DAY 271

Good Evening my Corona friends and I hope everyone is healthy and enjoying the lockdown. I know it has only been three days since my last rant but we had a snow day today, so I find myself with a little extra time.  Not that we need a snow day when you spend the whole day in your pajamas watching Hallmark Christmas and cleaning out your closets, right now that just feels like groundhogs day, but I will take it. You know what really bugs me about these big storms, is the dang local TV stations and their nonstop coverage by reporters as we have to watch as each inch falls. They preempt all the morning programs so I missed Gayle, Anthony, and Tony this morning on CBS, to get the blow by blow of falling snow. I could just sit back and enjoy a second cup of coffee, instead of running around getting ready for work and catch up on the latest and greatest, but no only more news that yes we got a boatload of snow, and really don’t care what is like past 128, because no one is going anywhere. We did get all geared up to venture out around noon and take a trip to the post office, and it was wonderful as there were no lines today. It really is beautiful walking in a foot of fresh snow. It’s what happens later that can ruin it fast. Today it was going to take a while longer to get all dirty, as there were really no cars on the road, just a lot of snow blowers. Walking along the channel the tide was so high that there was a river between us and the Barking Crab, just another reminder that you can’t eat out today. I remarked to my roommate that when we moved here five years ago, one of the best things about snow days, other than we no longer had to shovel snow all day, but we could walk down the street to our favorite spot and sit at the bar and enjoy a leisurely lunch while chatting it up with all the other snowbound people enjoying the bonus day. Well, Covid changed all that and I am pretty sure not much was even open for takeout today. I remember at the beginning of this whole Pandemic my daughter asked me what my plan was for stocking up for a possible shutdown and I said I live right down the street from plenty of hotels and they are always open so no worries.  Boy was I wrong about that and darn good thing that trader Joe’s opened here last fall or we would be without a lot of the time. Well signing up for that subscription of food boxes was genius, thank you, Sarah, because Techie has become quite adept at cooking, just wish he was as good at the cleanup, but I will take it. Speaking of which, we are pretty sure we have started a trend in our building because there are about 5 Hello Fresh deliveries in the lobby when there used to be only two.  I was getting pretty tired of it and have pared it down, but I love it when techie says I am cooking tonight, so I can sit back and have a cocktail while I research air streams to be ready to make our escape, as soon as it is safe to hit the road.

Tonight I got to live stream Susan Rice who was part of the speaker series at Symphony Hall and like everything else was put on hold during this pandemic. Celia, one of my besties, introduced me to this speaker series a few years back when one of the ticket holders had to bow out and I took her place and stayed on for the renewal.  It was a few years back when I met up for the first one and I arrived a bit more dressed up than usual, I figured Symphony hall, only to be met by Celia in jeans, she said I should have mentioned no one dresses up.  Ok then, my kind of people definitely the NPR crowd, in their LL Bean gear carrying the NPR tote bags, you know what I am talking about, the Intelligentsia Cambridge types who have crossed the river for the speakers. We had been thoroughly enjoying these evenings as a chance to meet for dinner and catch up, as she is still out in the burbs, and I am just like all my friends that I used to get mad when they wouldn’t drive out to Suburbia on a Saturday night.  I only like to go to places I can walk to or take the “T” public transportation, yes have become a bit of a curmudgeon in my old age, I own it. Tonight I watched the live streaming from my couch and at least I have Techie to set it up on the big screen so as not to have to watch it on my IPad.  Well, I did enjoy listening and watching Ambassador Rice, I just couldn’t stop looking at her background and those annoying doors. She just wasn’t set up properly for Zoom, no one properly did a perfectly styled bookcase with just the right amount of fiction and nonfiction, photos, and treasured mementos in her bookcase. Just a piece of art and then those annoying doors and it wasn’t even centered. Jared on the other hand had it going on, a really nice brown tone on the wall and a perfectly styled bookcase/wall unit behind him. Since I am a curmudgeon I will add that I just don’t care for that look with those white pods in his ears, I see them every day on people live streaming and have to say it’s kind of Star Trekky. Of course, I was longing for the company of my friend Celia when we could have a nice dinner and a few glasses of chardonnay and then get to the Hall and squeeze in one more before the start.  It is always a good thing that it never lasted a bit more than an hour, as there were no potty breaks. Just not the same sitting here with my roomie because he just doesn’t enjoy a good glass of chardonnay and we can’t catch up on the latest gossip or talk about our grandchildren. Great news vaccines are here and we will be some of the early ones, age does have its’ privilege, and we will be out and about in no time. Please get the Chardonnay on Ice, as we sure have a lot of catching up to do, and Celia just had another new grandson, Neil. She got me beat by five.

Just saying……………