Quarantine Times
April 04, 2020
In the midst of this madness, I try to remember how fortunate I am. I'm employed and can work from home. I have Joe and SonnyeBoy. We have plenty of food. We can make our rent, car payment, bills. Entertainment galore. I'm two weeks out from the last time I was around lots of people and three weeks out from the last time I was in a big crowd and so far I'm not sick.
Speaking of work, I bought a monitor to hook up to my work laptop. After three weeks of staring at the little screen, my eyes have acquired a squint and I'm not doing my neck any favors either. A nice, ultra high definition 24" monitor should help. I figure I can tote it to the office (Office? What means this "Office"?) and have a second screen at my desk - actually, it would be a third screen if I count the laptop. Luxury!
Joe does house stuff, picks up lunch, buys the groceries, takes walks. We watch TV. We buy things online. I've done some cooking; Joe's done some cooking. We have toilet paper. I have my meds. We're quite comfortable. It's quiet - well, the neighbors upstairs like to play fetch with their big dog every afternoon, so that's fun. And one night at midnight the next-door neighbor played Call of Duty or Grand Theft Auto or Fast and Furious with Guns or some such with their home theater surround sound turned up to the max, but Joe solved that problem by cop-knocking on their door. He did this loudly enough that the neighbor didn't even answer the door. The noise stopped, though. Success!
Last Sunday we went on a long drive around the area just to get out of the house, but apparently that's frowned upon because what if you get into an accident? But I really think it saved our marriage. (Kidding.) (Mostly.) It was lovely to be outside, riding along, looking at the scenery.
I got the results of my CT scan and had a tele-medicine appointment with my oncologist. All is well; in fact, I don't need to see her again for six months, and I don't need another CT scan unless it's medically indicated. Hurray!!
We're supporting our local tavern by buying takeout. I hope it makes a difference; we love those folks. Our favorite little ice cream joint is going to offer takeout soon; we'll definitely be supporting them!
One thing - other than the pitiful response/non-response by the Trump administration (Jared Fucking Kushner? SERIOUSLY?) - kind of bothers me. These CEOs, like the head of Columbia Sportswear, that are giving up or severely slashing their salaries to take care of their workers? That's great. Good for them. It's the right thing to do. I applaud them, for sure. But think about this - how much are these people raking in that they can cover all of their workers' paychecks with their single salary? They make millions. of. dollars. The workers probably make $15.00 an hour, tops. Maybe these guys should take permanent pay cuts and pay their workers a living wage. But I guess that's too much to hope for.
Anyway. Enough ranting. We're well. We're safe. We're home. You too, okay?