The Twist

 So about a week into my trip, I got Covid. Ugh.

It came on me like a freight train, moving from afternoon fatigue requiring a nap, to shivering and putting on extra layers as I went to bed, then waking up in the middle of the night drenched with sweat, throwing off the covers and lying on top. My throat had been getting steadily more and more sore, and in that middle of the night session I felt like there was a knife down it, and a hammer hitting my head on top and in the back. I had been taking my temperature throughout, and it went one time just above 100, barely a fever. So I thought, maybe it's allergies. Maybe the headache is a migraine. But at first light, I dug out the test kit I'd brought along, and was frankly terrified when it turned positive. How many times in the past three years have I felt poorly, and tested, only to have it be negative? But here it was, and likely true. 

The fear wasn't for how sick I was going to get, it was the implications of being sick while on a ship in a foreign country. What was going to happen to me? How would I lose control of what would happen to me?

When, according to my daily schedule in my room, the medical office was supposed to be open, I masked up and went down. There was a Greek doctor and a Philipino nurse on duty. I told them my symptoms, but not about my self-test. At that point I had no more fever. They gave me a release to sign before giving me another test, and I hesitated several minutes before going ahead with the official ship's test. Again, the issue was, what will happen to me? How will I lose control over what will happen to me, once I'm in some system as being positive? But I went ahead, because I'm so much of follow-the-rules person. Of course, their test was also positive.

They told me I should isolate in my cabin. They gave me some kind of decongestant, to be taken at night. They gave me so tablets for a cough. They gave me some vitamin C. I asked what was in the decongestant, the cough tablets the ingredients, but I didn't understand the answer, and they seemed to think being told when to take it should be enough. They assured me the progression would probably be no worse than a bad cold, and they had no access to antivirals, but I shouldn't need them anyway.

So back to my tiny but cozy ship's cabin. They brought me menus, and took my meal orders over the phone, and delivered them by tray into my room. I took my Extra Strength Tylenol, religiously every 7-8 hours (no more than 3 doses per day) and took my temperature just before renewing each dose. Never again did I have even the tiniest fever. I did not take the nasal decongestant or cough medicine, never needing it. The nose dripped but wasn't plugged. My throat was sore, and I had brought a long a large collection of cough drops / throat soothers, which I partook of liberally. I had loaded up my kindle with books and my iphone with recorded books and my ipad with TV shows and movies before leaving home as I knew there wouldn't be internet available on the ship. The first day, I slept more than half the time away. I woke up the next day feeling almost normal, so time passed as I devoured some books, marched ten steps up and down my room, did a few desultory body weight exercises and stretches, sat on my tiny little veranda to get a glimpse of Greek scenery going by.

And I worried. I mentioned no internet. What I had was my cellphone with an international data plan. So when we were cozied up to the land, and I had connectivity on the phone, I had slow and small internet access. Generally at night we were at sea and there was no coverage. So I tried to look up international regulations about traveling with Covid, any regulations on the airline site, hotels in Athens, etc., and was more frustrated than satisfied. The first couple of days it was more formless worrying in between feeling bad and choosing to drown in some books rather than actually figure out any plan of action. I realized how having money makes everything easier - if I needed to stay in Athens for some days, it wouldn't ruin me. But I had done absolutely no research on Athens, since the only time I would have spent there would have been while staying on the ship. Hotels.com had 967 hotels available in Athens, and I had no notion about neighborhoods, properties, etc.. I felt I couldn't cope and just went back into my books.

The day before we were due to leave, I went back to Medical and asked them about leaving. The doctor and nurse worked for the ship, and they said folks from the tour company that chartered the ship would be contacting me. They said guidelines recommended isolating for five days, but there was no ban on flying, and in their experience most people just went home. So I reached out (not for the first time) to the program people on the ship, and they finally got back to me. Their main question was, "do you feel well enough to fly?" and for me, clearly, the answer was "yes". Except for a mild sore throat, a slightly dripping nose, I had no symptoms except tiredness. I wanted home, in my own house, in my own bed! So they made arrangements for me (and, it turns out, a few other covid-positive passengers) to be transported to the airport separately from the other passengers. I was able to check in for my flight on my phone, and there was a moment of trepidation about what questions I would be asked. But the airline asked many questions about documentation and paperwork, most of which did not apply to US citizens, and never about symptoms or test results. 

We had been divided into small groups for the trip, and on the last day one of the women from my group came by to ask how I was doing and if I needed anything. She had NOT been told I was Covid-positive, and I was ... embarrassed to tell her. As if it was my fault, and I worried that I might have infected the others.  We spoke through the open door of my cabin, distanced, and she didn't run away from me when I told her. 

The same sense of shame pervaded me at the airport. It's very inefficient to get from Athens to the US east coast. Basically, you have to fly to central Europe and then catch a US bound flight from there. In order to make the connections, you have to be on the first flights out of Athens in the morning (mine was 7 am). Because it was recommended being at the airport three hours ahead, and it took up to an hour to get to the airport from the ship, it meant leaving the ship at 3 am. The airport was crowded with many of the other 200 passengers from the ship all doing approximately the same thing. I was double-masked - surgical mask inside KN95 - put on headphones, stuck my nose in my kindle, and avoided any eye contact or acknowledgement. I *really* didn't want to have an out-loud conversation in the airport gate room about my flying with Covid. I also was not happy with the idea I was typhoid Mary spreading germs intercontinentally. I rationally thought the risk to others was low - Day 5, double masked - but I still feel like deciding to fly home was one of the more selfish things I've ever done. 

It was a tough trip on my virus-battered body. It might have been better for me, as well as everyone else, if I'd gone to a hotel for a couple of days. But that's behind me now, no longer an option. It took me several days after I got home to recover simply from the fatigue of the trip: up in the middle of the local night after 2 1/2 hours sleep, then 22 hours before I reached the front door of my house. I was masked all but about half an hour of those 22 hours which added to the discomfort. I switched out masks, going with a really good N95 with behind-the-head elastic straps on the long flight. During what turned into five hours in Frankfurt airport, I bought a sandwich and found a deserted section of the terminal with no-one around me for a big distance, and took off the mask and ate slowly. My nose was never so congested I couldn't equalize my ears on the flights, hooray, but still it was a slight drag to be breathing through the mask all the time. I ubered home, and the trip from the airport was double the normal time. I was so happy to get home and just fall into my very own bed.

I missed a big family wedding on Saturday to my great regret. Thanksgiving dinner is up in the air (so happy again to be a perpetual guest, not on the hook for hosting or cooking). I am likely to show up masked to chat for a while, and then take a doggy bag home to eat alone, unless I get negative tests by then. (Not yet). Still the little dripping nose and slightly sore throat, no fever.

As I assess my condition, I'm not sure what is fatigue, what is boredom, what is laziness. This is a perpetual battle for me. I've been for short walks, done small amounts of raking, worked out slowly, body weight exercises, with my trusted trainer over video. My big boy is living in my basement, did some grocery shopping for my empty refrigerator, leaves on Saturday. We've only talked in passing, me masked and keeping my distance. He turns THIRTY tomorrow, and we're going to have a partially outdoor celebration for him. 

So that's me. Poking along. Not terribly ambitious. But so happy to be in my sun-drenched room, in my favorite chair, not feeling too bad, puttering every now and then with my plants. Excelsior!

Cult de Sac

My house in red. Cult members in blue.

I live on a corner of two streets that both dead-end. One street ends at an intersection, so you can turn and keep going, but the other is a cul-de-sac. I have a sign in my front yard that says "No Outlet", which I adopted as the name for my garden blog. All of the houses on both streets are tract houses, built at the same time in 1950. They were one story, three bedroom, small kitchen places with one or one and a half- bathrooms, partial or full basements, and about 1300 square feet on the ground floor. Even in 1950, these were small starter homes. When I moved in, 25 years ago (!) there were a lot of long-time residents aging in place. I have survived to become one of the senior folks in the 'hood, as houses have turned over, been renovated, and younger folks have moved in to start new families. The small size of the houses means no large families, and these houses are also attractive to folks like me, single or couples but without children.

The cul de sac next to me is a special place within the larger neighborhood. Most of the houses back on to the stream valley park, and one has a path down into the park everyone on the street uses. When the pandemic started, remember there was a thing about banging pots or singing? The cul de sac started with that, and over the past two years has built up the connection to where they call it the cult de sac. They have a weekly happy hour outside year round, and in (both) summers had outdoor movie nights. They have a very active and funny What's App chat group. They built a little free library, and have three basketball hoops at different levels lined up for the different sized kids.

I think it's the kids that pull the core families together. I went to happy hour on Saturday, after our first two snow storms, and there were four children six and under playing in the snow. I know of at least four other kids not there because they were quarantining (one four-year-old actually had covid). I remember the solidarity from other parents I found on the soccer sidelines, and I think it was no coincidence that most of my parents' close friends even into old age had kids roughly the same age as me and my siblings. During these pandemic times, opportunities for kids have been so limited, so the bonding must be even more intense. There are two families on the chat group that live not on the cul de sac but on the next street, but they have small kids which I think was their entree to the group.

I had been invited into the cult events from the beginning, but have only just started to try to attend. Saturday was sunny and cold, and everyone stood out in the big cul de sac circle bundled up with their own drinks, watching the kids playing in the snow. Clusters of grownup people moved around, formed and re-formed, about ten in all, chatting about nothing and everything. Parents spoke to kids - and I couldn't always tell which kid belonged to which grownup, because they know each other well enough to pick up any one of them that went sprawling on the ice, pat them and send them on their way. 

I'm looking forward to a little more sociability with my neighbors as I get deeper into the cult.

Seasons of Covid

Happy New Year! Our holiday was OK, but Covid cast its shadow. (Spoiler: nobody is sick yet.) 

Christmas Eve

Peripatetic Big Boy (vaxxed and boosted) had been in San Diego at the college frisbee finals until Tuesday, because he is coach of the women's team. Then he went back to Michigan, packed furiously (because he's moving to Berkeley for the next semester, was going to fly from here), drove himself to my house and arrived on Thursday, the 23rd, with one huge and two small suitcases and his negative PCR test result from Wednesday's swab. We dined together, and he settled into the basement suite. Friday, Christmas Eve, he texted about noon from the basement: "Update: one of my players tested positive". 

So then we began a furious search for a place to do rapid and/or PCR testing in the next few hours (because I didn't plan far enough ahead to have many home tests on hand). Many unwieldy website experiences later, I secured an appointment for 4 pm about half an hour away. Text at 4:30 from the long drive-through line: "Will I run out of gas waiting in line? Only time will tell!".  He arrived back home at 6 pm - the time the family was originally planning to assemble for dinner - along with his negative test result. But he had a bad sore throat (no fever), and more and more of the frisbeers were reporting in positive. 

So then began a furious consultation about whether we believed the test result or not! Should I pack food and take it to BILs house? SO MUCH WORK! But at his point, none of the others had been with BB and so were not at risk for a secondary exposure. We ended up in a cautious middle ground: they would come over, but no BB eating in the same room, my air filter running and open windows and BB masked and somewhat distant for conversations when we weren't eating. 

Julekage! The girl comes through!

This whole thing blew up my plans. This sounds like such a shallow and vain whine - but Christmas Eve dinner is my big event of the year. I had timetables written out, of when to do what. Roast in the oven, vegetables prepped and ready for cooking, when to change the tablecloth and set the table,  cooking commences at this point, candles need to be lit, appetizers and drinks to keep people busy while making gravy... None of this went according to plan. Dinner was an hour late, food wasn't optimal, BB ate by himself in the basement - I set plates outside his room, he came out and got them when I was back upstairs. Tablecloth never got changed, candles never got lit. Almost no pictures were taken. So did it even happen?

And another tradition got booted around. We have to have the Norwegian Christmas bread on Christmas morning. It's called Julekage, for goodness sake - it has Christmas in the name! Several years ago, BB, the baker in the family, took over this tradition. But he spent the afternoon trying to get tested, and I was in a kerfluffle, so suddenly it was after dinner and the Julekage hadn't been started. No-one thought it was a good idea for BB to bake. I declared I wasn't up to staying up and doing it. We discussed making it on Christmas day to have later, but that didn't seem like it made the magic happen. So my girl stepped up and stepped forth and did it! It took her most of the night, but we had also decided that noon was actually when Christmas morning started for us, so that worked out ok.

Christmas night

Christmas morning and evening were over at my BIL's house, with the same rules of distancing. Except for brief appearances, BB stayed alone in the basement suite. He had been planning to leave on Sunday for a fabulous vacation with friends - an AirBnB right outside Yosemite. But I offered and he accepted to stay hunkered down in the basement, where he had his own bedroom, bathroom, open windows, and access to separate living room and even a home gym. I got him an appointment for a PCR test on Wednesday, the first available, and he rescheduled his flight. Sunday, I was done cooking, but it was reasonably pleasant out so I bought hot dogs and buns, set out drinks, and folks came over to hang in the backyard under blankets.

Boxing Day

As BB's last known exposure to the infected people was Tuesday night before Christmas, he decided to try for a test sooner than the (8 days after) Wednesday plan. Monday, he went to a county-run walk-in place, but they ran out of tests and shut down after half an hour. Consulting with friends, he secured an appointment for a PCR test Tuesday night in Baltimore, and combined it with an outdoor firepit visit to a close friend who lives there. Test results came in about 18 hours, negative! Yay! Out of quarantine! He visited with some friends on Wednesday. After big family confab, most of us declined to dine together in a restaurant, so BB and I got Ethiopian takeout together, BIL closed his vaccine clinic which was in a bar and became a customer, and my girl and middle boy went to a private party.

Lines for testing - but with my appointment,
it took me six minutes

Thursday morning, day of BB's flight to California, new twist! My girl's two best friends, folks she and Middle Boy partied with the day before, were both positive! Oh no! (I had not seen my guys in this window, no secondary exposure from this source for me.) So girl and boy, both vaxed but boosted just this week, are hunkered down in quarantine at BIL's house, and I won't see the three of them until some clearance point is reached - not sure what that will be. I provided lots of info on available testing options, but left it to them to schedule. I did say if they are non-symptomatic I would drive them to tests (masked and with windows open). 

BB got off to California, with his plane delayed but not cancelled. Fierce headwinds across the country - just another bit of unpleasantness to add to the mix.

Cool lighting for our little dispersed party

Friday, New Year's Eve, was damp but fairly warm. Some neighbors opened their backyard to a party that started at 3 pm, with a planned small-child countdown and ball drop at 6 pm, and additional plans for adults to continue outside until it rained or midnight, whichever came first. I went over in the afternoon with a bottle of wine and it was pleasant. There are many small children in the immediate neighborhood, and I hadn't been around any for quite some time. I just observed, didn't touch. We remained mostly distant, everyone had masks near to hand, and many actually wore them. And two families on the street were isolating, wouldn't join outside. (Our host actually invited them to mask and come, and both families firmly declined. It was clear this was a relief to some of the others. Risk tolerances vary.) One of the isolating families had another milestone - it was the last day of work for the man - and we all walked over to bang on his door and serenade him (the only appropriate song we could think of was "For he's a jolly good fellow".) I lasted at the party for nearly four hours, but once again didn't make it to midnight this year. Maybe if I don't start drinking at 4?

I had made myself an appointment for PCR testing as soon as I heard of BB's exposure. The test was Thursday am; as of this writing (about 50 hours later) I don't have results.

So it feels like we're all going to get it. What I thought I knew about transmission - that outside would be mostly safe - no longer feels right. As I think my family members here will probably continue a slightly more aggressive risk stance than me, I'm planning on mostly being physically alone for a while. Luckily, this suits me fine. I picture myself walking with the dog and without the dog, working out in my gym, engaging with friends near and far virtually, gardening indoors and outside if the weather permits, reading, watching movies and TV. Basically, what I've done for two years, but with better strength and energy. Maybe, I'll try baking bread. I am so grateful for the many advantages I have in this dismal situation, and feel so strongly for those less well off than me. 

I felt the need to document this time.

UPDATE: Rapid tests should both my girl and middle boy negative, five days in. So I think they will leave the house, masking everywhere for the rest of ten days. 

Still Masked

These were surprisingly fiddly
and difficult to make

I ran across this, my favorite ornament, (handmade by me) from last year. Note how it says "2020"? How naive of me! What optimism we had, with vaccines on the horizon and a new, competent, president peacefully taking office after only a few days of uncertainty.

Yesterday, I read many articles about what is happening with Omicron, maybe more than is healthy. I came away with the horrible feeling that we will all get the virus. It's inevitable, we can't protect enough to avoid it. There is a very good chance we (vaxed and boosted) will end up fine after some unpleasantness, but the unpleasantness is coming and there is nothing we can do to stop it.

I also came away with useful tips on masking, to do my best to postpone the unpleasantness. Tip #1: use an N95, or a KN95. If the latter, make sure to verify the mask labelled "KN95" is truly that. Unfortunately, there doesn't seem to be a good way to verify the certification of masks. The best I can do is look for reviews or on the company website. I've bought both KN95 and surgical-style (pleated) masks from Maskc, because I really want to have my mask coordinated and stylish. They are sold as "single use" but definitely I re-use them.

Just some I've gotten from Maskc

 

If not using an N95 or KN95, double-masking is the way to go. The recommended method is to put a paper, disposable, surgical-style mask on the bottom layer (with the corners tucked together) and then a cloth mask over it. The bottom layer absorbs your moisture, and the top layer generally makes a better seal than the surgical-style. 

I was away last week, and during the week news got progressively worse, so I double-masked on the way home. It was fine, though I prefer the layer touching my face to be of cloth. The masks I made that I still wear have either silk or very soft cotton on the bottom layer. But for anything other than casual exposure, I'll either wear the KN95 or double mask.

So now, the question is, how do I make N95-style ornaments? Got to think on it.

Pandemic Thoughts

Pandemic Pup

We thought we were done with this! It is SO DAMN FRUSTRATING! This was so avoidable. It proves we need the vaccine to be universal - and that includes internationally, because variants will continue to arise unless the whole world gets vaccinated.

Way back in the 1980s I read some science fiction books* that tell the story of a planetary epidemic, of flu. Scores of people all over the planet are sickened and die. A vaccine is developed. Then the crux of the story: the vaccine must be distributed planet-wide within a short period of time or else it won't work - the virus is evolving quickly. A risky time-travel method is used, and our hero self-sacrifices to get the job done. But the basic point was made. Everybody needs this, and needs it now, or it won't work. We know what to do, people. We need to do it!

I went past a lovely coffee shop in town today, Kaldis. Back in the Before Times, but post-retirement, I went a few times there with my laptop to get various things done, including blog posting. Every time I went I felt I was play-acting the life of the freelance writer, as so vividly told by my New Jersey friend. This coffee shop was late to re-open for seated service, but today as I went past there were people seated with their computers. The sign outside noted limited hours - daytime, not into the evenings. But I won't go in there to sit, not now. 

My grocery shopping habits have changed so much during this time. I was probably going to the store 3-4 times a week before. In January and February of this year, probably my most hunkered down in place time, I only went about every three weeks. I started growing my own lettuce on the countertop, so I had something fresh all the time. I'm so much more focused on using up my food before buying more. I keep an inventory written on front of the fridge, and I add expiration dates to somethings noted there. I also maintain a much better shopping list. It's on my phone, and I add to it often while in the kitchen or perusing recipes. For non-perishables like dishwasher detergent, I add to the list as soon as I open a new container, so I always have another standing by. Folks, this may not sound remarkable to you, but I've never been this organized before. 

There was a long, comprehensive article about masks in the NY Times Wirecutter section this week. I got into designing and engineering cloth masks, and I have a substantial collection now. It's time to review them - replace the elastic, in some cases, replace the metal nose wire in others. I've also got some disposable surgical masks and some KN95s. I thought maybe I had overbought, but no. I think I'll get a chance to use them. I feel KN95 is the most secure, but not the most comfortable. 

I'm so glad I went traveling when I did. I've another trip coming up, by public transport - either a plane or train (depending on hurricane impacts - I have reservations on both). I went and got tested today - I have no symptoms, but it seemed a responsible thing to do, to head off inadvertent spreading. I'll get tested again when I get back. Testing remains easy here - I waltzed right in (mid-morning) and was out in five minutes. I'll be wearing a mask during my travel, of course, for several hours, and so will probably take several to be able to change when they get damp.

I went ahead of the science and got myself a booster vaccination, of a different technology. I had the Johnson and Johnson vaccine, single shot. Not so many of us had that shot, compared to Pfizer and Moderna, so there is very little information available on its efficacy. Recommendations expected soon will not include the J&J, because they don't know. Not, you will note, because they think it isn't needed. In fairness, the J&J was distributed two months later, so if there was any reason to think its efficacy period would be similar to the others, it can come later. But wait - it's a totally different technology! Why would its period be similar? When they do come out with recommendations, they will focus on whether J&J should be boosted with another J&J shot. But I decided to roll the dice and get a booster of one of the other ones, a "mRNA" version. Studies in Europe of mix-and-match technology have shown increased efficacy from the mix-and-match approaches. I believe the U.S. should be widely distributing the vaccines around the world, but I still got my own booster. Shading of principles with self-interest.

The picture of the pandemic pup is only for the cuteness factor. He loves his lobster from Maine!

*The science fiction books are part of the "Dragons of Pern" sagas by Anne McCaffrey. She wrote a bunch (16?) books all set in the world of Pern, and now her family members have continued the business. Several of the books have references to the epic song cycle "The Ballad of Moreta's Ride", and finally she wrote a book with the story of the ride. She also wrote another book taking place at the same time with a different main character, much more focused on the effects of the pandemic.

Vaccinated!

Maryland continues to be clusterf*ck of chaos when it comes to vaccine distribution, but I am amazed at how much of a difference it feels to know that I finally caught and tamed my unicorn. Having the one-and-done Janssen vaccine means I'm not in limbo - I'm building antibodies as I write, and in two weeks I'll be - not invulnerable, certainly not, but much more protected.

To be honest, I never really thought I'd die of this virus. But I did assume I'd catch it, and be very very sick alone at home. It's that thought that made me scared. The last time I was very sick, I was very incompetent at taking care of myself. Drinking, eating, washing... all seemed beyond my reach - though only for about 48 hours. So when I did my big stock-up shopping as we hunkered down a year ago, I bought shelf-stable foods for WTSHTF, but I also bought many quick, easy, comfort foods - Trader Joe's chicken noodle soup, frozen dinners, my favorite ginger candies in five pound bags. 

I spent my 65th birthday at home alone, with our first family zoom session. But as time went on, the certainty that we would ALL get sick started to wane. The solution, was of course, hunkering down, even more than masking up. So my horizons closed in. 

Briefly, at the end of the summer through the holidays, my horizons expanded to encompass my boat partner and her family, DC, and some outdoor socializing with family and local friends. But as word of new variants came out, my horizons closed in again. I had fewer trips to local stores. I took fewer walks, always masked to the hilt. Even family and my boat partner were masked encounters. 

Now, I can feel the possibilities opening up like a flower around me. I have vaccinated friends! I could travel to visit family! I can easily live within the current guidelines, and be glad for it. To be totally honest, I like hunkering down at home. The thought of going places fills me with anxiety - not Covid anxiety, just generalized anxiety. These past few months, there was no decision to be made, no need to build up my gumption to get out there. Now, I can work back up to it gradually.

The Sh*tshow Continues

I have tap-dancing class online at noon. I signed in a couple minutes early on my ipad, in the basement, wearing my tap shoes. At 12:04, (I found out later) the local hospital sent an email saying they had spaces available. At 12:30, I checked my phone and spotted the email, which had been forwarded by several listserves I'm on. I turned off the zoom camera and clicked on the link to the website, then the red "REGISTER" button on the screen. It took me to the screen you see here. Does this mean "just be patient, you are in a cue"? Or does it mean "refresh every 30 seconds and you might get through"? 

I decided it meant the latter, and so every 30 seconds for the next TWO AND A HALF HOURS I clicked "refresh". Then, at last, it took me slowly, s-l-o-w-l-y to the next screen, which said "no appointment availability". 

So glad I have absolutely nothing else to do with my time.

Apparently, there is a phone line for "non-internet friendly old people" run by the state that will, according to the message, have more appointments available on Monday. Guess we know how I'll be spending my day.

Chasing Imaginary Unicorns

My state is down near the bottom in vaccine distributions. It is SO annoying and frustrating. Because the state decided to decentralize the vaccine distribution, many people like me are spending every day chasing rumors and catching glimpses just as the unicorn vanishes around a corner up ahead. 

I am not terrified of getting the virus but I would like to avoid dying from it. I know that “normal life” requires herd immunity. My only risk factors are being old and fat, so I’m towards the bottom of the first priority group. And so I’m not desperate to get vaccinated, but I want to be responsible, pay attention, and take my turn when it’s available. That was my calm and rational approach to this a few weeks ago. And then chaos broke out.

There are literally 8 different possible distribution channels I need to monitor, not just daily, but multiple times a day. Twice in the last week I got to a website that had appointments available when I started to register, and then all slots were gone before I finished the process. And these were slots I had pre-registered for. And most people in my same situation are also going for the same multiple different channels, so each channel is having to deal with the whole eligible population of the state instead of just a sub-section. There are strong dis-incentives to be a good little citizen and just wait your turn, versus clogging the system by all jumping on at the same time.

There is no confidence that any place I’m pre-registered for will actually send me information about available slots when they have them - so I go out there and shake the trees. 

In my more charitable moments I chuckle and say “it’s like trying for Hamilton tickets!”. But honestly, it’s a clusterfuck of inefficienc;y. Not incompetence, not at any one place, but in the choices made at the beginning of how to approach this. It angers me, because they had more than half a year to build a better plan. 

Truly, if I had an appointment I knew would be honored, and that appointment was a month or two away, I’d be much happier right now than I am.

2020 Wrap-up: Travel

OK, so not much. In February, I went on my one big trip, on an airplane, to Utah via Las Vegas. That was immediately followed by the Bloggers Bash, Brooklyn Style. Aside from that, to paraphrase my father's inaccurate Henry Thoreau quote, I traveled extensively around my block.

The light spots on the map are where I went.

Mask Crafts

I've spent quite a bit of time on designing and sewing masks. I've been through several different designs, surfed around on the 'net, watched a bunch of youtube videos, ventured onto pinterest.

The first masks I made back in April were being done when supplies were not widely available, and a general call came out from some hospitals asking for masks. I ransacked my house. I hauled out my old sewing machine (bought in 1981) and I found some elastic and threads. I had some bits and pieces of fabrics from projects planned and never done. I also looked in my clothes closet and linen closet, finding cotton clothes and old pillow cases that could go into masks.A very basic rectangular design, with two layers of cotton, 2-3 folds and ear loops were the basic starting point. The first one took a few hours, subsequent ones came more quickly. I supplied three each to my local family members. 

Too matchy-matchy?
But an excellent all-day fit

Then I started wearing the masks. More and more evidence indicated they were a good thing, with more suggestions on the best materials. I realized the masks I had made first had some flaws. As a wearer of glasses, often during masked walks my glasses were steamy. I had a few occasions when I had to wear the mask along with my hearing aids, and ear loops were no good. I noted comments on TLo about how one should up their mask game for fashion purposes. I also found I liked sewing them. Making the masks became a creative outlet, requiring engineering skills and allowing some artistic license. 

I bought a new sewing machine (after forty years, what the heck). I have serious sewing friends who have very expensive machines, but when I went online I found new, apparently adequate, machines from brands I never heard of for even less than $100. The top-rated one at Wirecutter was sold out everywhere (hello, apocalypse thinking), but I got an "also good" Singer heavy duty. It doesn't squeal when the wheels go round, but otherwise seems the equivalent of my old machine.

White hair and black mask
But a good fit

So here are attributes of a well-designed mask: the fit from the bridge of your nose to under your chin is important. (My family varies from 4.75" to 5.75" in that measurement.) It is helpful, especially for glasses, to have a shaper over the nose, bending the mask to follow the face's contour. I worked with some pipe cleaners I had in the house, but then bought purpose-made metal strips on-line. It's important to have fabric layers as padding under the metal strips. It's good to have some space between your mouth and the mask, which requires some structure to be built in (the rectangular masks do not do that well). If the side of the mask is done as a sheath, the ties or elastic aren't sewn in but instead threaded - they can be replaced easily - and so a mask can convert from ear loops to behind your head fastenings. Two layers is good, and the inner layer should be soft. Three layers is better, but you don't want a big bump of fabric seams piling up on top of your nose, especially if you wear glasses. Cotton is universal, but a silk lining helps with comfort, facilitating breathing while still efficiently trapping particles (and adding warmth when outdoors). A lazy, quick mask can be made out of tshirts by just cutting ear loops right into the mask itself.

So now I pick up pieces of fabric, stack them double or triple, and first look at a light bulb through the stack. If I can see the outline clearly, it's a no-go. Then, I hold the stack over my nose and mouth and try nose breathing through it. If that works, I'm in business! I'm venturing into new pieces of fabric, aiming at fashion now that I have the basics of structural design down. I have a feeling we'll be wearing them for a while now.

Jury Duty

Imagine my surprise a few weeks ago to receive a jury summons in the mail! What? Really? Fresh in my memory was the experience of a New Jersey-based journalist of my (virtual) acquaintance who was summoned in the very early days of quarantine. He tweeted photos of the crowded conditions - and remember this is before we knew to mask. The very next day, as I recall, his location suspended jury trials.

It turns out my county decided to resume jury trials in October. They probably made that decision before all the county-level indicators started ticking up later in the fall. At any rate, they are pressing on, though slowly and cautiously.  Is it cautiously enough? 

I believe firmly that trial by jury is part of what makes America great. I've been called to jury duty half a dozen times, and actually served three times back when I lived in Chicago. The mere fact that I show up without an attitude to get out of it probably has a lot to do with my history of getting seated. Frankly, I've never understood that attitude. Why do people hate jury duty? Back when I was working, it was a welcome and unimpeachable excuse to have a break in the routine. I have an admittedly high tolerance for waiting around - back in the day, I'd bring a stack of magazines and jettison as I went. Now, of course, the phone or ipad work great. And, when involved in a trial, people's stories are interesting. The glimpse into other lives can be fascinating. I read mysteries and love me a TV courtroom drama, so to get to be there is cool. And, of course, I have a pretty strong sense of civic responsibility, and this shows some of our finest (and not so fine) systems at work.

So I faithfully showed up as summoned on Tuesday morning last week. I'd been summoned once before to that location, so I had the logistics of parking and finding the building all worked out. But clothes! What does one wear to be on a jury? And, setting the alarm, to be up and out on a schedule. I set three alarms, just to be certain. I decided what to wear the night before (a time saving trick from my working days) but ended up changing my tops three times. I went for comfort over style, choosing my dressiest yoga pants (an oxymoron?) and a relatively dressy fleece sweater over a plain tee. I left my beloved hoodie and flannel shirts behind.

The summons included the instruction for full time masking, and I brought a few with me, to be able to swap out if I was there all day. The entrance to the court building was next to another county building with a polling place, and there was a line there. But I found my way into the court building, where they took my temperature and ran through a quick verbal checklist ("have you recently travelled out of state? been to any non-socially distanced parties? ...") before screening me through security. In the huge juror's lounge, they checked me in without touching me, having me toss the pen I used to sign their sheet into a box lined with disinfectant wipes. They handed me an envelope with fifteen dollars in cash and a letter suitable for showing an employer, testifying to my appearance. 

The huge juror lounge had specific seats marked off for sitting. At checkin, they handed me a full sheet of paper holding only my new number, 19. They pointed in the general direction of the seats, and I found the seat with a large #19 on its back. It turns out, each row of a dozen fixed seats were set to hold two people, and the position along the row was staggered so no-one was directly in front of anyone else. So I settled in to my seat and started on my electronic magazines. 

After a while, someone at the front of the room attracted our attention, and started to call numbers. Each person had to hold up their number when called to be recorded. They ended up calling about 45 people, half the jury pool there, and then lined them up and took them to a courtroom for voir dire. They were asked to walk six feet apart, and the elevators had designated spots to stand in, only four at a time, so I imagine their trip took a while to get there and get settled. 

I figured by this time I'd spent about 90 minutes in a room with about 100 people total in it. The only public buildings I've been in since March are supermarkets and hardware stores, usually off peak and with very high ceilings and good ventilation. In the jury room we were well spaced out, and 100 percent masked. A casual survey of masks showed more than two-thirds in disposable paper masks (mostly the pleated surgical kind, a few N95 types), and others in cloth masks. But, we don't much about about how the virus spreads. How good, what type, of ventilation system did the room and building have? I have no idea.

So then for us, the other half of the jury pool, they brought the lawyers and judge to us for voir dire. They asked a series of questions about our past history and whether we knew specific people. If our answer to anything was "yes", we held up our number cards and they recorded us for individual questions later. It became clear from the nature of the questions that the case was a civil lawsuit stemming from an auto accident. Of course it was.

So then, they called us in one-by-one to a smaller room just off the big one, where the judge asked for the details on the questions we had flagged. After my questioning, I returned to my seat and my magazines. 

Finally, the big denouement. The clerk started to call numbers, and the big question in everybody's mind: Are we selected or excused? As it turns out, I was selected. Of course I was.  

By now, three hours had passed. The others left (I was glad to have fewer people around) and it was our turn, the eight of us, to line up and go by fours up to the court room. Then, more waiting around. At some point, we'd been told to turn off our devices, and I cursed myself for not having thought to bring an actual book book or magazine. It appeared our trial was the only activity on the entire floor, and I was relieved to have even fewer people around. There was a long corridor with floor to ceiling windows and it was great to get to walk back and forth and see some actual daylight. One juror went in to talk to the judge alone, and then we were seven jurors, six women and one man. 

Finally, into the courtroom. The jury box, built to hold fourteen, had seats blocked off for three to sit in each of two rows. Very comfortable fixed but swiveling seats, with a waist-high wooden wall in front and clear plastic sheets suspended between the rows. One poor juror had to sit in front of the jury box, on the courtroom floor, where she felt like she was on display. She had to sit nicely (we could put our feet up on the wall in front of us) and she felt the need to be alert and taking notes all the time. So now, in our courtroom, there were the seven jurors, and about ten others (plus some witnesses).

The judge thanked us constantly for being there, and revealed this was his first jury trial since March. He explained things clearly, interpreting some of the lawyers' motions for us along the way. He's not on the ballot this year, but I'd vote for him again. His clerk had recently taken the bar, remotely, and noted there might be less reciprocity than in previous years because it was a truncated exam.

So the case itself was a rear-end collision, three years ago, and the plaintiffs were suing the driver that hit them for whiplash. We heard testimony from doctors and chiropractors, the plaintiffs and defendant. It seemed to me none of the lawyers were any good - but maybe I watch too much TV. Certainly, two of them failed to read the room - with a jury of six women and one man, do you really need to emphasize the boxing league credentials of one doctor, or pepper your speech with a flood of football analogies? 

I used my car as my portable bubble, and ate my lunch there every day. Two of three days I also walked, but the last day the remnants of a hurricane swept through so I just read in the car. With temperatures in the 60s every day, the car was nice secure little space to be unmasked.

After two-and-a-half days of testimony (and a lot of waiting around in the hallway) on the afternoon of the third day we went to the jury room to deliberate. (Just before that, the poor woman who sat in front was designated the alternate that could be released - we only needed six for the decision.) It was really interesting to hear what others were thinking. We had of course started to warm up to each other during our interminable waits, what do you do, where do you live, etc., but of course hadn't started to talk about the trial. Some thought the plaintiffs were totally faking, others had more sympathy for the fact their lives had been upended when a car struck them out of the blue. We took about 90 minutes, and ended up splitting the baby. We didn't give the plaintiffs everything they asked for, but we gave them something. And we all agreed on which was the sleaziest doctor!

So now, I've imposed a (modified) quarantine on myself. I never felt the situation was clearly unsafe, but it also was clearly much riskier in terms of virus exposure than my normal life. My sailing partner and I discussed it, and we agreed to wear masks all the time we were together yesterday, even though all summer we didn't mask up on the boat. (As it turns out, it was cold and so the mask was not unwelcome.) I double-masked at the grocery store this morning, and will mask when I see my girl for her birthday tomorrow. I'm postponing some errands, banking, etc.. I figure after a week or maybe ten days, I should go for a test. When I get the results, then I'll declare myself clear.

The frustrating thing is I keep having to postpone my hair appointment, to get new color! I figure I shouldn't put them at risk, even through a mask, until I'm clear.

(I voted, I'm ignoring the fact life as we know it may change in a couple of days.)

On Vacation

How can I be on vacation? Vacation from what? But I feel like last week was indeed a vacation, at least from my [normal] life. My boat partner and her husband, J and J, had their vacation to the Azores aborted at nearly the last minute. We have been in essence podded together this summer, sailing without masks but seeing no-one else but family and store clerks. They live in rural Pennsylvania, beautiful but not so cultured. And so, J and J came and stayed in my lovely basement instead of the Azores, which is almost as nice. It certainly was nice for me!

J had done her homework, and gotten timed tickets to open museums in DC. The African-American History Museum, the newest and everyone’s first choice, was not available. But they got the Portrait Gallery (my favorite) and the American Indian Museum, which I had never been to, and for the day I wasn’t available, the Spy Museum. The best weather day of the week J and I went sailing, while husband J did a major gardening chore for me and worked on his novel and played with my dog. The whole week was the best of fall weather, warm enough to be outside, bright bright sun, not too hot, rated 10-out-of-10 every single day by the Capital Weather Gang in the Washington Post.

It was so nice to be out and about! We spent hours inside the museums, which were not at all crowded and thus felt safe. Husband J had been a middle school teacher and had been on several field trips to the museums, but there was enough change to keep him going, reading every sign on every display. We had drinks and nibbles at a sidewalk cafe one day, deli sandwiches dining outside at the new Eisenhower memorial with J & J’s lovely DC-suburban resident daughter another. Most of the food at home was takeout, where they delighted in our easily available Central American, Ethiopian, and Vietnamese cuisines. I was also pleased to be enjoying so many different flavors not cooked by me.

But I am used to being alone, and I was not displeased to have a day of isolation and solo recovery, before plunging back into my [normal] life. Which is, tbh, isolation most of the time too, and it suits me.

Blursday

 I read the term “Blursday” in The NY Times, I think. I don’t remember the whole article, but the term struck me as just exactly right. This is the time period in which I am living. There is little to distinguish the days, except if I zoom in and grab it, write it down for posterity.

I try various things to track my days, to try to pin down where my time goes. This is so hard: I can’t really remember. I went grocery shopping, was that Thursday or Friday? When did I last go through my mail and pay all the bills? Don’t I have some deadline coming up on one of the few things I am actually responsible for? When last did I speak to someone? To my family?

It’s so easy to just drift. I am doing things, sure enough. I’m working in the garden, I’m walking, reading books, laundry piles up and then gets done. I’m pretty much on an island most days, but things are getting done.

I’m keeping a log of when I do what in the garden, when I remember to do it. I started this after I planted some grass seeds, and then after a period of time, they came up. How long was that after planting? Because I was planting more seeds, I really wanted to know how long to wait before declaring failure. (Because my mind always assumes a catastrophic failure, but that’s a discussion for another time.) I had to go back and look at my pictures, and read the date taken, to be able to figure that out. Hooray for taking the pictures at the right time!

I’ve taken to actually keeping a calendar to see where my time goes. There is little on the calendar to begin with, but I go back, not every day, but every couple-few days, and try to reconstruct what I did. I don’t have goals here, just curiosity. But I do want to minimize the aimless puttering, the aimless TV (as opposed to purposeful TV!), and the aimless iPad surfing. It bothers me when I have hours accounted for. I want my time to count for something, even if it’s just growing my mind. 

So I look for clues, in the electronic signatures I leave around various places. My fitbit tells me when I woke up and went to bed, and by the number of steps I can often figure out when I did various physical tasks. My phone knows where I am in space, sort of (it’s buggy) and so I can use that to verify what day I went to the Giant supermarket. The iPad tracks screen time, even down to which app I am using, so I fill in details with that. Reading books or watching TV have no electronic signature, except when I finish a book (if it’s on the kindle and I have it connected), or what I can deduce from lack of activity tracked by the fitbit.

Why does this matter? No idea. But I’m doing it, at least for now.

Travel (Maybe)

I've been fizzing back and forth on a trip to Iceland in July. Like in three weeks, July. This year.

I signed up for this trip last August, so it's been on my horizon since then. It's ambitious: two weeks away, a week of it aboard a beautiful small classic sailing ship. A few days in a hotel in Reykjavik before the trip, a couple in the remote town on the northwest coast of Iceland afterwards.

I made the airline and hotel reservations in mid-January. My first choices were already sold out - July is the top month for travel to Iceland. Most of it is paid for.

Of course I assumed for the past couple of months I wouldn't be going. I originally signed up via a travel broker in the UK that specializes in booking passage on classic sailing ships. They sent an email in late March saying they were shutting down and they had turned all of the records over to the owners of the ship. I heard from the airline all my flights were cancelled.

Still I followed the voyage of the mighty little Tecla. I started following her after I booked the trip last August. She was in Greenland when first I found her, and she made her way through the melting pack ice of the Northwest passage in Canadian waters - the first large sailing ship to do so. She had a crew/passenger change in Nome, Alaska, and was off to the Galapagos. She visited Easter Island, rounded Cape Horn entirely under sail, stopped at the Falklands. Then, she was off to Antarctica. She got to Cape Town, South Africa, a few days after the country shut her borders. Allowed to anchor, and to obtain supplies, but not to disembark.  At first, it appeared the passengers wouldn't be allowed off, but after two weeks they were allowed to fly to their homes. (Quarantine, even though the passengers and crew had not touched inhabited lands or seen other people for the several weeks of the Antarctic voyage, and Covid was not known to have spread out of China when they set off from the Falklands.) The four professional crew took the boat home to the Netherlands, via the Azores, where again they were not allowed ashore (despite more than four weeks enroute from Cape Town) but they obtained fuel and fresh food. They got to the Netherlands last week.

The Tecla is owned by a family - bought by a husband and wife for this type of adventure cruising a decade or so ago (paying passenger crews subsidizing their Arctic yearning). Now, the ship is mostly sailed by their grown son and daughter. They usually have two family aboard, and two other crew. They can take up to twelve passengers, in two person cabins (that each have their own little water closet). This is a very similar size and arrangement to the Pride of Baltimore II that I have been on in the Chesapeake.

After a few days of the first time ashore since Antarctica and family reunion, the Tecla folks decided to go ahead and operate the Iceland trips in July. I vacillated mightily. But I decided Sunday I wanted to go, and if I can, I will.

Before you jump all over me, keep reading.

Iceland is a small island nation, an advantage in locking down and fighting the spread of the virus. They had a high tech international biolab company with its flagship laboratory there, and quickly they were able to ramp up testing to one of the highest rates in the world. The virus got ahead of them initially, but as of now there are less than a half-a-dozen active known cases in the country. They have implemented a government sponsored phone app for contact tracing, and more than half the country has put it on their phones. They are opening back up, and even are opening swimming pools and barbershops.  (Swimming is a huge thing in Iceland - they tap their greatest natural resource, hot springs, to provide indoor public pools everywhere.)

Iceland has had a mandatory 14-day quarantine for all visitors since the lock-down started. They are open for visitors from Europe, the Schengen area, and just started an option of, instead of quarantine upon arrival, getting a PCR test (the kind that feels like they are scraping your brain) with results in less than 24 hours. If no known problems surface in the next two weeks, they will open to the rest of the world on the same terms July 1.

My original flights on United that were cancelled involved domestic legs before flying on the seasonal non-stops to Reykjavik. After some time on the phone with the airline Sunday morning, I rejected what they would offer me, with circuitous routings and thus more airports - each airport being an additional potential contagion point. While on hold with them, I checked into Air Iceland's offerings, and this economically shaky (but extremely important to the Icelandic tourist industry) airline has put on a less than daily non-stop flight from Dulles to Reykjavik. I was able to book non-stops with slight adjustments in my schedules (one less day in-country before boarding Tecla).

So here's the deal with virus risk. I will need to travel, masked, through Dulles Airport and onto an airplane that is, I believe, selling every seat they can, not blocking any for infection control. But upon arrival, I will be tested, and everyone else on the plane will also be tested. Contact information will be collected and I'll download the tracing app and go to my hotel. Once I get my clear test result, I'll be free to travel in an infection-free country. I'll board a small ship with up to 15 other people. On board, we will practice hygiene as best we can, and everywhere we plan to sail is extremely remote and without any (or much) settlement. When I get off the ship in Isafjordur (I can spell this without checking now!) I will either drive with fellow passengers or fly internally back to Reykjavik, spend another night in the same hotel, and then fly non-stop back to Dulles. When I get home, I'll do a two-week self quarantine, relying on family to do my shopping and staying away from our crowded park trails.

So the main vulnerability is me or a fellow crew member catching the virus as we travel into Iceland, so it doesn't yet show on the arrival test, and then becoming infectious and later symptomatic on our little voyage. Likewise, the trip home is a risk, but the plane ride home not so much, since I'll be leaving a "clean" country.

So in my opinion, the virus risks are acceptable. But as I started to figure this out, I really agonized over whether I really even wanted to go.

This trip is a very big deal to me. It takes a lot of gumption for me to travel on my own. I love it and I dread it both. I do not meet new people easily or naturally. A day or so after being on the boat, I'll be fine with my fellow crew members. It's the days before and after that have had me worried - I don't want to lurk in my hotel with room service, but eating alone in restaurants in a strange country isn't so easy. I planned to book some guided day trips from Reykjavik after I got there. But all the time, on my own and figuring things out solo, I've got an edge of adrenaline coursing through my veins. Aside from the social stuff, I planned to train for this trip and be much more fit by now than I actually am. If I go, I leave in three weeks and I can't reverse several months of lying on the couch obsessively tracking the news in that period of time. The truth is, the more fit I am the better time I'll have. But they don't actually require me to work the ship if I don't want to. There will be hikes ashore in the remote fjords, but I don't have to go, or go far. I could hang out on the beach and pretend my passion is macro photography of lichen and rocks. 

The deciding moment for me was when I was sailing this past Saturday. The day was lovely, we were out in a nice wind in the middle of the day, and I realized I felt better throughout my body than I have felt in days. Of course I want to do this trip. And it'll be fine. The parts I'm nervous about will be fine. I've even communicated with one of a couple of relatively local people (mid-Atlantic region, anyway) that are also going on the same trip - I think we're even going over on the same flight!

There are a lot of "ifs" around whether I will be allowed to do this trip. But the question of "do I want to" has finally been answered in my head and I'll be disappointed if I can't go. Maybe a tiny bit relieved, but mostly disappointed.

Update

Oh, geez, things have been in such turmoil - and yet, almost none of it touches me, directly. Just my family and those I love, and the country I love... Me? I worry, I ruminate, I self-medicate with books, my body declares war on me so the dizziness, migraines, knee pain and digestive distress really multiply, and my nervous system is on high alert for any signs of the virus. But I'm fine.

Things started going south the day I finally went sailing. My brother-in-law (BIL) dropped by to pick up my girl, who had come over to take care of my old dog. As he got to my door and came in, he got a text from his employee, showing her positive Covid-19 test result. Still standing in the doorway, I told him to step outside immediately. We sat down outside, distanced. His assistant - who can't work at the pharmacy alone, only accompanied by BIL or BIL's one other pharmacist - felt ill the day before. BIL sent her home (after 3 hours together, though both masked!) and asked her to get tested. Here was the result. Gah. So worried. We discussed contingency plans, for the family and for the business. It's now been more than two weeks, and both he and his assistant pharmacist are fine. His employee is still out, but at home. From the moment the text arrived till now, neither he nor my girl have come close to me. (My only risk factors are being old and fat, but I'd like to avoid any unpleasantness.)

So then the issues of racial justice and violence against black people blew up. I spiraled out of control, feeling like the country was close to civil war. If it came to it, I would put my life on the line. If I thought it would be useful. As I noted, I decided at this point to give money - enough to feel it - and to re-engage on areas where I could be actually useful. My body makes war on me, so that I couldn't look someone in the face and answer "yes" to "Do you feel well today?". It keeps me from attending even local protests. When the going gets tough, Nan gets sick. It's a pattern that has repeated itself all my life.

My BIL's pharmacy, in the latest gentrifying area of DC, has been hit three times. Not looting, professional thieves. Folks who knew which drugs to take. He boarded up the big windows. He's talking to the landlord about metal grating. His insurance company is not happy with the situation, and they are talking.

My girl decided she had to go into DC. Of course she did. It is the right thing. But it scares me to death. She has not, so far, encountered any violence. She is on fire with zeal, and also has big feet blisters. I cannot see her, except from a distance, as I provide some practical support. She wears a mask, she says. But she is putting herself at risk. It's so different to contemplate this from the parent perspective. I think back to my own activism, traveling across half the country with people I scarcely knew to protest the Vietnam war, narrowly escaping arrest from the vicious Nixon administration. I was never scared, just mad. Or partying. My parents, separated from me by geography in the pre-cell/text era, heard almost none of this. Now, I'm terrified for my girl. But I also get regular updates.

My boys are fine. The middle boy lives in DC with his girlfriend, in a small studio apartment, and they both are working from home on things that require a great deal of tech equipment. For Memorial Day weekend, they went to an AirBnB just a couple of blocks away - a two bedroom with a balcony and a roof deck! My boy believes strongly in the science of virus spread and has not gone to the streets. No protests directly where they are. He has money of his own, however, and is also giving. We talk often.

My big boy seems to have sunk himself in math. He lives in his university town in a big house with six other guys, so he doesn't lack for company while still being isolated. For the past several years, his life has revolved around math and ultimate frisbee. He's lost the latter, and feels disoriented. And he was competing in ultimate at the top levels of the country - both as a professional (literally, but don't quit your day job) and as a nationally ranked amateur. He's not trying now to keep conditioning up, couldn't think of a non-math book he's read recently, and just geeked to the max. His well-educated, liberal, university town has had some well-bred protests which he hasn't attended. So safe and well, relatively speaking, but I long to see him.

So we're fine.

Something My Government Did Right

I’m kind of spiraling out of control on the news front, and finding how best to engage on the racial justice front is consuming so much of my energy that.  In the meantime, I thought I’d check in on the pandemic. Remember the pandemic?

The Washington Post had an interactive website updated almost constantly that showed various statistics — mostly cases and deaths - for the DMV. (That’s the local shorthand for the DC area: DC, Maryland, and Virginia.) It seems to have disappeared, though they still have the graphics for national and international data. (Because the WaPo is a national paper, I have started going to the Baltimore Sun for info on state of Maryland matters.)

But my county government has one of the best government dashboards I’ve ever seen! It shows a wide variety of pertinent information. (Remember, “information” is data in context. A number sitting out there by itself is usually not very useful.) Since the dashboard was first brought to my attention via our very active neighborhood email group, it has been refined and updated. It shows not just real time cases and deaths, but where our capacity to handle cases is relative to the load. Remember, the whole point of flattening the curve was to have the capacity available. Then, for re-opening, we need testing and tracing. I was thinking what a useful addition that information would be to this dashboard, when they added a couple of pages for testing (but not tracing).

I have a long time professional interest in how to use data to tell a story. It’s difficult, and this is an especially good instance where numbers are presented in a way that one can grasp the situation. I’ve given my rave review to the county (hoping the poor under-appreciated data nerds will hear about it) and will also provide the link to some data visualization sites I frequent.

Spoiler alert on the state of my county: as of this writing, we are getting better on almost every front. From the beginning of the serious local outbreak, “acute care beds” (versus ICU or ventilators) has been the big problem.

The chart I show in this post is a static screen shot, the link is to the live site. Each one of the boxes on the first page has a graph on following pages you can click through, with the documentation at the end. Sometimes, the site takes a long to load initially, but clicking through once it’s loaded is quick.

Food

My food intake (and thus my weight) have really gone the wrong way lately. I primarily blame the Whirligig, because it hasn’t entirely settled down and it keeps a constant low level of nausea just below the surface. Fewer trips to the grocery store and other isolation measures mean I’m thrown back on my own resources for putting together meals, which often requires me to cook.

I have white board material on the fridge
and keep a rough inventory as a reminder

I don’t hate cooking, I just don’t want to spend the time every day to do it. And while I have a few dishes I do well, I’m not a fabulous every day chef. I do continue to improve. I took an internet month-long class in it once, and that helped. I love reading cookbooks, but rarely do I actually use one to make a dish. Most likely when I have visitors, ie not now. More often, I use the cookbooks as inspiration, techniques and seasoning approaches. I’m in a kind of routine, and I often make big portions so I can just reheat quickly. I’m good eating the same thing for 2-3 days before I get sick of it, but I’m getting better at freezing extra portions right away, so it doesn’t get bad and I have quick food sitting in the freezer.

Way back in March, when were all preparing to hunker down, we didn’t know exactly what to prepare for. I assumed there was a good chance I’d get sick, and I’d be physically on my own during the illness because I wouldn’t just run to the hospital. So much of my early shopping was for quick and easy convenience foods for the cupboard and the freezer - shelf stable soups, frozen dinners, popcorn, granola, cereals, energy bars, apple sauce. Things I could either eat raw or pop in the microwave. This came in handy at the peak of the vertigo, once I was ready to try to keep food in me. At the outset, I also shopped for WTSHTF (prepper term, google it). Heavy on beans and brown rice and big shelf stable boxes of broth and tomatoes, which went down into the basement. I filled the freezer with bags of frozen veggies and fruit. I bought fresh veggies which were likely to keep a while, squash and cabbage and lemons and limes.

I started out well, keeping an eye on the inventory and usually cooking the next thing that might go bad. I was determined not to waste any food. I ended up using vegetables that in happier times I likely would have pitched right out. Tossed into rice and lentils cooked in the Instant Pot, and frozen into portions to provide quick, microwaveable food. I made two trips to the supermarket in April, and one so far this month, focused on fresh foods, but also replenishing any shelf stable things I used. That turns out to be about every two weeks. My girl (who goes more often to the grocery) has picked up a few extra items for me, and I got a smallish delivery from Costco, focused on big bags of coffee and some bulk organic meat for freezing. I’ve done takeout about every ten days, and I buy enough one time to last 2-3 meals. And at the height of my vertigo I ordered several pound of Gin-gins to be delivered.

But my evenings have been a continuous problem. And they wouldn’t be such a problem if I didn’t bring the treats into the house in the first place. When I buy chocolate or ice cream treats, I try to remember to ask myself, “What is my intention in buying this?” I have two themes playing out in my mind. My conscious mind is saying “No food has power over me.” Good thought. “No food is “bad”. Another good thought. “I can have just a tiny bit and stop”. NOT TRUE, at least this is not how things usually unfold. My conscious mind is an adorable optimist!

The other theme playing is simply a constant but mostly unconscious refrain, “Everything is awful so I’m going to give myself pleasure by eating this.”

When I got vertigo last month, that second theme just rose up and took over.

In my own defense, I had severe nausea, and my digestive system went wonky from top to bottom. I needed to eat what I rarely eat - white carbs in the form of white rice, pasta, toast. Microwaveable chicken soup. And, sadly, sugar also sat well. No fiber - no beans, no cabbage family, no crusty whole grains. I grazed gin-gins freely (they really work well for nausea, I use them on the boat), and squares of chocolate seemed to smooth things over.

While the nausea isn’t completely gone, my overall digestive system is much better. But I’ve got to get a handle back on my eating, aiming at the vegetables and whole grains and controlling my evenings. I have some ideas - stay tuned.

Nan’s Not Quite Excellent Adventures

Spoiler: Nothing bad, and not much at all, happens in this post. It’s called an adventure only because all my other days are so dull. This has the tiniest frisson of danger, but unknowable how much or how it comes out.

The last time I left the house and went to a place of commerce was Wednesday, March 18, when I stocked up at Whole Foods and PetSmart. On Friday, March 27, I went to the marina to check on my boat. I wasn’t within six feet of anyone the whole time, except a rambunctious puppy. On the way home, I drove past Costco and Walmart and Lowes and Home Depot, but reluctantly decided not to stop at any of those places. I didn’t need anything. Just lusting after some things, especially plants. So  for three weeks the only breach in my bubble is seeing my niece. She has been in my house, though not within hugging distance (not me in hers, because it is not tightly bubbled). Oh yes, also the gas company guys were in the house last week. So not an intact bubble. I’ve had takeout delivered twice, but I consider that risk minimal.

Yesterday, Wednesday, I had enough cloth masks made to distribute to the family. I drove down to the  city and met my nephew and his girlfriend outside their apartment to make the handoff.

It was so weird being out! This was the first time I had been out of my neighborhood since the trip to the marina. Traffic was light. The first part of the trip is the same path I followed for twenty years to work. Since I’ve been bubbled, I feel like my life is not that different than it would be anyway. But it is. More than I realized, I stepped through the portal into this alternate reality we all live in now. My world has shrunk. I accept some of the premises under which we operate now, so that while watching Grey’s Anatomy I yelled at the TV to make them stop hugging patients and each other! Danger! Not Safe! So there I was, in a place familiar and yet not, because things are so different now. I am different. I wore one of my masks during my brief outdoor visit to hand off masks to my nephew. I drove home the long way, past my old office building (occupied because of operational necessity), a mostly deserted national mall, and through Rock Creek Park, admiring the blooming redbuds. My path took me through downtown Silver Spring, and I thought of stopping at a store, but I hadn’t brought gloves and hadn’t thought through my list. I was struck by the amount of roadwork underway - what a good idea, with good weather and light traffic. I was distressed to see that none of the road workers were wearing masks. When I got home, my mask went in the wash pile, but that was it, no other decontamination. Still, it was odd.

My plan for a while had been to go to the supermarket today - depending on the haul, perhaps Costco as well. They have old people’s early opening hours, so it did involve setting an alarm and heading out early. My struggle on whether to go went something like this:

“I don’t need anything. I have lots of food in the house.”
“But I don’t want to eat anything that’s already here. I want new! I want different!”
“So now I’m going to risk my life because I don’t want to make curry out of that sad old cauliflower?”
“I have my staples, sure. But I’ll really start feeling the pressure in another week, when I’m down to just beans and rice. And the easy-prep soups I got for if I get sick. What if, when I am truly out of food, either food is not available or I’m not able to go to the store by myself?”

It was that last argument that decided me. I feel good, now. Word in the neighborhood is that most things - especially fresh foods - are well stocked. Word also is that delivery is difficult - available delivery times are hard to get. Online ordering does not have real-time inventory, so things you think you are getting, even if a couple of days out, don’t actually show up in the bag. So, I made my list carefully last night, even plotted my course through the store to be as efficient as possible. (Fun aside: I confided my plan, including setting an alarm, to my girl. She said, “but how can you use the old people’s hours?”. I think she was genuinely surprised to realize I qualified!)

Up and out early this morning, 7:05, with clean cotton mask and clean cotton gloves. I carefully put my credit card in an easily reached pocket, and left the purse in the car, so it wouldn’t be “exposed”. Whole Foods opened at 7 to old people, and I was about a dozen people back from the front of the line, as they metered how many could be in at once. About five minutes wait, with everyone I could see in a mask or bandana - mostly what look like disposable surgical masks. The store line monitor asked a couple of very grey and old-looking folks in front of me for their IDs, giving me a moment’s panic (purse back in the car). But, it was a joke, to keep things light.

But I couldn’t be light. I thought, Soviet Russia. The opening scene from that movie where Robin Williams is Russian and later defects, in Bloomingdale’s. But first, he is queuing for toilet paper. I looked at the older (than me) folks and thought, Did you ever think this would happen here?  While standing there, I looked at my list and rehearsed my planned path through the store.

Once in, the very first thing I did was toss a bag of avocados into the cart. Not on my list. I like avocados, but a whole bag? Things got partly back on track, as I checked things off. Cabbage. Lettuce. Carrots - not on the list, but they keep well, what a good idea. Oh, lemons will be useful. No, I don’t have a plan involving them, but they keep well in the fridge. There was an awkward dance through the store, as some people were very conscious of keeping distance, standing back and waiting before moving to a shelf. Others were in their own mental bubble, and just moved right along, stepping in front of and close to others. I ended up with a full basket (including some gelato, not part of the original plan). I got most things on my list, and not too much that wasn’t on my list. The only real shortage I noticed was in the frozen food department - few, if any, frozen vegetables. I was able to be third in line to check out, not much of a wait. I had my own bags, so they wouldn’t do the bagging (which decreased by one the number of people touching my stuff).

When I was done, I went to the hardware store right there (same parking lot). They had plants! Sitting out front, calling to me! In the past, I have scorned to buy plants from them, because they are not well tended. But I couldn’t help myself. I got some stuff, also picked up some paper yardwaste bags (always useful), and didn’t really venture any further inside.

By then, it was 8:05. The Costco old peoples’ hours start at 8, and I decided not to go. The fact is, the main thing I want from Costco is Aidell’s Chicken and Apple Sausages, a staple in my household for twenty years. If I went, I would get other stuff, especially coffee beans. But, there are other sources for coffee beans, and I also have two small unopened cans of ground Folgers I rescued from my mother’s apartment for emergencies. I was certain there would be a wait to get into Costco, and I couldn’t let the gelato melt. I’ve seen the sausages sometimes at my Giant, so I went there.

The only thing I was planning to get were the sausages, which they didn’t have. But the first thing I saw when I went in was asparagus, so I got that. Then, disappointed by no sausages, I wandered a bit. I ended up buying a fairly large collection of fancy cookies, including Oreos with dark chocolate (flavored) filling. I also saw, in the aisle where they stock the Hispanic brands (a perk of my neighborhood, big demand), packages of dried beans, labeled “small red”, “white”, and “pink”. Charmed, I bought one of each. I also saw all-purpose flour, which the neighborhood chat had indicated was in short supply. I don’t bake a lot, but I have stress-baked a couple of times in the last couple of weeks, and I knew I didn’t have much flour left. My thought process on the beans and flour was along the lines of “what if there is scarcity later? I’ll regret not buying when I had the chance.”

I think I am a bit of a hoarder, and also a bit of a miser. I want to know I have plenty - that’s the hoarding. Traditionally, I leave the best stuff to last, and sometimes that means I don’t get to the best stuff before it goes bad - that is miserly. As I try to manage my perishables and my pantry, I’m consciously trying to eat the stuff that will go bad first. But I’m also trying to buy and eat stuff I normally like. Dried beans and baking are slightly off my path. But they will keep, and should true scarcity strike, I’ll be glad to have them in reserve.

When I got home, I realized how nuts trying to be sanitary will quickly make me. I used hand sanitizer in the car when I took the gloves off, and wiped down the steering wheel and door handle. Then, I used my clean and bare hands to pick up the mask and gloves and shove them in a pocket for bringing in the house. Huh. I brought all my bags into the kitchen with bare hands, though I had worn gloves to put them in car. I had a cleaning cloth I soaked in hot soapy water, and with that and bare hands I gave a less-than-thorough swipe to packaging as I put stuff away in the fridge and freezer and cupboards. I put the mask and gloves into a bowl with a capful of Woolite and hot water, and swished them around with bare hands, feeling better about my hands. I swiped the doorknobs. I washed my credit card! Then I stripped, tossed all my clothes into the laundry, and took a shower. I realized as I took my eyeglasses off for the shower that they were also a potential harbor for a virus, so they got washed too. After the shower, I wrung out the mask and gloves, and put them in the hot sunshine outside to dry. (Except as I wrote this, a clap of thunder alerted me to the shower that just started, brief interruption to get stuff in!)

I am certain there is cross-contamination going on. I can’t maintain surgical cleanliness. I discussed with my kids, that not every exposure results in infection. Also “viral load” is a thing, so more exposure, and how much one is exposed to, are factors in the probability of getting sick. But this is making me nuts. I think for the next while, I’ll just stay the fuck home.