13 Hours.

[queerbychoice]

That's how long it took me from the time I heard until the time I finally processed it enough to be able to cry.

I think everybody on my entire friends list beat me to it.

Call me slow, I guess. My first reaction was a 12-hour-long panicked adrenaline rush of the kind that would have been great help if I were one of those scrambling to escape, but which didn't do me much good safely holed up in Sacramento.

But I've known for a long time I had overactive adrenaline glands. Even as weak a stimulant as a can of caffeinated soda is sufficient to make me feel horribly uncomfortably near to going into convulsions (which is why I learned quickly to only ever drink decaf); and the adrenaline included in a standard shot of novocaine is sufficient that it does send me into convulsions for half an hour, making it impossible to operate on me.

Convulsions are not pleasant. And ever since I heard the news, all day long, even though I haven't had a single drop of anything caffeinated, I feel wired and nervous and jumpy and shaky and tied in knots beyond any amount of caffeine that I've ever been stupid enough to drink.

P.S. Read this.

Comments

[embryomystic.livejournal.com]

That's about how long it took me.

Then I imagined the world ending, if only for one person. If that person was me.

My stomach turned to cement.

Being bombarded with the same piece of footage and people saying nothing at all doesn't help.

I've finally got an inkling of what it was like for my father's generation, living under the threat of nuclear war.

I hope we can resolve this quickly and with as few casualties as possible.