Living in the Time of Corona

Hello everyone and anyone how are we all doing tonight?  I hope better than I am as I spent the whole day till this evening, till techie told me the truth that it was Wednesday.  I don’t know why but this really shook me up and I know we joke a lot about not knowing what day it is, but the fact I was so convinced it was Wednesday is freaking me out a bit, and wondering if some little worms have got inside my brain and tricking me.  I know we have all been having weird dreams, or so I have read it is common during the plague, but now I am getting really paranoid. I really should keep a dream journal, because I could probably start writing for Ozark and that show would look tame. I often wondered when watching some of these shows, what kind of demented minds think of this weird shit. Well problem solved, just put them in isolation, deny them Starbucks, buy unlimited vodka, and the mind goes to places at night you would have never thought possible. OK maybe I am making too much of it as it is only one day, that can’t be accounted for and maybe I slept through it.  What really happened is I wasn’t in my routine today, I actually left the house at 8am and was out of my morning coma before 9am.  The bigger issue in all of this is I was separated from my roommate for more than 8 hours today, didn’t take my daily walk and had take out for dinner. Really threw me off my game, and for anyone that knows me, I hate a schedule. I like to fly by the seat of my pants and make it up as I go along. The fact that we have been shut in for over a month, with limited in person contact is taking a major toll, and not just about the personal hygiene. I know I am not alone, for people my age, when I constantly stop in the middle of a sentence or thought, and ask what was I just saying?  My lover here is so nice about it all the time when I say I am losing it , he starts giving me a quiz trying to walk it back, but now I am questioning if he is tricking me.  But of course he is the closest thing to a saint so I know I am off base, or just plain crazy.  One big change that I have made is I am not watching cable news, not to say I am totally cold turkey, I still have The Dailey Show to keep me in the loop. Trying to keep up through reading only print, to keep up with the daily goings on in our new world order. I do read a real live newspaper in the morning, but then constantly look for updates on my devices all day long and clicking on different stories, often take you to another that I never would have found. Now I don’t know if this is a new or old, but I only read it today and it is about one of our favorite subjects during our lockdown, and that is toilet paper. I know there are a lot of theories of why people hoard the TP because it is something they can control when everything else is out of control. But the fact of the matter almost everyone is only using the toilet in their own place and because of all the extra usage we just never anticipated the need. A lot of people have family members that have moved back home and making all their daily deposits in that home.  I know from experience that I would time my walks around the city knowing where all the nice bathrooms where should they need arise, and now they are all shuttered, game changer.  Another thing there are different producers of toilet paper the nice fluffy Charmin, or the thin layer found in commercial spaces like airports. I found that it is not economical for those making the thin paper to really retool the line to change the paper. As it turns out TP is not a big margin, for the amount of bulk storage it takes up, in all these warehouses, so they never really got going in stockpiling the inventory. Apparently there are warehouses full of that low grade TP and it may be coming to a store near you soon but don’t worry it will be a bargain and just put it in the bathrooms your family members are using and they may cut the visit short. At least we can all breathe a sigh of relief because if all else fails, we can be sure that the federal stockpile will have tons of “shitty” toilet paper on hand. I on the other hand don’t want to brag, but a few years back while renovating our only bathroom, I convinced techie I needed this Japanese style toilet, complete with heated seat, against his better judgment because we were well  over budget. Well now I consider myself a visionary because when push comes to shove we don’t need any stinking paper.

 Just sayin……..

Hello everyone, and everyone take a sip from their drink, and then deep breathes, we are still living in the time of Corona and no end in sight. I see I am at day 25 and I started a week after the shutdown so that just means we are over a month into this nightmare and frankly no end in sight. I am actually amazed how quickly we are all adapting to this new normal, wearing our masks, 6 feet apart, no gatherings and sheltering in place.  I am just going to say it, and I don’t want to wear a mask and I am having nightmares of losing mine or leaving it, on a park bench and then getting a fine about it or even jail time. I think I may have mentioned that Techie and I may be some of the oldest people in our building, and now we are getting close to being some of the only people still living here. I think most of the Millennials have flown the coop and gone home to Momma for the duration.  Fine with me never a wait for the elevator, it is almost like it might be a private elevator right to our apartment. My roommate and I were discussing today, on our daily walk of at least 10,000-16,000 steps after all we are boomers and we have Fitbit, that it has been a month since the shelter in place took effect and what do we have to show for it?  First off I was going to learn a language and I have signed up and taken the introductory shot on babbel for Spanish probably over twenty times, haven’t gotten past that first shot.  Hablo espanol?  I wish I could answer in the affirmative but alas I am a lazy ass and just can’t seem to move on to the next lesson.  Read I was going to read at least a dozen novels, as generally I am a voracious reader, but I haven’t even finished one book. I just don’t get it, but I think I do better when I just don’t have time and then I squeeze a lot in to one day. I planned to write letters, even have some nice stationary, but just sitting at my desk.  Going to keep a journal and write some chronicles for my grandchildren but the first page is still blank.  I do have to share that when I first met my daughter’s outlaws, before they get married I was in their summer home in Maine, and being the insomniac I am reading through their journals in the bookcase. Her Mother –in-law kept composition notebooks on all four of her four sons and they were filled with their histories and pictures of their growing up. I have to say when I found them I was wowed and would have been easy to say oh well what else did she have to do, but she was just amazing, a full time job and raising four boys a lot on her own, as her husband travelled a lot, but did she have to be such a show off.  So there are those over achievers out there, just not me and even given this gift of time I still can’t get it done.  Does anyone remember when they first had a baby and the first time you may have been home and not working? I feel like I am living that same scenario today.  I get up very early maybe 3- 5 am, and then back to sleep at 6 ,to an almost coma on the coach till techie puts the coffee down in front of me, similar when he would have been on his way out to work. Most of your clothes had burp spots on your shoulders, now those same stains are all over, and you don’t give a damn. You go through the day feeding and changing diapers, and then all of a sudden its dinner time, and you don’t know where the day has gone. This is similar to what I am experiencing today but only I am the one burping, eating and changing my depends all day long.  I ordered this exercise ball, and techie blew it up for me but I have yet to even sit on it, I just stare at it across the room. I miss my old machine that I had to leave behind during the downsize, where I would go to basement every morning where I would do my sweating with the oldies in my underpants, not a good visual. As a matter of fact I was delivering groceries today to my husband’s elderly cousins  and they came to entrance of their condo one of them in her underpants, with a short jacket on and the other geared up to the max. One of them was taking casual living to a whole new meaning, shirt no pants. Starting tomorrow I am turning over a new leaf and have a list of tasks right here to start in the morning, NOT. I just want to say that I did have a visitor tonight, who texted me can you come outside right now and low and behold Donna and Steve were curbside delivering a handle of kettle one, and apparently someone out there is listening.  Still waiting on my masks… I can’t sign off without mentioning that today is April 15^th and seven years ago in this fair city we were shaken to the core with the Marathon bombing, I have changed my home page picture to depict Martin Richards Park that opened last summer to commemorate lives lost and to strive for Peace.  We are resilient, and this too shall pass and we will always be Boston Strong and America Strong.

Just sayin……..

Hello everyone and how are we all feeling tonight? I hope we are Covid free and all safe and sound in quarantine village.  Today was an almost glorious day after the howling winds and rain from yesterday, the calm after the storm instead of before, if you get my drift.  First let me say that little pregnancy scare was just that a little scare, and we are all good and I can continue on my nightly cocktail habit without any worries.  I must admit it was kind of fun for a little while to think that you may actually be expecting, does anyone remember those days?  I don’t want to make little of what people go through today, to get pregnant or poke a little fun at the planning but we can actually remember a time, when you may wait to see if the stick turns blue or pink and sit in panic. I have totally gone off the deep end as I am talking about a pregnancy scare because of a double yolker and I think I have crossed over into the twilight zone. I actually woke up this morning with a bit of morning sickness, but turns out it was a false alarm.  Once we knew that there wasn’t going to be any additions to our family we decided to take a nice long walk this morning. I must admit getting out of this one room apartment gets harder and harder every day.  We go out and sit on the bench and put on our outdoor shoes, start down the elevator or we need sunglasses, hat and Mask, check, check, just not that simple any longer. It really took us like 20 minutes to check all the boxes this morning and I am not sure who was the pokey one today me or Techie.  We walked over to my Techies boat today and it was just lovely that we had another place we could walk to and hang out for a bit.  This is where he is in his glory, and the biggest reason I got him to move to my room apartment five years ago, because he would be close to his beloved boat.  I guess it is a thing you just have to understand that they just love to sit on the boat doesn’t matter if it ever moves.  So you can understand my confusion a few years ago when he came home one night and said I sold the boat.  WHY??  I told him he better find another one, because come the summer he better have a place to go because he couldn’t park his ass here.  Well anyway a few years later of being boat less, he got the picture, and now he has another place to tinker and putter, after all he is MacGyver.  All boat owners know things are always going to break. It takes about 30 minutes to walk over and we picked up some lunch and had a nice picnic. I have to say it was really nice to be able to take a walk and have a place that you can take a pit stop. No worries I am a depends kind of girl, so take no chances on the longevity of those walks. Luckily the boat has a funny little head so we can have a bottle of water at lunch.  My friend Cindy called while we were hanging out, and said she was coming into the city to walk and did I want to do the distance with her, YES I sure did and that may have been the first non-zoom, Facebook girlfriend contact, in over a month, Hallelujah.  We met up close by and I had to tell Techie this is girl time, so please leave us alone.  We walked for more than a few hours around our beautiful city, safe distancing and just to walk next to a girlfriend while blabbing the whole time is a wonderful feeling.  We were not toasting cocktails on Zoom or Facetime but just enjoying the time of being next to another human that you haven’t been with every minute of every day for the past month.  It’s funny because we both had the same concerns as we were into the last hour of our walk ,what were we going to have for dinner, and really I was so thrilled that I wasn’t the only one who frets about that when the dinner bell gets closer.  As it turns out take out is not available at a lot of places on Tuesday so we were both going to have to make do with leftovers. I was pretty beat and actually just now I get  a text from Cindy, that we walked about 6 miles and the 4, I did earlier I earned a few extra nutty buddies.  Here’s the thing you know from yesterday’s story that I was wiped out of Vodka and Chardonnay and when I got home I was just too pooped to walk the 10 minutes to the Packy.  Well guess who is back in the lover category because he made the run.

Just sayin……

 Hello everyone and how are we all doing? I hope we are still healthy and staying put. First of all I just want to say that I’m in crisis right now as I have just emptied the last few drops from my Ketel One vodka, and no chardonnay in reserve. The weather was very bad today so did not venture out to restock, sure won’t let reserves get that low ever again. I just want you all to know that I have moved my techie back into Lover category because he offered to go out in the bad weather to replenish my stock but I declined.  Of course I was in the middle of cooking dinner so that may have been an influencer in keeping the chef happy. I think I may have mentioned that I have assumed the role my Mom always wanted me to have, and that was making sure my husband is well fed. I can do this as long as I have internet and all the help with navigating the Netflix, Amazon, HBO, ShowTime etc. I need not to freak out when I lose my episodes. I don’t know what is was like for everyone else today but we started getting warnings via phone calls and texts from early this morning ,that we most likely would lose power at some point. As if a plague isn’t enough we also have to add a bad storm to the mix? First thing you think about is better power up all our devices, where as in our old life it would have been fill the bathtubs with water because if we lose power we can’t flush, and yesterday was Easter. Can you imagine not having the ability to flush after all that cabbage and kielbasa?  Well thankfully we are city living now, and we don’t have to worry about the septic.  While making breakfast today for the help/techie I had what I would say is an amazing happenstance because I had two eggs in the same pan that were double yolkers. Two in the same pan what are the chances of that?  Well I assumed it could only mean good luck but then I looked it up and it said maybe the female in the house was pregnant, so Erica and Max you are going to have a baby brother or sister just about 33 years younger.  So I sat down to read the paper, while eating my fertility breakfast and what is on the front page, people are rushing to get their wills completed. OK this shit is really getting real, and my immediate thought is I don’t even know what the passwords are or where to find them?  How do I gingerly approach this conversation with my techie, I mean I have been on a need to know basis and now I need to know? Luckily for our children we downsized a few years ago and really got rid of a lot of stuff, some of which I wish had now, bread maker, fondue pot. Seriously we did them a big favor we did all the work so they wouldn’t have to and you are welcome. I also want to point out to my kids that when I jokingly said Dad and I we were spending your inheritance, I wasn’t joking.  Anyway the point is there is a run on getting this stuff done. It is more complicated by the fact that you need witnesses, to validate your will. There may be a lot of contested wills out there at some point. My friend Donna suggested that we should have them say now items, they want after we are gone. Of course she never read any of those articles that “your kids don’t want your stuff” and her basement is riddled like a serious hoarder, and believes they want it.  I definitely think they want those workbooks from K thru 8 and of course the essays from High school, not to mention all the art projects, not just her kids but she also has hers as well. I bet they are looking forward to taking them home with them someday.  They love to hang on to things even old cars, her  husband kept an old Volvo in their driveway for about 15 years because he just couldn’t part with it for sentimental reasons, and I think the neighbors held a wake for it when it finally got taken away.  I think I am going to send a note to my kids and just ask them what they would like to see in their corner when the time comes, just to see what they say. In fact I think it is a good idea that we all pick something pick that one thing that we would like to keep. I wonder if the answer today, would be different today than a few months ago. I know I am getting a bit mushy tonight but after all I just learned I am pregnant which could explain the nonstop eating, but the truth is there isn’t any one thing. I just want to be able to be with the people I love and hug and kiss them and even swear at them but I want to do it while standing next to them so I can get right up in their face. It is definitely going to be a very long nine months and hopefully we will be let out of jail before I get committed.

Just sayin……..

Hello everyone and how re we all doing?  Happy Easter to all those who celebrate today, and I know for sure this is not the way you thought you would be sporting your Easter bonnet  this holiday.  But hey this is our new reality so if we want to see our family, chances are we do a drive by wearing a masks, and waving at our kids as we throw those chocolate bunnies out the windows.  I did my kielbasa deliveries early this morning and have still yet to have a taste so maybe later this week, on the other hand all those cabbage delights have been completed. I took to my two wheels today and rode around the city, I needed a break from my roommate as he went to tinker on his boat. Let’s just say we are roommates today who are very cordial and I didn’t need any technical assistance so we had a good amount of social distancing. It sure was the strangest Easter I have ever celebrated and I am sure it was the same for everyone, unless you lived in bum$&% somewhere as your Pastor still wanted his flock to come to the Church. I will let that go because it is after all Easter, and as a friend once said sugar, fire and lightening you don’t need to say those curse words, so I am trying. I don’t know about everyone else but during this strange time we really long for the ways things used to be even if they haven’t been that way for a while. I think I may have mentioned that I had ten brothers and sisters, so yes we had a lot of people when celebrating these holidays and think about it, we probably all complained at one point or another about having to hang with the family.  But I am sure today given the choice we would all give anything to have some of those family compulsory holiday celebrations, back on our calendars without many complaints.  Easter was always a big deal at our house and my Mom served dinner in shifts, because along with all her kids came the outlaws and the grandchildren, and we were more of a Schitts Creek family as far as the Homestead. My family was almost always on the third shift because we came from further away than everyone and were usually late.  This of course is because my mother always wanted dinner served at Noon for any special occasion and mostly so she would be ready for round 2 at 230 for snacks before a full supper at 5, as every holiday was a marathon eating day. I can remember the first Easter bringing my roommate home for dinner, and my brother Mike was sitting next to him and said, to the last few pieces of ham on the platter. “Are you going to eat that?”  Let me back up by saying Mike was always there for the first shift, and then continued to sit through all shifts, while his mother waited on him.  The thing with techie ,is my brother had never met anyone Jewish before, and figured he had dibbs on that last bit of ham, but Roomie just said yes I am, and put all the rest on his plate.  Just for the record they became and remain the very best of friends.  I missed seeing everyone today, even those siblings that just run on and on and on, I could have sat through dinner and promise to do better next time. I don’t know about everyone else but I couldn’t stop thinking about all our Easter holidays in days past and longing for the good old days. We often used to do  pub crawl the night before, when everyone came back to town to visit and was so fun to celebrate with my nephews and nieces who were now old enough to join the in the adventure.  I can remember a time when my brother in law told his wife you better go check on your sister because I think she is sleeping while sitting on the toilet, after one of those crawls.  I am not the sister he was speaking about before you get any ideas, I told you I had five of them. The thing is that Easter Sunday we were all at Mom’s eating our Spiral ham, along with the creamy potatoes, kielbasa and pierogis and we and we were the happiest tribe at that point in time. Some of our clan has left this planet, but I just want to say when this is all over we are getting together and it won’t be for a wedding or a funeral but because we all want to eat some really good food in honor of Grandma, and I will learn that recipe for creamy potatoes. We know Mike has the capusta recipe down, and Kathy knows the polish ladies who make the pierogis and the underground kielbasa, so no excuses not for everyone to show up and it won’t be on Zoom. We just want to be transported back in time when things were normal and here are some pictures of some serene and happy shots of this beautiful city that I call home. You are all welcome to visit when the Corona clears.

Just sayin…….

Hello everyone and how we all doing?  I hope we are all happy and healthy during this time of lock up, because we should really call it like it is, jail. The only difference is we all have our own keys. So there are a lot of really good things coming out of this whole experience. I mean there are so many people out there that really want to help you through these trying times. I get so many emails every day from lawyers, accountants, marketing people that just want to help me navigate these unchartered waters of Covid-19.  This must be what happens whenever there is a lot of “free’” money on the line, but they sure come out of the woodwork. I wonder if this is what it’s like when you win millions of dollars in the lottery and everyone “wants to help” you navigate all that cash.  Well now they smell all the government aide in terms of PPP, EIDL, IUD, FICA, FUTA, BUTA, IPAD, and MAXI PAD whatever the latest program is to help small business get you out of this shitshow we are living in, and they are your friends to help you through it.  I never knew I had so many friends and it is good to know “That we are all in this Together” and only a slight fee will get us to the finish line. I mean I can’t really blame a guy for trying because that it is the real beauty of Capitalism, we have all these cottage industries starting up with masks, homemade hand sanitizer, meditation calls, and a lot more ingenious ideas that may be bring in a few bucks and hell we do have to figure this all out. What I think is just hilarious is how all these people that reach out do it on such a personal level, Peggy I have been thinking about you and your family but dam if I know who they are, and it is probably better that way. What I am most excited about is how nice people are being to one another, even in the limited interactions we have with another human being, in person besides my roommate, The checkout guy at Trader Joes that greeted me the other day and said Ma’am did you find everything you needed?  I just get a chill when someone calls me Ma’am because you know I still think I am under thirty. I can still recall the first time someone called me Ma’am, may have been in the waiting room at the car dealership waiting for service. Young man came over and said Ma’am your car is ready. I really didn’t even look up till I realized I was the only woman sitting there. I was in shock. Are you talking to me?   Well water under the bridge, I can answer to Ma’am if that is what it takes to have some real face to face human interaction. Accepting holding the door for you, moving six feet away when they see you coming, and all the things that warm your heart.  Even if on every trip to the CVS and you ask about the hand sanitizer and they heartily apologize that don’t have any, they really look sad. I wonder how many times a day they have to say no to people about hand sanitizer, how did we get here? I guess there has been a real shortage of flour and it is right behind toilet paper and hand sanitizer on the top of everyone’s Christmas list.  I wonder if people have been dusting off all those bread makers and Panini makers that they got for a wedding or house warming present. I bet there are some people who followed Marie Kondo’s advice and got rid of all their unused stuff. That Instapot would sure come in handy today. I guess a lot of people have figured it out, you don’t actually need a bread maker to make the bread, but you do knead flour. I had been on the lookout, because so many people were asking about it, so I felt like I found the golden ticket yesterday and snagged two bags in the market. I was texting my daughter because I was so proud of my find, and then at checkout I turn around and see a mountain of flour at the end cap.  Anyway gave me a good laugh, thinking I had been so stealth and just goes to show that just keep looking the hand sanitizer will show up one of these days.

Just sayin…..