Tag: working from home

Quarantine Two, The Sequel: Shit Just Got Real.

I started writing this post the other day but the post just never would gel. I couldn’t figure out why I couldn’t put my thoughts together, and I realized it’s because I literally could not see an ending for this crap.

And today there was an announcement at the place where I work: the return to the office has been postponed until June at the earliest, and September for the bulk of the work force. I’m “the bulk of the workforce” because I can do my job just fine from home if I have to, so, yeah.

We were sent home from the office in mid-March, and all of us figured it’d be weeks, a month or two at the outside, and now, 18-ish months?

The sheer endlessness of this COVID clusterfuck is getting to a lot of us – at least to those of us who are still paying attention. I’ve gained weight, I’m crabby, I’m having trouble concentrating, I’m online “comfort shopping” too much. And you know what? I realized today that I don’t give a fuck, because I need to do what I can do to stay sane through this.

Actually I very much do give a fuck about the weight gain, because my clothes have to fit. Hot weather is looming, and I can’t afford to replace the shorts that now won’t button. I need to get control over my diet and exercise, for a multitude of healthy reasons. And also because I’m on a mission to fit into all of my shorts and tanks, because they’re all perfectly good and weren’t cheap and it’s going to be 90-fucking-degrees in a few weeks.

But the rest of it? If trying new skin care products and buying yarn and pretty stationery and growing succulents helps me not stab anybody, I refuse to feel guilty.

I need a game plan, or I’m going to outgrow my entire wardrobe and forget how to communicate with words. I’m afraid that by June I’ll speak only in technobabble, acronym and spreadsheet. Oh, and dog baby talk, because my dogs are the cutest little babies ever and deserve ALL the treaty-treats, don’t they? Yeah, I’m a bit starved for fun, non-work conversation.

Blogging about it really does help, and I will do it more often. I appreciate the feedback for my intermittent posts.

As I’ve said, I’m not really “quarantining” like the cool bread baking and indulging in creativity people, I’m more like “imprisoned” in a home office doing a job I fervently wish I could afford to quit, but alas, retirement is still a few years away for me.

So I’m going to put together a game plan to get me through 2021, because this shit ain’t anywhere near over.

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.