Day #79 of Self-Imposed Isolation in Epidemic Central

[shadowkat]

Deep breath. Sigh.

It's sunny today and in the eighties, also very humid or so I'm told. I have not been outside and currently have the air conditioner set to 72 degrees F. Spent most of the day staring at my laptop or out the window, attempting to push rocks up a hill.


Crazy Company in line with the Governor requested that we all stop and provide a moment of silence in commemoration of George Floyd, whose memorial service started at 2PM today in Minneapolis. I actually did it at 2:03 - because I lost track of time. And it didn't entail all that much - just turning off my music and standing up and staring out my window. Which I do a lot of anyhow.

Decided to reach out to a few more of my black friends - to see how they are doing. I don't really think of them as black friends, just friends. It's not really how I think. I mean I know they are black, and know that there's no way anyone can be colorblind, but honestly it's never really mattered to either of us that much. It's not the stinky elephant in the room, it's more of a spider that we know is there, but it's doing its thing in the corner. (And yes, I have issues with spiders - racism to me is an insidious thing like a spider - it creeps up on you.)

Had a lengthy chat - text messaging - with CW, who is ensconced in a nice house with her significant other in Ipswitch, MA. She's a fiscal Republican who adored HW Bush, also her sister is a parole officer. Currenly she runs a medical supply company, her own business, and is the database manager/workflow/IT support for an Oncology Network. The other one, who is a liberal version, is ensconced in Martha's Vineyard, and I've not heard back from. And, cubical mate - the one on the opposite side of the aisle from me, who had health issues - hasn't responded to my email.

Much like COVID-19, the protests appear to have overshadowed my life. We have another 8 PM curfew tonight. Folks are discussing doing away with police in their entirety on my FB page - I'm talking about people I know off-line, who go to my church - reposting an article from a UU Minister (who seriously might want to consider a different calling). Okay, no. Not a good idea. I restrained myself from responding to a comment on a friend's post about...how "there were no good cops, because they stand by the bad cops, and when a bad cop does something wrong he just gets transferred" - okay this is akin to me saying there are no ministers, good teachers, doctors, firemen, priests, union leaders, Republicans...because hello, that happens in those professions too. The Unitarian Universalist Society just had a huge scandal last year regarding the lack of POC in the UUA. And look what happened with the Romance Writer's Association of America? That organization fell apart because of racism - and no, just because there are a few racist romance novelists that does not mean all romance novelists are racist.

I ranted about this to my mother, who well...

Mother: Yes, you need to be wary of making generalizations. Including you, when you state all Republicans are evil. They aren't all evil.
Me: Yeah, I know, I text messaged one today - who I'm pretty certain did not vote for Trump.

I happen to know a lot of good cops, many who are of color, male and female. A lot of my co-workers husbands are police officers, and volunteer firemen.

Also, it's all good and well to state we don't need cops - until you get mugged, raped, robbed or someone has broken into your house and is trying to kill you. There are gangs and organized crime, not to mention serial killers, rapists, etc in New York. Were people dropped on their heads?

Doing away with the police is not going to solve the problem. Racism is not just in the police departments. It's more wide-spread than that. If it were just in the police departments - there wouldn't be a problem. Also, there are a lot of people in police departments who are NOT white. 9-1-1 actually addressed this a year ago rather well, I thought. Demonstrating how we need the police and not all cops are bad - and we need to work together to make the world a better place - not throw the baby out with the bath water, so to speak.

End rant. Stupid people make my head hurt.

In other news? The police stabbing was about twenty blocks away from me. Reminding me of why I've been avoiding that area of the city lately. Apparently some nitwit came up and stabbed a cop, then shot two cops. They finally shot him - and everyone is in critical condition. He wasn't a protestor, he was a crazy person. There are crazy people out there too.
Of course the stupid media and the police commissioner who I'm beginning to despise - he makes my skin crawl whenever he's on screen, are making a big-to-do out of it. The Police Commissioner looks like he is wearing eye makeup. It's very odd. (Not that I necessarily have any issues with him doing it...just that it is odd for a police commissioner to be wearing eye makeup.)

The protestors protected the Target at Atlantic Avenue Terminal (which is the one I go to and the one nearest to me) last night from looters. Go protesters. Hey, maybe the protestors can take over for the police - they can protect the city from the looters, certainly appear to be doing a better job of it. (Note that Target - is principally run by black people as are many of the businesses in Downtown Brooklyn and Atlantic Avenue Terminal - most of the workers and employees are black in those stores.)

I mention these two things - because it's surreal that it is happening near me, yet I see none of it. Don't hear it. Don't see it. If I stayed off the internet and away from the news completely? I'd be oblivious to it. Kind of like COVID-19. It's the horror show happening outside my window and it's just getting worse. I would really like to change the channel now.

OR go out and get better snacks.



At work, I finally got a Requisition approved - only to discover that there was a shortfall. It's as if someone flipped the numbers, and put in the wrong one. But I don't know which one was put in wrong. The funding or the Requisition. I figured this out after I set it all up in our purchasing system. So I sent an email to my team to see what happened.

Mother and I chatted. Mother was kind of funny today. Apparently my father has decided other people are wandering in and out of their house.

Me: How's Dad?
Mother: Outside of the fact that he is a bit confused...he keeps thinking there are other people roaming the house. Today for example, he asked who made his sandwich. And he wants the bathrooms replaced. I told him that we just needed our equipment replaced, the bathrooms are fine.

They decided to get a haircut today - in their retirement community. Why my father had to have a haircut - I've no clue. Two things that I would not do right now - get a haircut and go to the dentist - yet that's what people are doing. Sis-in-law is trying to set up one to fix a tooth, which yes, I can understand, but why do you need a cleaning right now?

Mother: Well, not everyone is like you - they can't go years without seeing a dentist.
Me: I'm not talking about years here - I'm talking a matter of months or days. I mean - we're all being told to keep our hands out of our mouths - that's kind of what a dentist does.

Did COVID-19 just not happen for some folks? Or is approximately 108,000 some lives not a big deal? We have over 1.8 million people who tested positive. Over 30,000 died in NY alone. Granted we're now down from a 26% infection rate to a 2% infection rate - but that's after a lot of hard work.

Found out today that George Floyd had just recently recovered from COVID-19. Mentioned this to mother, who said, "oh that's why he died as easily as he did, he'd already been compromised." Pause. "Who kills someone over a twenty dollar counterfeit check? What is the thinking behind that? Why would you?" I don't know. Makes no sense to me. Nor does racial profiling for that matter. "Or," mother added,"stopping, harassing and arresting a bunch of teenage girls in a car? Why do that?" There are sick twisted people on this planet? None of it makes sense. It makes no sense to me that a volunteer fireman and all around great guy, calls Barack Obama a terrorist and votes for Trump. It's cognitive dissonance.


I don't understand people. I do understand why people are protesting - that I understand. Although, I kind of wished they'd done it last year and not in the middle of a pandemic. 2016 would have been a much better time for this. But the pandemic makes sense. It's been building, and the frustration level, cabin fever, and boredom has contributed. Also our media is fanning the flames daily, distorting the news and politicizing it - which it has been doing for a very long time now.

And this year has been a slow build...we started the year out with Impeachment Hearings, and the Romance Writer's Association meltdown over racism. While that was brewing, the virus and the police brutality issues were brewing in the background.

And the year isn't over yet.

Mother: I'm worried we may not have a country by the end of this year.
That's not something that I ever worried about before now.
Me: I feel the same way. I'm depressed, frustrated, and trying to just go one day at a time. But it is hard to have hope sometimes...
Mother: I'm sorry you're depressed and frustrated.
Me: I'm no more depressed or frustrated than anyone else, than you...for example.
Mother: True enough.

After work I pulled the winter/spring clothes out of my drawers and into the trunk, and substituted them with the spring/summer clothes. It's slowly dipping into the low eighties now. I don't know if I'm losing weight or not, everything seems to fit the same or be slightly looser, hard to tell.

It's a small thing to do. But something I have control over. I've no control over most everything else. I feel like the world has gone crazy outside my window - but it has always been crazy. What can I do?
The creeping death continues, lying in weight. Although it needn't bother.
In some bizarre way...this feels like a less entertaining playing out of Stephen King's The Stand, except I'm at that point in the novel in which I want more action and less long speeches and monologues.

Sigh. Deep Breath. Maybe a drink? Or fix dinner? Relax. Away from the news and the internet.

I leave you with more flowers...but from another year, and another place.

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[shadowkat]

It's a flowering bush near my mother's house - taken December 2018.