Quarantine day FORTY

Well, it's day forty of quarantine. If the word was any indication this would be the last day and we should be out in the streets celebrating. Not that I want that. I'm going stir crazy but I am glad that the state of Minnesota has proceeded through this nightmare keeping science and people's lives at the forefront. I don't know if I have to say this but our president is a fucking moron. Just yesterday he said that perhaps people could inject disinfectant and doctors should really be looking at that. Jesus.

The lockdown took another major downturn on Monday when my mom went into the hospital. She didn't want to go but she has had trouble breathing since her hospitalization in December for pneumonia. About a month ago she mentioned that her blood oxygen levels were in the 60s percentage-wise and everyone freaked out and told her to GO TO THE HOSPITAL but she wouldn't because all this corona virus mess was starting up and she didn't want to use resources or be in a hospital with this horrible virus going around. So she stopped talking about her blood oxygen levels.

Last weekend my dad said he was in a constant cold sweat because she was in such bad shape so he told her she was going to go to the doc whether she liked it or not. She didn't like it. He called the hospital to see what the protocol is for bringing in a patient during a pandemic. He was to drop her off at the ER and they would come get her to see the doctor. As soon as she got in the emergency room she stopped breathing and had to be intubated. She was in bad shape so they decided to fly her to Duluth because they have intensive care units at our hospitals here. She's been here since Monday on a ventilator with little change. It's incredibly sad, but more so because she can't have any visitors. There are no visitors allowed in the hospital at all. I've seen stories on the news where families visit loved ones through the windows at care centers, but she's on the seventh floor, so unless I get a helium balloon or start flappin' that's not going to happen. It's all so tragic and horrible.

Quarantine sucks. 

Quarantine: Day 34

Kira and I have played an amazing amount of Mario Kart on the Wii for the last month. We have unlocked characters and cars nobody knew were even there. We have discovered cheats and short cuts. And we both have experienced the excruciating pain of keeping your eyes open too long with dirty contacts because we don't want to blink and miss a turn or a jump. We were watching the movie Aladdin the other night and there was a scene where Jasmine was teary-eyed at the thought of her kingdom being run by (whoever the bad guy is, geez, am I supposed to remember everything!) and Kira said, "I wish my eyes were that wet when we play Mario Kart," and I laughed and laughed. She played so hard one night that a contact lens fell out and she couldn't find it. I found it today on the kitchen floor.

Distance learning for my students is really starting to suck for me. Today, nay, I should say, last night at about 10:30 a parent emailed me asking where her student could find the information (Read chapter four of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde) she needed to answer the question I had as an assignment today. I gave the books out to students before we started distance learning but this student didn't pick one up. No problem! It's in the public domain and online! I graciously took a screenshot of the slide in my slideshow where her daughter, and all the students can find that information and more! As you can see, I linked the chapter, AS WELL as an audio link to the chapter, AS WELL as TWO links to summary and analysis. AS WELL as a link to Sparknotes. But they couldn't find the information.

I replied to her email and told her to have her student look in the slideshow that I took hours painstakingly making and she would find the links. She said they couldn't find it. You know why they couldn't find it? Because they didn't look. Every other kid seemed to have no trouble finding the chapter. Even if I was a total coaster and didn't post links and just said, "Find the book Jekyll and Hyde and read chapter four" that would not be an unreasonable thing to ask them to do because it is, as I've already said, in the public domain and a simple Google search of "Jekyll Hyde Chapter 4" brings dozens of results. I have amended my Jekyll and Hyde unit so the kids have to answer ONE question per chapter instead of several among other activities, and still I get complaints. Well, "complaint, (singular)" but it still riles  me up. The nerve. I know exactly what happened too. This kid told her parent, "I don't know what I'm supposed to do," which is a total lie because I haven't changed the basic format of the course from when we were at school, and the parent believed her and got busy on email before she could do her own research. I get it. People are tense. I am tense. I understand. But still. 

For the most part though, school has been okay. I miss my students desperately and I miss being in the classroom with them, but they have been doing alright. Another colleague asked her tenth grade advisory if they were getting too much, not enough, or just the right amount of work in their courses and 100% of her students said that they were getting the right amount in English. No other department had 100%. It's tremendous. All the people are saying it's the best department ever. The results are unprecedented.... oh, sorry. I just forced myself to watch a national press conference and also, on an unrelated note, I'm just a tiny bit drunk. 

Quarantine: Day 25

We have been on lockdown for 25 days now. That seems so surreal to write and sounds way worse than it has actually been, in some ways. We are very comfortable and the three of us get along quite well so it has been not unpleasant. I have friends with small children who are really having a hard time. I can't imagine. Actually, my kids were both pretty easy and I had no qualms about benign neglect so I don't think it would have been terrible with my kids.

I have been positive at times that I am in the midst of my own personal fight against Covid 19, but I don't really think so. I think I have spring allergies (and always have) but now I am hyper conscious of every single cough and ache. I guess fever is the real test and I have not had a fever. Except when I get hot flashes. Then I have a fever of about 600 for about two minutes. But it goes away pretty fast.

Some days I've been so despondent and/or furious about this whole thing. I know pandemics happen and we are vulnerable to novel viruses once in a while, but when I watch the daily press briefings from the White House or hear about them on the late night comedy shows I get so MAD. How is this happening to us? Why does my government suggest that in the face of a potentially deadly virus I should fucking CRAFT my own personal protective equipment? How is that acceptable? Yesterday the Wisconsin primary election was held because the criminals in the Republican party got the state Supreme Court and the federal Supreme Court to say they had to have in person voting. The courts met online to make the decision that the people of Wisconsin had to vote in person during a lockdown caused by a pandemic. I hope that someday in the not-to-distant future those criminals are made to answer for this and I hope they have to pay with prison time.

We have been watching movies (Frozen II, Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker, Zootopia, etc.) and watching some good shows (West World, Ozark, Schitt's Creek, Outlander) to keep us busy. I have also been working on jigsaw puzzles, and I'm so obsessed with the one I'm currently working on that I missed a meeting yesterday because I lost track of the time; and at night when I close my eyes to go to sleep I see puzzle pieces. I don't hate it. I have also been trying to work from home but it is very difficult to focus and keep organized. It will take some getting used to. Mitch has been extremely busy with work and thank goodness for that. I was worried that people wouldn't call for his services because so many people are out of work, but that does not seem to be the case.

That's about it for day 25.