Caterwauling

I have been singing “Stacy’s Mom” 20x daily for the last two weeks. Great handwashing song.

So I’m a little rattled that the songwriter just died from coronavirus.

OTOH, are there any tRump-related songs I can sing?

Halfwit neighbor across the way plays a song at top volume every night from 9:55 p.m. to 10 p.m. Usually Lee Greenwood. They all clap and hoot and holler. Like they’re at a MAGA rally.

I’ve shouted across the tidal basin to knock it off. (This fucker ruins the ending of all my shows. Also, that’s a tRump anthem if I ever heard one.)

They yelled back to fuck off. In a sleepy retirement community. Classy.

Maybe I’ll play some “Stacy’s Mom” tonight at 9:54.

Was trying to strike the right tone on a coronavirus article.

So I thought, well, what are people going through in my circle?

* They’ve lost an income or two, their ability to pay April rent, their freedom to go for a walk. Their daily Starbucks. Their social life.

* They’re homeschooling their kids for the first time. My friend said it’s harder to find sidewalk chalk than TP.

* They’re 330,000th in line for a test. Testing started yesterday and we only have 750 a day to administer. By appointment. In the Florida heat.

* Their mom is in a nursing home and they have to stand outside the window to wave at her. They had to deliver a TV for her because she didn’t have one in her room, and she couldn’t even give a thank-you hug.

* You cannot tell me stores aren’t raising prices. I just paid $25 for TP and paper towels. Four rolls of each. From highway robbery to grand larceny in one sneeze.

* You also cannot tell me that the hospital by me with an empty parking lot isn’t filled beyond capacity.

* I know an employee who is terrified of getting fired for bringing in his own PPE. And wondering how to get by if he has to leave for some reason (quitting or worse).

* And don’t even get me started about living one mile downwind from a crematorium when they start shipping bodies (with forklifts, a friend up north was telling me, in his area, because there are so many).

* They can’t get through to the unemployment hotline and it’s not like you can stand in line anymore. So hey investors, jobless claims were pretty good at 3.3 million last week.

* With orders to stay indoors extending into June, everyone’s mental and physical well-being is at stake.

I said we could just run this:

I have a low-grade fever and a hot throat.

Heh.

I am also fatigued but that’s just lack of sleep.

You know what they say. If you’re awake then you’re awake in someone else’s dreams.

So, not virus-y at this time.

But happy to lick someone and see if I’m a carrier.

This salty gal doesn’t like sour but even without much ability to taste right now, I still have impeccable taste.

Which explains why I was socially distancing long before it was cool.

If only others would do the same but I get it. I’m appetizing and delicious.

And addictive.

A new-old colleague (that happens a lot in this field) sent me this Friday:

That Discomfort You’re Feeling Is Grief

So I asked my friends on Facepayges, how they are doing with this coronavirus thing.

Half are getting by or close enough to fine. The rest are struggling. But they don’t want to say it on a public-ish post.

I never gave my answer.

Which is this.

I moved to D.C. what seemed like mere minutes after 9/11. I drove past the smoldering Pentagon for a long time before the building was repaired and eventually the shiny new construction — clearly a cleaner, brighter color than the rest of the weathered building — started to blend in with the rest.

Shortly thereafter, we were zigging and zagging across parking lots and gas stations, trying not to be hit by the D.C. sniper.

Fast-forward a couple decades, I was going through Some Shit last August when two mass shootings happened in a weekend.

And I took the opportunity to say what was in my mind and heart.

Either the feelings were temporary insanity or maybe the need to express them was.

But I didn’t need for it to be received well. Or at all. I just needed to say it.

I will leave the aftermath out of this post. I’ll only say, no goddamn wonder. And that must have been some picture.

My answer about how I am is that I’m always on guard.

And when I stop being guarded for a while, I soon find myself grieving either the thing or the decision itself to believe in the thing.

Today, it’s a one-two punch of missing my old job/team and still not jibing with the WFH routine I started long before it was forced on the masses.

Of wondering if he weren’t him and she weren’t her and I weren’t me, what would or wouldn’t be.

In any event, it feels like a lot of that wanting to tell people they are loved is happening right now.

Not saying goodbyes, but at least making sure they don’t die with words unsaid.

Not me.

I am taking this opportunity to tell anyone who needs to fuck off, to fuck right the hell off.

When this is all over, I’ll be saying it in person. Or though a Ouija board.

Love,

Goddess

Day 60-something of working at home. It bleeds into the weekends now. About to jump back into it now.

The good news is, if I need to take an afternoon off to run to Costco, I can.

The bad news is, I really need someone to TP my house because I can’t find any anywhere.

A square, can you spare?

Down to my last roll. Can anyone spare a square?

Fished Bella out of the dumpster/shredder/trash compactor thingy again late last night. Forget coronavirus. For as filthy as I am after these adventures when I get in the car at night, I will be lucky if I don’t invent a new strain called cAronavirus.

*Ba dum bum tss*

I figured out that’s why she has a wound that keeps reopening. But she is super good about sitting still and letting me clean it.

My backseat is looking like a pet hotel/hospital. Not quite what I envisioned when I bought this car.

And I certainly didn’t envision having to forage for supplies. Seriously. Stores get trucks in every day but if you aren’t there during senior hour, you ain’t gettin’ dick.

Sorta jealous of all these folks who are doing not a goddamn thing right now. Like self-isolation is an extended spring break or something.

I’m not trying new recipes or playing all that much online. Not going out so what is left to post about?

I still try to pull a tarot card a day. Got the Sun today and put a piece of citrine out to attract more positive outcomes.

Had a dream this morning after a shit sleep. Saw him in a mullet, my favorite shirt and his stupid sweatshirt, but otherwise he was still him. We had a good moment and went our separate ways.

I wanted to go after him, with him. But I didn’t look back.

So I don’t know if he looked back. He’d be an idiot not to.

It’s nice to be at a place of peace with everything.

Switched up my handwashing song.

Seen in Dorseyville:

Stacy’s mom is wiping down surfaces.

Have consumed my weight in Kind bars but *checks* nope, still not.

Tried to kidnap my badass little cat Cocoa last night because Green Acres ain’t the place for me.

She literally ripped the carrier in half, licked my leg and went on her way.

That’s my girl.

Cocoa’s mom still got it going on.

I took a photo, on all the days I knew I would want to remember.

Not of the person or the activity. Something from the place.

A sign. A flower on the table. The view. Maybe a selfie with a smile I couldn’t have gotten any other way.

I knew they would all just be memories someday.

All I have is the time stamp.

And yet another puzzle piece hidden in my pocket.

I got the better end of the deal.

Someone who was good to me died today.

The title is a nod to him. As long as it’s in yellow highlight. With a comment in the margin that says, “Preefrood please.”

I’m just over here wondering why God works the way She does.

Given the location and his condition, it’s probably coronavirus. Which he would call a “Demorcrat hoax.”

I wouldn’t be surprised if his final act were to persuade his doctors that it was “just” pneumonia. This man could sell shit to shitheads.

But I loved his wife and she loved him, as did my old boss. So, I can forgive that.

I have people to reach out to.

My mind went immediately to my old boss who was so good to me. This is his third close friend in a short time to pass. He couldn’t make it to the last funeral. With the (albeit loose) stay-at-home order, what if he misses this one too? I can’t bear that for him, again.

In any event, maybe this is why people die. So the rest of us reach out to each other to say hello and to let them know we’re holding space for them.

Maybe with this Fourth Turning we’re experiencing, we won’t all retreat to our respective living worlds after we’ve connected.

Oh who am I kidding. Workaholics gonna workaholic.

That’s what made this loss so tragic. And so great. The stories he’s told. The stories still untold. So many stories.

I know what his final projects were. They will never, never be as great as they could have been.

Of course, again knowing my workaholic old boss, he will tell them … and probably even better … for his old friend.

I’ll always think of Harleys and his love for his Redhead. And how they both gave me a leg up in life that I’ve barely taken advantage of.

Time to change that.

Just heard the boss was praising me on a call I wasn’t on.

Happy to be home with the ones I love.

Hallmark is running a Christmas movie marathon. I put up Christmas lights. And I’m listening to ambient Christmas music.

I’m happy I took a WFH job when the coronavirus was actually ramping up and not when the gubmint got around to telling us about it.

I’m so glad it’s Aries season. I have Aries rising so, fire. And a six-month cycle of reputational damage control, friendship-building and community-rebuilding.

Plus, the old astrological cycle and the fatal bug it brought us is in the rear view mirror. This year really put the P, I, S and S in Pisces.

I still haven’t opened the champagne I bought to celebrate my new job. I made it to the six-week mark. Will celebrate that instead.

My web traffic is spiking like a fever. Cool.

And I randomly pulled the victory card as my theme for today. I saw the Six of Wands and knew this ordinary day would be special. It is.

Cheers, loves and lovers.

New Irish blessing …

May your coronavirus supply hoard last through hurricane season.