Pandemic: ugh

How's this past week been for the Laundry Faerie, you ask?

Public domain Cyclone image by Mark Houtzager

Well, to sum up: it's been a roller-coaster. First elated. Then nervous. Then terrified that this nation will experience a full-on coup d'état, with the tacit approval of about a third of the population. Plus, this last week -- due either to nerves or some kind of brand-new food allergy -- I've been continually breaking out in hives. 2020, you truly are the gift that keeps on giving. I had a televisit with the doctor, who prescribed an anti-steroid medication, loratadine and an antacid, but the thing that's kept me out of continual scratchy hell is Benadryl. Trouble is, Benadryl completely knocks me out. So I can either be awake and blazingly itchy from the back of my scalp all the way down to my knees, or I can have some temporary relief and stay zonked out in bed all day long.

Let's just say this week hasn't been very productive.

Fortunately, Captain Midnight came to my aid on days when I couldn't leave the house, picking up aforementioned Benadryl and emergency groceries (gotta have Mountain Dew, he says), and other stellar behaviors. He's a keeper.

Miss V has been busy working at a local business, walking a lot, getting trim and making some big life choices. But since they're her life choices, not mine, I'll let her discuss them elsewhere at her discretion.

Charlie-cat is being a furry little mendicant, as usual. It's a good thing he's so cute, or we'd have turned him into gumbo by now. He's also discovered that if anyone leaves the pantry doors open, he can sneak inside and hide out in the kitty-cat clubhouse area behind the food. We have accidentally shut him in there on more than one occasion, and only found his super-secret hiding place when he started knocking stuff over in the pantry and we looked at each other and said, "PA! DID YOU HEAR THAT SUSPICIOUS THUUUD?"

At the moment our biggest challenge as a family is staying 'rona-free until we can get vaccinated... which, realistically, won't happen until spring 2021, but it's a lifeline all the same. I've been trying to avoid risk whenever I can, but I realize we've just been lucky up to this point -- it's very easy to catch, and it's extremely difficult to tell who has it. I've got five siblings, and at this writing three out of the six of us have caught a case of the stuff. Soooooooooooooo that's fun.

I miss my mom. But I guess that goes without saying. I try to focus on the memories of her love for me; she and Dad always made sure we knew we were loved, and I'll need that knowledge to sustain me for the rest of my life.