Notes from a Self Quarantine

I went out into my vegetable garden this afternoon. My tomato plants are growing out of control, they’re pretty much taller than me now. They’re getting so big that I needed to add a single tall garden stake to a plant I had already put in a tomato cage — the plant has grown well over the top of the cape. So do I now need to cage my cages?? At this rate the tomato plants are going to take over the entire garden enclosure. Now if only those green tomatoes would ripen soon!

And I am annoyed — an animal has once again gotten into my bed of wildflower seeds and dug up all the sunflower seeds. And the little sprouts! And when I say “dug”, I mean 3 big holes in the bed, and there might have been an animal ass print too. I had been dumping cayenne pepper on top of the seeds, but I hadn’t been out to check the past two days because work had been so busy. And the animals must have noticed, because they wasted no time in ruining all my hard work!

Our neighbor planted two sunflower seeds in a pot months ago — it’s on their deck (which is low to the ground) and now has two huge sunflowers growing out of it and one of them just bloomed this week. It’s beautiful. And our neighborhood animals are not messing with it! Are they just afraid to go on the deck?

I’ve been really jealous about their sunflower plant, so two weeks ago I tossed two seeds and some soil into an empty pot and put it on our patio. I now have a little seedling growing. I’m afraid that the squirrels or birds or chipmunks or which ever species is the sunflower destroyers are going to notice it and drag it out of the pot like they have done to all the other seeds I have planted. How do they even smell them?? It’s like as soon as I plant the sunflowers, they are lining up ready for dinner.

If this sunflower survives on our patio and actually produces a sunflower, then I’m definitely going to stop planting them in the garden enclosure because it’s a waste of my time. Maybe our neighbors are on to something. And maybe I should just stick to tomato plants. And spinach!

I went out for dinner with a friend tonight — we picked an Italian restaurant in the center of town. They’re a little pricey, but the food is always good. And they just built a new outdoor patio during the past year — construction started way before COVID-19, it actually took them a really long time to pull this patio project together, but it was worth it. The patio has a roof, lights and even overhead fans (it was kind of chilly last night, so we didn’t need them), the floor is stone and they’ve hung pots of herbs on the railings. It’s beautiful.

And — we left our husbands at home! Now, that’s a night out! And honestly, my husband was thrilled to have 3 hours to himself at home. Yes, we were there for 3 hours — the reservation was only supposed to be for 90 minutes, so they had time to disinfect the table before the next customers, but thankfully they didn’t have anyone that needed the table after us, because we definitely sat there for as long as we wanted.

And boy, did we eat! We actually grazed — we ordered two appetizers, a cheese plate and shared a beet, arugula and goat cheese salad. We ordered a couple of cocktails (wine for me of course!) and finished the night by splitting the steak tips with pappardelle pasta with a delicious gorgonzola sauce. It was an entrée that neither of us would have thought of ordering, but the waitress recommended it and I am so glad that we listened to her. It was amazing. We practically licked the bowl. I actually used bread to sop up the cheese sauce. There’s no judging at this restaurant!

What a wonderful night chatting with my friend! In “normal” times, we would try to do this every couple of months and there’s another friend that would join us. We’ve all been stuck inside for so long that months have passed since we’ve had a dinner date. It was so nice to see her. And so normal!

We ate, drank and chatted and the night just flew by! Thank goodness they didn’t kick us out…I guess that’s the beauty of going out on a Wednesday night instead of a weekend. We walked back to my house and chatted for a little bit before she left for home. What a nice night!

Although all that cheese is now congealing in my stomach…who’s idea was it to order cheese with every course??? Totally mine. My stomach is not going to be happy with me tomorrow…but that’s tomorrow’s problem.

I had big plans for today. I had to monitor a series of Zoom meetings for my full time job this afternoon and I honestly thought that being tied to my computer for 4 hours would allow me to get some other projects done during that same time period. Oh, I am just so funny, right?

Well, you know how this story goes — things didn’t work out according to how we’d planned, even though I organized each and every detail down to the second. And for most of the participants in today’s virtual meetings, they didn’t even notice the hiccup, but I did and it annoyed me. The technology only malfunctioned during the first 5 minutes, and this happened before the meetings were actually supposed to start.

So it wasn’t a real problem, but it was stressful and time consuming for the group of us that were behind the scenes operating all this new technology remotely. If we had been able to conduct these meetings onsite, in a meeting space, then our little snafu would not have happened. Or then maybe one of our meeting participants would have gone to the wrong location, gotten lost and showed up late to the meeting, so I guess mistakes could have happened even if we were meeting during “normal” times.

The rest of the day was perfect, the technology worked, everyone was able to show up where they need to and on time, but the beginning mishap is now what I am concerntrating on, because we have to do the same set of meetings tomorrow. What if we have an even bigger problem tomorrow? I’m going to stress about it tonight, instead of relaxing and basking in the fact that we were able to fix a problem on the fly and totally under the radar. Sigh.

And my eyes just sting tonight from staring at a computer all day. I’m tired and I didn’t get all that other work done that I thought I would able to get done while monitoring my computer for 4 hours. But I did read almost 50 pages in my library book this evening. And we haven’t seen a mouse today. And those things are definitely wins!

Today I got out of bed determined that I would no longer be upset that we had a mouse sighting over the weekend. I had slept really well and even though I didn’t spring out of bed when my alarm went off, I felt pretty rested. It was a new day, a brand new week, and I wasn’t going to let the crap from last week get me down.

It also helped that my husband went into the kitchen first and checked the 3 mouse traps, which he reported were empty, so I felt brave enough to head into the kitchen (while wearing shoes!), ready to start my brand new, positive week. Until I saw the coffee pot.

It had leaked all over the kitchen counter (AGAIN!), all the parts and pieces were in the correct place, so I have no idea how this keeps happening. It’s fine for 6 days, leaks for one, and then is fine again for 2 weeks. Damn appliances! And now I am cleaning up the kitchen AGAIN! I thought I was done with this crap!

So I clean up the coffee (which wasn’t that bad, considering how much coffee could have dripped down the counter onto the floor…) and put the kitchen back together. I have now missed my window to get in a morning workout, so I log into my computer and start working instead. And you know what happens next — the phone rings, I attend a meeting, the phone rings again. Before I even realize it’s after 12 p.m., I’m ready for lunch, I am so close to finishing this document that HAS to get out today, and now it’s pouring outside so I can’t go for a walk. And of course I haven’t showered yet because I’m still wearing my workout clothes, but haven’t worked out yet. Don’t judge me.

Why are Monday’s like this?? But the day ends well– I finish my project that needed to be done today, it’s for a series of meetings that start tomorrow, and it looked good. It was complicated, but I pulled it off. Let’s hope it actually works during tomorrow’s virtual meeting. Zoom, anyone??

And I get both my walk and my workout in (my arms are going to be sore tomorrow!) and the shower that I so needed (still no judging!). My kitchen is clean (for now), because my husband has been smoking a brisket in our outdoor smoker for about 18 hours. That’s tonight’s dinner. I found a yummy wine in my makeshift wine cellar that will go perfectly. I think I might have a few minutes to read a few pages in my library book. And I haven’t seen a mouse today.

Take that, Monday!

I didn’t sleep too good last night — I was worried there would be mice running around my bedroom. I mean, where there is one, there must be another, right?? Don’t they multiply like crazy, like bunnies? Although I would be much happier if a wild bunny broke into my house. I’d probably lay out the bread and make him sandwiches. But no mice, no, thank you!

So I kept waking up thinking I was hearing the sound of little gross feet running through my kitchen. There is no way I would be able to hear that from the bedroom, but whatever, sometimes my imagination gets away from me. I woke up at 3 a.m. and I really had to pee, but I didn’t want to get out if bed. What if I ran into a mouse when I turned on the light in the bathroom?? I finally made myself get up at 4:30 a.m. to use the bathroom, no mice around, but I was watching the whole time. How can an adult woman be so scared of a little mouse?? Cause they are gross and are not paying any rent!

My husband checked the traps this morning, and we didn’t have any new customers. Could it really be just the one mouse?? He went down into our crawl space this afternoon and plugged up some holes and spaces around the openings for the pipes for our gas store and the kitchen sink. He put out some more traps down in the basement crawl space as well. Maybe that will help.

And I continued to clean again today — I washed the kitchen rugs, I vacuumed, I scrubbed the rest of the dishes that I didn’t finish yesterday. I washed the kitchen counters so many damn times. It was exhausting and I feel like I have nothing to show from my weekend except wrinkly, dried hands. I was going to get out in the garden, and read my library book and just enjoy the sun. I did go to an outdoor yoga class this morning with my favorite instructor! But other than that, I cleaned the kitchen.

I hope there won’t be any more mice. This has already become a fulltime job and I have to work my actual fulltime job tomorrow. Hopefully the damn mice will just go back outside and leave us alone, and I can stop cleaning the kitchen like a crazy person. Sigh.

So I think that we have a mouse in my kitchen. And I am definitely not happy about it. And I have been cleaning up after this unwelcome guest ever since we discovered that he stopped by. My hands are now raw again like they were back in March when this pandemic first started. Let me tell you what happened this morning.

My husband made his typical Saturday morning 3 slices of toast. A little while later, I went to make my own toast — there were a couple of slices left in the bread package, I pulled the first one out and it looked like the corner had just been cut off the bread. I figured that it had been done when it was packaged at the bread factory (this brand of bread typically has big holes in the center of the middle slices, its so annoying when you just want to make a sandwich!), so I didn’t think anything of it. We had a whole new loaf of bread so I just grabbed two slices from there and stuck them in the toaster.

When my husband came back inside the house, I casually mentioned the missing bread corner. He asked if it looked like someone had taken a bite out of it. I hadn’t even though about it, so I grabbed the old loaf of bread out of the garbage to look. And sure enough, once I turned that slice with the missing corner over, it looked like someone had taken a giant bite out of it. There were definitely teeth marks. Now we are grossed out because we have been eating from this loaf of bread all week. Did this happen at the store?? My husband said he’s seen mice at that grocery store before. Wait?! He thinks it’s mice that ate the bread?? I flip the plastic packaging over and there’s a hole in the bottom, a good sized hole. We cannot have mice, I will just freak out if we do.

I start pulling things off the counter were the bread basket always is and there’s a pile of mouse shit on my countertop. I am so not happy. My husband makes me put on a mask and gloves to clean up the poop, while he goes to Home Depot to buy traps. I cross my fingers that he won’t get the poison ones, because I don’t want these assholes to eat poison in my kitchen and then go off somewhere else to die a smelly death.

I start scrubbing everything that was on the countertop — utensil holders, salt and pepper shakers, olive oil bottle, my cannisters for flour. Everything that can go in the dishwasher does, everything else I scrub until the skin on the back of my hands starts to crack. The bread basket goes in the trash, so does that new loaf of bread. I don’t think we will be eating any sliced bread anytime soon.

I wash the countertops, the stove, sweep the floors — I find more poop, but it seems to be in a concentrated area if that is any consolation. I start hoping that maybe a cute little chipmunk found it’s way into our kitchen — he was disoriented and helped himself to some bread. I’m not sure why a lost chipmunk makes me feel better. Maybe it’s because I find mice so dirty — they poop all over everything and now I feel like I will not be able to get my kitchen clean. If it’s a mouse, the only option available might be that I need to move out of this house right now, I might not even pack a bag, because what if there is mouse poop in it??

My husband sets up a few traps in our kitchen, and a couple by our back door. They are the kill instantly traps, thank goodness, not that I want living things to die exactly, but if this mouse isn’t wearing a jacket and tie and writing me a monthly rent check, then I just don’t want him in my house. And especially in my kitchen — that’s our food in there, not a buffet for local animals!

We decide to go out for dinner, even though it’s Saturday, a day we usually cook at home. I don’t think either of us can stomach making food at home, especially my husband who ate toast that a mouse could have licked.

We got back from the restaurant just past 10 p.m. — my husband is excited to check the traps, but don’t mice usually come out at like 2 a.m.?? Well, of course, not our mouse! He’d already been out foraging in our kitchen and got stuck in one of the traps. He didn’t make it. But he left behind some poop for me to clean up.

And I am really glad that it’s over. Maybe it’s because it was the week after the holiday weekend. Or maybe it’s because I only had to work three days last week, so come back to working five days in a row was just hard…whatever it was this work week has just been long and really busy. I’m pretty tired, but it’s Friday, so you know what that means — Friday night outdoor dining for us! We’re supposed to get some heavy rain from a tropical storm tonight, so that will definitely make outdoor dining interesting. Hopefully that tent holds! Or I’ll have a much better story tomorrow.

My husband and I are by ourselves for dinner tonight. We had such a good time with our friends last week, that it might be a little bit of a letdown to go back to the same place by ourselves.

And then last week on our walk home, we stopped to chat with with a group that we’ve been chatting with on Friday nights during the pandemic. We would see them every Friday evening if the weather was nice — they’d be sitting outside in lawn chairs in front of their condo when we’d be walking back with takeout on a Friday night in the beginning, and then when the local restaurants opened back up for outside dining we’d see them hanging out in the same spot when we walked back from dinner.

My husband and I have been chatting with them for a couple of months now — it’s always the same two ladies, but last week they had two other friends with them. We stopped and chatted like we usually do, but this time they asked if we wanted a drink. I was going to say no because I didn’t want to impose, but my husband said yes, so we sat on the sidewalk in from of their condo and had a drink with them. I had a glass of wine and my husband had a beer. Look — we made new friends at our age!

It was nice to sit and chat with them, people that we have probably only chatted with because we were all stuck at home. If this was “normal” times, my husband and I would probably be in too much of a hurry to stop and chat with strangers. See — this pandemic has taught us something!

It’s been really hot and humid the past two days. I typically don’t mind the heat — I like it sunny and warm. I’d move to Florida in a second, if the bugs weren’t so big and my husband would even entertain the idea of living in Florida. He hates the heat and would rather live in a climate where it snows all year round. There is no way that I would join him there. We might need “his” and “her” homes…

I decided to go for a run today during my lunch break, even thought it was about 1000% humidity. I’ve been running on Thursday’s lately, so why not continue the tradition today? Who cares if it’s hot and sticky? Of course I went later than I originally had planned because that’s just how it works for me. I get outside and it’s hot, but it’s a nice hot. I started my run, and yeah, it’s pretty damn hot, but I’m happy, I’m smiling, I’m moving. It’s just a nice summer day!

Until I finished mile 1 and realized just how damn hot and humid it was today. That kind of hot that makes you feel like you are walking backwards. So I shortened my original run plan, stuck a little bit closer to home in case I got dangerously hot, but I still did just over 3 miles! Not bad considering today’s weather!

My husband went back to the gym for a spin class tonight for the first time since March. He used to take a spin class 4 or 5 nights a week when we were back in normal times, so I know that he has missed it. Or missed it as much as he will allow himself to show…

I figured that he would be so excited for his first class in months, but again, he doesn’t do excited real well. And I think he came back from class annoyed. The gym is limiting the number of students per class obviously, but they are also requiring students to wear their face masks during the class, even when they are on the spin bikes. So he was hot and sweaty from the class, and then his mask started sticking to his mouth as he was trying to breathe through the workout, which I am sure made it worse. And the gym isn’t turning on the overhead fans to cool the room, so that made him even hotter. He wasn’t too happy when he got home which I don’t quite get because isn’t exercise supposed to realize happy endorphins? Not for my husband obviously. But it was a hot one today!

OMG — guys, look at what I was able to score at Target this evening!!

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It’s like the trifecta of elusive home products — toilet paper, napkins and hand soap! What a score this was!! And if I needed to purchase paper towels, I could have! They were there too! The toilet paper aisle as so packed with products that it reminded me of those long ago pre-COVID times! What a Wednesday evening! Maybe I should have played the lottery. Is that even still happening in COVID times??

And while I was checking out with the cashier, the next couple in line came right up behind me — they were seriously dancing with the “keep 6 feet of distance away from the customer in front of you” protocol. I gave them a little bit of a warning look, but while wearing a full face mask, what the heck do my nasty looks even mean?? The cashier must have understood my concern, because she walked to the end of her station to hand me my receipt instead of using the Plexiglas cut out on the middle. Or maybe it was because I was already heading out towards the exit to the parking lot so I could put distance between me and the customers behind me…I would like to think that the cashier just got me and I am sticking with that! The stuff she must see every day — she should be writing a daily blog!!

But I was able to purchase another 8 whole rolls of toilet paper — my husband is so jealous because they didn’t have his preferred brand there tonight, which I would have totally purchased instead of my brand had they had it! *cough, cough*

Thank goodness for Target, folks, now we have more TP! Or at least I have more TP! Yay!

OMG, I finally got my teeth cleaned today!! It seems like it has been forever since I’ve been to the dentist — my last cleaning was scheduled for March, but then the world ended and my appointment got cancelled. The office optimistically rescheduled me for May 12, but then they never reached back out with a reminder or a confirmation, which is unheard of for this office. I called them the morning of May 12 to see if they were even open, they were but just for emergency work. My teeth cleaning hardly seemed like an emergency, so they reassured me that they would call to reschedule when they were allowed to reopen for normal appointments.

And they called me first thing this morning!! I actually answered the phone, which I never do especially before normal business hours. They’d had a cancellation and was I available to come in today at 2:30 p.m.? Oh yes, I was available!! I don’t think I’d ever been so excited to see a dental hygienist in my entire adult life. I was petrified that I’d grown a forest of cavities in the last 10 months since I’d been in for a cleaning. But I was just so excited to have my teeth professionally cleaned after all this time. It was almost as exciting as getting my hair colored…almost.

I sailed through my appointment, even got full x-rays. No cavities for me! My hygienist said that everything looked good, but I do have some staining that she tried to scrub off. I didn’t tell her just how many cups of coffee I have been drinking lately…

But my teeth are clean and healthy and I made my next appointment for January. Do you know that’s only 6 months away?? I hope that the world will look much more “normal” when my next appointment rolls around!