At first, I struggled with the SAH order much more than I expected. I guess it was grief. I'm enjoying staying home right now. I've been working on some hobbies I neglected (needlepoint and cross stitch). I've gotten some work done for my eBay store. We've saved a lot of money, which is a relief. I've been learning to cook a few more dishes. I'm no Gordon Ramsey, but I've had a few successes lately, so I'm happy. Cozy time at home with the boy and the husband. I honestly hope that he decides to work from home permanently. We clashed for awhile, but I'm really happy to have everyone here, together. Mostly, it has given me some time to think about what I want and where I am headed in life.

People don't care until it impacts them. A lot of the people in my area that scoff at illness are young. They've yet to hit that point in life when they have elderly relatives that fall sick easily. They also aren't old enough to start having chronic health issues and are more likely to die in a car wreck than, say, complications of diabetes or pneumonia.

I'm ordering online from Target. We don't plan on going many places (anywhere?) this summer, so we'll make do with what we've got. I did go through kiddo's clothes right before Covid hit the fan, and bought new underwear and socks for him. He has plenty of shirts, and a "good enough" selection of shorts. He's not a clothes horse and doesn't care what's in the drawer as long as it's clean.

The cheapest I've seen is $1.39, but they seem to be an anomaly. All the other stations around here are about $1.63, give or take a few pennies.

There are board members that I've argued with because they have this attitude about taking their sick kids out to extra-curricular activities and social events. There is always a tight little rationale for why it's no big deal. The best one I heard was that *I* was being selfish in wanting to avoid illness, only because I was too lazy to be inconvenienced by preventable illness.

He trusts his sister. She would be rule as regent until his oldest son is old enough to rule independently.

A covid model from UT @ Austin. https://covid-19.tacc.utexas.edu/projections/

In the past, I would have engaged and tried to get her to see my point of view. When I saw that come up, I was angry about it and thought "Actually, we don't have to be on the same page about it. I am not asking permission to do this; I'm simply doing it". It's given me some food for thought. I have a lot of people in my life with a poor concept of boundaries. I probably need to do some reflection on my own behaviors to understand how I'm letting these folks get so far into my life.

Facebook is having a hard time pinning me down. I guess I don't shop enough online. They started with ads for period panties. No thanks! Then I got ads from a "pro-body hair" razor company, with pictures that were TMI. Very much no thanks! Some more ads for alternative feminine hygiene products. Nope. I clicked "this is too personal" when asked why I didn't want to see the ads anymore. After that, they started showing me ads for hijab outfits. ???

Here they are recommending people do not show up to the ER without doing telephone triage first. 🤷‍♂️ They don't want people showing up in a panic and accidentally exposing themselves to COVID. I read something where a doctor said he's been seeing patients with low pulse ox readings and elevated resp rates. The patients report feeling fine, and don't realize their respirations are up. They don't feel out of breath because the lungs are still flexible enough to get C02 out.

Has he been sick at all? What is his pulse rate and respiratory rate? If his respiratory rate is high and his pulse ox low, then he should call the ER and tell them what's going on.

I feel like I"m being misunderstood in this thread. I'm not dismissing friendships based on minor differences in opinion. I have a lot of friends that swear that alkaline water will fix all sorts of health problems. I think this is nonsense and lacks scientific backing, but it doesn't hurt them, so they drink their expensive "magic" water and I drink my cheap "toxic" tap water, and we're all good. Their different opinion does not harm me or anyone else. Some of these friends also are big fans of CBD oil and are casual pot users. They swear up and down that cbd and mary jane will fix every problem under the sun. My response is that I"m sure it feels like the problems have improved, because that's kind of what pot does, lol. I don't think it's really going to hurt my friends or anyone else, (provided they don't drive while partaking). It's not going to hurt me because I'm not taking CBD oil or smoking pot, so I can shrug and move on. I have another friend that believes in ghosts and swears that "orbs" visit her at night. I listened to her story about "orbs" and she said "You think I'm nuts, right?" and I said "Well, a little. You know it's just dust reflecting in the camera lens, right?" It's nonsense, but it hurts no one. But when the same people start yelling about tyranny because they have to wear a face mask at Target, or starting angry social media campaigns to elected officials about why all vaccines should be made illegal and making a lot of noise about a potential COVID-19 vax being "the mark of the beast", I'm not sure I can ignore that. It moves from "My friend Susie is little eccentric but very fun" to "Susie thinks elected officials should prevent me from receiving a vaccine that could potentially save the life of myself and my family, because she thinks it's better if we all die 'pure' rather than live 'tainted'". (Yes, this was a quote from someone) The last point is a deal breaker for me right now.

I honestly have no idea how we get back to "normal life". Maybe we have to redefine "normal" for awhile. I have to admit that until this thread, I hadn't thought about what I was hoping for re: flatten or eliminate. I realized that I've really been operating with the hope that we can eliminate COVID-19 or make it so very rare that we can all return to something close to normal by fall. But that isn't likely to happen, I think. I've read reports from various experts saying that social distancing will may need to be in place for a couple of years, barring some miracle vaccine that hits the market quickly. At first I thought "Sure, sure, I can wear a mask at the store, use lots of hand sanitizer, and we'll keep a low profile for awhile, no problem". Then it hit me that it also meant "If travel loosens up, you could see your family, but you can't hug them. They may not want to see you, though. You might be too big of a risk for them. And a socially distanced birthday party for your nearly-12 year old sounds quite terrible, actually. How do you 'socially distance' at the children's museum? Everything there is meant to be touched. Will we ever be able to go again, while he still loves going?! How do you trick-or-treat with social distancing? Pictures with Santa? He still cares about those things. We're talking about moving away from here, but how do you make friends in a new place with social distancing? How does a kid do that?" A whole new wave of grief just washed over me. 😞

Ain't that the truth. I've been surprised by the people that have reached out during this time, and disappointed by the people that shrugged or acted annoyed that I was struggling.

Not all risks are equal, though. Zoning issues are not in the same ballpark as measures to protect public health during a pandemic. Do you not change your behavior based on how you perceive risk? Because that is what this comes down to for me. I was friends with people during a time when risk to my health seemed low. Their behaviors and priorities, while vastly different than mine, posed low risk to my health and safety because I could take steps to mitigate the risk. The situation is different now. Those same philosophies now have an increased potential to impact me negatively. I can't tolerate that anymore, no matter how funny or kind these people might be. They take chances that are no longer acceptable risks in my world. I mean, I do think there are some people that are not worthy of my friendship, and it sounds like you do too, because in you said you don't even form superficial relationships with people that you think are awful. You apparently judged them as awful pretty quickly to rule out friendship. I took 6 years to realize someone was actually awful. If I'd known 6 years ago that I'd be in this situation, I would have made a different choice in befriending this person. But here we are. I don't feel like I should have to pay a friendship debt and continue a relationship with someone that makes me feel unsafe, just to spare their feelings.

This is a riddle for the ages. We're such a dumb species sometimes.

San Antonio area. They built a new HEB here, with aisles twice as wide as the old store. They also gave us carts that were much bigger than the old carts. Now you get two giant carts blocking the aisle, one in each direction, and a family of 5 walking shoulder to shoulder as they peruse the cracker selections in Aisle 4. It's a teensy bit better now that HEB has kind of directed people through the store due to social distancing. Since we're all entering through one door, most people are heading in the same direction, but you still get bottlenecks because someone will lose the plot and decide to phone a friend while staring into the cheese case.

This is life in Texas. Going to the grocery has always been social time. They bring the whoooooole family: mom, dad, 5 kids, meemaw, Uncle Lou, and great aunt Betty. Everyone weighs in on the merits of 2% milk vs 1%. Creamy or crunchy peanut butter? Whole wheat or white bread? 1 ply or 2? Who can possibly choose! Let's stay here all day, block the aisles, and contemplate how different our lives would be with each dizzying permutation!

But...so what that this is more immediate? The immediacy of it is part of the problem. It's not a hypothetical debate or an philosophical exercise. To your second point, no. I can't agree with that. I've heard some pretty ugly things from both sides of the political spectrum that have made me realize that a vocal segment of the population really does not care what happens to people on the other side. Politics isn't just different views in a vacuum. People vote based on those views. Laws are made based on those votes. Money gets allocated to programs based on those votes. Money is removed from programs based on those votes. It's not an abstraction.

Well, I actually am dumping a few friends over politics, because they are actively and loudly advocating for laws and policies that impact my family's health and safety. I looked the other way on some of this for years, and they were polite and didn't discuss some of their views in front of me. We had reached an "agree to disagree" point, but now they have set that aside. It doesn't feel "petty" to distance myself from people that are willing to jeopardize my health and safety. I won't make big, angry declaration to them about the end of my trust in them. I will still be nice and kind, but I have reached my limit for what I can tolerate and ignore.

Don't bring the keys over. Send them in the mail. Or drop them off in her mailbox. Or leave them in an envelope on your porch and tell her "I left the keys for you at X place". If you don't need the income or benefits (?) from the job, then quit and turn in the keys in whatever way minimizes your personal risk and gives you the least amount of stress.

My favorite complaint locally was from an older lady insisting that all clothing stores must open fully because she couldn't possibly buy pants online. She can only wear elastic band pants and it's just so hard to find ones that fit (?) and she absolutely cannot find these very special pants with an online order/2 hour curbside pick up to try on at home. Ok, let's start... 1) Where the heck are you going that you need new pants? 2) Lady, you are old enough to have ordered stuff out of the Sears catalog. That stuff took 6-8 weeks to arrive for you to find out it didn't fit, so stop with the "2 hour curbside pickup is oppressing my freedoms!" schtick. 3) Like elastic waistband old lady pants are such a rare bird that you've got to hunt for them in person. Hush now.

Start one! I'll weigh in! I have loads of opinions on the matter, lol. I have done so much purging of the relationship and emotional baggage closet lately.

@vonbon Oh yes, there are good parts to her personality, most definitely. She's very generous and has a great sense of humor. She's helped me out when I've needed it, and I appreciate that greatly. There's just all the rest of this...stuff...that goes into being her friend that is so overwhelming. I sent the email to her the other day, and while I was fiddling with the mail settings to route everything to trash, she responded with "It's fine if we don't talk anymore, but we both need to be on the same page with that, so I need you to write me back and tell me what's going on". Ugh. No, I'm not going to respond to that.

I have no idea. My family all live 1200-1800 miles away. We'd have to fly or make a heck of a drive with hotel stops, and then quarantine for 2 weeks once we got back home. I am actually less afraid of picking up the virus while traveling than I am about getting stuck far away from home because "something" changes and travel is further restricted. Until the mandatory quarantine for re-entry to the state is lifted, I don't feel like it would be wise for us to attempt a visit.