Sike - Mickey

I usually like to play things in the background, whether it be music, videos, or shows. I haven't been watching shows as much recently because the only streaming services I pay for are Apple TV and Crunchyroll (don't come at me). And I'll tell you something: Apple TV doesn't let you see what you're watching if you mirror to another device. That, or my technical ineptitude is showing (probably both) and I'm far from being proficient in Japanese to have shows play in the background without swapping it to dub.

So, between coding for this and drawing, I've been consuming unruly amounts of lore videos and content essay videos. Elden Ring lore was my champion of choice closer to the beginning of July. I got back into playing the game, but then I wasn't doing my chemistry homework... So I decided I probably shouldn't add that to the myriad of distractions I already have.

For some reason, I kept getting a lot of recommendations for Pretty Little Liars content so one day in mid-July, I caved and started playing those in the background: what a massive mess of a show. I can't even imagine what the writer's room sounded and looked like. There's so many events that occur... My jaw? Dropped. In a state of absolute 2011 Jennifer Lopez's "On the Floor". I even watched a two part series of someone comparing the books (yes, there's books) to the TV show. Messy messy.

Nowadays, I'm watching more Content Essay Channels. I watched a few of videos on Pickle Ditto's channel. I really enjoyed her analysis of Silent Hill F, it makes me feel like I should play the game some point in the future. I also really enjoyed her essay on Adolescence.

1Q84: This book has been on my 'to read' list for almost a decade now. I had a copy of it back in high school, but have since lost it. I was at Barnes and Noble at the start of July and wasn't planning on buying anything... Until I saw a 3 piece boxset for 1Q84 that had my favorite art style from the publisher Vintage International. As of 7/12/26, I'm not yet 100 pages deep, so the outlook isn't strong... But that just means I'll probably bleed this goal over into August ;)

Blueberries: I live in Maine and love to bake (but baking hasn't happened as much since I went back to school in addition to my prediabetes diagnosis). For maybe two years, a couple family members and I would go blueberry picking and I'd make a blueberry cake recipe afterwards. It was a nice little annual treat, but that was back in early 2020's and I'd love to bring it back again :)

Something Creative Daily: I am not someone who plans well long-term. Almost everything I do is like an explosion: it's loud, happens all at once, and pretty destructive. I try to push and condense a learning curve into something that isn't feasible (at least if I want to take care of myself with things like ‘sleeping' and ‘eating well', etc. etc. the boring stuff) and then I beat myself up about not rising to the unrealistic challenge I created for myself. I wanted to push myself to spread ‘something creative' out into a daily task, hopefully starting the process of training myself to be more patient and long-term oriented.

I spontaneously lost hearing in my right ear in December of 2023. The long and short of it: it sucked. The long and not-as-short of it: it sucked ASS, actually.

The worst part wasn't even the hearing loss, it was the vertigo and almost complete loss of balance I had for a few months. I couldn't see or walk without the world twisting and warping for weeks. Somehow, I drove myself to work every day at the time. I remember my mindset being something like 'either I rot here on my bed extremely dizzy or I'm paid to rot and be extremely dizzy' and I clearly chose the latter. I also remember feeling a bit better up and moving versus being stuck in one place at a given time, like lying down and bed-rotting.

My right ear was tested to be essentially dead for a few months and I earned the diagnosis of sudden sensorineural hearing loss (SSNHL). When I was first going through the motions of accepting the loss of my hearing, I combed through Reddit threads of people also experiencing SSNHL. Sometimes reading the posts provided hope, but most times not. There is, however, a pretty universal description mine also fell into: it sounded like a broken radio both as I was losing my hearing AND as I continue to gain my hearing nowadays. At the time, the doctor told me that the 6 month mark was likely how it would be permanently. I'm happy to say that I fell into the 'unlikely' category here and my hearing somehow continues to get better, even almost three years later.

Though my ear was completely deaf for a while at the start, I experienced intense tinnitus. It was odd, my right ear being unable to hear and interpret the world, but it could hear/interpret the tinnitus.

I'll try to describe the tinnitus I experienced: two people running a mallet all up and down a xylophone and wind chimes while they're by the sea, waves crashing et al.

Also, for some reason, there's crickets.

Another thing with tinnitus is the inability to change its volume. Normally, having some background noise helps drown out the tinnitus, but that is (unfortunately) not something that works when your ear is dead.

If I find out how, I'll see if I can create and put in audio clips of what the tinnitus sounded like, what the different stages of me getting my hearing back sounded like, etc. It was all quite a process.

One of the last songs I heard before I lost my hearing was “Always Forever” by the Cults. I was taking a shower, it came up in my playlist, and when the next song came on: I suddenly felt like I had water in my ears and everything was muffled. The guitar solo at 1:39 was my favorite part of the song. It used to strike a bright and sharp feeling that I always used to get in my chest, specifically the top half of my heart. I haven't had that feeling from listening to a song since I lost my hearing. I have inklings of it though, so I still hold on to the hope that there will be a day when I'm able to hear and feel that again.

Another odd thing I noticed when I was half-deaf was the tie it has with physicality. When I chewed food, it was like the right side of my head was extremely dull and muted not just on the outside, but also on the inside. The crunch of food as we chew it isn't just the feeling of it between our teeth, it's also our ear's ability to hear it. Touching your ear is another example. When I was half-deaf, me touching my ear felt more like a half-numbness than it did an actual, viable feeling. We primarily hear ourselves touching our ear more than we actually feel it.

Odd things like that.