puttering, flowers, and alone time

Kind of a slow day at SHARE last Thursday. Most first Thursdays of the month usually are and we figure that’s because people got their government assistance. Even so we managed to pass on most the perishable food stuff and milk and a lot of the bakery goods which is all ‘sell by’ or marked down donations from Walmart and the area dollar stores that comes in in the morning. Those that did come in for food got a lot of extra stuff. What doesn’t get given out or we have no room in the freezers, volunteers can take for themselves or to give to others. I generally take left over stuff that won’t keep til next week to a family on the street.

Thursdays are always a busy day for me but this past one was especially so. Besides my usual routine I got another roll of the super strong black gorilla tape to re-do the black formed plastic shield under the engine compartment of the car. Marc had run into one of the concrete barriers at the ends of parking spaces and tore it up so that part was hanging down and dragging on the road surface which I did not know until I drove to El Campo that evening for yoga. I could hear a scraping sound so I pulled over once I was in El Campo and looked underneath and it was all bent and torn and shredded from being dragged for 13 miles. Later back at home I did my best to tape it all back together and to the surrounding frame. 

Since Marc was leaving on Friday for Dallas, a 5+ hour long drive and with the wear and tear and rain and dirt on my repair over the last year or so I wanted to redo it. So I did that. Then I wiped all the bird poop off the car and washed all the windows inside and out. 

This weekend is the Bar Mitzvah of our great nephew, Marc’s sister’s daughter’s son. All the family here was planning on going, as were the twins in Austin, so I opted to stay to feed my cat and dog, Robin’s cat and the boys, and the three wildlings. That was my excuse though I have other more personal reasons. So Friday morning Marc took off for Dallas giving me one full day, Saturday, and the lion’s share of Friday and Sunday to have the house to myself, some alone time (one of my personal reasons).

I puttered around in the yard yesterday, potted up some things, cut up some large branches, one that fell and others I cut off the native pecan in the back that were hanging so low they were almost touching the ground, did some watering over at the other house, fed all the cats, fixed myself a big salad for dinner. More of the same for today. 

Some of the day lilies are putting up bloom scapes but all the different varieties of amaryllis are blooming. 

And one new iris blooming over at Pam’s and some of these are coming home with me.

seasonal stuff and social anxiety

It's October so that means the confederate roses are blooming. Confederate rose is a not a rose but a mallow, part of the hibiscus family or, I guess, hibiscus is part of the mallow family.

There are two times a year, spring and fall, when two things happen. The first thing is that I have to wear a cap in the morning sitting at my desktop because I face east and the sun is rising later and has moved so that it shines in my face when it breaks through the leaves of the photinia. The second thing is the chair in the bedroom. You know, the chair where clothes go that have been worn enough not to be folded and put away and too clean to go in the wash. These two times every year the chair sports not one season's garments but two, warm weather and cool weather. Wake up, check the weather app, select the appropriate clothing off the chair for the day, get dressed. Tomorrow it may be the other set of clothes. My yoga clothes also live on the chair Monday through Thursday. I usually wear the same clothes for a week unless they get really dirty or smelly. I don't go anywhere except the grocery store, an occasional errand, and SHARE (I do wear fresh clothes to SHARE) so I see no need to put on fresh clean clothes every day and it cuts down on the laundry.

Monday was a good day. I got rid of a lot of the give away stuff. Rocky took all the fishing gear, the two footlockers, and a National Geographic telescope that was given to my grandson at some point and everyone thought it was a great idea to leave it at Granny's house out in the country. All well and good but we could never figure out how to make it work. Rocky knows a guy into that stuff so he took it to give to him. The other stuff was the box of games and puzzles, the box of yarn and crochet hooks, and the box of memories from the kids growing up. I took those over to where my son in law works for him to take home to Robin and Sarah. After Sarah goes through the box of memories she can take it to her brother for him to sort through.

It was pretty breezy Tuesday and the pecans are really starting to fall. Up until then, for the past three weeks or so, I've been picking up a handful or pocketful or two a day. Tuesday I picked up two gallons worth and I could hear them falling now and then when I was out there,

filled this bucket twice

was still a little breezy Wednesday, overcast and humid, 50% to 91% chance of rain starting today and for the next seven days. Walking the yard at midday picking up pecans and fallen trees branches I was hot and sweaty enough to change my mind about going over to the shop and doing more clearing out and reorganizing. That's going to change on Sunday when a front comes through. Instead of dropping 50 degrees from high to low as previously predicted, it's only going to drop 40 degrees.

I've stopped buying lunch meat because we are sick and tired of all the choices and too processed for our preference anyway but just so convenient so we've been making do with leftovers and tuna and the like, grilled cheese. I decided I wanted to make tostadas from the leftover refried beans in the fridge so I looked for already crisp tostada shells (not really a shell, just crisp corn tortillas) and I could buy them if I wanted 32! So I got a small package of corn tortillas (10) and I'm going to crisp them up myself. So that was a success and they were really good.

Tonight, Friday, is a little social gathering and dinner at the home of one of the couples that volunteer at SHARE. I have RSVPed my attendance but I'd be lying if I said I was really looking forward to it because I'm basically anti-social. I told Marc he did not have to go since he doesn't know any of the people besides our two neighbors that volunteer so he's staying home. I wouldn't want to go either if the situation was reversed. I get along with everyone and we joke and kid around but we're there to do a job so it's easy. Plus, you know, I've had weeks and months to get comfortable with everyone. But a purely social situation is different. I'm very different from the rest in many ways, I don't do religion, not conservative and in fact am an unapologetic liberal, I smoke pot and drink, I'm fluent in profanity, I'm an old hippie fer cryin' out loud. Anyway, my anxiety surfaced in my dream last night. I dreamed that I was having this party and I had waited til the last minute to clean house or prepare food and get in drinks so I was frantically running around making beds and picking up personal belongings, searching every closet for the dress I wanted to wear and couldn't find it and people were starting to arrive and somehow there was some drinks and some sort of hors 'doeuvres made out of graham crackers while I was still trying to find the dress but not the promised dinner. Then the whole group moved out to the park where some sort of competitions were planned and one of the women was a little pissed about either not winning or not being chosen, something. Anyway, I woke up.

tales from a COVID-19 self-quarantine, part 2

Monday... 

Bill the plumber showed up to connect the water lines to the sink with a new helper. “Where's Gunnar?” I asked. “Gunnar's sick today,” he says. I'm on the phone to Gunnar's mom. Sore throat, she says. OK, that's good, if having a sore throat can be good. Sore throats are not symptoms of this virus. The clinic wouldn't let him in...not a symptom, go home, if you get symptoms on this list, call people on this list.

Got a text from my daughter (I had teased her with jigsaw puzzles last week).

Got my dirt and a quick foray to the grocery store for butter, bread, and oats. Got the butter and oats but no bread. Well, they had bread but not the kind we eat (Orowheat Jewish Rye), plenty of wheat bread though which we don't eat. Last Monday when I went besides only having one door open it was pretty much as usual. Today the door on the right end of the building was for entering, the door on the left end was for leaving. The entrance was cordoned off so as to create a line with an attendant at the door handing you a cart and controlling how many people could enter. The checkout stations had red squares with white footprints on the floor every six feet to show people the correct social distancing and there was a clear plastic shield between the customer and the checker. She wouldn't let me hand her the money. I had to put it on the little shelf and then she picked it up. This was probably my last outing until the next trip to the grocery store.

GroupMe text from Abby re yoga tonight...anybody interested in a FB Live class? Respondents say yes so no more in person classes for a couple of weeks or whenever. I guess we're all a little more nervous. So we're doing yoga together and yet we are apart.

The library, open with reduced hours last week, is closed this week.

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Tuesday... 

I wonder if the younger people getting seriously sick are ones who vape. Harris County, in which is Houston, is going into lock down today. Three more confirmed cases in my county, all in El Campo and vicinity 12 miles away.

Chatted with my (not crazy) neighbor (though I may have to amend that) today. He doesn't believe the coronavirus is real (do you know anybody who has it he asked me), doesn't believe global warming is real either. Apparently what he does believe is every crackpot conspiracy theory out there. I asked him where his tinfoil hat was.

Dug up some woodland petal pinks, baby blue eyes, easter lilies, purple coneflower, rocket larkspur, love-in-a-mist, and a banana tree for my neighbor who speaks about as much English as I do Spanish which is hardly any. I wrote down all the info for her so her son could translate it.

Texas' Lt. Governor Dan Patrick is all for everyone going back to work now because all the grandparents will be willing to die for the economy for their grandchildren. Many Republicans are on board with that. I should be surprised. I'm not. No, sorry Dan, I would die for my grandchildren if it would save their lives. I will not offer to die to save a millionaire a few bucks.

Trump, who has the attention span of a gnat, is bored. COVID-19 is a bore. People keep saying mean things about him. Someone posted a video of him getting a current pandemic briefing and he couldn't even keep his eyes open much less pretend like he was paying attention. He's ready to move on and declare it all done. He wants his beautiful stock market back. He wants his beautiful rallies back and to be showered with adoration. He wants his golf weekends back. He's picked Easter Sunday to relieve all restrictions because he thinks it's a 'beautiful day' to start the resurrection of the economy. Yeah, go pack those churches; get breathed on, coughed on, and sung on by all the people around you. Good thing I'm not a believer.

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Wednesday... 

Out of bread.

Saw this tweet which is why the husband made a trip into Houston yesterday before it was locked down to get something we consider essential to our working and living together 24/7 for 44 years.

Thank the powers that be that the Democrats regained control of the House. The Republican stimulus bill was all about bailing out industry with little to no oversight and little to no provisions for the working class including a secret $500B slush fund for them to dole out to their cronies with recipients' names being withheld for 6 months and Trump refusing to promise that he and his family would not be a recipient. Doesn't matter because even if he had promised, it would have been a lie.

Quiet day. Got some things out of pots and in the ground. Had our FB Live yoga class, walked the dog. There's a mountain of dishes in the kitchen that aren't getting washed today either. Finished my book.

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Thursday... 

Had to call the plumber back today as the p-trap was leaking I noticed last night. There was a puddle on the shelf under the sink. Rocky showed up and fixed it. We think.

Well, hooray! Some news outlets are finally going to stop airing Trump's daily news briefing re-election rally since all he does is give out false information lie, whine about how badly he's being treated, and brag on himself.

Spending more time than I should on FB and Twitter but less time every day as I'm reaching overload on the incompetence of the people at the top, reading blog posts about what people are doing, how they are coping. For me it's still pretty much my regular life. I'm a bit amused by some of the extreme lengths people are going to to protect themselves, wiping down everything before they touch it, wiping down everything before it comes into their house that someone might have touched...food, mail, shoes, packages, money, phone, car, any and everything...but then I don't live in a heavily infected area, only four confirmed cases in my county.

And I did manage to do the dishes and clean the kitchen just in time for Marc to mess it up again.

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Friday... 

Today the US has the most confirmed cases in the world and rising thanks to Trump's inaction and incompetence. Worldwide today the death rate is about 5%. Some people keep trying to poo poo the severity of this pandemic comparing it to things like annual deaths from flu, annual deaths from car accidents, annual deaths from suicides, all improper analogies. Suicides are unpreventable as long as people have easy access to guns, flu isn't nearly as contagious or lethal and most people have some immunity to various strains, and if 5% of people on our roads at any one time died I'm pretty sure we'd be shutting down the roads. No one has any immunity to COVID-19, it is highly contagious with a high death rate. For instance, worldwide (according to this article and I'm rounding these figures up) as of two days ago 500,000 (half a million) cases and 21,000 deaths. Seasonal flu in the US alone sickens 38,000,000 (that's 38 million) people with 23,000 deaths. Currently in the US we have 85,762 confirmed cases of COVID-19 with 1,306 deaths which is more than 1.5%. The older you are the higher the death rate which is why Italy with it's aged population has had so many deaths. The over 80s haven't got much of a chance though young people are dying too and by young I mean 40 and under.

And nope, p-trap is still seeping.

Wharton County now has 5 confirmed cases, four in El Campo and surrounding area, one in the rural area around Wharton. Getting closer.

Feeling listless today. Went outside to do some more work in the yard. Did I really want to do that work in the sun I asked myself. No, no I do not. I did manage to bathe the dog and clean the filter to the turtle pond, a nasty icky job if ever there was one, and watered the front yard.

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Saturday...

“You know,” he added from the White House, “we don’t like to see the complaints.”

^ This from the president of the United States as the country struggles to deal with the COVID-19 pandemic as this country now has the most confirmed cases in the world. He also said he told Pence, who leads the coronavirus response team, to ignore governors in hard hit areas if they are 'not appreciative' (in other words the first words out of their mouths isn't praise for Trump). And this...Michigan Governor Whitmer who has been vocal about the horrible job Trump has and is doing says that vendors were told not to send stuff to Michigan, that supplies she has ordered are being sent to the federal government instead. Trump also has decided that New York doesn't need all the ventilators it's asking for because...? I'll tell you why, because Governor Cuomo has publicly criticized Trump. More proof that for Trump his ego is more important than the lives of everyday Americans. He doesn't give a rat's ass how many people die. 

Well, Trump has finally signed an order to compel General Motors to manufacture ventilators (why GM?), something he should have done back in January, and practically in the next breath harangued them for not being able to make 40,000 overnight.

A worker for a national company with an outlet in Texas has reported that employees received a letter stating that their paychecks would be preemptively cut by 100% of the amount they receive from the stimulus package just passed by Congress and not just once but every time the government decides to send the common people a check. Preemptively. In other words, the company will decide how much they think the government is sending their employees and deduct that about from their paycheck before the employee even gets the money. WHAT THE FUCK IS WRONG WITH PEOPLE!!!

Cooler out today and overcast. Did a little more putzing around in the yard. Finally sat down determined to do a drawing or a watercolor. Maybe both.

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Sunday...

I read two articles today, one in the NYT and the other in the WAPO, about the likelihood of contracting the virus by touching a surface that an infected person touched like a package delivered or a container at the grocery store. While the virus can be detected on surfaces like glass, plastic, paper, cardboard (the longest), steel, clothing hours later; it is highly unlikely that you will get the virus from those surfaces for several reasons those being the infected person showing symptoms (fever, coughing, sneezing) would probably not be working, the infected person would have to have recently coughed or sneezed directly on the surface, and you would have to touch the exact spot the infected person coughed on and then immediately touch your face or mouth.

Current statistics as of today 3/29/20, 14:55 GMT (last Sunday's totals in parenthesis): cases – 123,958 (38,757); deaths – 2,231 (400); recoveries – 3,238 (178).

The next two weeks are going to be horrific.

tales from a COVID-19 self-quarantine

Week one of partial self-quarantine is done. I say partial because I have been to the grocery store, to yoga twice, went out to pick up my watercolor, and went to the feed store besides walking the dog every day.

Last Sunday night I got a call from my daughter with our marching orders. We were to prepare to stay at home for a month and Aunt Pam too. She was going in to the city to finish a few things on her desk at work and then do a big shop so if we needed anything text her a list and then she was going into quarantine at home as her work was going to close to the public. And NO yoga for you, she tells me.

I went to yoga Monday night (and Wednesday night). Not five minutes after I left, she and her husband pulled up.

“Where's Mom?”

“You're not supposed to be here”, my husband said.

“Where's Mom?”

“Mumble mumble yoga.”

“I told her NO yoga!”

I texted her Wednesday morning to see how her first day (Tuesday) of self-quarantine went.

“Boring!”

In fact, she had gone in to work Wednesday which did turn out to be her last day for the next who knows.

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Since I had called my sister to pass on her marching orders, she grumbled about ignoring them and then said she'd go to the grocery store in the morning to get in more supplies. Since you get up before I do, I told her, call me and let me know if they have anything. 8:30 AM Monday morning the phone rings,

“If you aren't already on your way you better get here soon,” she says. 

Parking lot is full, store is packed, every checker station open, people wheeling heaped cart loads out. Well, damn. Haven't even had my coffee yet but I got dressed and got there before 9 AM (store opened at 8 AM). Parking lot was not full, store was not packed, at least 4 checker stations were closed. I was mostly concerned about getting enough dog and cat food for a month but I picked up other things as I saw them available, like the bread we buy and the peanut butter he likes and dried beans and OJ and fruit and avocados and lunch meat and eggs, in all $130+. I didn't bother to go on the paper aisle as we have enough but it was odd the things there were and the things there were not. Like plenty of meat but no fresh vegetables except for beets and bok choy but plenty of fresh fruit, lots of chips. Only a few 5 lb bags of potatoes and only one bin of loose big yellow onions. Dried beans were almost completely cleaned out leaving only some bags of the weird ones or lentils. I discovered 6 bags of pintos on a lower shelf that had been overlooked because they couldn't be seen while standing. Getting checked out the woman behind me was quizzing the cashier on what would be available when and she just shrugged. Gotta get here before 8 if you want something specific she said. Talking to my daughter later she told me people were already waiting in the parking lot at 6:30 AM when they drove by on their way to work that morning. Marc went yesterday afternoon and was able to get just about everything on the list except butter, lots of bacon he said, but all just one single kind.

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Dentist office called, I assumed to tell me my new crown was ready, but no, they were calling to tell me they were closing til April.

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As mentioned, my sister and I went to yoga on Monday night and I went on Wednesday. It's a large indoor/outdoor building (the sides roll up when the weather is good) and I knew the walls would be partially up as it had been a warm day, it's a small group (usually just 6 - 12 people), and we could easily stay 10' away from each other, and at that time there were no known or suspected cases of the virus in our county. The general consensus was we want to be careful but we also need some normalcy in our lives. Plus the yoga helps keep us centered and not freaking out for at least that hour. I'm starting to waver on going next week though because while I think it would be safe enough, El Campo, where the class is, now has its first confirmed case of COVID-19; a 30 yr. old woman who had traveled recently to an area with a high number of cases and is quarantining at home. How many people did she infect before her symptoms showed? I'm thinking perhaps better to be more prudent going forward.

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Also as mentioned I went to the local feed store late morning Saturday to get bird seed and potting soil and composted peat so I can pot up some of the stuff I want to share with a neighbor. I got the bird seed but not the dirt because as soon as I walked in it started raining and I wasn't going to have the guys loading that stuff up in the rain but it had been awhile since I had been in and since I'm friendly with two of the employees, they had been wondering if I was OK. Yes I told her, just waiting for spring and then the sudden bathroom remodel had kept me preoccupied. Normally we would have hugged hello and/or goodbye but not this visit though we did get closer than 6'. So I will go get the dirt Monday, an essential trip for me and for them as some commerce has to get done and the dirt will keep me busy at home, but it may be my only outing all next week besides walking the dog.

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The planet is getting to breathe a little easier without all the constant frantic human activity. Factories shutting down for weeks, cars off the roads, just less general activity and the pollution producing effects of it all stilled for a short time. China is seeing exceedingly rare blue skies, the canals in Venice have cleared up and you can see the fish and swans and dolphins are swimming in them again.

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According to this website, WORLDOMETER, these are the current statistics for the US as of 3/22/20, 18:43 GMT: cases – 38,757; deaths – 400; recoveries – 178. Kind of alarming as the numbers grow exponentially. Still not enough masks or protective gear for our health workers or ventilators for desperate patients, still not enough tests and the ones we have take too long to get results, still arrivals at airports aren't so much as getting their temperature taken, still an incompetent whiner doing nothing in the White House except spouting off more ignorance. In Texas, as of Saturday, there were 325 people who tested positive and 5 deaths. Most of the cases are in the large urban areas...Dallas/Ft. Worth, Austin/San Antonio, Houston. Houston is an hour away. Still, our county is very rural, lots of farm and ranch land, and this town I live outside of is not very active though people do commute to the city to work.

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Some people are speculating that the world will be a much different place when this is over. I'm not sure what they mean by that. Different as in learning to live without constant stimulation or instant gratification or continual rushing around? That people will learn to slow down and bide time and be here now? That we will be more relaxed and compassionate and good to others? That we will all of a sudden realize we don't need all that stuff out there calling to us and we will adopt simpler lifestyles causing this pause for the planet to become normal? Yeah, fat chance. We will all still be human beings mired in this modern culture and we will go back to our selfish ways post haste. Or as hastily as a society can during a recession caused by all the lost work, lost jobs, lost businesses, lost investments followed by lost homes. Because surely that's the different world we will face when this is over. Or maybe not. We'll see.

cynicism ascendent

re my last post...a tweet that simply sums it up: "They didn’t save health care for 9 million kids. They didn’t save 800,000 DREAMers from being deported. They didn’t protect us from guns. They didn’t make us safer. They didn’t create any jobs. They didn’t help seniors, students or disabled. Republicans only helped themselves." - Scott Dworkin

And from Trump's own mouth to his rich friends at Mar-A-Lago...”You all just got a lot richer.”

Another 5 minute snippet heard on NPR yesterday about 'doxxing' (making someone's personal and private information public on the internet for the express purpose of intimidation via intense harassment and threats)...the backstory of this woman (whose name I did not get) is that she came out against some injustice naming a guy and putting out on social media his name and the organizations he was connected to, that he was a nazi who organizes for them and if he moves into your neighborhood just know that this is who he is and what he wants to do basically blowing this guy's cover and he moved away and the alt-right gun nut group doxxed her which led to extreme harassment for which she was prepared, she said in the interview, knew it would happen but thought it important for people to know. The interviewer was putting forth the position that men were losing their jobs because of accusations, of being a nazi, of sexual harassment, not proof of wrongdoing, and was a form of 'social justice', akin to vigilanteism, and the opposite of the rule of law which is what we are supposed to abide by. What my little brain was thinking about the interviewer's comment was that if the rule of law was actually doing it's job and protecting people, we wouldn't need social justice. She plans to continue the practice, letting people in communities know who the wolves are among them.

Yes, I know it's Christmas Eve and I should be writing about anticipation and cookies and presents and decorations and trees and food and be all smiley but I don't do Christmas. Not a believer, not in the religious part which is an attempt by one religion to wipe out it's predecessor by keeping the celebration but making it about the new god and not in the cultural part which is a totally manufactured group of 'traditions' loosely based on pre-christian celebrations for the express purpose of parting you from your cash. I suppose it's the same thing as happened before. Pagan god gave way to the christian god and the christian god gave way to the money god.

Well, since the Republicans just made the rich richer and the Christian right supports the Republicans, a worse lot of sinners according to their own theology you won't find, so I'm guessing that the transfer to the new god is near complete judging by the rise of all the born again right wing Prosperity Theology being preached.

hermit days

Yesterday, Wednesday, I left the premises for the first time since last Thursday. I would have left on Monday but yoga was canceled at the last minute. The week or so before that I think I only left the property for yoga. I'm leaving the house today because it's estate sale day, which is why I left the house last Thursday. Also I have a list of errands I've needed to run in town but haven't been motivated to do. I've been pretty much a hermit since we got back from Hawaii. Doctor visits, yoga, and the occasional visiting with neighbors while I walk the dog has been about all the contact with humanity I want. I've finally stopped sleeping til 9 or later, waking up at my usual between 7 and 8. I take my thyroid pill, drink a small glass of water, and then head outside for an hour or so doing whatever yard chore, then come in for coffee, internet, and breakfast before starting on whatever model I'm working on, then lunch break while we watch General Hospital, then more work on whatever model til it's time to feed and walk the dog after which I fix my cocktail and relax til dinner and then after dinner, read til I fall asleep. Yay! Exciting stuff!

I'll be leaving again tomorrow to drive into Houston to pick up the grandgirl Robin and with another list of supply run stops between Houston and here. It will be a long day and money will be spent.

Robin is 16 this summer, the age I expected the grandkids to stop wanting to come spend a week out of their summer with their grandparents. They did continue to come but life is changing in their house. Mikey is 20 and works full time but he still pops in unexpectedly now and then. The twins, who still came for their weeks though they have worked full time during the summers since they were 16, are now 19 and preparing to leave for college mid-August. They may or may not manage a few days before then. They're only working weekends this summer and are spending time with their friends and going places before they all go off in different directions. Which brings me back to Robin who would just as happily spend her summer holed up in her room and hanging out with her friends as come visit. I'm not sure this four days was motivated by her desire to come spend a few days or her mother's prodding. Either way I'll be happy to have this time with her.

We finally got a decent rain yesterday. Still seeing baby anoles and baby toads.  This guy was a half inch from it's nose to it's pointy little butt.

The white orchid tree (more like a shrub) that froze to the ground that I almost discarded before I noticed that it was finally coming out is blooming.

So is the white plumeria

and the yellow flowering senna

and the morning glory bush

and the yellow bells

and the native hibiscus is putting on a second round of flowering.