10:06 AM, Monday, 13 December 2021

he joke goes that whenever you’re retired every day is Saturday. And it’s true. For a good part of yesterday I was thinking it was Monday… the point being all the days pretty much seem the same, and I don’t mean that in a negative way because I’m not easily bored and always find something to do/read/write/watch… when you’re not working or having to be somewhere. As far as I’m concerned, after a life of incessant stress inducing deadlines, not that I don’t still have a few, including the BIG final one, this seems healthier. And I immediately think back to primitive man, the caveman and women whose deadline was finding something to eat before you die. Life was more ‘basic’ then.

People are on the move… For the holidays or just because…still complaining about being stir crazy… my daughter’s main squeeze is gone with his brothers just landing in Spain of all places,a place I went and I still remember the length of the trip and the fact that my clothes were new and uncomfortable including the shoes which gave me blisters even while I was on the plane for the long flight and of course I was responsible for 50 some students — not a relaxing event because there are a LOT of hazards and adolescents rarely perceive or care about them until it’s too late…..but Spain was nonetheless interesting, immensely so,  and I would love to go back now that I’m older and wiser and not responsible for the safety and edification of a whole swarm of adolescents.

And Quilla’s boyfriend will then be flying from Spain to North Dakota to be with his family for the holiday. Talk about a different environment!!! But we’re staying put pretty much, except today we’re going out to use some gift cards that I gave to Isabel for Christmas last year!!! She’s slow that way, not too materialistic or much of a consumer, plus we’ve been on lockdown for a good part of the year… I’ll be the wheelman… she’ll go into the store and I’ll keep Wookie with me entertained in the car and read and listen to music it actually feels good, I don’t mind this at all, and encourage her to take her sweet time. She’ll wear two masks.

But some people are not so careful and this is why there’s still over a thousand people dying in hospitals or filling up again nurses and doctors are overwhelmed and burnt out and leaving the field. Thank goodness in blue Washington it’s the law to wear masks and people obey it without any whining like you see all over goofy, ignorant pockets and swaths of red America.  And there’s an article in The Atlantic by someone somewhere in U.S. who says they never think about COVID !?!?! and neither does anyone else they encounter in their town, it doesn’t govern what they do or how they act at all, and they think that the news is over hyping and creating unnecessary over-the-top fear, excessive caution, and this strikes me as being almost a psychosis/ wishful thinking/ denying reality and also being extremely risk oblivious and irresponsible, but these are intelligent people who still are acting this way, throwing the dice every time they go out and encounter someone. I don’t live in fear, but I certainly respect an invisible (!) deadly illness that has already shown what it can do in countless ways. Not taking it seriously seems ridiculous and trying to encourage others to be lax seems negligent and/or malicious. How many stories of people like this are there, or worse, the ones who are out proselytizing and encouraging people that it’s all just a hoax, a conspiracy by the ‘elites’ (here I am another ‘elite’, stretched out here in my threadbare jammies) and urging everyone to not get vaccinated or even show caution, wear a mask, and then they die or someone they love dies? How many of those cases have we seen? Those diabolical elites killing people off right and left, I guess.  And some on Twitter say, “Well, just about everyone dying now is unvaccinated and a Trump voter… so, to each his own and good luck on getting smarter on the other side. Plus, now they won’t be voting.