The viral takeover of life in these United States is a never ending story.
I used to check the death count, but I don't anymore.
The only time I leave the house, is to go feed the park boys, and check on the wood lot cats.
The wood lot is closed and although there is an onsite person there, I think he forgets sometimes to feed them, although they do not seem hungry. I guess I go out of a desire for familiarity, to hug the ones remaining and feel them against my face, happy to see me. I can't do that with humans right now.
The weather has been atrocious---soggy wet and cold. I imagine that is a great help in keeping people inside and from infecting one another. We have held steady in this county with two deaths from corona and 37 known infections, most related in some way to the veterans home.
Over in Corvallis they're having trouble at another nursing home, with one death there so far and other infections. I worked at that place once and it was atrocious then---under staffed and often without needed supplies and that was so long ago.
If they don't get a handle on it there, workers will get infected, not know it, and spread it back to the community.
Otherwise Oregon has done well thus far and infections here are very low. But if you have a bad apple in the bowl, like that nursing home, with workers from two counties there, who may be exposed, that can change fast.
They are going to end up with a fat well deserved fine if the owners of that place don't buck up and clean up their act.
Life is severe for the multitudes who have lost their jobs with rent and utility bills due, kids, car payments. Oh my. Around here the restaurants closed for sure, but most businesses including manufacturing plants, seem to be open. Home Depot, Lowe's, all the grocery stores, the production businesses, you name it, all open. The service industry workers, who don't get paid that much to begin with, are being hit hardest.
Many of my neighbors are retired. The ones who aren't retired are either still going to work as usual or working from home. Nobody I know of on this block has lost a job. I don't know some of the folks well though. Now the house at the end is up for sale. I don't know what happened there. They've only lived there a year, but pretty soon I never saw the woman's car anymore, just the guy's pickup which is still there and the sign's up "For Sale".
Maybe she got a job elsewhere, you know, and he's staying to sell the house. Or something. Or maybe they split, who knows. That house must be cursed. Nobody lives there long. Not if they own it and not if they rent it. The other empty house is a rental and renters there usually are there only a year or a little longer so its empty again. We're all used to that.
Once the weather turns nice that's when people will want to be outside and crowd the few parks open. I do worry about that, and whether they will have to close the one's open. The boys in the one park depend on me.
Awesome double rainbow! My husband follows the pandemic news and shares some of the sorriest tidbits while I try to just breathe and keep my shoulders down off my ears. Ugh... Take care, my dear.
ReplyDeleteYeah, I'm tired of the news, yet horrified by the numbers and the stories and awed by the health care workers in these overwhelmed hospitals who just keep on going back to work.
DeleteWe have a nursing home problem about 10 minutes from my house. As of now, 77 residents are infected and 5 have died. So sad.
ReplyDeleteOh gosh, l and L, that is a lot of people infected at one place. There have to be infected workers by now too.
DeleteLove the rainbows - and hope they are prophetic.
ReplyDeleteWe are strongly discouraged from going out - even to parks. My city (half a million or so) has recorded one death and less than 100 infections. Testing is still very limited and I expect there are many more than that.
Stay well, stay safe.
I was fed up to talk to a Portland friend tonight who informed me she's so done with the social distancing thing. Here she is making masks, talking about the effects of the virus but is done with trying to deal with two teen boys in her house. So one is off for the weekend staying with friends while another is off with his dad in another city and her boyfriend was coming over. I thought, "Really", is a week or two at home more than most Americans can endure as hardship? I thought how pathetic and self centered have people become.
DeleteAfter talking to her I thought, Ok this is going to be who will be left standing at the end of all this, at least here in America.
DeleteI wrote a long response, but the page reloaded, and it was all lost. In short, I was wondering about how you're managing to keep you and the cats supplied with your needs.
ReplyDeleteWell I had enough for two months when everything changed, cat food that is. I get the Costco purple bag dry for my cats but now I can only get one at a time, and often they have none, so its a bit scary in that regard. Chewy cannot get things to people, but I got three bags of a Diamond variety, that is similar to the Costco purple, and carried by Wilco, online. The cats do not like it as well, but that's too bad. I'm trying to get enough doses of Bravecto to treat all the cats with that, so I won't have to worry about flea treatment again for months. It lasts three months. How are you two doing? Its not that hard to have enough food for one person. Lisa from Sweet Home left me two dozen eggs outside from her own chickens. For instance. I have mustard spinach that got away from me growing everywhere so I eat that for salad. For instance.
DeleteIt seems to me that rainbows in Oregon are more likely than not to be double, but it's unusual for the two to be equally beautiful. I sure do miss lightning and thunder, but, of course, lightning can be dangerous, and thunder would scare the bejesus out of the cats.
Delete"How are you two doing?"
We're under no hardship. I'm to have my first online doctor's appointment in 30-minutes, and I'm ordering groceries delivered, mostly from Walmart and Costco, although I plan to order a few things from Albertson's. Instacart took my money for one order--from Costco--that was never delivered, but my biggest problem is that many (I would even say most) items are either out of stock or ineligible for delivery, so the day will come when we're out of a great many things that we would really like to have. My last two shipments from Chewy arrived a bit slower than usual, but not by much, and since Costco won't delivery cat litter, I'm now ordering it from Chewy, which might work out better anyway, since quality control for the Kirkland litter has gotten so bad that many containers are extremely dusty and don't clump despite being advertised as doing both. (By the way, I use the containers for emergency water storage, each one holding, I would guess, four gallons). Winco now has online ordering and delivery, but no bulk foods are available, browsing isn't possible, and items must be searched for. When I tried to get together an order yesterday, none of the 15 or so things that I wanted for were available, although they were all staples. I'm really bummed that I can no longer go to St. Vinnie's and shop for cat books, but compared to how badly millions are suffering (and oftentimes dying), Peggy and I are doing very well indeed, and, as I'm sure you know, our cats are an enormous comfort to us. I love being able to protect them from the misery that exists beyond the walls of their home. What an extreme honor and privilege it is to share our lives with such divine beings. I don't know if I told you how close we came to not being allowed to keep Harvey, but the rescue agency was concerned about our age, and our lack of plan for where he would end up if we died. We too share these concerns, but with any luck at all, one of us will surely outlive him.
"mustard spinach"
I've never heard of mustard spinach, so am wondering if you meant to put and "and" between the two. Peggy will eat spinach and kale, but I would love to have collards, mustard greens, turnip greens, and so forth, but they're way too strong for her taste. What I would really like would be for all kinds of greens to come frozen.
Last night, 60 Minutes had a Holocaust survivor who, starting when he was eleven, spent two years alone in an attic, and his story put me in mind of the woman you know who said that she had enough social isolation after a mere two weeks.