Respirator, part 2: Live-fire exercises
Jan. 10th, 2021 11:43 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
brin_bellway[cw: illness]
(edit: part 1)
---
While the base unit arrived a few days ago, the filters only just arrived today, so I didn't have much chance to practise using [the respirator in its final state] before work. There *is* definitely a learning curve.
* When I put it on before work (so, more time-sensitive than the previous occasions), I *felt* like this time there was a little bit of leakage at the top of my nose, yet it still passed the plug-the-exhalation-valve test. Nocebo?
* The straps were so tight they were giving me a headache. I'll have to experiment with different settings and see if I can find a strap length that's airtight without being painful.
* The filtered air is very dry. All the practice I did in spring at going seven waking hours at a time without water came in very handy during this four-hour shift. There's probably not a whole lot to be done about the throat in future, but I might at least be able to do some prophylactic lip balm.
* Most importantly, I need to practice attaching the filters and making sure I can properly click them into place, because one of them fucking *fell off mid-task*. There I am, abruptly essentially-maskless in the middle of a crowded restaurant in the year of our Lady Rona 2020 (no matter what the calendar says), trying *very* hard not to panic, a pair of customers (who just heard me break customer-service character by swearing) waiting for me to continue their order. I had to leave them there for a minute while I went in the back and fiddled with the filter, trying to click it back on. I ended up having to take everything off my head so I could see what I was doing, which also meant having to sit my glasses and uniform hat on the prep counter and then put them back on my face. Not thrilled about the surface contact there, but it seemed the best I could do on short notice.
---
Don't get me wrong, I'm still very happy with the purchase! Even on day 1 it beats cloth: [1 minute of masklessness + 239 minutes of P100] compares very favourably to [240 minutes of cloth] as I understand it, and I value clean air highly enough to consider it worth the dryness and headache. I just think that with a few more bugs worked out it can be even better.
---
I went to the convenience store after work to pick up a thing I had a store coupon for (a big enough discount to more than cancel out the convenience-store premium), and when I saw the clerk hastily pull her mask up upon my arrival I felt only abstract disapproval rather than personal offense. When I passed close to a pair of maskless teenagers on the sidewalk on my way home, I held my breath for *their* sake, not mine. When I opened my front door, I did not feel the usual mixture of anxiety and relief at the scent of home ("it's bad that I can smell it through the mask, but at least my sense of smell still works"): there was only the scent of plastic, now faint from over four hours to become accustomed to it.
---
(edit: part 3)
(edit: part 1)
---
While the base unit arrived a few days ago, the filters only just arrived today, so I didn't have much chance to practise using [the respirator in its final state] before work. There *is* definitely a learning curve.
* When I put it on before work (so, more time-sensitive than the previous occasions), I *felt* like this time there was a little bit of leakage at the top of my nose, yet it still passed the plug-the-exhalation-valve test. Nocebo?
* The straps were so tight they were giving me a headache. I'll have to experiment with different settings and see if I can find a strap length that's airtight without being painful.
* The filtered air is very dry. All the practice I did in spring at going seven waking hours at a time without water came in very handy during this four-hour shift. There's probably not a whole lot to be done about the throat in future, but I might at least be able to do some prophylactic lip balm.
* Most importantly, I need to practice attaching the filters and making sure I can properly click them into place, because one of them fucking *fell off mid-task*. There I am, abruptly essentially-maskless in the middle of a crowded restaurant in the year of our Lady Rona 2020 (no matter what the calendar says), trying *very* hard not to panic, a pair of customers (who just heard me break customer-service character by swearing) waiting for me to continue their order. I had to leave them there for a minute while I went in the back and fiddled with the filter, trying to click it back on. I ended up having to take everything off my head so I could see what I was doing, which also meant having to sit my glasses and uniform hat on the prep counter and then put them back on my face. Not thrilled about the surface contact there, but it seemed the best I could do on short notice.
---
Don't get me wrong, I'm still very happy with the purchase! Even on day 1 it beats cloth: [1 minute of masklessness + 239 minutes of P100] compares very favourably to [240 minutes of cloth] as I understand it, and I value clean air highly enough to consider it worth the dryness and headache. I just think that with a few more bugs worked out it can be even better.
---
I went to the convenience store after work to pick up a thing I had a store coupon for (a big enough discount to more than cancel out the convenience-store premium), and when I saw the clerk hastily pull her mask up upon my arrival I felt only abstract disapproval rather than personal offense. When I passed close to a pair of maskless teenagers on the sidewalk on my way home, I held my breath for *their* sake, not mine. When I opened my front door, I did not feel the usual mixture of anxiety and relief at the scent of home ("it's bad that I can smell it through the mask, but at least my sense of smell still works"): there was only the scent of plastic, now faint from over four hours to become accustomed to it.
---
(edit: part 3)
