Category: Rants

  • “The End of an Error”

    I suspect that if you are reading this, you are of like mind, or at least tolerant of differing opinions. The title was seen on a social media platform this morning and I think it says it all.

    It distresses me that 45 has caused such division in this country that the inauguration of the President will be before fields of flag instead of people, behind high fences with armed National Guardsmen as the only “spectators.” He is out of Washington, lacking the class to politely and civilly transfer the power as has been done throughout history. But he isn’t out of office for another 2 1/4 hours. He abdicated his power months ago and the VP has had to try to pick up the reins.

    On 45’s way out, pardoning his cronies and those wealthy who might give him a boost. Issuing executive orders to undermine the new administration, lifting travel restrictions to countries hard hit by COVID. All attempts to make the transition more difficult.

    The events of the last two nights have been class acts, the lighting of the mall and the 200,000 flags, the memorial to those who have died of COVID that was so grossly mismanaged by 45 and his administration and the lighting of 400,000 lights along the reflecting pool in their memory.

    I hope that Biden’s administration doesn’t discover too many disasters. I hope they will meet with a smooth transition, but am already seeing some of the same players in Congress who tried to block the certification of the Electoral College, trying to block Cabinet member certification. Players who obviously don’t take their oath to uphold the Constitution seriously, instead playing to their own political agenda.

    The last 4 years have made me tired and stressed. I hope the next 4 are less so. I have lived through a lot of historical events, some to cheer for, some to stress over, some to mourn, but never did I think I would live through a President impeached twice in one term that has tried to removed rights of the citizens, block immigration, and tear our country apart.

  • A Rough Start

    This week start has not been a smooth one. For some time, we have observed the “newer” of our two vehicles, it is only 13 years old compared to the almost 16 year old one, has been not running well and leaking oil. We wouldn’t drive it farther than town and kept our fingers crossed that if it broke down, that daughter would be available to get us home or to a rental car location. Because it is the larger vehicle, we loaded the trash and recycling in it yesterday morning to take down to the “Convenience Center.” Don’t you love that as a name for the fenced in area with the dumpsters and recycle trailer boxes in it? As soon as hubby put the beast in reverse, I could smell the clutch and suggested we take both cars and leave the Xterra at our local shop for diagnosis and state inspection. The decision was made to take it the next time we had to go out and not yesterday. The garbage was dispatched, the package I had that needed to be dropped off at the USPS was dropped off, we drove into town to get lunch and a birthday card for a grandson, but didn’t make it home. As we started up the first hill, the smell got stronger, the car got slower, and before we got to the top, there were no gears that the car would go in. A call to daughter, but she was an hour away headed home. A call to the local mechanic and he sent a masked driver in their “Shuttle” van and another driver in the tow truck to haul it in. Once we get an estimate, we have to decide if a 13 year old car, leaking oil, with 246,000+ miles on it is worth the repair, leaving us at least for the moment with the 16 year old car with 240,000 miles on it as our sole transportation.

    Last night as I prepared to address the birthday card, I realized that one of my favorite pens was missing. I can’t find it anywhere. Usually it is clipped to the small leather notebook cover that I carry in my bag, but it isn’t there. Isn’t in the bag. Isn’t stuck down the cracks of my chair. It has at least temporarily gone missing. I’m sure it will turn up at some point, in a car, a pocket, or some place I normally wouldn’t set it down.

    Also yesterday as I continued to knit on my fingerless mitts, I realized that somehow, I had crossed yarn balls and both mitts were knit from one ball, linking them together with a piece of yarn too short to just cut and weave in, so I had to begin tinking (knitting backwards) for a row on one mitt and another row on both. After doing that, I decided I didn’t like the thumb gusset on the fingers down pattern as I tried one on for fit, so I pulled the needle and frogged (ripped out stitches) for many rows to get back to where the thumb stitches were picked up. Then tediously and carefully picked up the stitches again in an order that would still allow me to knit two at a time, knit a couple of rows to make sure there were no missed stitched and all the stitches were turned the right way and decided to work the wrist up vanilla pattern I always use with a classic thumb gusset that will allow me to knit a real thumb. I am probably back about to the total length I was before yesterday’s error.

    During this reknit project, the television was on to the news and talking heads that analyze everything going on and I was appalled at how a congresswoman who had been in the Capitol during last week’s siege would throw a toddler tantrum over not being allowed to carry a gun into the chambers, and how dozens of the rioters from last week and people interviewed at Trump’s bazaar charade of a visit to the Alamo and his incendiary speech there yesterday, exactly parrot his language to the exact phraseology. And they call those who don’t agree with them sheep. They call themselves patriots and true Americans, yet they attack our halls of government and threaten our lawmakers.

    Next disaster, a relatively minor one today. Lunch was prepared, just grilled cheese sandwiches still sitting on the griddle pan on the stove, the plates with pickles served out beside them and I called hubby down to eat. In reaching up to get a glass for my water, he knocked another to the Silestone counter below the cabinet and it exploded sending glass shooting across the stove top, the adjacent counter where the plates were waiting, and all over the floor. After glass was cleaned up, lunch tossed in the garbage, counter tops and griddle and dishes washed, I started over.

    On the positive side, the hydroponic herb garden that Son 2 and family gave me for Christmas has sprouted all 6 herbs. I check each day to see how much growth has occurred. The dill, thyme, and parsley are putting out secondary leaves, The mint and basils are above the rims of their planting baskets. That was such a great gift for a gardener suffering the off season doldrums that houseplants just don’t satisfy.

    Back to chores, knitting, and spinning. Hmmm, I wonder where the pen is?

  • Challenges begun

    As the ball dropped beginning 2021, I started spinning my Christmas gift fiber to be the first official block of the Breed Blanket Project 2021 challenge. The fiber was two ounces each of two colors of a very soft BFL wool. It only takes less than an ounce to do a square so the first ounce was spun, washed, dried, and is now being knit onto the test square of Jacob wool that I spun in November and December and plied in the late days of December. Because I want a larger blanket than a dozen 10 inch squares would make, I am going to be making two or even three squares each month of the fiber selected for the month. The other two ounces of the Christmas gift is the teal still being spun. There is another ounce of each of them that can become additional squares or a hat or fingerless mitts. I love the colors of both and they are gorgeous together.

    I am glad to have this challenge to keep me occupied until such a time as we can finally get a vaccine and feel somewhat safer about going out into the region for essentials and family connections. Our county of only about 15000 people has reported 652 cases of COVID, and 95 of them have occurred since December 31. The village store keeps their newspapers right at the door and my routine on days we get a paper is to take one step in with exact change, take a paper, put the money on the counter and flee without ever letting the door close. Yesterday, three customers and a vendor all left the store just as we arrived and none of them were masked. The resistance to such a simply safely measure is so strong here. I’m sure that we will see even more of a surge as the holiday gatherings that surely happened all over the county spread it. So far the hospitalization and death rates here have been fairly low which surprises me as the population is older and if the products carried by and brought out of the village store is any indication, a lot of smoking and drinking is done by the population. This is just another challenge to our new year.

    Our country is facing the worst challenge with COVID and with the political climate when our “leaders” take to social media and the airwave encouraging violence to over throw a legitimate, fair election. Our Democracy is threatened, our country is fractured and it is frightening. We are not a third world country. What happened to civility. Did none of these people pay attention in Civics and Government classes? We have a Constitution, but it is being ignored by so many politicians. We have a President who envisions himself a Dictator and has a cult following that is armed and dangerous. I hope the next few days are not as contentious as they are playing out to be, I hope no one is harmed, and I hope that all the players who are encouraging the rabble are properly punished.

  • Emotions and Mistrust

    The current political climate in our country is disturbing and each incident seems to make it worse instead of improving the situation. I’m not just referring to right vs left, GOP vs Democrats, but anti-science vs science, masks vs non-masks, whether a protest is a protest or a riot and how many days of protesting is effective or becomes fuel for bad behavior not necessarily promulgated by the protesters, but then blamed on them.

    I would like to believe that as an educated, free country, that sane discourse could be held to resolve differences, but that doesn’t seem to be the case. My brother sent me a video that was funny, yet disturbing as an interviewer asked questions and when the interviewee answered and then was challenged with factual information would basically say, “I don’t care, my mind is made up,” and they didn’t see the irony in that disparity.

    People are untrusting. I was very disturbed by a news article about a young black man stopped while jogging as a possible suspect in a domestic assault. He was cuffed, held for over an hour, and forcefully put in the back of a police car. And though he wasn’t the perpetrator they were seeking, he was charged with resisting arrest and assaulting a police officer. That situation is so wrong on so many levels. He was asked his name and DOB which he refused to give and by law he didn’t have to, but if he had, the situation may have ended very differently as they had the name of the man whom they were seeking. The mistrust of police and even each other has caused a lack of common sense.

    When we were kids, our house was never locked except for when we went on vacation. You trusted your neighbors. Cars were not locked in parking lots, there was no need. Now you wouldn’t think of not locking your car or your house, you trust no one.

    I go no where without identification on me. It is unlikely I would be stopped and challenged, but who knows in these times. What used to feel like a free country is feeling less free and are we tearing ourselves apart by our actions and divisions. In these times, I think more and more about my Dad. He was on a Peacekeeping task force. He would be so disturbed and distraught by our current times. Our grandchildren are not going to grow up in the same environment as the one I grew up in. We saw change happening and there were those that resisted, but it looked for years like it was change for the better and was being accepted, but now I question whether the resisting factions were just being silent and have become vocal and worse.

    We are all the same on the inside, regardless of our color, gender, religion or lack of on the outside. Young children seem to recognize this until they are taught differently by their elders. Maybe we should be learning from them, not teaching them.

  • They Fixed It

    VDOT actually came out yesterday morning and dug out the ditch and culvert. I didn’t climb down in the ditch to see how far into the culvert they cleared, but hopefully far enough that when it starts raining again later this week, the water will run under the driveway, not down it. They didn’t rebuild my mini berm across the top, I may take a load of watermelon sized rocks up there and make the base with them, then pile some soil and gravel over and behind it. That also help redirect the flow off of our driveway.

    The Big Bad Harley is still in the shop in the city. Yesterday hubby checked on the repair and they are still awaiting the mirror.

    Yesterday’s gardening and harvesting efforts produced more cucumbers even though I had pruned them severely, they are still provided a few more each day. Another half gallon of Turmeric Dill Quick Brine pickles was made this morning and is cooling on the counter enough to put in the refrigerator without breaking the glass shelf.

    About a month or more ago, I fell prey to an ad on Instagram and foolishly ordered the product without carefully checking out the vendor. It wasn’t expensive, under $20, paid for through PayPal so the vendor didn’t get my credit card info. Yes, it was another Chinese company and after waiting forever, the product came and it was a “bait and switch” situation, not what I had ordered. An email to the vendor produced a reply obviously from a non native English speaker whose response was, I see you have filed a complaint with PayPal (I had not, yet), but basically said, I got what I ordered. It clearly was not. So I did file a dispute with PayPal, but of course, the original item is nowhere to be found in an ad now (so no screen shot and the confirmation email doesn’t specify the item), so it is my word against theirs. Yesterday, I received an email from PayPal saying they needed for me to file a police report and send them a copy. Our little county sheriff’s department would laugh me to the curb for filing a police report over a $20 claim to a Chinese company who has probably already changed their name. I told PayPal that and that I had learned two lessons, 1) not to order from a Chinese company, 2) not to pay for goods with PayPal. The vendor will win this one, a pure scam because PayPal will rule in favor of the dishonest vendor. I had just finished dealing with this when hubby because a rewards debit card he has awaiting but still had not come for three weeks that would be used to help defray the cost of the Harley repair, called the credit card company. These rewards can only be spent in the Harley shop for goods or services. The credit card company said they sent it digitally though he had specifically asked for a card because of difficulty using the digital reward at the shop once before. I went from the frustration of dealing with PayPal to the frustration of finding the digital reward email in his Spam folder, trying to help him log on to his HD site to find his password had expired and we needed the old password to create a new one, but the one he had written down didn’t work. A trip through the lost password, reset password route, finally got us to the reward which we were able to print as a pdf, but by then, I was snapping at everything he said, probably would have taken his head off for even saying thank you. Because his riding days are numbered, he isn’t using that card now, he is back to using our joint card that has cash rewards.

    Though the mail did not bring his reward card, it did bring another new to me Jenkins Turkish spindle. It is a tiny Black and White Ebony Kuchulu, the ones that are only about 2.5″ in diameter, but perfect for toting in my bag in a little tea tin to protect it so I always have a spindle and fiber with me.

    Here it is with the Kingwood Finch (about 4″ diameter) on the left and the Chechen wood Kuchulu and Olive Finch to the right. I love these spindles and the way they spin.

    The young farmers came over yesterday right after lunch and got the hay baled and hauled off to the farm for winter feed for their cattle. It was a good first cut, they got 84 large round bales, plus three shaggy half bales, one of which they left for my use up by the coop. Usually the first cutting is down, baled, and moved by the end of the first week of July. All of the equipment is gone except for an old hay rake. They will have to ride one of the tractors back over with no attachment to pick it up. The upper field they did first is already a foot high and the stickweed (Yellow Crownbeard) is thick this year. It is such an invasive broadleaf weed. I sprayed some of it around the yard hydrant with the Citric acid spray and it didn’t touch it. The only fields that aren’t thick with it around here are fields that are sprayed with 2,4-d or ones that are sprayed with Round Up and seeded with grain or corn. We are going to have to get a bush hog again soon and I will resume mid summer and late fall mowing to keep it from going to seed. That doesn’t kill it, but it does help control it some. Even without reseeding, Yellow Crownbeard is a perennial that grows out from a rhizome crown and continues to spread outward. It has gotten worse each year we have owned this farm.

    Stay safe everyone. This spring and summer have passed in a blur or what day is it questions. With little outside contact, I am ever grateful when one of our kids starts a stream of text messages about kids, gardens, or cooking. Not being able to see them, hug them, visit with them has been the hardest. Daughter will come by once in a while with her kids and we social distance, masked in the yard and that helps some. Last Christmas, she asked for her kids to be given activities with relatives rather than physical gifts and as a result, most all of their gifts have had to be cancelled, not just ours, but ones scheduled by daughter and the other grandparents. It was such a good idea at the time, but little did we know that three months later, we would all be in social isolation.

  • Hazards of steep gravel roads and rain

    Last week, VDOT spread crusher run gravel on the steep state maintained gravel road on which we live. On Thursday, we had heavy rain for several hours and all of the gravel uphill, washed down into the ditch above our driveway until the ditch was level with the roadgrade, filling our culvert so the rain had no diversion from running down our driveway. A couple of years after we moved in, we were having the area around the house regraded to smooth out rough areas that the contractor left and removing large rocks from behind the house. At the same time, we had the driveway regraded so that water would not run down and cause gully’s, we had a culvert installed under the driveway near the house to also redirect any water away from the house. When the upper culvert fills, the driveway takes a hit.

    The last two photos are the ditch at the top of the driveway. I have made a telephone report and was told I would be texted a service report number which I never received. Today, I filled out the online form and hit submit and got a message the page did not exist and was redirected to their “new” form which I submitted. After dinner tonight, I went to work with the tractor and the grading blade we purchased a few years ago.

    Most of the gullies are filled and leveled, but I won’t dig out the ditch, VDOT is going to have to do that, hopefully before it rains again. I’m too old to dig it out and the tractor bucket makes a ditch that is the wrong shape and doesn’t clear the culvert hole. It would be nice if they would dump some crusher run at the top of our driveway. Having a cattle grate there would help eliminate the problem, but then the motorcycle wouldn’t be able to get out. We will see when and if the state makes the repair.

  • Corporate Frustration Rant

    Before the world went into lockdown, I placed an order for 3 sets of items to be used as favors for a retreat to be held later in the summer if lockdowns allow. The order was to be fulfilled by Amazon fulfillment, so not coming from other distant land. The order didn’t come, then shipping slowed to a crawl due to COVID and since I wasn’t in a hurry, I waited. Months went by and the items could not be tracked because there was no tracking number given. I finally contacted Amazon and according to them, the package had been fulfilled by Amazon fulfillment and they could see that it had never been delivered. They did send me a refund, but this put me back to square 1 on the project. I was able to locate some of the items needed through another source, but some of it can’t be located at a reasonable cost to me.

    This brings about two other issues. I designed labels for the containers for this retreat favor and decided that rather than print them at home on labels that would likely fade or smear, I would have Avery Dennison print them on plastic stick on labels that wouldn’t fade or smear. This is a nice service, though those labels ended up costing nearly as much as the containers. I received a shipping notice within a couple of days, the labels being sent Sure Post through UPS to the USPS. Tracking said I should have received them a week ago and tracking hasn’t changed in a week. If you go to the UPS site, it says that once the package is transferred to USPS (Postal Service), you have to contact USPS not them. Their site says the package was transferred in Roanoke over a week ago. USPS site says it is awaiting the package from UPS in North Carolina. Bottom line, it is lost in the ether. I have called Avery and was put in a call back queue awaiting to discuss it with them.

    Because of shipping issues and not wanting to have to go out to the USPS or other shipping sites unless absolutely necessary during the lock down, I signed up for the 4 week trial of Stamps.com so that I could buy and print postage at home for anything from stamps, media mail, small and large packages as I was selling some items that I no longer use in my fiber arts and crafting. It took less than their 4 week trial to discover that when you add insurance, you get billed separately at the end of the month though it appears to come out at the time you buy the postage and that you get charged nearly $18/month for the privilege of printing your own postage yourself from home, though you can do it through other services for only the cost of the postage. I went online and processed a cancellation of services form and submitted it. When I received the credit card charge for the insurance and 4 weeks service which I didn’t complete and shouldn’t have been charged if the form had been processed, I called them, accepted that I was stuck with that month but was assured that the service had been cancelled. A month went by with no use and again I was charged for a month of service. I called again on Friday, sat on hold waiting for a customer service representative for nearly 30 minutes, and was told that neither my attempt to cancel online, nor my first call had cancelled, but it would be taken care of immediately and I would be refunded. The refund showed up in my account the same day that the month’s service was recharged to my account, but it was the weekend. This morning after another 30 minutes on hold awaiting a representative, following an electronic message that my account was closed, the representative said the notes showed it was closed, the refund made, and yes, rebilled, but she couldn’t help me because the account was closed and I would be transferred to her supervisor. Another 30 minutes of hold time and the supervisor was able to refund the second charge and assure me I wouldn’t be charged again, and that it hadn’t previously been marked not to recharge. I maintained my calm and stayed nice. But then they had the gall to send me a customer service survey. I wasn’t nice.

    Avery finally called back, a much nicer system than sitting on hold for an hour and very quickly offered me either a refund or them to reprint the labels and send them out rush delivery. At least they have their act together.

    And don’t get me started on FedEx, they have yet to get a delivery to me without it going to a neighbor or totally astray.

    If the Post Office goes under, we are in trouble, we will never get anything ordered.

  • How will it be?

    I am not currently active on Facebook. If you are reading this there, I will not see your comments and reactions.

    Will we ever get to meet our newest grandson? Get a hug from our sons, daughter(s), and grands? Will we ever be able to fulfill our Christmas gift trip to three of our grands? How about craft shows? History events? Fiber retreats?

    We can’t be part of the herd immunity theory, we are both in the at risk category by age and prexisting conditions. If we were to disregard this SARS-2 virus, likely we would die, not become immune. Our exposure is very limited, wearing masks when we are away from home. Only I will go into the plant nursery or the post office, leaving hubby at home or in the car. We did finally break down to do drive through food occasionally since there have been no reports of transmission by that means and the number of cases in this part of the state are fairly low.

    How will our children fair if it lingers and impacts their jobs? Though the two eldest can both work from home now, there are furloughs being suggested in their fields.

    Will schools reopen and how? At first the fear wasn’t for children to catch the virus, but rather become vectors, but now there are serious cases and deaths to children as well.

    So much history has occurred in my lifetime: Korean conflict, Vietnam war, Cold war, space flight, moon landings, technology to improve power production. Negatives such as factory farms, climate change, pollution by smog and plastic, fracking. We have seen the arrival of HIV/AIDS, SARS, MERS, resistant bacterial infections, but this virus is frightening. It infects across all ages, affects people so differently or not at all as they asymptomatically spread it. It has brought out the worst kinds of behaviors in people who believe that safety measures are infringements on their rights. “Your rights end where my nose begins..” and I don’t want you spreading your illness to me. What has happened to respect and civility in this country.

    For now, I will stay home and spin, knit, garden, and take care of us.

  • My Sanity

    Let me begin by saying if you are reading this on Facebook, it is because I can share it remotely. I will not see any likes or comments you post on Facebook, only if you like or comment directly on the blog Post.

    Day 64: Of our self imposed stay at home order. On March 31 it became a state order. Because we have no home pick up of garbage and recycling, we have made trips to the “convenience center” a few times. Our wonderful natural foods store has a pdf order form you can fill out, submit via email, they call you when it is filled, you drive up, call the pick up number, and your goodies are delivered to your car by a gloved, masked employee. We have made that trip weekly for 3 weeks, allowing fresh produce, cheese, yogurt, nuts, and a few other products we use regularly. We finally braved a drive through fast food a couple of times when we were picking up the goodies (how incongruous is that, fast food and organic grocery pick up). Cabin fever sets in especially when the weather isn’t conducive to the garden, mowing, or walking the hills.

    Yesterday was our last average frost date, however, there are 3 nights in the next 5 where a frost is possible, so other than garden prep the garden is not happening for another week or so. When there is nothing to do outside, or the weather doesn’t permit much outdoors time, there are sanity saving activities indoors. The garden plan is finalized, so that nightshades don’t get planted in the same place two years in a row, or that the onions and garlic won’t go back in the same box this fall. I’m thinking of adding two more 4 X 4 boxes and a 4 x 8 box for next year. The space where the mint was removed and where the three sisters garden will go this year would hold them and keeping the paths heavily covered with spoiled hay will keep the weeds down. It isn’t difficult to clear a box with a hoe as long as the paths don’t overwhelm.

    And of course, there is my sanity basket.

    I rotate through the spindles, spinning bits of yarn, focusing my energy to creativity and slowing the process down so that it is not production, but enjoyment. I enjoy spinning on my wheels, but until a few weeks ago, had forgotten how much I enjoy the spindles. For some reason, spinning on the spindles doesn’t aggravate my arthritis as much as knitting does and the yarn is accumulating much slower than it does from the wheels. I did learn the trick to wind the singles from the spindle off on a small bobbin using my great wheel so that when the spindle is filled again, they can be plied together without tangling as they tend to do from the center pull cop using both ends to ply.

    Yesterday we had to go into town to pick up a prescription refill for hubby and drove a bit farther to the shop where we bought our Stihl line trimmer 14 or 15 years ago. They have serviced it a number of times, fulfilled a recall for the gas cap once, and I needed a part to be able to use it again this year, as well as fuel mix and line. The shop is open, but you call from your car, let them know what you need, pay over the phone if not using cash, and they bring your order out to a table in front for you to pick up. It was very seamless, except a couple our age pulled up beside the driver’s side of the car, the man wearing a mask got out and started for the door. I was waiting, wearing a mask, by the passenger side of our car for our order to come out and pointed out to the man that he needed to call inside, that their doors were not open. He returned to his car, told the woman who was driving to call in and proceeded to walk to the front of our car. As I backed up, he moved forward. I backed up, he moved toward me making conversation. I was just about to tell him to give me space when the woman called him back to his car and spoke with him and he turned around and said, “She says I need to stay back at least 6 feet, is 12 enough?” I guess she had seen me backing away as he approached. After picking up my order, the employee was trying to get his information as he was leaving a line trimmer for repair and he walked as close as he could get to the gate with the table on the other side of it and pretended like he was going to pat the female employee on the shoulders or play patty cake or something. What part of social distancing don’t people understand and realize that his actions are not taken as playful. Times have changed. It is stressful enough to go out without feeling like you have to defend yourself from fools. At least he had on a mask, so many people aren’t wearing them.

  • It Means You, Too!

    Will live a few miles from West Virginia in SW Virginia in regions that have no REPORTED cases of COVID-19. That doesn’t mean that there aren’t cases. It means that they haven’t been tested or they are walking around with no symptoms, or “just a cold,” and possibly spreading it throughout the community that will suddenly show a handful of cases, then double that, then double it again in a few short days.

    The schools in Virginia have all been closed for at least 2 weeks to try to flatten the spike, try to slow this health disaster before there are so many ill the hospitals have to make decisions on who to treat and who might die like they have done in Italy.

    Yesterday, my social media feeds were full of “What time do you want us over?” “We will meet you at…” Pictures of local music venues where you were eating, drinking, and jamming. That is not social distancing. Maybe the person next to you is an UNREPORTED case. That doesn’t mean they don’t have it and aren’t spreading it, it means they have not been tested. You might get sick, you might heal, you might spread it to a child in fragile health who won’t survive it, or a senior citizen in the grocer who had no choice but to shop for sustenance, one whose immune system isn’t as strong and may not survive.

    If we can’t self police, the next step will be total isolation like Spain, France, and Italy. They have had it for a couple of weeks longer and it spread.

    I would love to have weekend time with my grand children and children. Love to have hugs. Love to go to my social places, but I can’t risk it, I am one of those senior citizens and I know that my immunity isn’t as strong as it was, my hubby’s either.

    It isn’t about you. Think of others. If you miss a few weeks or months of being in groups, you will get over it. If you give this devastating virus to a sick child or immune suppressed adult, they may not get over it.

    If you have to go to work, wash your hands often. Don’t hug or shake hands. Stand at least 3 feet apart. If you are trying to support a local venue, buy a gift certificate so they have cash now and use it when and if this passes us by.