Living in the time of pandemic: COVID-19 (263)
June 16, 2025
Year 4 of COVID in the Bay Area.
Year 6, Day 49: Summer’s here and one parent friend is already sick of it. The kids are driving her up the wall with their drama; her dogs escaped the house and went on unauthorized walkabout; her pipes burst. I’m personally not looking forward to the work portions of summer, I’m back to working too late every night, or the bills for summer camp. But compared to this one friend, I’m doing pretty well. I’m hoping the rest of life stuff will be tolerable or manageable. I’ll take either one!
Smol Acrobat and I are feeling mildly under the weather though, that might be the stress and fatigue. They complain of a sore throat and my head hadn’t stopped aching all day no matter what I throw at it.
I did finally find cord locks that might work for SmolAc’s masks, fingers crossed.
Year 6, Day 50: We did our annual local pickup of the outerwear left behind and thankfully this year some enterprising individuals had already washed nearly everything by the time we turned up. Huge relief for me as the pickup only took about 30 minutes. I’d been bracing myself to do multiple runs this week to gather everything and wash it all while somehow still getting work done.
Back at home, I set up a temporary work station for JB. I was in charge of constructing taped up boxes, opening and hauling the giant bags. JB was in charge of stuffing the boxes full. They forgot to keep count so I only know we have four enormous boxes full of donated books and outerwear. We’ve got one half load to wash and pack up left.
Today was extra tough on that point, I had meeting after meeting after meeting which ate half my day. The donations ate a quarter of the day leaving me with very few hours to work so I squeezed some in waiting for JB to finish their activities and then logged many late night hours. Not fun.
Year 6, Day 51: My back twanged when I got up this morning, because apparently sleeping is an Olympic sport, and my left index finger tendon was strained. Just the one finger. No idea why.
Perfect timing for my free weights to arrive! They have been unpacked and relocated to their home for now.
The kids usually want scrambled eggs with cheese for breakfast (yes I feel a faint twinge of guilt for supporting Big Egg but that’s not a place where I can focus energy right now) so I generally oblige even though it’s not my favorite egg prep. Usually all versions get a “yum” of approval but today’s were so sublime, SmolAc had to stop eating and come to my office to specially say “thank you for the eggs, they were delicious!”
Year 6, Day 52: SmolAc’s daycare had a moving up ceremony for the kids going to their TK program in the fall. They were completely uninterested in it, examining their chair the entire time while other kids bounced in their seats or sang.
Father’s Day is this weekend and I have utterly dropped the ball on that – AUGH. I assigned a craft to JB to do while I assigned the photo printing part to me. It would be great if the Walgreens photo site actually worked, ahem! CVS is too far out of my way to squeeze in a run there before Sunday. Especially since my pain decided to spike today. Maybe JB’s got the right idea to start planning for their next birthday the day after their last one. That’s what I should do for these holidays that happen every single year. O_O
Year 6, Day 53: The final quotes aren’t in yet but we’re looking at a ballpark of $30k+ on repairs between the roof and the maintenance that’s piled up in the last eightish years. Plus another $$$$? for the painting that we’ve procrastinated on this entire time. I’ve got about $24k set aside for this purpose so we’re going to have to make a few adjustments to close that gap.
Now that I’m in the neighborhood of 6 months with a trainer and not quitting, I’ve proven to Financial Me that I’m taking this seriously enough that it’s ok to spend money on equipment. I am excited (emotionally) to use the new hand weights and resistance bands I finally bought but physically I’m about to become one with the floor so actual use will be exciting next week.
