Today, our little quarantine drama had one meltdown, one sloth-like drive to organize things, and a challenging day for The-Prettiest-Girl-in-the-World

Outside the house, London Drugs dedicates an hour of shopping to health care workers. That’s very cool. Distilleries all across Canada are now making hand sanitizer,  Also, very cool, I can now stop bathing in gin. But (sadly) the number of cases of Covid19 continues to rise as does the death toll. I greatly fear we are going to fail in our ability to control this thing.

Inside the house, The-Prettiest-Girl-in-the-World had her first day of onlining – which is to say working at home. It was more of a challenge than it should have been. The moment she put on her headphones, plugged into her computer, it began. “Whatcha doing?” “Hey, Cutie, did you…?” “Mom, I just finished…” “Mother, did you know…”

So she had to shoo us all away. Not easy for her. She loves everyone being around, even loves being bugged like a clerk at an airport information kiosk (or an 811 operator during this crisis.) So for her to ask everyone to do their thing was huge for her. Plus, it seems the moment she tries to do something for herself, all of a sudden, with no coordination on anyone’s part, everyone wants to talk to her.

Same thing happens to me the moment I try to write. For a whole day The-Youngest will play on his computer, The-Oldest will compose, and the dog will snooze, but it’s like they sense something important’s being done and want to… what, interrupt it, be a part of it? I don’t know.

We were able to give The-Prettiest-Girl-in-the-World some space and she got some of her work done, (which was mostly doing training workshops that no one ever had the time to do when the world was normal.)

But for the rest of the day, she made sure we were all doing ok. How’s the writing going? How’s the rollercoaster build going? What composition are you working on? She made supper (sneakily because I’d gone to have a shower), and washed all the towels, which we are now throwing into the laundry daily. As well, she helped me organize meals, listened to me rant about stupid, m*therf*cking banks, and made sure Vegas got love every time she walked by.

She gives so much, even when The-Youngest had finally had enough with, well, actually, I have no idea, but I suspect not being allowed to do stuff he wants to do. It’s a build-up of frustration at the restrictions on his life. We can’t afford to order in (and eating out is a thing of the past), he can’t go play in the park, or play hockey or anything.  Anything!!!!!!!!!

This brutal readjusting of life is hard on us all, and while it makes me more thankful than ever for the life we had, that adjustment isn’t a slow turning of a gigantic freighter, it’s the Titanic hitting an iceberg.

But during the meltdown, she took on this latest challenge with her usual chill, sitting outside his door waiting for him to be ready to talk to her about what was really going on.

It’s impressive.

What I did was far less impressive. Like a snail stuck in molasses, I worked on organizing and tidying. But in doing so, I found some strange stuff.

• I have about 75 packets of salt taken from the cinema. See, every time I get a popcorn, I grab a few salt packets to saltify my popcorn (no wonder my blood pressure is through the roof), but I don’t use them all and end up emptying my pockets and putting them somewhere in the pantry. I have about 5 year’s worth there.
• I found novels from my friends, including one from someone who worked with me. Charles was his name, a great kid who really grew up in Toys R Us, and he’d written a couple of novels in his spare time. By hand. In pen. I’m glad I still have them
• I found a soup can from the Y2K scare. Anyone need some chicken noodle soup? It’s probably still good.
• There in the back of our lazy susan was a cake mix! I plan to use this.
• The-Oldest, assisting me in my epic quest, found 3 copies of Dances with Wolves in my DVD/Bluray collection. Ha. I know I got one donated to me, but at some point, I decided to buy another. Good lord.
• I forgot we have about 5,000 bottles of hotel shampoo, conditioner and body lotion (which usually gives me hives). Ok, it’s more like 30, but still, I won’t be shopping for body lotion anytime soon. If ever.
• I still have my previous dog’s dog tags and collar. I didn’t throw them out, but put it lovingly back.
• For some reason or other, I put some doggie treats in the downstairs filing cabinet. I want to say I put them there deliberately so I could have treats for Vegas when she came downstairs, but if not, then I wonder what I filed them under?
• I have actually kept all my old D&D stuff. All of it. I kinda knew I had, but there are boxes and boxes of it, so I hauled a few out and saw all my old maps, all my handwritten notes, my binders of worlds I created and my folders full of parchment notes to the players. Gosh I was way more productive when I was young.
• I found a mysterious box of slides. They’re not mine, but I’ll check them out tomorrow. Maybe we stored them for someone? Maybe The-Prettiest-Girl-in-the-World’s? Stay tuned.

Be safe, be healthy and respect this new world.

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