Planning a Vacation During a Pandemic

I feel like there should be sitcoms devoted to the comical ways life has changed since this pandemic. Like the fact that I received this in the mail yesterday:

It's from a Jehovah Witness who, due to social distancing, was unable to come to my door. Now their only path to converting all of us heathens is to hand write really long letters. I was so tickled by this little piece of mail that I almost didn't have the heart to throw it away. (Almost. I ended up throwing it in the fireplace. I do appreciate this lovely woman's effort, though).

But nothing beats trying to plan a vacation during a pandemic. Last year, my extended family (Mom, Dad, sister, brother in-law, nieces, etc.) and I booked a summer cruise to Alaska for my grandpa's 90th birthday, which falls on July 13, 2020. At the end of May, our cruise was cancelled. We were disappointed, but we moved on. We found a resort on the island of Kauai that was still welcoming tourists. We booked the resort and all our flights. In some ways, the new vacation sounded more fun than the original.

Then in June, Hawaii brought down the hammer. They decided that anyone flying into their islands would be required to be quarantined for fourteen days. Not a possibility for us, considering we were staying for only a week.

After that, Clint found an amazing deal for an all-inclusive resort in Jamaica. Jamaica has no travel restrictions or quarantine requirements--they're pretty much welcoming tourists with open arms. Clint and I went ahead and booked it. My mom and my niece were super excited, viewing this vacation as even better than the first two! The one caveat was my sister would now need to get passports for her kids super fast since we were only a month out from our vacation. No big deal; the passport agency is willing to expedite passports for an extra fee. 

Oh wait. No they're not. Not during a pandemic. Apparently a worldwide virus required them to downsize their staff and they no longer have enough employees to expedite passports. 

So we waved goodbye to our Jamaican dream. After that, the conversations regarding "Where should we go for vacation" reached ludicrous levels, with a lot of manic-type crying and kicking and screaming (along with some hair pulling) over the subject. Some ideas originally open for discussion due to the public reopening were quickly disregarded due to these same areas going down into lockdown again, or due to safety concerns with the recent looting/rioting (because, you know, a pandemic isn't enough. Let's throw social upheaval into the mix as well).

So what's the verdict? What did we decide to replace our beautiful Alaskan/Hawaiian/Jamaican trip with? Are you ready to be awed by the glamor of my upcoming vacation?

We're RV camping at a KOA about 2 hours from my house.

*sighs*

Yep. Most of life's 'new normals' are inherently unfunny, but there is some humor in all of this if you look hard enough. Like, really hard. Really really har--yeah, okay. I hate this sh*% too.

The First Lines of Emails I've Received While Quarantining

I don't know why this poem makes me giggle so hard (written/posted by @jessica_salfia on twitter)...it's not like it's that funny. Nonetheless, I'll leave this right here. Sorry it's blurry:

In other news, Chasing Echoes was selected for a featured promotion for Book Bub! I'd love to say they just recognized it's awesomeness and chose it right away, but...no. The book was rejected several times prior, so maybe it finally had enough reviews to be taken seriously. Or maybe it's because Black Lilies is out, and having two books makes you appear more legitimate as an author. Or maybe I just finally wore them down. I don't care, I'm just thrilled it was finally accepted.

Semi-related-but-not-really, this commercial just now came on while I was typing:

Tearjerking stuff, right? 😂 

Birthday Eggstravaganza

My mom-in-law's birthday is on April 8th, Trin's birthday is on the 11th, my dad's is on the 13th, and my dad-in-law's is on the 30th. So April is basically Christmastime, Round 2. Because of all these April birthdays, it's not uncommon for us to have a birthday land on Easter. 

In this case, Trin's birthday fell yesterday, the day before Easter. Celebrating was a little trickier this year due to the lockdown, and the fact that we were snowed in until yesterday morning so unable to get food/cake until an hour before her celebration. We decided to have a small birthday get-together with our Sheltering-In buddies (aka: My sister's family). My parents decided to come too, but vowed to maintain their social distance. This worked out really well for the first hour or so until some of us got buzzed and caution flew out the window.

All in all Trin's birthday was a blast. I mean, a literal blast. In addition to playing Exploding Kittens, my brother in-law Jeremy was itching to try out a small, real-life cannon he had built that week, so we fired it once or twice.

Okay, it was six times. (Maybe seven). But that was only because Jeremy wasn't satisfied with the loudness of the blast. Apparently it wasn't boomy enough. So the boys kept adding more gun powder and more compression. More compression = dish towels and hamburger buns, by the way. The final time we fired the cannon, it was ear-splitting--the kind of noise that slams against your chest and rattles your inner core. We all went running and shrieking into the house, yelling "We are soooo busted!" totally convinced that the sheriff would be pulling up any second.

We dubbed it "Trinity's Birthday Boom." Good times.

That night we came home for Round 2 of Trin's birthday with Teri and Carey. Teri made an amazing chocolate cake from scratch topped with beautiful amethyst gemstones carved from sugar. She needs to be on one of those baking shows on Food Network. Anyway, they both did a great job of social distancing in the beginning too...even keeping their face masks on. But as the evening progressed, everyone got a little more comfortable--or less conscientious, and the masks came off. Today, as we celebrated Easter, social distancing sort of went out the window. We did our Easter Eggstravaganza, which is basically a tournament of egg-games, including the Egg Roll Off, Egg Drop, Egg Derby, and Egg Shoot Off. It was so much fun. Teri obliterated us. She won last year too, so that's two years in a row now that she gets to flaunt the ever-coveted Easter Eggstravaganza trophy.

(Yeah, I hear it. We're ridiculous).

After the egg tournament, we had our normal Easter egg hunt. The snow afforded a lot more hiding places and as I type this we are still missing six eggs.

Merry--er--Happy Easter!

COVID-19 - A Post for my Future Grandkids

This post isn't for the general public. We're all going through this quarantine together, so there's nothing I can say here that would be new or interesting for you.

This post is for my future grandkids. I want them to know what life was like here in California when Coronavirus hit America. So Ling Ling and Thing 2 (and any other grand-babies that end up popping into existence), this is for you. 

When it comes to shocking events, everyone remembers exactly where they were or what they were doing when their world was suddenly spun off its axis. My grandparents remember where they were when Pearl Harbor was bombed. My parents--though little at the time--remember the shock that swept through the nation when they got the news that John F. Kennedy was shot. For my own generation, it's 9-11. We all remember the sickening numbness that washed over us when we saw that second tower crumble down, and the fallout that resulted from that terrorist attack. But for your parents (I'm talking to you, Ling Ling and Thing 2), it's Coronavirus. As I write this, I'm 41. Your [future] parents are in their late teens. This pandemic...well, this is their life altering event.

Pandemics don't work like bombings or presidential assassinations or planes hitting towers, though. There's no "Where were you when..." discussions, because it doesn't slam into you the way other calamities do. Instead, a pandemic creeps upon you slowly, where you see it first from a safe distance, and you think nothing of it. It continues to inch closer and closer, and you adjust to every new development. You get used to its omnipresence in your world. But then you wake up one morning and realize you were the frog boiling slowly in the pot all along, and your entire world has been turned upside down. And you take a step back, and scratch your head, and mutter to yourself "What the hell happened?"

For me personally, it all started Wednesday, March 11. With over a thousand cases of Coronavirus (COVID-19) now in the U.S., the virus was already on the peripheral of my thoughts, but at this time most of us considered it nothing more than an extreme cold or flu (except for my twin, Shannon. She's known since December that this was something different). That night, the World Health Organization officially declared COVID-19 a pandemic. In school the next day, our principal came on over the loudspeaker in the middle of third period to ask all teachers to play a safety and hand-washing video for our students. At my school, it's rare for the school's intercom to be used to interrupt teachers in the middle of their lessons, so the loudspeaker announcement was probably my first real sign that the outbreak had finally stretched its long, spiny fingers far enough to graze my part of the world.

That night, panic buying ensued. Aisles were cleaned out of food, especially bulk food such as beans and rice. And of course, hand sanitizer, and toilet paper. I don't even need to mention the Great Toilet Paper Shortage of 2020 because that one will be forever marked in history.

The next day was Friday the 13th. We found out that Disneyland and Disney World had closed, along with Universal Studios and every other major theme park. Students and teachers scraped by the school day. I was out with a sub to take Elijah to the doctor's for a possible ear infection. I never went home that day; we had planned a trip to Las Vegas for my nephew Dylan's 21st birthday. So after Elijah's appointment and lunch, we started the long drive. We were nearing State Line when we got the news that school was cancelled until further notice.

Our weekend in Vegas was...surreal. Buffets were only allowed to stay open if gloved restaurant workers dished out the food. There were workers stationed at the escalators with disinfectant spray and towels, whose only job was to continue to spray the moving hand railings and wipe them down. Everyone--visitor or worker--had hand sanitizer. You'd see hand sanitizer every five seconds, next to slot machines or as you were walking the aisles. Despite all this, there was a relaxed vibe in Vegas. Kinda. It was calm, yet there was an underlying uneasiness in the air; a nervous energy. It was an accident that we all happened to find ourselves in Sin City in the beginning phases of a pandemic, and I think most of us wanted to go home. No one likes to be away from home when the shit's hitting the fan. We still had a good time, but it was the weirdest 21st birthday ever. Our family spent a lot of our free time during meals following the events happening in California and laughing over the latest toilet paper memes. 

We returned home on Sunday, March 15. The entire Vegas strip shut down a few days later.

Here's where I start to lose track of dates, because every day seemed to bring a new damage report--and still does today. So what I can tell you is this: Sometime after returning home from Vegas, we were given "Stay at Home" orders from the governor. All non-essential businesses were closed down. Grocery stores (of course) remained open, but movie theaters, parks, dine-in restaurants, etc., were all closed, and remain so today. Gatherings of any kind are prohibited, so birthday parties and social events are now being held over video conferencing. Here's me and some colleagues enjoying "Wine Night" together:

If you take your dog for a walk, you have to practice "social distancing," which means you must avoid coming within six feet of another person. It's so odd, because we hear this phrase a thousand times a day now, to the point where social distancing feels like it's been a fixture in our lives forever. But in reality it never existed a month ago. 

Seniors (such as Trinity's boyfriend, Caleb) will not have prom or graduation this year. The Class of 2020 is probably the most gypped class in our nation's history.

Visiting any of the essential stores that are allowed to remain open is...strange. Unless you show up right when they get their new deliveries, aisles are still cleared of food and other provisions. Half of the shoppers are wearing face masks. And more rules keep getting added.

My mom works as a nurse, and you should see the 'gear' she has to wear. It looks like a hazmat suit from the movie Outbreak. Here are the confirmed cases here in America, as of today:

It's expected to peak at the end of this month. School is now out for the rest of the school year, and Distance Learning starts tomorrow. 

I think the most surreal part is, unlike the assassination of John. F. Kennedy, or 9-11, this pandemic is not isolated to the United States. It's happening across the globe. We're all in various forms of lockdown. I've never in my life experienced an issue that everyone on the planet can empathize with. It's disconcerting on the one hand, but unifying and equalizing on the other.

The plus side of all this is the amazing quality time I'm getting with my family. We play games regularly, take walks, have movie nights, etc., and I get to do leisurely things that I've never had time for in the past, like take Neil Gaiman's online writing class, home interior projects, and play Sudoku. My favorite thing though is sending and receiving "Polos" from my mom, sister, and niece. These are short video messages, and we go back and forth all day, staying a part of each other's lives.

I don't know. Is the world still like this a decade from now? Because right now, it feels like it's never going to end. It's permeated every part of our lives. Even when it does end, it won't end. So many Americans who are considered nonessential employees have lost their jobs--either temporarily or permanently--and despite an emergency stimulus package that was recently approved, our nation might be heading for a bad recession, if not another Great Depression.

As I write this, I wonder how your lives--Ling Ling and Thing 2--have been changed as a result of Coronavirus. Is it normal in your world to see people wearing face masks? Do people still carry hand sanitizer everywhere they go? Are they still practicing social distancing in public? 

I'm going to end this with a few random pics that capture a bit of the world we live in today. I believe that, for the most part, life will return back to the way it was before a pandemic held the entire globe in its grip, and that someday this will all be a blip in the radar of our world's history. But I also believe this pandemic has created waves that will be felt for generations. LL and T2, you'll be born in the wake of those waves, so you won't know the difference. But they're there, and will always be there. Every little ripple will be felt and known by the people who remember what life was like before the outbreak of COVID-19. Your parents and grandparents--their lives will never be quite the same.

 

 

 

Doctor wheels elderly Coronavirus patient outside to watch the sunset.

COVID-19 Preppers

Needless to say there's a lot of frustrations on social media right now regarding Coronavirus. Not about the virus itself per say--at this point, most of us have not been personally touched by COVID-19. Mainly the frustrations are coming from those who are annoyed by the "alarmists" who are "stockpiling supplies" and "spreading fear" (to pull a couple quotes from twitter). 

So I'd like to offer another, less popular perspective on the matter (or an explanation, if you will).

Most stockpilers aren't alarmists, nor are they panicking/scared of the virus. 

So why are they piling up on supplies then?

I'm not a prepper, but I do have enough food/water for about three months if there's ever a disaster, so I feel like I can weigh in on this with two main reasons:

1. When thousands of people are suddenly stockpiling, you're often forced to do the same to ensure you have basic necessities--not for an emergency, but for next week. Take the toilet paper shortage earlier this week. Clint and I woke up to media reports that there were shortages on toilet paper. A friend/colleague of mine sent her husband to our local Costco for TP, and there was none to be found. Upon learning this, Clint immediately placed a bulk order from Amazon. Not because we were scared, or panicking, or alarmists, but because we want to be able to wipe our asses next Tuesday. Did we add to the toilet paper shortage in that moment? Yes. Do I care? Not really. Because unless I can convince thousands of people to slow their roll and quit stockpiling, I'm stuck doing the same, given that my priority is to take care of my family (and their booties). But the irony here is--it wasn't actually preppers that compounded the problem. It was the media. By advertising TP shortages to the masses, guess how people responded? By buying more toilet paper. And this is happening on social media all day long; fear mongering posts and tweets about mass-buying hysteria when in reality these posts themselves are inciting (or at least aggravating) the act.
2. The second reason people are stockpiling is because situations like this remind people to take stock of what they have and prepare for the worst. This doesn't make them alarmists. They simply aren't sheep who assume that the government will always have their backs. For example, anytime we experience a small tremor here in California, it reminds me that I should be prepared for a larger earthquake, which may lead to me buying an extra case of bottled water that month to store in my cellar. This is not me trembling in fear that another earthquake is about to strike. It's simple awareness, and common sense. COVID-19 is now spreading its spiny fingers through the U.S. and we now have 45 active cases in my state (as of yesterday), but honestly, I don't know anyone in real life whose panicking about it. However, some of us are using this as an opportunity to take inventory. Think of COVID-19 as a yellow flag. A talking point. Are we prepared for a pandemic? Are we prepared for an economy collapse? Most of us aren't worried about these things, but COVID reminds us that we shouldn't sit around, guilelessly floating in our bubbles of ignorance, either. It's a good time to have those conversations, and to get ready for an event that might happen five years down the road, ten, twenty, now, or never. (Somewhat related: I just finished reading a book about the Yellow Fever in 1793, and you better believe the people living in Philadelphia at the time desperately wished they had considered these things.)

So keyboard warriors can keep railing out on social media about how preppers are making the situation worse, but really it accomplishes nothing. You'll never be able to talk thousands of people into not preparing to take care of themselves and their loved ones in an impending (albeit perceived) event. And frankly, you might be making the situation worse by leading others to believe that preppers are about to clean out store shelves. That incites panic--not a few folks quietly buying some emergency supplies. So either grab a few extra Top Ramens and canned veggies yourself during your next grocery store run, or get over it. Let them do them, and you do you.