Kiddo #2 is officially on vacation and coming home for the week.  She hasn’t been to the hospital in 9 days (not sure how that happened for her) so she feels confident she will not infect us.  She was supposed to leave this morning for spring break in Hawaii.  To celebrate, John made a batch of Mai Tai.  This picture isn’t ours – we didn’t have the fruit slices.

And we also:

• We debated where we can install the horseshoes game.  While weeding earlier in the week, we found a horseshoe.  Not sure how long it has been there since we have never played horseshoes at home (that’s a camping activity.)  We’ve lived here 30 years.  John’s hypothesis is that the previous owners had a horse in the yard and the shoe came off.  Barb’s hypothesis is that they played horseshoes on that side of the yard.  Who is correct? Barb, of course!  Why? Because I’m always right hahaha
• Enjoyed the afternoon and evening talking with Kiddo and drinking Mai Tais.

I can’t believe it has been 2 weeks!  On one hand it seems SO MUCH LONGER!  On the other hand, it has gone by relatively smoothly. 

We are trying to find ways to keep ourselves entertained without leaving our property.  Our 9000 square foot piece of land (.2 acres; 836 square meters) doesn’t give many places to hide with a house on it!  I think our biggest challenge is finding some time alone.

How are you finding time alone with this “Safer at Home” order?

Today we:

• made extra YUMMY pancakes with some of the sourdough starter – didn’t think to take a picture until they were all gone!
• worked on Sudoku puzzles
• GUITAR HERO!  Amazed our guitar still works!  I think it’s been over 10 years since it was last used.
• naps and a very restful day

Is it just me or is this never going to end?  I have a weird feeling that we aren’t going on vacation this summer.  Looking at the number of cases this morning seems to confirm things are getting worse, not better.

My principal sent an email this morning (midway through our spring break that’s already ruined by the pandemic) that we must check our work email HOURLY starting Monday.  Like I have nothing else to do (oh wait, I guess I don’t) but still!

They also want us to “interact” with the students starting next week.  Granted, we can’t assign anything that results in a grade and we can’t force them to “interact”.  They want all of us to set up a Zoom or Google Meet time so students have access to us.  Not sure how comfortable I am with this.  They can already message through the district platform and email us.  Is it so they can see us?  Be reassured by us?

Today on the homefront:

• a few more weeds pulled out of the side yard
• facetime with the kiddos
• patio is ready for spring, I even had lunch outside today!
• Declutter a shelf in the back bedroom so we can put our Wii stuff there.

My LadyBug friends while out with the weeds!  My social life is devolving!

I’ve updated our day numbers.  We started isolation 2 days before the first blog post.

I haven’t left the house/yard since returning from dinner Friday 3/13.

On this day, I left for work and was dreading Friday the 13th at a middle school.  We had already had RAIN (you know that wet stuff that occasionally falls from the sky in Southern California), FULL MOON, and DAYLIGHT SAVINGS!  What more could happen??

Friday after lunch, everything changed.  The county was shuttering all school at the end of the day until 4/6.  By Tuesday morning, the closure was extended to 4/30.  John found out his school was closing until 4/6 on the same day I found out 4/30.  It wasn’t until Thursday that John received confirmation that his school was closing until 5/1.

I’m not sure if this is a positive or not, but we are not expected to provide specific lessons to the students.  Because some students do not have internet access, we can’t assign anything we expect to have completed and turned in digitally.  Some students have started the “assignments” I posted but not a majority by any stretch of the imagination.  The district also feels this is a stressful enough event without adding parents trying to guide/teach as well.

So now we have to “entertain” ourselves for at least 6 weeks at home.  Today we:

• did some yard work, we were out there for 2 hours!  It was a beautiful morning here.
• contemplated what we will do for student semester grades IF we don’t return.
  • Barb thinks we won’t go back
  • John is optimistic we will.
  • Can we just give a grade based on what they earned just before shutdown?
  • Can the state just say “No Grades”?  They’ve already said no state testing.
  • AP tests will still be given during May.  Not sure how this will look and how valid the test scores will be.
• completed another puzzle – we purchased this in Yellowstone National Park.  It is OBVIOUS someone purchased it before us and returned it with broken pieces.  Glad all the pieces were included.  Would have been really annoyed if it had missing pieces.

• started another puzzle

As we wrap up our first week of isolation/Safer at Home, here is a list of the movies watched this week.

1. Contagion – and why not?
2. Frozen II – and we don’t have kids here!
3. Fast 5 – we still need to watch the most recent one
4. Remember the Titans – one of our favorites!
5. The King’s Speech
6. The Rainmaker
7. Hell or High Water – we’ve been on an underdog theme it seems
8. My Big Fat Greek Wedding 2 – personally I liked the first one better
9. Seabiscuit
10. CHiPs – Dax Shepard also has a pretty good podcast we enjoy on road trips
11. Rango – although it is a cartoon, it is not a kid movie in my opinion
12. Super Size Me 2: Holy Chicken – interesting twist on Super Size Me.

No “TV” series at this point.  What have you been watching?  Any suggestions?