(written 8/31)
A small breakdown did happen, but it wasn’t too bad. Between being sick (and consequently not being able to be upright for more than ~15 min), having ants crawling all over my room, and having our drinking water be brown with scum on top, being here is a bit hard. Many of you guys know I’m not the world’s cleanest person, but I enjoy having the option of being clean- which I don’t really think I’ll have here. Also, I really believe in good sanitation and the fact that no one uses soap and we have to clean our dishes in water full of bacteria that we’re not supposed to drink without boiling, all really make me squeamish.
We’ve been boiling our water and then putting it in water bottles, but I’m having a hard time drinking it because it has a bunch of particles that look like disintegrated fish food floating around in it. This has been making me think a lot about our American concept of what good drinking water is- much of which I think is due to bottled water advertisements. We are bombarded with ideas of crystal clear natural spring water from fresh snowmelt as the perfect kind of water. I’ve seen a million commercials of well-lit slow-motion water being poured out of a bottle against a white background. In comparison, this funny smelling water full of fish flakes is pretty disgusting, even though I know that we’ve killed the harmful bacteria. However, the PCs before me drank this water and did just fine, and at some point I will too once I get over the fact that it doesn’t look like water in commercials.
As I’ve been lying in bed sick, Ashley’s been an angel and has continued cleaning the house- at this point she’s mostly been working on the kitchen. It’s looking infinitely better and almost ready to start putting food in. I’m pretty sure our neighbors are all puzzled that we’re spending so much time inside.
My small bit of cleaning is trying to eradicate the ants in my room. I think I’ve almost succeeded. This either means I’ve killed most of the ant colony, of the subtle persuasion of mass murder has convinced them to seek their fortunes elsewhere. I’m a bit worried that some night the ants are going to exact their revenge on me and carry me away in the middle of the night. If you never hear from me again, you know why.
Life as a Jamie 