Pandemic Entry #3

Hello again. I struggled with how to title these posts. My brain kept telling me to start out with "Captain's Log, Star Date blah, blah, blah," but I don't really know how star dates work so I would just be making it up, and I want this to be accurate. I'm sure that Peanut Head could have hooked me up with a proper star date, but so far I've been keeping these posts on the down low. My experience is just that, my experience. I'm doing this as a diary of sorts, so I don't forget how it all went down. I just hope that looking back I can laugh at how we all got through the toilet paper shortage of 2020. Please let me be able to look back and laugh.

As of this moment, Idaho has 11 confirmed cases of COVID-19. Community spread of COVID-19 has also been confirmed in one of those cases. That means the source of the infection is unknown and cannot be traced back to the source. I think this is where we're supposed to say "Sh*t's about to get real."

We have been following the website nCoV2019.liv for up-to-date stats on the virus. It's a cool website for nerds to geek out on. Well, as cool as a website about a pandemic can be.

Also in the news, gas prices fell below $2 a gallon in 12 states. Too bad nobody is going anywhere so they can't take advantage of it.

I'm worried about money. Everyone is supposed to stay home so we slow the spread of the virus and keep from overloading the hospitals. We're trying to flatten the curve.

https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:SlowTheSpread.png

Restaurants and bars are closed to dine in traffic and restricted to take out only. Will businesses survive this? Will we?

China is just now recovering, although that's relative. Today is the first day that they don't have a new infection. That's good news, right? They took drastic measures to quarantine their population in order to get to this point, but it took them several months.

I am officially on an early spring break as of this afternoon. Last night I cancelled my plane tickets to visit my friend, Smashley, in Knoxville. It makes me so sad that I won't get to see her.

I go back to work on March 30, although that is subject to change. Exponential growth is no joke.

I've been obsessed with the news. I don't remember feeling like this since 9/11. As soon as I hit publish on this, I'm going to make myself a big To Do List and a schedule to stay busy and get some things done around here.

I'm also going to try to enjoy my family. If only they'd stop bickering . . . everyone's nerves are frayed. I wish I had a 1,000 piece puzzle for us to work on. No puzzles in the house though. There's still the list. I'm off to tackle that.

Pandemic Entry #2

It's been two days since my last post. Idaho now has nine confirmed cases of Covid-19. Four more than Sunday.

We had school yesterday, Monday, although our attendance was way down. Many parents chose to keep their children home. I made Annie go. Last night the decision was made to close school beginning Wednesday. Parents were urged to keep their students at home today, but schools would be open to give them time to arrange child care. At the elementary school where my office is, there were only 14 students in attendance. The silence was palpable.

Teachers are working through Thursday to get their classes online. The plan is to return after spring break on March 30th, but if that is not possible we will hit the ground running with online school. Most likely. The situation is pretty fluid and flexibility is key.

Outside it's oddly quiet. I actually heard a small plane from my office today, and it was out of place. Eery.

My sister-in-law lives in the San Francisco Bay Area and she was sent home from work yesterday because six counties were told to shelter in place for the next three weeks. She will be alone in her little cottage and I worry about her. I am thankful that we don't live in a densely populated area.

Clark and I are both still at work, although his employer is strongly encouraging people to work from home. They are to use their Virtual Private Network (VPN) dongles to work remotely. We're not sure if dongle is the correct term, but it sure is a cool word, isn't it? Today the VPN crashed because so many people were on it. I think internet is going to be a big issue around the globe. I don't think we are equipped.

I worry about money. Not just for ourselves. I worry about the people who cannot work from home and are already struggling. I can't imagine how we are going to get through this as a country and a planet. I think we will be forever changed after all is said and done. I only hope it's for the better.

Pandemic Entry #1

I've been very sporadic with posting on this blog for the past several years, but the state of the world right now and the feeling that this is only the beginning, has prompted me to get on here to start documenting. I feel that if I don't, I won't be able to remember the sequence or the speed of events about to unfold. No one knows how long it will be before things are back to normal.

The Covid-19 virus is spreading around the world. It started in Wuhan, China in December 2019. We had our first confirmed case in Idaho two days ago, March 13, 2020. We stand at five today. Our city is grappling with the decision about whether or not to close schools. They are worried about people who still have to work but have no childcare. Also, there are students who are food insecure and can only count on regular meals at school. It's a lot of responsibility and I'm glad I don't have to make those decisions.

Zoe came home from college for spring break a week early. Idaho State University sent students home on Friday urging them not to return. Classes for the remainder of the year are online. The extra week of spring break is to give professors time to get their classes online and up and running. My heart goes out to teachers in classrooms. An already difficult job has become even more difficult.

After we picked Zoe up from ISU Friday evening, we stopped by the grocery store so I could pick up a roast for Sunday evening. I was thinking that since my whole family would be together we could have a nice dinner on Sunday. How naive I was.

We arrived at the store at 10:40 p.m. and an employee greeted us at the door and warned us that we had 20 minutes to get what we needed and be in a checkout line. The produce section was decimated. I was hoping for a bunch of bananas. Nope. No roasts either. No canned chicken noodle soup (in case one of us gets sick). I didn't need much, but most of what I wanted they did not have. Somehow we still ended up spending $85. It was surreal. I felt like I was in a movie, watching crazy people shopping, overflowing carts deserted at the checkout stands. People are losing their minds.

Annika is worried about her summer plans with Civil Air Patrol. She has been accepted into a Flight Academy and has been offered a scholarship. We don't know if that will still be happening. She is also waiting to hear if she has been accepted into the Summer Seminar at the Naval Academy in Annapolis. Will that even still happen? Then there is Encampment. She has an important role in putting that on and has been planning and preparing for it all school year.

I have plans to visit a friend in Knoxville, Tennessee over spring break. I'm sure that is going to have to be postponed.

We are not alone. Everyone is affected by this. My hope is that we come through it unscathed and that we can all still look ourselves in the mirror without looking away. I want to remember to be kind. We are about to be tested.

Putting Out a Fire

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As is typical of me, I waited until Google Reader was kaput before I did anything about it. I just this very minute signed up with Bloglovin, so this fire is out. Done.

If you're on Bloglovin and you want to follow me, you can click on the link above and you should be good to go. Have a great day!

Caramel, Bugs, and Livestock

I know, crazy post title, right? It just came to me as I was uploading the pictures from my phone. It pretty much sums up the pictures I was seeing and am now going to share with you.

It's your lucky day.

So first, the caramel.

I love it. Especially this time of year. It's been at least a couple years since I've made Caramel Apples, and I really had a hankering for it this last weekend.

Plus, Mattie Cake loves caramel and a little voice was telling me that I needed to make some caramel for her. I don't always listen to the voices in my head, but when they tell me to make caramel, I take them seriously.

Only I was too lazy to actually wrestle pointy sticks into the apples and dip them into the caramel, so I took the cheater route and put the caramel in cute jars.

In all honesty, who really loves to eat a caramel apple anyway? There is just no delicate way to do it. You have to open your mouth Orca wide and take unattractive bites while caramel and drool slide down your chin. And with camera phones and Facebook around, it's just not a good idea to take that chance.

Especially if you are planning to run for President like myself. Yes, I'm a write-in candidate. Please vote for me. I have no idea how to run a country, but how hard can it be, right?

Bugs. This is Willard Scott. Actually, that's probably not his real name. It just now popped into my head and I really like it. Willard and I met at a math conference in Boise earlier this month. In this picture my teammate is tying a harness to Willard so that he can pull many pennies far exceeding his weight across our speedway of paper towels.

You have to be ever so careful when tying the harness, so as not to burst Willard like an unfortunate can of exuberant biscuits, thereby eviscerating his bugliness.

And I can guarantee you, he will not win the race for you if you do that.

I so wanted to touch Willard, to prove to myself that I was brave, but every time I reached for him it sent my body aquiver with Willies. Have you ever had a Willy? Willies are most unpleasant.

Willard is some kind of super bug and was able to pull more than 1,000 times his weight.

But Willard does not brag. He is a modest bug, and wants only to bury his head in a pile of rotting leaves.

I can relate. About the rotting leaves, not the modesty thing.

Livestock.

Groan. We have too many eggs from our too many chickens. I'm having flash backs from the time I decided to plant a garden, and I planted twelve zucchini plants just in case some of them didn't make it.

Anyone that's ever planted zucchini knows that they always make it, and one plant is enough to scare all your neighbors into ignoring your knock of zucchini blessings.

So, remember we have four chickens. We thought perhaps we had one rooster because, while they are all creepy looking to the nth degree, one of our chickens was looking especially masculine with extra large fleshy bits around his creepy chicken head.

Well, the egg laying got going pretty fast and all of a sudden we were getting four eggs a day. Four chickens. Four eggs. Um, it seems that the Maybe Rooster is perhaps just a very Butch Hen.

I don't really know how all this chicken stuff works, so I'm just going to assume that's what we have going on. 

Completely unrelated to the caramel, bugs, and livestock, Zoe Bug has started playing the violin. It's a very painfully awkward time, this new to music time with a screechy instrument. Her skills amaze, and she is able to clear vast rooms of people with one carefree swipe of her bow hand.

This picture has no point except that it makes me happy. My kids. Doing dishes that I now do not have to do. Bliss and contentment abound.

Another picture that's not like the others, but it reminds me of a beautiful day at the end of September when my little family ran a 5K together and nobody vomited. Good times.

Last picture. I just took this one today and it makes me giggle because it reminds me of the first year my girlies went to horse camp and Stinkerbell was assigned so very appropriately to a mule.

I should explain how this picture came about. Well, I know I've told you that my girlies love horses and that we have approximately 18,523 plastic horsies in our basement. You would think, most excellent parent that I am, that by now I might have enrolled my girls in some sort of regular horsey pursuits, right?

Wrong. As a parent, I suck. Yes, I also suck at the Easter Bunny, the Tooth Fairy, and Santa. Surely I'll soon find something that I'm good at.

Anyway, earlier this month I finally signed my girlies up for horse lessons. Today was their third lesson and they think I'm the Best Mom Ever. I arrived at the end of the lesson to pick them up, and Stinkerbell was trotting around the arena, no lie, trotting, on this cute little toy horse. He was adorable, all fluffy and bouncy, and she was just bounce-bounce-bouncing atop his cute little furry back with the biggest grin on her face. He is very appropriately named Doodles, and I think he is just Oodles of Adorable.

And there you have it, my pointless post of random. I've been scarce on this blog lately, and I assure you that I have not forgotten about it. I'm just struggling through a stressful period of time with beginning a new job. With all it's accompanying newness, it's hard for a person as controlling as myself when there are not enough hours in the day for all of the controlling that I want to be doing. I need to let go a bit, and perhaps do some Yoga. That sounds Heavenly to me right now.

So bear with me. It will get better.

Thank you to everyone that's still coming back, and thank you to the sweet boy in the hall the other day, a stranger to me, who came up to me and said "Hi Mrs. Scott. My mom follows your blog." I had to restrain myself from grabbing that child and hugging him on a day that I so needed to hear something nice. Thank you to his mom, whoever you are. He made my day.

Valentine Banner Winner

Hello Peeps! I loved reading all your comments about your over due "To Do" list items. It's always nice to know that I'm not alone. Thank you to everyone who participated.

I know you just want me to cut to the chase, so here goes. Congratulations go to Jacy Rogers for winning the Valentine banner! Send me an e-mail with your mailing address and I'll pop that in the mail for you this week.

Top Ten for 2011

All over the Blogosphere people are doing their 2011 post recaps for the year. I've never done one before, so I thought it would be fun to give it a try this year.

My top ten posts are the ten most viewed posts from 2011 that were posted in 2011. I decided to disregard posts prior to 2011 because my sidebar does a nice job of keeping my overall posts ranked and current. That, and I'm just dang tired of looking at those posts. I'm even a little tempted to delete them. But I won't, because they're my top ten and they generate a lot of traffic.

Ho hum. With no further ado, here are my 2011 top ten:

#1, by a landslide, was Menu Planning Redo

#2 - Flexible Chore Charts

#3 - You Asked For It . . . Thoughts in Vinyl

#4 - Digital Scrapbooking with sbcStudio for Mac

I feel like I should wash my mouth out with soap for this one. I finally gave up on the Mac software and made the switch to Photoshop Elements. I've said it before, and I'll say it again, if you have a PC, the Creative Memories StoryBook Creator Plus software is awesome, but if you have a Mac, don't waste your time.

#5 - Band-Aid Boxes for Teachers

#6 - I Was Going To . . .

#7 - Water Chestnuts Wrapped in Bacon

All I had to do here was to say "bacon" and everyone came running. Knocked me right over.

#8 - Backpack ID Tags Round Three

I'm happy to report that the third time's a charm. This round of ID tags is holding up very nicely.

#9 - You Stress Me Out

#10 - Turkey Salami Wraps

Now, let's just pretend that Google Analytics doesn't exist and I get to pick my own favorite posts for 2011. This is how it would all shake out.

#1 - The Life Cycle of a Spider and Other Zen-Like Ponderings

#2 - If My Kids Scream in the Forest and I'm Not Around to Hear Them, Do They Make a Sound?

#3 - Annie Get Your Gun . . . The Peace and the Love Continues

#4 - Death in the Family

#5 - The Adventures of Compass Man and Perpetually Lost Girl

Oopsie, that's all I have. No top ten because I don't even think I posted ten times this year. My bad.

Clearly I'm not doing that SEO thing and clearly Google doesn't think the post titles I'm choosing for my favorites are worthy of being ranked by the SEO thingamajig. I'd promise to do better, but the truth is, I like making obscure post titles.

It's not me, Google, it's you.

A Quick Note About Pinterest

I received a comment today from a reader, scrapbookmomx5, and she asked me if she could Pin things from my blog onto Pinterest. She was worried that my copyright blah blah on my sidebar forbade such activity.

I quickly crafted my reply, only to realize that scrapbookmomx5 does not have her e-mail address attached to her Blogger profile, so my e-mail was simply going to be sent into the abyss that is known as noreply-comment@blogger.com. It's a dark and dismal place.

So, in case anyone else is also wondering, here is where I stand. Absolutely YES, you can pin any ding dang thing on my blog that you want. The copyright blah blah is to discourage people from posting my pictures and my content on their own blogs. Believe me, it has happened, and it does happen. It's very awkward.

My copyright blah blah is not intended to apply to Pinterest. Pin away, if you so choose. I would be hard pressed to find a blogger that didn't allow pinning from their blog, and really, how can we stop it? The reality is that Pinterest brings a lot of traffic to blogs. I get almost as much traffic from Pinterest as I get from Google, and I would be crazy to turn people away from Pinterest. Well, I am crazy, but you know what I mean. CrazyER.

Pin away, Peeps, and thank you for all your pins! They are much appreciated by me.

Merry Winners!

Congratulations to Elsa and Stephanette! Please e-mail me at Jillderbeast@me.com to claim your banners.

I had a blast reading through the comments and I laughed hysterically at Livin' in Duckville's comment. She informed me that she saw a sign on Pinterest that said "Glitter is the Herpes of Craft Supplies."

Yippee! My first CTD (Craft Transmitted Disease).

It's Really Over

It's really over. Summer, that is. Tomorrow I can get into my classroom to start setting up, and I'm going to be spending every spare minute getting ready for the new school year.

That's tomorrow though. I made a little deal with myself that I have to get this post up before I disappear into the abyss of classroom prep. Let's just call it my little end of summer recap.

The picture above is Zoe Bug wearing her new, wearing on my nerves, attitude. I believe I snapped this picture and grumble-whisper-scolded her, "You give me a smile or there will be no ice cream."

Correct me if I'm wrong here, but isn't 10 a little young to enter the grouchiness of puberty? I'm always getting eye rolls from Girlfriend here, and if she chicken necks me one more time, I'm going to turn her into a Bobble Head and put her on my dashboard. At the very least, I'm going to get a crick in my own neck from exaggeratedly mimicking her.

In this picture, we were at the San Diego Zoo, having a good time. It would be nice if you could tell that we were having a good time, Zoe Bug.

I'm happy to say that at least this put a smile on Zoe's face. Isn't it the cutest little paw you ever did see?

It belongs to Mr. Taking a Nap Polar Bear. I just wanted to climb in there and snuggle up with him. Except that he would probably eat me for lunch.

The glare of the glass makes it look like he's holding a water bottle, but I promise that is not the case.

As I mentioned a couple posts ago, I went to BlogHer '11 while in San Diego. This is an Ivory soap sculpture from the conference. I think that means Ivory was one of the sponsors. There were a lot of sponsors, and let me tell you, they treated us well.

They were feeding us every time we turned around, and it was good food. I think I gained eight pounds in two days.

I'm talented like that.

This is my new BFF, Erin, at the Dove chocolate booth. 

The only reason I remembered her name is because she's wearing a name tag, and I was able to zoom in on it when I was editing these pictures. I guess that means that technically I didn't remember her name.

I love her though. She fresh dipped a Dove bar just for me. 

I've always had a special place in my heart for Dove chocolate.

And special padding elsewhere that is always happy to rent space. I don't love that part.

After eating lunch and the Dove bar, I stumbled into this Hershey's S'more Bar. I was in a sugar stupor.

Then I came across these Truffles on a stick at the Red Envelope booth. Seriously. I am a chocolate junkie, and I was surrounded by pushers. Since I was already hopped up on chocolate, I was able to leave the convention center with the entire truffle completely intact. I had plans to bestow it upon my prepubescent offspring.

I got all the way back to my mom's house with it too, and as I was pulling it out of my bag to bestow the gift, I snarfed it down.

I have no idea what came over me, it was an involuntary reaction to the raising of the truffle next to my head.

The next day I went back and got another one, and I'm happy to say that I delivered it to my babies untouched.

All of this stuff, and then some, was free. Apparently it's called swag. Swhat? I know. That's what I said. I had to Google it. It stands for Stuff We All Get. Please tell me I'm not the only one that has never heard this term.

I mean I've heard of swagger. Kesha's got it, and I think I have it. The Minivan Swagger anyway. But swag? I must live under a rock.

Guess. What. This. Is. You won't believe it. Of course it's Lady Liberty, but can you believe that she is made entirely out of Twizzlers?!!!!

Get. Out.

Seriously, who has this kind of time?

Somebody needs a more productive, useful hobby because they even made the Space Needle.

It looks kind of creepy up close, doesn't it?

Try not to think about it. Just try to appreciate the art for what it is.

A waste of some dang good Twizzlers if you ask me, but nobody cares about my opinion here.

I never got to see the Pioneer Woman because she left before I even got there. That was messed up. I did, however, get to attend a session by these two fabulous bloggers. That's the Nap Warden on the left and Scary Mommy on the right.

I learned about a lot of things that I didn't even know I didn't know. Does that make any sense? It's like my ignorance is so . . . ignorant. That's the only way I can think to describe it.

One of the many things I learned is that my sidebar was a train wreck. Did you notice that I cleaned it up? It was too distracting and cluttered. Not at all the image I wanted to project.

Also, I have been loading my pictures way too large. I always edit my photos and save them in Photo Shop at the maximum resolution, when all this time I should have been selecting medium, or 72 dpi. Apparently the pictures don't look any better on the web at the higher resolution, but they make my page load slower than a snail excreting concrete.

That's S-L-O-W. So I apologize for wasting your precious time with my lethargic page loads. From here on out my pictures will always be 72 dpi, and hopefully my pages will start loading faster as I make the transition.

I am not going back and reloading all of my pictures though. Life is too short for that mess.

And guess who this is?

Bob Harper from The Biggest Loser.

My favorite show on the planet.

The show that I plan my life around.

And no, before you ask because I know you will, he was not at the conference as a blogger.

Quaker, another sponsor, brought him in to do a group workout, eat breakfast with a group of bloggers, and sign autographs and take pictures with us. 

And I'm still upset, but I didn't even know that he was going to be there. 

I didn't get the memo, it was not in the program, there were no announcements, and blah, blah, blah, I am disgruntled.

The only reason I saw him is because I just happened to walk in on the breakfast in progress.

Yep, I crashed the party and stumbled around trying to get a picture in the horrid lighting of the conference room. None of the pictures turned out, but later he was in the Quaker booth which had glorious natural light streaming in from above. I couldn't get him to look at me because he was doing an interview, and I was a chicken butt, so I settled on this one. I was too impatient to wait 20 minutes for his interview to finish so I could get a proper picture with him.

But I was close enough to see the dangly unraveling thread on his shorts. That's pretty cool, eh?

So that was BlogHer. I don't know if I'd ever do it again, but it was a good experience.

While in San Diego, we went to the beach a few times. That's always fun, except that somewhere along the way I've lost my ability to catch a wave on a Boogie Board. My Internet Friend, Anne, very snarkily asked me "Can't you just flag one down?" As if it's a taxi or something. Hardy, har, har, Anne.

The girls and I fell in love with this German Shepard my mom is fostering. Her name is Stella, but we like to call her Stellaluna and Stella Bella. She's scary smart, she loves kids (obviously), and she has a very gentle nature.

So if you are in Oceanside, CA, and you want this dog, I can hook you up. I almost kidnapped Stellaluna myself. The only thing that kept me from snatching her is the knowledge that two dogs equal way too much poop, and the extra floaties of dog hair poufs around the house would cause me to jump off a bridge.

I took Stellaluna on several runs while I was visiting, and she is an amazing running partner. She was always right next to me and never pulled on the leash, so it felt like I was running with an invisible dog. Now, I realize that I'm not exactly built for speed, so she didn't have to exert herself while running with me, but my point is really that she didn't drag me or make me drag her.

There was one point where we were running up a hill, and I was huffing and puffing with exertion. It was kind of like one of those nightmares where you are running as fast as you can to get away from the monster, but really that is only slow motion like the Bionic Man, but without the hot bod. Then I looked to my right and Stella Bella was walking in a very untaxed manner. It was difficult not to be offended, but at least she had the people skills to roll her tongue out at the end of the run and flop it around like a tired insole.

Stella likes to play with my mom's dog, Cleo, aka Naomi Campbell, on account of her popping eyes and fabulous bone structure. Cleopatra, however, is a bit of a box of rocks. She and Stellaluna play tug-o-war, and Cleo gets all agitated and growly. Stella Bella keeps her cool and just waits for the mistake.

The mistake comes when Cleo fumbles with her end of the rope, and Stella doesn't miss a beat when she casually drops a paw on Cleo's rope end and then "Game Over, Sister Girl."

Cleo then becomes discombobulated and wants to know "Where did it all go wrong?!"

It's a comedy, I tell you.

This is my little brother, Pickle.

He never cooperates for pictures, so I write mean things about him to exact my revenge.

This is Uncle Billy Flop giving Zoe a ride on a Boogie Board. I just this very minute bestowed that name upon him. His name is Billy and he does belly flops in the pool so it shall be known.

I know he's going to love it.

I didn't include any belly flop pictures because there was some crackage showing, and this is a family blog.

And crack is illegal.

Uncle Billy Flop is a big kid and the girls looooooooove him.

That was our trip to San Diego in a nutshell.

This picture has nothing to do with our trip, but I need to tell you about it anyway. We went to Yellowstone with Zoe's Girl Scout troop last weekend, and this bison statue was on the lawn outside the Visitor's Center. Peanut Head walked Gunny over to it and our little Bunnery Sergeant went berserk. He started stalking the statue and growling real low in his throat. He dang near wet himself, he was so intimidated by this obvious statue. Doy.

That Gunny Bunny, he has the brain cells to maintain life support and we're not sure what else.

His pretty face, I guess.