An Important COVID-19 UPDATE From the Management:

The Management contemplating times ahead and wondering if my 1.75L bottle of scotch is running low. Time to make a zombie run outside of the homestead…

So, I am just curious as to how everyone is doing. Are you dealing with it? Things sure as hell aren’t like they were a year ago.

Routines are driving me crazy. My dogs love it – they are all about routines. If I find myself developing a routine, I try my best to uproot it. The problem is, those routines are not easily recognizable by oneself.

TV is one routine I can do without. I have almost stopped listening to the news on TV. Yes, the sound is on but I am captivated with everyone’s backgrounds. I’m talking about the talking heads and their remote broadcasts from home. I look at their art, I squint and try to decipher what the books are on their bookshelves, try to figure out who’s who in the framed family photograph, I admire their kitchens, laugh when their dogs appear, vote on who has the best office, and speculate on who has the best taste in art. Sadly, most of these people have horrible taste in art. These are journalists with regular gigs on the major cable networks so, we know they have pretty good salaries yet many of their backgrounds look like my dorm room during my first year in college. One reporter looks like his wife relegated him to a tiny space in the basement of their Georgetown apartment; I can tell it’s probably Georgetown because he is a Washington reporter and the wall behind him is made up of very old bricks. He has a tiny little painting that is poorly hung – and hung too high, a stack of four books with a pot of artificial flowers on top.  Other remote locations are pretty nice: The doctor explaining COVID numbers wins the office prize. He has architectural furniture, bookshelves that wrap around the room, and a cool model of a Saturn rocket on the table. I then wonder if it is an office or a waiting room but then figure it’s probably the former – otherwise, someone would have a full-time job telling little kids to keep their dirty little paws off the rocket. Many of the correspondents want you to notice their books and will turn them so the front covers are facing you. No practical jokers with covers of Hustler magazine strategically placed. Then there are the journalists you presume are very intelligent and their bookshelves look like staged offices in a Saturday afternoon Open House. Pitiful. It’s curious how many like to broadcast from their kitchen. Why? I don’t know. Some of the kitchens are very cool and deserve the attention but most are just normal outdated ones. One well-known Southern journalist who specializes in presidential history broadcasts from a very nice living room. Behind him is a large, framed nautical chart that I can’t determine where it’s from; it looks like a mirrored image of the Florida Keys so, I imagine it might be the Chesapeake Bay. In the glass of the framed chart, there was a reflection of his beautiful waterfront view so, I figure the chart is where he lives. This guy definitely has the big salary yet as I look around the rest of the living room, there is no real artwork. I’m thinking I am going to propose to one of these networks that they hire me as a paid, artistic background stylist for all of these people who certainly could make better impressions on the viewing public.

“Isn’t that unbelievable?” my wife, Vicky, sitting next to me, says.

“The living room or the view?”

“What? Aren’t you paying attention to what he’s saying? He’s talking about the Supreme Court!” she looks at me with a frown.

“Um, you know me – I’ve got a lot on my mind.”

More routines:

When my beard stubble is moveable, it’s time to take a bath. I catch myself going out to get the mail on Sundays: At the last second, when reality sets in and I realize what I’m doing, I pretend I am fixing the mailbox door. The only person who sees me is my next-door neighbor who is a retired Methodist minister. He gives me a knowing grin. He wears his usual T-shirt and pajama bottoms (even before COVID) and sports a really bad hairpiece that even he makes fun of – so, he does not count.

I have started a list of important things I am doing so when friends call and ask what I am doing, I sound like I have it all together.

When we are fixing lunch, my wife asks what I want to drink: “Wine,” I tell her and when she gives me that WTF look, I tell her, “Lemonade and iced tea are not appropriate combinations with fine cuisine.” She buys it and I have 2 glasses while we watch a movie over lunch.

I also secretly throw in clean shirts, pants, underwear and socks into my laundry hamper that currently contains nothing more than five pairs of pajamas. I can boast, however, that I rise before my dogs – they are now sleeping in past 9:00 am.

And for the first time, I have to worry about periodically starting up my car to make sure the battery doesn’t die. I do that when I put on my go-to-the-mailbox outfits – two sets of clothes that I alternate daily so the neighbors don’t think I am not hygiene conscious.

Now, if you’ll excuse me, it’s 5:30 pm and I need to put on my go-to-the-mailbox attire and get back before cocktail hours start.