spread byline in a leading national daily on a subject dear to my heart. It got a decent amount of appreciation. I was stoked because why the fuck not. Finally managed to channel my rage of losing someone important into writing.

I also got a publisher. A leading academic publisher in the UK decided to take our collaborative research project on board. If all goes well, or well, according to plan, I'll be published in a book in 2020. This is subject to if I survive to write that paper.

We lost a cat. In a freak road accident, some motherfucker killed our stray and left her kitten orphaned at our door. She's a total doll but isn't fond of me. I try to cuddle the fuck out of her but she won't let me. Consent is kinda real, she wins.

To make up for the lack of cuddling a cat, I found a human who permitted me to cuddle him and vice versa. Our transactional relationship is the stuff of dreams. There is hygiene, respect, consent, and cuddling. If you hear of someone starting subscription package to cuddling people during difficult times and seasons, hit me up. The mofo stole my idea.

I got a raise at work. Which was scheduled to happen last Summer but I won't crib. It happened is all, and I was relieved because the intimation for a meeting seemed ominous. Either that or I was overthinking the fuck about where to stay in Bangkok. A conversation for another day (aka never).

I have been waking up for the most part of days spent in the barsati to a nightmare. Of how I booked myself to go to Thailand (last minute- as always) and how absolutely uncomfortable I am with the idea, that even in my dream I start panicking, trying to cancel, only to find myself in the Baht Bus while the alarm rings. Waking up in a cocktail of drool and sweat is disgusting.

I gained four kilos of weight. It's the only thing weighing me down. I am sorry. 

I survived three months without a drop of alcohol. Instead, I spent those calories on pizza, patties, kachodis. Basically, starting next month, I'm probably going back to alcohol. It was a shit decision. In 2018, I had pizza grand total of 3 times. In this trimester, I had pizza 4 times. I don't even fucking like pizza.

My mum started retailing some of her specialty food. She's down to treating the city with the best of Summer and Winter fermented food. It's been phenomenal with people reaching out placing orders with us doing bare minimum marketing. It's pretty much the only reason I survived January with a straight face.

I lost people close to me because it wasn't working out. For the sake of my mental well being, for the sake of my self-respect, and possibly for the sake of there being no love, respect or admiration from their side to me. It's okay. Shit happens. Worse things have happened and I've gotten out. These are just people, who are like furniture to my existence, just like I am to theirs.

It's easier to cut people out than to get over them. I wish someone had prepared me for that. No amount of resilience and pep talk can withstand the grief of losing people who meant something to you. Every commendable achievement or listing above is a testament of what I did in the face of grief to get out. Every unwritten post and writing here is a sign that I'm not past this and I am down the dumps.

I give myself three more trimesters to get past this funk. If it doesn't happen then we'll know something is wrong with me beyond normal, acceptable level of wrong.

90 days into this year: me.