Living in the Time of Corona

Hello everyone and how we all doing tonight?  Hope you are healthy and happy sheltering in place and safe at home. I know we should somehow cherish this opportunity to have this time but you really have to talk yourself into it every day. Most people who know me would say that I am a workaholic and often hard to shut it down, even at home. I work hard and play harder, so usually that would mean a trip somewhere with limited internet access to get in the groove. But I think it has been two weeks of working from home, which is pretty ridiculous when you’re a retailer. Imagine getting very excited on a live chat, it’s like a friend popped in to visit.  Today is Saturday and I honestly had no idea what day it was when I woke up. I was thrilled when I realized it was the weekend. Had to check my phone to see what the temperature was, another weird thing about our life changes, where as in the past I would open the door and feel the weather.  I decide it’s time to dust off the wheels and go for a nice bike ride. Well to be clear, Techie went and pulled the bike down from the wall in storage and pump up my tires to have my chariot ready for me.  I have to go grab my gear out of the secret closet, where we stash our toys and appropriate gear, to dig out my biking garb. Now even in the best of times, me in spandex, it just ain’t a pretty site. But I am willing to don the gear every year because I ride in the PMC, Pan Mass Challenge, a ride for cancer that raises a lot of $$$, more on that later.  Lo and behold the spandex clothes seem to be a bit snugger than usual and I am wondering if someone has been in my gear.  Of course I left off the spanx today because who really cares it’s about comfort not fashion.  My techie got a kick out of me when digging out my helmet, I found an unopened package of Coscto underwear. I was leaping for joy because I can’t find them anymore and they have been literally the best granny pants, EVER! have to celebrate these simple pleasures.  Anyway I am geared up and ready to ride and take off on my journey through the streets of Boston in my spandex. I ride about twenty minutes and realize I am freezing. This was a real buzz kill, so I do what every wife does, pulls over and calls her husband to bring some warmer gear.  I think I may have mentioned this guys is a saint. So now I may actually look a little frightening with all the artic clothing and flames helmet but I am good to go for a nice long ride.  I ride all over the city and go places I normally never would. Ok I did get a little lost, but so exhilarating to be on the road with so little traffic. I was calling out to people as I passed them and singing as loud as I could, definitely just as I may have been released from a loony bin.  People, you need to say hello and smile make some eye contact. Remember “we are all in this together” God I am beginning to hate that phrase, why don’t we just say it like it is this really F’n sucks.  Just so you all know some of friends have mentioned that I have been pretty good on the language which is not my usual style, but I have decided I don’t want my grandchildren to come across these ponderings some day in the future and think their Grandma was a potty mouth bitch, so keeping it clean.

So arrived home this afternoon after taking more than a few wrong turns and with  this no traffic thing, along with so much new construction has turned me upside down on my ride.  I got home and Techie was working all day so had to make his own lunch and I was famished. What do I do?  Sweet Greens or shake shack?   Both within spitting distance, alas went with the SG and dam if I didn’t order my usual Kale Caesar, but hold the Kale, they gave me Kale and you all know how I feel about the Kale. I will master the app someday.  Techie’s turn to do dinner tonight and totally lucked out Shake Shack wins. He always said he was a great cook and he needed was one appliance in the kitchen, his telephone.

Just sayin……………………

How are we all doing today?  I hope everyone is staying healthy and keeping their distance. Today was an absolute beautiful day in Boston today. The sun was shining and it was warm enough to shed your coat.  We did a fair amount of walking but had to keep coming in for those damn Zoom meetings.  The only Zoom I look forward to be my girlfriend happy hour and that is only a few times a week.  Tonight I was feeling a bit blue as this whole Shelter in place is starting to get to me and I may take it out on Techie.  I was thinking I couldn’t even write a short post tonight but then I was heading over to TJ’S aka Trader Joes for some lettuce and I ran into the only other elderly woman in my building outside dressed like she was pulling a major heist. She literally had a full scarf around her face, sunglasses, heavy coat and hat full disguise. I said what the hell are you doing and she was standing next to a car where her friend had the window down and they were having a conversation.  I was dying laughing of the ridiculousness but almost crying because that is what we have come to today.  On the other hand I was on my way out wearing flip flops, no jacket but some serious gloves, so what does that say?  I don’t want to touch anything, doorknobs, elevator buttons.etc.  So we are all going to be wearing some new uniforms.  Now I have become a big fan of uniforms in my old age, unlike my days of Catholic school uniforms where we all detested them but when you get older and don’t care it is great to have ago to…  Twilight Zone had nothing on today’s latest fashion.

So I get to TJ”s and for the first time there is a long line out the door, and if I knew how to do it I would be inserting a picture here right now, as my son Maxie says I should, but he wouldn’t pick up when I called so he could help me.  That will be a whole other story of why when you call your kids, they never pick up but if you text they respond right away, we are on to you.  I just wandered over to the small convenience store, keeping safe distance to get my lettuce.  Gourmet night tonight we had El Paso tacos right out of that yellow box kit and I don’t care what anyone says they are the absolute best. I used to make them every few weeks when my kids were younger and I thought I was Mrs. Cleaver for my cooking abilities.  Techie and I love them and haven’t had them in ages and I would highly recommend them as an easy meal.

Tonight I had my virtual happy hour and I wish you all could be there because it is pretty hilarious. Sandra is the techy in charge and tonight she said she wanted to do IPAD and half came in on IPad and half on computer, a real shit show, and my techie says it doesn’t matter, but fifteen minutes later we were all up on screen and a few drinks in but all very tired.  We generally say no talk about health issues because if you know people over 60 that conversation can go south pretty fast, but tonight they wanted to talk about Botox and Juvederm ( I need to investigate what this is) because everyone’s eyes were drooping, of course not from lack of sleep or stress but just because we are starting to droop.  Today the eyes and tomorrow the Boobs just bring back the Leisure suits and I am happy.

Sorry I have to sign off now it is late and Techie doesn’t have his steps in so while it is still warm and I am sober I am going out for a leisurely stroll.

Stay Safe,

Oh Ya I forget to mention that has anyone heard that poor Corona beer is suffering because people are &^%&^% to believe it came from a beer that’s almost as bad as calling it the China virus.

 Just sayin……………………….

Hello everyone and I hope we are all still doing our part to “shelter-in-place” and keep our distance. I hear it’s a bit different in the suburbs but here in the city it is a ghost town and I encounter very few people on our walks. They are still clearing the sidewalks when they see the elderly. Granted I am not complaining, but all this time I see myself as thirty hence the world does not. Have you ever walked by a big window and seen your reflection and said to yourself who is that “old lady”? I choose to ignore it and believe I am still thirty. One thing I have to get out of the way right off the bat is to apologize, not really, about any grammatical errors you may come across in my blog. I ran into an old colleague today on the street while walking and we chatted safe distance apart. She said I saw your blog and it all came back to me how I used to edit your writing when I worked for you. She said I just wanted to go in there and add the punctuation. For the record she declined my offer to be my editor so just bear with me.
So it occurred to me today that our world has definitely turned upside down and now the kids are the adults in the room. My kids are young adults with their own kids, but as I spend my day sharing memes, whatever the hell that means, or YouTube videos that are funny, and some totally inappropriate, so I am now the kid. Ok,while most are probably inappropriate, my kids are sending pictures and videos of my grandchildren. While I make a list of all the junk food I have eaten, I will get a new Kale recipe from my son-in-law. I know he is appalled by our pantry and know he is only being helpful, but you know where you can shove that kale recipe. His family was quarantined for the past 10 days,but today we heard it was negative. I still had to drop groceries last week I groceries on the front step. They gave me a short list of milk, fruit and veggies, but hey I am Grandma and I know better what we need in a lock down. I loaded that cart with all the basics to survive an Apocalypse- Cheetos, Doritos, captain crunch, cocoa puffs, brownies, cookie dough, nuttie buddies- as much as I could in a flash shopping spree. Later I got to Facetime as they were all diving into the stash and Charlie and Maisie said Thank You for the junk food. I guess the food was labeled right off the bat as junk so don’t count on it regular basis! I even saw the babysitter sitting there with a big smile, probably thinking yes finally someone who can deliver “normal” food. I can tell you in both my kids’ homes if you are ever going for an extended stay, bring your own supplies. Looking for a snack there may consist of some Chia seeds, rice cakes, popcorn that tastes like styrofoam and generally a lot of weird shit. My son no longer eats meat and that is fine, but occasionally if he knows where that chicken went to college or that the cow was only eating “organic grass” he may go for it. A while back my daughter and her now husband came to live with us after moving back from the west coast, back when we lived in a place with multiple bathrooms. We had to stash the good stuff, a.k.a. Peggy snacks. When they finally moved out we found ourselves a little less diligent about the recycling; you know how they fold every piece of cardboard and wax paper. They had the nerve to buy us a composter for Christmas one year, and boy that thing could smell. I said,”I don’t need one I have my own composter”. We lived in a wooded lot with a big deck from which I could just throw the food and make a nice compost pile. It was always a surprise to people that their dogs were willing to take the hit with the electric fence to get to my compost pile. Ok I am getting off point thinking of the “good old days”. That ship has sailed and now we are in the twilight zone. I am sure today Hugh would not be upset at all to see his mother-in-law squirting the Redi-whip right into his son’s mouth, hey we thought it was fun. I can’t wait to see those babies and I will have a can of Redi whip ready for each of those little mouths.
My grandson has a birthday soon and I sent him an early birthday present, a UPS truck. He is over the moon excited about it, and a good thing because it is apparent that it may be one of the only careers available to him. Let me just say there is nothing wrong with that career as we are really very dependent on this team and I do appreciate them.
Got to run as I smell dinner in the oven and I have to keep my Techie happy. Stay safe everyone and it will get worse before it gets better.
Just sayin…………………………………..

How is everyone doing today?  I hope we are all healthy and happy. I have had a really tough day today, I am seriously dragging butt, because I binged watched a show on Prime. The Incident at Kettering seriously weird and slightly scary Australian mystery and I just had to see it all the way through. I started at 1am and finished at 830am, of course sometimes I would nod off and then have to rewind but I did the whole series. Now my techie was sleeping, so I had on earphones with my eye pad, which was great but the battery kept dying. The charger was on the other side of the bed so I literally had to get on the couch with this short little charger and hang over the side so I could keep watching. It would charge up again a bit and then I jump back under the covers, this little routine went on for hours.  The good news is I had 0 cable news all day and I am really not feeling any withdrawals and I think I can do this for a day at a time.

We go for our long walks in the afternoon and today is was really eerily quiet as the weather wasn’t so great. I solved the problem of my hesitancy of really long periods because there are no restrooms that I can use, DEPENDS.  Usually with my walks around the city I know all the really nice bathrooms to stop in and my favorite is a Hotel is closed till May, so a real bummer but thankfully CVS is open and the Boomer aisle is loaded with all the product. Have you ever perused these Aisles, there is some weird shit on the shelves and I will snap a few pics next time.  This past week on my strolls I am always just surprised how many people walk around talking to themselves and of course they have those weird pods in their ears, or some kind of listening device. Well I don’t have any of that Hi-tech stuff but I found that if you stick your phone in your BRAFFICE and put it on speaker and works just perfectly. The good news is everyone around you gets to hear both sides of the conversation but considering the social distancing for now it can easily work.

I don’t know if anyone else has noticed but the People in Trader Joes have not been wearing their Hawaiian shirts so I guess they are going a bit lax on the dress code in the time of Corona. This is the only market that is close to me, so this boomer has to shop with the Millennials. I never really shopped there much before, but I do like that no matter what I buy my bill has always been under 40 bucks, which never happens at Whole foods. I especially love the box of mini ice cream cones and we definitely go through  box a night they are so small you have to eat at least 4, and I always say I am buying for the grandkids but now they have to watch us eat them.  I have to start dinner for my Techie so I can keep on his good side and earn brownie points with my Mom above and tonight there will be no happy hour because if I have one glass of wine I will fall right to sleep. I am not going to start another series tonight unless someone can recommend something better than a Zombie Apocalypse. Stay safe and feel free to overindulge you may never have this much time on your hands again.

Just sayin……………………………..

How is everyone doing today? Better than yesterday?  I decide to try a new routine this morning and limited by screen time on the cable news networks and as a result a lot less foul language and a bit less volume. I am trying to wean slowly and read the newspaper, I get a real newspaper, I like to turn the pages and besides I am a Boomer.  I found a couple of really ripe avocadoes in my fruit bowl so I decided I better use these up before I have to toss them. I decide to go with a millennial recipe and have an avocado toast and you know what? I am sticking with the peanut butter. My husband had his usual bran flakes, got to stay regular. So reading the paper I came across an article that says the biggest contributor to deaths in this country are poor diets, which lead to obesity, high blood pressure and diabetes.  This I am reading while dipping a fat chocolate chip cookie into my coffee, remember I like breakfast desserts.  While I am totally screwed because I check all the boxes, diet, wine and now CORONA what’s a girl to do when you in lockdown.  Anyway had a zoom meeting and that will be a whole other blog entry. I know I have mentioned I live in a large 1 room apartment but did I mention that I also work with my husband?  What were we thinking?  I am so very lucky because the guy could be called a saint and I know a lot of people are thinking that when I write about pestering him to help me with technology.

My next biggest decision was deciding should I shower before or after I go for a walk, well I chose the latter and now I am going to be late for girlfriend’s happy hour. I really wanted to get dolled up a bit tonight but now I am going to show up with wet hair. As long as the wine is chilled we will be ok and hope we can do a better job than the last one. Nothing is more hilarious than having several women get on a zoom and only one or two have any idea how to use it. Lower left is the unmute button, wait I can’t find it, which one has a picture? Everyone talking at once and of course for me am very spoiled because I have my own personal attendant. I want you all to know that I have been making meals every night now for a week and often lunch and feeding the help A.K.A my techie.  I was having a laugh to myself today when I was recalling my Mother being annoyed with me because I didn’t cook for my husband. She actually said to me one day I don’t know why he keeps you?  She was definitely of a different mindset but now I find myself in a position that I better feed him or he is going to cut off my support.  Mom if you are looking down you must be smiling.

Just saying……………………………

Well how we all doing? I am sure by now everyone has been sharing funny videos and memes up the Wazoo, and I hope it continues because we really need to laugh. I do have to say, my son has shared a few with his mother that he really shouldn’t have, and I wondering who raised him.  I am going to blame it on the Dad because those who know me well, know I would never tolerate it.  I am finding myself a little ill equipped on the technology side, and wish I had paid more attention when people were trying to get me to learn more on the computer. I was having a super fun time last night sharing dance videos with my grandson, and I was so impressed that I sent it to all my girlfriends so I could do the bragging thing about how he is so talented.  After seeing some of the nieces and nephews I knew something was up, and when I saw my son-in-law, the jig was up. the guy just doesn’t have those moves.  I mean he has many talents but those dance moves aren’t one of them. Of course when I asked what was happening, they all got a good chuckle and said we sent the app, well I didn’t see it! I decided to do a video myself without the app and I would post it but it would thoroughly humiliate me, so maybe later. . I think I mentioned yesterday that we live in a one- room loft, so right now I still have tech support just a quick shout away but I caught him wearing earphones when I really needed an answer right away. We are going to have to work on some signals, because I am not very patient.  I am going to have to set some type of schedule if I am going to survive this shelter in place business.

This is today’s schedule so far : up at 6am swear at the cable news for about 3 hours, Breakfast dessert first and then breakfast, Snack at 10am, bit of work, Snack at 10:45. Really trying to limit snacks to 45 minute intervals but it is very hard. I guess I was being a bit more of a pest than usual because my husband said to go away and write my blog.  I am going to go out now because it is snowing and I need to restock the wine before happy hour. I am going to so many virtual happy hours that it is hard to keep enough wine on hand, as those virtual friends sure drink a lot. Guys I just had an amazing experience at my little store where I buy my wine, their internet was down, so he couldn’t take payment.  He told me just pay the next time you are here.  Ok so he sees me a lot and he knows next time is sooner than later but still it was awesome.

Just sayin…………………………………….

Well here we are living in extraordinary time and might I say a bit frightful conditions.  So much has happened in the past week that I decide that I will begin documenting Living in the time of Corona, as a Boomer and as my kids keep telling us “target Demo” so stop going out. It has been exactly seven days when the world changed for us and a whole new way of living came to be and for who knows how long. There is a host of new jargon “sheltering in place” sounds kind of cozy, “social distancing” easy to achieve where I live just go out in a MAGA hat no problem, the seas part.  One of the things I want to get out of the way in my first edition of this blog is that I may offend some people and it is not my intention but I have never been known as being politically correct, so I apologize in advance, but not really. I have been married for decades and this togetherness thing is still very ok but now I am questioning my decision to downsize a few years ago and move from a big house with more than 1 bathroom to a loft, one big room and 1 bathroom. I really want to binge on TV all the time and my husband opts for music and reading. I can play nice for a while but I don’t know when that tipping point is going to hit. Luckily the weather has been cooperating and we have been taking long walks in a pretty much vacant city where the sidewalks are bare and when we are approaching people in the opposite direction, especially when they see that we are old ,they cross the street and it is a good idea but sure feels like we have the cooties.  I don’t know about anyone else but these eerily quiet streets with people wearing masks brings back memories of the twilight zone which we loved as kids but always spooked us and now we are living in the time of Corona, just keep thinking it’s an episode of Twilight Zone and we can change the channel.