Tag: Covid-19

15,300. That was Sunday’s new virus count.

Today, 12,624. So, yeah, this is going GREAT! Florida is I think #4 in the world now? in new COVID-19 cases? We are the third most populated state in the nation but we are running away with this virus, due to a high population of Fox-watching assholes and a truly worthless governor.

And that’s the reality we have to live with, somehow. Or die trying.

I’ve found that the thing that really is keeping me grounded is just 30 minutes of outdoor exercise a day. It’s hot AF here, heat index of 105 by midday, so I go early when it’s just hideously humid.

Usually it’s a walk to the “top” of the gently rising street near my neighborhood and back; it’s about 15 minutes up and back. I definitely feel the difference in my energy and mindset for the rest of the day. If I skip it, I’m much more miserable.

Over the last four months of working from home I shifted my morning alarm from 5:30 to 6, and sometimes 6:30. I’m turning it back to 5:30 tonight, so I can get out and walk at 7, after coffee and critter care, and shower and dress and be on my work laptop by 8.

Because the place where I work (not my employer, I’m a contractor) has slowed the “Return to the OFFICE!” plan. They’d done a sort of soft reopen with a handful of people on my floor. Within a few weeks they had to backtrack.

One of the first to return was exposed to the virus outside work and reported it; doesn’t have it at the moment, but is home and isolating again. So they sent everybody else home and deep cleaned the entire floor again, and let the first pioneers come back.

Phase II of the return to work plan with a few more volunteers is “on hold.” I was not a volunteer:

1) I’m not an employee so fuck that noise; and

2) I’m over 60 and a brain aneurysm survivor, so fuck that noise twice.

I’ll go back when they tell me I must, but they really are being very cautious. I expect to be working from home through the next three months, if I manage to stay employed. The financial damage of this is something nobody really wants to talk about yet, but as a contractor, I know I’ll be the first overboard if the budget gets bad and heads are cut.

This weekend sucked, as all weekends suck now, but I did follow up on my incredibly sweaty walk by purging crap and rearranging stuff, and putting stuff in my car to take to Goodwill at some point this week. I rearranged my small eating area in my kitchen, and flipped the bookcase of cookbooks and miscellany with the tiny cheap table and chairs. It opened up that space so much, I can’t believe I took this long to do it.

Behold! Floor Space!

I can’t believe how just switching a tiny table and chairs and a bookcase opened up the space so much. That tiny kitchen table is really just overflow seating and can sit on standby along the wall. I don’t use it myself, I prefer to sit in the larger dining area off the living room. I have parked children in the kitchen very infrequently, so tucking it out of the way and dragging it out when needed will work just fine. I hope children get to sit here again.

And it’s so weird to actually wonder when that could happen again.

So, tomorrow is Monday again. Month FOUR of this shitshow. It’s exhausting and depressing and endless, and Florida is in freefall with no leadership.

2020 is just exhausting.

In every possible way.

Today I gave myself the day off; I did a little necessary housework and that is all. Tomorrow I need to get out in the world and get gas and put air in my tires, and go to Publix (grocery store). My poor car has barely moved since March. I’m working from home and will be for at least the rest of the month. The grocery store is less than two miles away, and I really haven’t gone anywhere else.

Coronavirus cases are spiking in Florida; every day the number of new infections is worse than the day before. We broke the 2,500 new cases in a single day mark yesterday; a new high. But screw it, this is so boring! The governor says it’s fine, let’s open everything! Bars, gyms, movie theaters – go for it! Mask wearing has decreased as well, right when it’s even more important that we do what we can to protect ourselves and each other.

I live in a neighborhood with a lot of seniors, older than I am, in their 70s and 80s, and I am just shaking my head at their total disregard for their own safety – no masks, little social distancing with a lot of them. Not everyone – one man I don’t even know alerted me that Publix had both boxes of disposable masks and plenty of hand sanitizer on hand when he’d been there earlier. I said, “Now if we could just get people to use them.” and he agreed.

Our Governor DeShithead has declared that schools will reopen in August, because – and I’m not joking he really did say this – it’ll be safe because kids don’t get the virus!

Because that’s what schools are, you know, buildings full of just kids roaming around with no adults present, so no risk! And kids can’t get it [yes they can] and certainly can’t get it and bring it home to their parents and grandparents, right?

Local school districts greeted this statement from the governor with caution, as in “Yeah, we’re still evaluating what we’re going to do.” At the rate new cases are climbing, I’m thinking this will all sort itself out by mid-July, and not in a good way.

Meanwhile, I’ve decided that I really need to get a couple of things done before shit gets even worse. I have a haircut appointment for Monday evening. I mentioned before that the salon I go to has a solid plan in place and is taking precautions, and I feel reasonably comfortable with going in for another quick, very short cut.

The first time Maria ever cut my hair was in March, days before everything shut down. She had snipped away so quickly I had no idea what I’d end up with. It turned out to be the best haircut EVER, and it was such a perfectly balanced cut it grew in very gracefully. It has taken over three months to finally look unkempt. Fingers crossed that she can recreate that perfection; it’ll get me through the rest of the summer if necessary.

I’m semi-committed to going gray, but honestly, that’ll depend on how I feel about it when much of the remaining brown is chopped off on Monday. If it looks as I hope it will, bright and silvery, I’ll happily embrace the gray. But if it looks dull and steely gray and I look all faded and tired, I’ll slap color on it without a second thought, and try again next year. I am fine with gray if it’s a pretty, bright, silver-gray. If it looks like that dull, battleship gray, well, that’s why we have hair color.

I’ve also made an appointment for an eye exam; again, they’re taking all the precautions, and I really can’t put this off any longer. My glasses are on the brink of falling apart, and my prescription is way out of date, and I stare at computer screens all day. I am definitely feeling the eye strain.

Arlo the new baby puppy is the smartest little bugger ever, and he’s definitely not going to stay a little bugger. He went for a shot the other day: 8.5 weeks old, 13.5 lbs. The vet said part Catahoula was a good guess, but his face doesn’t have his grownup shape yet. I reminded my daughter that Great Danes also come in that dark merle coloration.

Whatever he is, he’s a handsome little devil and sweet as they come, and has been a breeze to train – he’s mastered sit, is learning down, and taught himself to ring the bell at the back door when he needs to go out. 8.5 weeks old. He’s a baby genius.

The rain finally stopped long enough for me to meet him the other evening, and holy crap, I’m so glad I adopted adult dogs (and cats). He’s utterly precious, but utterly exhausting.

I had offered my too small, cheap old desk to my daughter because with everybody working and schooling from home, they needed all the work space they could get, and it finally stopped raining long enough for them to come collect it. My son-in-law brought Arlo, and I held him on his leash while they got the desk. It took about five minutes for them to pick it up, carry it down, and load it into my daughter’s SUV.

In that five minutes, Arlo and I had done at least a dozen, “No, that’s not food” “What’s in your mouth?” “Drop it!” samplings of leaves and sticks, considered chasing a squirrel (the leash was a deterrent) and he generally wore me out. He was in constant motion and needs constant watching, like a hyperactive toddler. I was very glad to hand his leash back to his daddy. He’s utterly adorable and will be a handsome and very intelligent dog, but holy shit, I’m too old for a puppy.

A long overdue update…which is also quite long.

I’ve been working from home during this weird, weird time, so I haven’t had the “quarantine experience” I’m reading about online. There’s no sourdough starter in my kitchen, no Netflix binges, no creative mask-making. Just work, walking, a bit of yoga now and then, lots of housework, and too much online shopping. So, normal life, now with a mask and a whole lotta hand washing.

I’m depressed, I hate my job, it’s endless and aggravating. I’m grateful to have a job, but I hate my job. I have damn little joy in my life these days. I need a new project or three, and to make time for my mental health. So, maybe knitting is the answer.

Not knitting that will “challenge” me, I have my hated day job for challenges. I need soothing. I need a yarn and pattern that will be there for me after work, and say, “There, there, it’s all okay, feel how soft and pretty?”

I’m a proudly lazy knitter. I’ve been knitting a very long time, and while I can do short rows and lace and all manner of fancy shit, I just don’t like it. If I can’t watch TV and sip a glass of something while I’m doing it, it’s not going to get done, period. So last week I had the urge to cast on a simple sweater, and started searching patterns for something suitably mindless that would go nicely with chardonnay and Schitt’s Creek.

Oh, and if the pattern is free, all the better. I came up with this: My Go To Knit Cardigan. It appears to meet my standard of flat out mindless simplicity, but would actually be useful next winter, assuming we’re not all dead by then. I’m not using the yarn in the pattern, but my fave Florida yarn, Universal Cotton Supreme. I’ve ordered it in Ocean, which seems to be the shade of blue I’m obsessed with this year. I love this yarn, it’s light and soft and knits like a dream, and I’m hoping it will revive my love of knitting.

The pillow cover for the office? I had to rip it after I was about 8 inches in, when I discovered I didn’t have nearly enough yarn for it. Apparently my yarn stash is way smaller than I remember, which is strange. I didn’t have anything suitable for my mindless therapy sweater, obviously, and other than yarn earmarked for yet unfinished afghans, I really don’t have that much. I don’t even know what yarns the cool knitters are loving right now, I’ve been out of it for years.

But that yarn is all I’m buying for the next 30 days (other than groceries and pet stuff, obviously.) I’m done shopped out for now. I’ve finished the Disneyfication of my home office; final photos to follow, after the Etsy prints are framed and hung; this room makes me happy.

I’m watching in despair the “reopening” of everything in Florida when THIS ISN’T ANYWHERE NEAR OVER! This is insane.

Nevermind a “second wave” in the fall; we are never going to get out of the first wave. The place where I work (not my employer, which is proudly on record as not giving a flea’s fart about its employees) is being very cautious about all of this. I’ll be working from home at least into mid-June, and possibly beyond if cases spike as they may, two weeks after this mind-boggling holiday weekend stupidity. Even when we do go back, we’ll have to follow so many rules for social distancing it will be like commuting 20 minutes to sit in isolation there, and I just don’t see the point. But they’re continuing to pay me, so I’m grateful.

Our Governor DeShithead (R: UpTrump’sAss) is opening up summer day camps and recreation and sports teams without restrictions – no rules! Have at it, Florida! The dumbshit actually said it’s fine because kids don’t get this, which is so completely untrue – maybe it rarely puts them in the hospital, but they are NOT immune.

Which has put my daughter and her husband in an awkward situation – the dance studio has reopened, but isn’t following the rules it set for itself in an email sent to parents: no masks, no social distancing, and dance is one of those heavy breathing activities that is high risk. My daughter observed a large class and said Hell No to that. They’ve had to tell my granddaughter that she’s not going back yet; they promised to revisit this June 1st and see how cases are trending.

They’ve promised my granddaughter she can do swim team instead. There’s a junior team thing at the high school that is well run, entirely outdoors, and is taking this seriously. We aren’t crazy paranoid about this; just taking reasonable precautions.

OTOH, our hair salon is doing a great job with reopening. They put out a list of rules that was quite impressive: everyone must wear a mask, you can only bring your car keys, phone, and method of payment into the salon; only the client can come in, no friends or kids; you must wait in your car until called and told to come in; you must wash your hands when you come in; no unnecessary chatter; and – this is the one that told me they’ve really thought this through – no blowouts or blowdrying for the time being. That one took me a second, but they’re being extra careful about not spraying any airborne particles. I’m still going to give it two weeks and see how things are, but I’d feel pretty safe going in for a quick cut under those terms.

I was very lucky to have had an excellent and very short cut back in March, just a few days before things started shutting down. I didn’t plan it, it just worked out that way. My hair has looked quite good until the last week or so, when things started to fall apart. (I did give my bangs a quick trim a couple of weeks ago, just to get them out of my glasses.)

And damn, I’m gray! I am eager to get another very short cut, which will get rid of most of the brown. I’ll decide then if I’m cool with the Jamie Lee Curtis look. I think I’m going to go with it.

I am also ready to do whatever I have to to get an eye exam and new glasses, up to and including holding my breath. My current glasses have never been very good and are now starting to fall apart; the finish is flaking off the frames and they’re too loose, not to mention that my prescription is way out of date. Again, I’ll wait two weeks to see what happens before I make any appointments.

Sophie’s still not doing so great, mostly. Her poop is still liquid despite two weeks plus of the steriod, but she’s comfortable and eating well and ::shrugs::.

Gidget is most excellent. Ellie is Ellie. A tropical wave is coming and it’s going to rain like hell here starting tonight and into tomorrow, but then, one day is pretty much like the other now, isn’t it?

I hope the new yarn arrives soon.

Dispatch from Pandemic Valley

It’s been weeks since I’ve spent any time with Delaney, and far too long since I’ve even seen my NC granddaughters. God knows when I’ll get back up there at this rate. I do check in with my son and everybody’s fine, they’re doing a lot of socially distanced hiking, and he’s fallen down the sourdough rabbit hole.

He was already a bread maker as well as a brewer, so it was somewhat inevitable that he’d have to study the science of sourdough and make his own starter and start experimenting with it. He taught me the word “levain,” which I’d never heard before.

Delaney, meanwhile, is showing some real talent as a makeup artist. Not an eye shadow and lipstick makeup artist, though she loves that too; nope, the girl has a real gift for special effects makeup. I get texts of images like this:

I think Halloween is going to be quite something this year.

She has grown inches and gained muscle during this time away from school, and looks 9 going on 10 instead of 8. She’s still doing online dance classes, but she’s had more time to just hang out with neighbor kids. This was deemed safe after confirming that their parents have been isolated as long and everybody is staying safe and even shops at the same Publix, so the odds of exposure to the virus are equally minimal.

Delaney got sucked into the world of dance at 3 when her mom enrolled her in a tiny tot class to wear her hyper little ass out. She had real talent, and progressed rapidly into team dancing and competitions.

Before this spring, she really hasn’t had much down time to just hang out and ride bikes with friends; dance at her level is truly an all-consuming passion. She’s still dancing, but she’s not spending hours a day rehearsing for competition this year. She’s had a chance to try new things, like drawing and creating gruesome makeup effects, and yesterday the same neighbor kids invited her to go fishing at the neighborhood lake. She caught her first fish!

When you take a dancer fishing….(yes, she is practically all legs.)

She wants her own fishing rod now.

So, when I bitch and moan about how awful everything is, and it IS awful, there are also unexpected small joys. I’ll take whatever I can get.

Settling in for the long haul.

So, Florida schools will not be reopening this year. Not surprising and also wise, and it’s nice that our dimwitted Trump-ass-kissing governor is not entirely up Trump’s ass to the point that his ears are submerged. He can be backed into a corner and forced to do the right thing if enough people yell at him. Yay.

I don’t have kids in school (duh) but I do work in a place that has lots of young parents, so I suspected we’ll be working from home for May, too, at least until the school year would have ended. Who the hell knows anymore?

I’ve been gradually making improvements to my home office. I now have a rug. This rug was a deal, for real. I paid, like, $35 for it, and it’s now unavailable from that seller and is only available for $88.

Seriously, it’s worth $35. It’s basically a mat, not a rug, but it works for me because my desk chair tended to roll too easily on my slick floors and I feared that I’d sit down one day and the chair would squirt out from under me and I’d bust my ass. It’s hard to tell in this picture, but the cheap rug and the equally cheap futon cover have the same muted aqua-ish color, and the two Disney prints over the couch pick up very close shades of aqua here and there, and it looks like I actually planned this. I did not plan this, but I’m delighted by the happy accident of a non-plan coming together.

I need a few more minor things to make this fully functional. I have had two dead electrical outlets on the opposite wall from the desk for, OMG, years. This was way down on my hierarchy of needs, but now that I’m going to be sitting in this space for at least another month I really need to get the whole room working. I will move the printer across the room to the currently “dead wall,” add better lighting, etc. But all in all, I am very, very lucky and I know it.

My office mates are sort of adjusting. You’d think that after a month of this they’d be used to this new routine, but they’re not. Sure, they look all relaxed here, but the reality is if I get up to get a drink or go pee they all have to follow me to see where I’m going, and it’s utterly exhausting for them. They can’t relax until the work day is over, dinner has been served, and they can compete for space next to me on the living room couch. That is normal. Mommy home all day on the computer is NOT normal.

None of this is normal. Even the animals know it.

I’ll update more this weekend, I swear.

I’m still working from home, and I’m grateful for the paycheck, (and hey, isn’t it awesome how the US ties our health care to employment, so we just threw 10 million people out of work and also off health insurance during a pandemic?)

As I’ve mentioned, I’m a contractor and have been for years, and normally it’s fine, but this week two things happened: I participated in a conference call with the company where I work (not my employer) and heard what they’re doing for their employees to help them out, and I got an email from my own employer.

The contrast was, um, striking. The employees are getting cash, extra paid time off, flexible schedules where possible. Someone asked if the company would do anything for the many, many contractors who work alongside the employees, and the answer was, “We’re trying to keep them working.” In other words, nope.

My own employer, source of my paycheck and health insurance, emailed us to say that they’re not doing anything extra for us, but hey, if our contracted positions go away we can always apply for unemployment, and good luck with health insurance. So, yeah, that was this week.

By yesterday I really could feel my nerves fraying; I think we’re all just starting to wrap our minds around the fact that the normal we knew before is never going to come back in quite the same way. We’ll get through it, most of us, but we’ll never be the same.

A friend shared a wonderful, darkly hilarious and profane essay by Chuck Wendig on Facebook. I’ve shared the link to it below; go read it. The entire essay resonated with me, but this part in particular:

” You cannot meet abnormality with increased normalcy. It just doesn’t work. There’s no countermanding it that way. We’re told we can be more productive, that we’re all work-from-home now, but lemme tell you: this isn’t your average way to work-from-home. This isn’t how to accelerate productivity. It’s like being told to work-from-home during a locust plague and a forest fire.“

Read the entire excellent essay here.

Adjusting to the Abnormal.

Arrgh. I haven’t updated in almost a week. It’s been a period of adjustment.

Another work-from-home week is in the bag, and it’s almost starting to feel…normal-ish. I’m getting into the routine of conference calls and dog walks and emails and another dog walk, and stuff is getting done, mostly.

I’m horrified and paralyzed by what is coming. Florida is going to be the next epicenter of this pandemic, partly because our governor is a Trump Worshipping Dipshit who lives in fear of pissing off his Orange Overlord. So yeah, it’s all a fucking disaster, it’s terrifying, but all we can do to stay sane is follow the advice from the CDC and smart people, and try to survive.

Disney is closed for the foreseeable future. This is personally heartbreaking, this has never happened before (like so many things we’re living through) but the economic effect on THOUSANDS AND THOUSANDS of residents of Central Florida who were either directly or indirectly working for the Mouse is almost impossible to imagine.

So we’re all crazy, all over the world, but unexpected things are happening too, as we try to find our way through this.

Check it out: I built myself a desk chair! It had been sitting in its box since I ordered it in February as part of the office makeover. I admit I was not looking forward to assembling it, but after week one of working from home, I had a sore neck and knew something had to be done, so yesterday I faced the assembly challenge.

It was a breeze, and I needn’t have feared it. The assembly was really easy and it is comfortable, with decent lower back support. The casters are smooth and solid, and the pneumatic seat adjustment is better than my chair at the office. This counts as my major accomplishment of the week.

But that was nothing. My daughter dragged out the old and barely used sewing machine I gave her at least a decade ago, and she is teaching herself to sew clothing. Without a pattern. This is like witchcraft to me; I could barely operate the damn machine without injuring myself and never could sew a straight seam, and found the whole sewing business incredibly frustrating. So the machine sat in my closet until I gave it to her, when it sat in her closet, because she didn’t have time to mess with it. Now she’s making clothing without a pattern, guided by a sewing blog.

Actual, wearable clothing, created without a pattern. Witchcraft, I tell you.

I’ve been crocheting granny squares again, and then got a wild hair and decided that what the futon in the office really needs is piles of smooshy handknit throw pillows.

The pillows there are from IKEA, and while they’re cute enough, they’re kinda blah. I don’t want to spend money on Disney-themed pillow covers right now, but I do have a fairly substantial stash of yarns leftover from other projects, and I can re-cover those IKEA pillows with something less bland and mass-produced. I’ve dug out some leftover Cascade Sierra cotton. I think the first one will be neutral cream, but in double seed stitch so it’ll be all texture-y, and it’s a mindless thing I can do at the end of the work day.

I did order a rectangular pillow form from Amazon when I ordered more of my weirdly-sized AC filters today, because my nice new chair would be even nicer with a cute pillow for my lower back, because the days are long and Grandma’s back isn’t getting any younger.

So I’m knitting, my daughter is sewing, and my granddaughter got a similar wild hair and decided to teach herself to draw Manga-style cartoon characters. As with everything this child decides to try, it turns out that she’s quite good at it, and her mom’s going to order her a sketchbook and some real pencils so she can learn shading. (She’s using a #2 pencil and a lined spiral notebook right now.) Her dance studio is sharing lessons on Zoom and YouTube, so she’s been able to dance a bit. Online school starts next week.

So we’re practically a freakin’ Jane Austen novel here in Pandemic Valley, with our crafty-ness and artsy-ness and dancing and educational activities; all we need is a lovely country house and invitations to socially distanced garden parties, where we will nod at one another from six feet away, and sip punch while wearing gloves.

Even the dogs are benefitting from this enforced confinement. Gidget has decided she likes people just fine as long as they maintain proper Social Distancing. She’s much braver, and even talked shit with my neighbor’s asshole Chihuahua. He always does that “lunge and bark fiercely” thing when he sees my dogs, to the embarrassment of his mother. Gidget used to hide behind me, but she now runs toward him and barks sternly, then prances into the house for a treat and a “Brave Girl!”

(Although this newfound courage still applies mostly inside the neighborhood. I tried taking her for a walk around the block again, she spotted two ladies and a dog coming from the other direction and she turned around and headed home. The world outside the four streets of our condo community is still a Nope.)

Cosmo, my daughter’s Frenchie, is going on so many walks around the neighborhood he’s finally learning leash manners. See? bright spots!

Tomorrow I’m going to hit Publix as soon as it opens, with a list and a plan. I’m going to be working from home until mid-April at the least, and the company is preparing for this to be a long slog. I’ve been eating somewhat decently, but rather randomly, and it’s been pretty carb-heavy.

I’m going to go through my recipes and improve my diet: more fruit and vegetables, more salads. Publix has done a great job of keeping the produce department stocked in the last week or so. I’m going to become like one of those bullet journal YouTube chicks who has all the meals written down – in my case, it’s so I remember what I bought and why I bought it. I’m going to try really hard not to waste anything, so meals will be simple, and as fresh as possible. I’m craving berries, salads, and iced coffee.

This weekend I’ll check in with the Asheville contingent to find out how they’re coping. I know they’ve been hiking a lot.

So we’re coping, creating, trying to make the best of all of this, but damn, I miss normal. I wish I could feel confident we’ll ever have normal again.

The First Weekend in Captivity.

My downstairs neighbor was sitting outside again, alone, when she called to me. Her company had gone home, and she was visibly more relaxed and pleasant. So I’m going to chalk up her weird behavior to the tension of house guests that overstayed their welcome and were on her last nerve, and forgive and forget.

The work laptop and the Elderly iMac (circa 2011) traded places, and I had my desk back for the weekend. I’ll swap them again in the morning, but it’s important to me to have MY STUFF in its normal place during my personal time. When this is over, assuming there is an “over,” and assuming I still have a job at the other end, all things I cannot count on at the moment, I’m buying myself a new, bigger, better iMac. I have been saving toward one, but under the circumstances I think I’d better hold onto that cash.

I cleaned the house like a madwoman, including deep cleaning Ellie’s bathroom. A large cat with hairy paws tracks litter everywhere, and it’s gross.

Before the virus hit the fan, so to speak, I had started turning my spare room/”office”/general crap catcher into a Disney-themed home office, and finally hung the Disney themed art I’d collected at various festivals.

Snow White is a digital image I got for being a passholder, or credit card holder, or something. The Walt Disney quote actually came from Amazon, which is a surprising resource for cool Disney art.
I bought this print at this year’s Epcot Festival of the Arts. This artist also has a really cool print of Walt and Steamboat Willy. I covet it, but I’m not buying art at the moment.

At the time I had planned to create a Disney blog as well, but that’s on hold.

And we had confirmation that the runDisney Star Wars Weekend has been canceled. Not postponed, not “to be rescheduled TBD,” but nope, it’s not going to happen in 2020, and we’re giving everyone their registration fees back.

That’s both disappointing to me personally, because I was excited about that 5k, but an alarming sign of how long we may be living like this. Although Disney World is officially closed through the end of March, they went ahead and sent the college program kids home when the parks closed, and now the cancellation of a major event in mid-April is a clue that they don’t anticipate reopening anytime soon.

It’s the uncertainty of everything that is the hardest to deal with. I have put the balcony project on hold for the time being. I can’t be sure how long I’ll have a paycheck, so yeah, that nasty old carpet can just stay there for now. If I do get laid off, I may tackle it myself. The idea of ripping up something I hate feels really satisfying and would be a great stress reliever.

In the meantime, while I wait to see what the future will bring, I’m going to organize my photos and plan my Disney blog, because this will be over someday.

I couldn’t find a taker for the old futon, so yeah, I have an office couch.

It’s hard to see the posters over the couch, sorry about the glare, but they were actually quite cheap and cool and from Amazon.

I’m Old. How old are you? I’m old enough to remember Eastern Airlines. And the coordinating Delta poster from 1971? How could I resist?

I’m on a no frivolous spending program for the foreseeable future, but I foresee some classy Disney themed throw pillows replacing the existing ones from Ikea. I think this one and this one would work, and I can see myself knitting a few pillow covers to mix with the Disney-themed pillows.

So, I have some plans to cope with this weird new world. Tomorrow, back to back to back conference calls start at 8:30 a.m., and we’ll get an update on the company’s plan on how we’ll cope, and yeah, it’s all totally fine!!

via GIPHY

Happy Friday.

I’ve made it through the first “work from home” week without killing anyone or losing my mind. (Though if I lost my mind, would I be able to tell?)

Things I’ve learned: Getting out for a walk in the morning has helped my stress level, as long as I avoid the unfunny neighbor. I’m going to add yoga to the rotation; depending on my conference call schedule there are some days when a morning walk won’t happen. It’s already very hot here, and the HOA has warned about a new, very large bear sighting, so I prefer to wait until the sun is up before I walk.

I really miss my two big computer monitors at the office. I’m wondering whether, if this goes on for an extended time, we’ll be able to go in and take them home.

I had been beating myself up a bit for being a bit of a hoarder earlier this year, buying craft supplies and whatever just because it “was a good deal.” I am no longer beating myself up about that. It may be the thing that keeps me sane.

I’m glad I trusted my inner neurotic and bought one of the last giant packs of toilet paper available on Amazon. After I ordered, I thought I was crazy, and surely this bizarre paper products shortage would sort itself out in a few days. So far, it has not. Otherwise, Publix has rallied and the stores are pretty well stocked.

I have a lengthy and thoroughly uninteresting work project I’ve been putting off that I must deal with today. I also have some very ripe bananas on the kitchen counter, and I think I have all the ingredients for banana bread. A loaf for now, and one for the freezer – that’s the plan for this afternoon.

And I hope Chewy is able to sort out their delivery issues; I’m running low on Sophie’s prescription food. Poor Sophie; she’s not d0ing very well. It’s like she’s become an old dog; though she’ll be turning 11 next month that’s not really old for a small dog. She’s sleeping a LOT, snoring deeply, and has definitely lost a lot of her vision.

Yesterday she lost her footing going down the stairs, and I felt the leash tighten in my hand so I was able to “fly” her the rest of the way in her padded harness and help her land on her feet at the bottom. Thank God she’s a small dog and I can do this with one hand. I try to handle it calmly so it doesn’t upset her further, but it’s a new weird development in a time of great weirdness.

Time to begin another day in the Upside Down.

Day Three, Under Surveillance.

So, this morning I woke at 5, though since I’m working from home I could sleep later. Just because I can doesn’t mean my insomniac brain will let me. So I got up, walked the dogs in the dark while watching for bears, drank coffee, and before 7 a.m. I fired up the big work laptop that now occupies my desk. I checked/responded to the 30 emails that had piled up overnight (most were crap I could just delete without response, fortunately). After about an hour of this, I realized the sun was up and one of the advantages of working from home was that I could go out and walk before it got too hot. Yes, it’s very hot here already.

So I filled my water bottle, put on sunscreen and sunglasses, and headed out. My neighbor and her sister(?) were in their usual spot, smoking – I wasn’t paying attention because I was listening to a podcast and looking forward to some exercise.

I became aware of motion in the courtyard: My neighbor was on her feet, dancing around, miming making a call: “calling my boss.” I tossed, “Really not funny, but go right the hell ahead and call!” over my shoulder and kept going, while they cackled, laughing at my back. Later, she “apologized” – “I hope you realize I was only joking!” Of course I do, you stupid bitch, you might be aware of where I work, but you don’t know what I do, or that I control my own hours and can take a fucking walk if I want to take a fucking walk. I didn’t say this – I’m still trying to be somewhat diplomatic – but just said I had been up and working since 7.

She got “mad” on my behalf “but that’s not your normal work hours!” (How the fuck would she know? How long has she been watching?) and I said I was a professional and controlled my own schedule, and could work early or late as it suited me. She seemed apologetic or at least trying to fake it as much as she could, so, I thought that was settled.

Now, one would THINK that after two days in a row of being told that I don’t appreciate her keeping tabs on my activities or her “humor”, she’d just shut the fuck up and just say hello when she sees me, BUT NOOO!

This afternoon I went to the supermarket, which is still out of paper products but did have produce, because I needed a few things. I came home and The Deplorable and the Other One were just sitting outside the front door again. This time she called, in a sugary tone, like awful adults use when addressing a child: “Did you get all your work done today?” I just stopped and stared at her. I took a deep breath counted to ten, and said, “No, there’s more for tomorrow, that’s why they call it a JOB.” and turned my back and went up the stairs.

I’m seriously at a loss here. How do I MAKE IT STOP, FOR THE LOVE OF GOD??? I may be working from home for weeks, and I’m already ready to kill this bitch.