Covid 19 - 5 months later

So, I've officially been working from home for five months. We will be doing this for at least the rest of 2020. It will be another five months before we go back to on site. Thank God I have a home to be in.

We got our new house. That's been nice. I love this house. We've done a lot of little upgrades but nothing major yet. Painted, bought furniture, fixed the cement floor in the shed, fixed doors and stairs and locks. Bought a gun for home defense, just to be safe. The world got crazy during the pandemic. Just sayin.

We travel once in a while, to the mountains to camp or to Mt. Hood to hike, to the gorge to kayak the Columbia. That sort of thing. We try to stay away from people. I missed my brother's memorial service and our civic group fourth of July party, though, because my husband travels for work and we don't want to give anyone the virus if we have it.

FYI, this post never got published, so I'm publishing it today. Doh!

The Walnut House and Covid 19

• Covid 19 is everywhere and it's what all the news is about. Masks are now used by most people, more to prevent transmitting the virus if you have it and are not yet symptomatic. Deaths in the US are at 42,000. I've been working from home for a month.

We finally closed on our house. We bought a beautiful historic home on a hillside in a small town. The house is darling and actually has 2000 square feet, even though it looks tiny. It has five bedrooms and two bathrooms, with marble granite countertops and new flooring and carpets. We bought a fridge and a washer and dryer. And a lawn mower. Its been 5 years since I've had to do yard work.

I'm on vacation this week, to try to get the Walnut house in order and to pack, so we can move in. We've been cleaning and painting and working on the sprinkler system by day, and packing up our apartment at night. I painted the connected closets under the stairs because I was not pleased with the original, 100 year old wood inside. It was creepy. So I used a sprayer and now I'm covered in paint. I had to wash my dining room floors several times because of the paint blowby, which was minor but annoying. My nose hairs are painted white.

I recaulked the tub in the big downstairs bathroom. I used the new shopvac to suck up all the gross stuff in the shed. That shed is solid as a rock but it's seriously country-fied inside. We laid Robert's Persian rug on the floor for some visual warmth to the shed. It's the rug he bought for Teepee Village, where he stayed for a while after he walked the PCT. Great use for an old rug.

We bought a 100' hose and I hooked it up to the sprinkler system. Turns out, the previous owners touted the underground sprinkler system but they neglected to explain it's  a manual system, pushed only by water pressure! It works though. I adjusted some of them.

We went to Klamath last weekend to get a dining set with 6 chairs.  It's an antique mahogany table with 3 leafs. The 6 chairs have a beautiful fleur-de-lis design on the backs. They're gorgeous. We borrowed a truck and trailer from Robert's coworker because my mother's truck died the day before we were supposed to use it. We also got stuck on the way home, in pouring rain. Thank goodness Robert thought to bring two big plastic wraps that looked like mattress wraps, and a large roll of plastic wrap for moving. We barely got the set home. But it's stunning in our dining room.

We've done a lot to the house to get it ready for us to move in. Tomorrow I finish painting the corner cabinet and both sides of the arch wall between the sitting room and dining room. I will put clear silicone around the sink, dig up the weeds in the front lawn (there's 3), and plant my roses Axel bought me.

Hopefully, we can get everything moved in by the first week of May. None too soon.

Covid 19 quarantine

Today is day 10 of quarantine and working from home, for me. I'm super blessed that I can work from home. My husband has to go to work every day and I worry about him because of it. I know his company won't send him home. Remember the movie I Am Legend? My husband's business would have been the one company that would have been open, in that scenario.

My adult sons live together and I'm glad for that, because the youngest is a type 1 diabetic. He is immunocompromised and as such, he's considered high risk. He was able to go to the hospital and get a quarantine letter but we still aren't sure if his company will be paying him during his shelter-at-home period. That part is less important to me. What I know is, he cannot get this virus. He's 120 pounds soaking wet and he's 5'10". I pray daily that he and my oldest don't get the virus.

My best friend and her mother are high risk. I worry about them, too. My bestie is my "hetero lifemate" as she calls it. I just have to have faith they'll be ok. I'll go nuts if I stop believing that.

We're also in the middle of buying a house. That's been fun. We are buying a gorgeous historic home. We locked into a great interest rate but the inspection identified required repairs. So we're waiting for those to be done. The appraisal should have been last week, but the appraiser was sick. So here's hoping the appraisal gets done this week. We are supposed to close by March 31st.

I agreed to work 6 days this week. I'm just thankful to still have a job, so if my company needs me, I'll do whatever it takes. I'd much rather rest and watch movies or something. But it is what it is.

I watch the news every morning. It's depressing. I've read everything I can get my hands on about Covid. Because I was a News Director in my past, I'm eternally curious. But that's it's own curse. Because friends and family post stupid stuff and I get quite disgusted.

One of the things that bothers me is the trend to make homemade surgical masks because the US has a shortage of PPE. The accepted study out of Vietnam shows those who wear cloth masks are more likely to get Covid than those who wear appropriate PPE, but also those who wear cloth masks are more likely to get Covid than those who wear nothing. So although I get that some people want to help, I feel the data supports not using a cloth mask. A couple friends who are paramedics agree with that, so I'm not going to make masks. I want to help, but I don't want blood on my hands, whether anyone knows it or not. That's the choice I've made.

The one thing I get angry about is people traveling. We've all heard the concept of Flattening the Curve, by now. But the Oregon coast was packed this weekend. Socrates said humans are too stupid to govern themselves and I'm afraid he was right. I don't understand why people would travel during a deadly pandemic. You'd think they would stay home and save lives.

I have cabin fever. Not gonna lie. I'm sick of my apartment. I'm glad I have internet and cable, because without movies and social media, I think I'd lose my mind. We have rewatched True Blood and West Wing and The Newsroom. It feels like there's nothing new left. We've watched it all. Now we're watching foreign films and series'. I refuse to watch WWII documentaries. I draw the line.

I have more to talk about but it's time to go to work.

Stay home. Stay safe. Keep the faith.