As if the Covid-19 virus wasn’t bad enough, last week the dams were breached which caused floods in Michigan. And now there are riots because a black man was killed by a policeman in Minnesota. (Hope they through the book at the cop if he wrongly killed the guy.) The riots first hit Minneapolis/St. Paul, but have spread across the country. Tampa was hard hit so they’ve established a curfew for tonight.

What more can this nation cope with?

The whole attitude of the nation is messed up. Hopefully after the elections, things will improve.

Of course the virus and weather won’t be improved by the elections, but maybe people would have a better attitude. Right now, it feels like the nation is falling apart. It scares me.

For a while it seemed we were coming together over the virus but now there are conflicting views about how “shut down” we should be. I take a moderate stance. I feel we can gradually open activities, but please, not too fast!!! I approve of limited use of the pools. I can definitely see pickleball, lawn bowling, and other outdoor activities resuming, but I can’t envision a dance. I would be willing to space ourselves out at a Kentucky Derby party, but lining up to get our food from a buffet wouldn’t work.

I doubt that things will ever go back to the way they were. (Not in what remains of my lifetime anyway.) The changes will remain. We stand further apart. We wear masks in places where contamination might occur. We wash our hands more and hand sanitizers are used a lot.

As I said in my last post, last week two dams in Michigan were compromised and it’s still a mess in Edenville, Sanford, Midland, and Saginaw.

Sadly last night I read that Traverse City (in the northwest corner of the Lower Peninsula), is also flooding.

For weeks after I got down here from Michigan, July of 2018, it would rain EVERY afternoon. That’s the same pattern we’re in right now.

Today started with rain in the morning before I was out of bed and it’s going to start up again later this afternoon. When it rains in Florida, it’s not like Michigan. It comes down by the bucketfull.

I say that but recently Michigan was hit with heavy rain totals and consequently two dams were compromised (in Sanford and in Edenville) and the whole area flooded. The two lakes formed by the backwaters of the dams have drained. Businesses have been wiped out. The Sanford house I bought in about 1963 is probably underwater. Midland, where I grew up and went to school is flooded, and M-46 which I took to go to work from Shields to St. Mary’s is impassible. It’s all really sad.

The area may never recover, and Michigan has been one of the hardest hit states with the Covid-19 virus. How much can people take?

But back to my complaint about “the rainy season.” Hopefully the pattern will move on but for now, we’re having showers or rains most afternoons.

The Covid-19 virus has changed so much. I can’t lessen the restrictions, nor would I want to expose myself to the risks associated with going out in public. I stay in but I am trying to add things to occupy my time and improve my situation.

I bought myself a Ninja Foodie air fryer/dehydrator/toaster/oven/etc. There is a lot to learn so I can get the most out of it. I’ve joined a facebook air fryer group and purchased a couple of recipe books. I’ve used my new appliance several times. It appears to do what I want so I’m happy with it. As I understand better how it works, I’ll use it even more. Soon I hope to make some air fried potato chips. Healthier than store-bought and tastier.

I’m promising myself more golf cart rides. Sophie would love it and it’ll get me outside rather than plunked down in front of my television set watching Lifetime, Hallmark and Netflix movies or game shows.

I joined the dating website for older folks, Our Time. (Almost immediately, I quit and got a refund, but according to “Our Time” I’m still a full member.) I’ve met a couple guys on the site: Henry from Sun City Center, and Bob who plays piano.

A neighbor here in Kings Point, Duane, has called several times and I enjoy our conversations. I also enjoy the other two fellows but so far no romantic connection with any of them. I can’t get close anyway (because of the virus), but I haven’t reached that point with anyone.

I am not ready to go to any dances because that would mean being in close proximity to my dance partner, and I doubt that I’ll ever feel safe enough to be within arm’s distance. I would like to go to dinner with a gentleman (and some places have opened with limited service), but I wouldn’t want to ride in a car with anyone. Closeby Fiore’s is open but I haven’t tried it yet. I know I could suggest to Duane or Henry that we meet there and they’d join me, but I’ll give it time.

Covid-19 has altered so much! Coronavirus lockdown is gradually easing but that doesn’t mean things are returning to normal.

What is “normal” now?

Our clubhouses remain closed but even if they were open, it’s doubtful that many would risk exposure by participating.

One club, the Sportsman’s Club, is going to start online zoom gatherings in June with a maximum of 100 attendees. (Membership is about four times that.) I will be there.

I’ve attended weekly Skype or Zoom parties. It’s not the same as “in person” but at lease you get to interact with friends.

Two of the swimming pools have opened but you must make an advanced reservation in a specific 90-minute time slot. I haven’t even considered going because I realize that for some, the pool and swimming is important.

I should spend some time outside and my lounge chairs are perfect, but it’s easier to stay in, so I do.

I invited a couple friends to stop over and sit at a distance from me on my patio. It’s not like comfy socializing. You don’t offer drinks or snacks since germs could be spread.

Travel is restricted. Will folks ever feel safe enough to fly? I want to visit with my daughter, but at this point, she’d have to be isolated for two weeks coming and going. And most flights have been cancelled. My friend, Evie, is leaving for her northern home in Massachusetts with plans to come back at the beginning of December. It’s possible that the virus will flare up again and she won’t get back. We know some will never return. Borders could close (again). There is so much to fear!

The Emergency Squad where I volunteer has had one worker hospitalized because of the virus. He taught a class at the Emergency Squad Training Center the day before he became symptomatic so the ones he came in contact with are now quarantined for two weeks. He hadn’t worked on an ambulance or van for some time so it’s doubtful that he picked it up there or that other volunteers have been exposed but it’s still frightening. I think a plexiglass shield is being put up in the lobby area where I work so we’ll be more protected. Even with the protection, I’m a little scared. I plan to wear a mask all the time when I’m there and I’ll skip lunch (or take it with me) so I can leave my mask in place. It’s difficult not to fear contagion. I don’t want to get sick!!

I was scheduled to have my six month physical at Dr. Marquez’s office but I cancelled. It’s not that important that I go now since it’s just a routine appointment so I have changed it to July.

For about a month I’ve been trying to meet someone using “Our Time,” an online dating service. So far it’s been a total failure.

One fellow answered my “I’m interested” message with an indication that he wants a “BFWB” which translates to “Best Friend WITH Benefits” (meaning sex) which definitely goes against what I need. I crossed him off. (When I explained to him what he’d said, he apologized and said he thought it meant travel.)

I did find a sweet fellow from nearby Ruskin but he’s not at all compatible with me. We have had a couple long phone conversations. He lives in one of the mobile home parks. He isn’t at all techie and definitely doesn’t understand my interest in the internet and computers. Reading isn’t his thing. Even with the pandemic, he’s attending church so his virus attitude is different than mine. All in all it would be a waste of our time. I want someone I can communicate with on the same level and it’s not him. We speak a different language.

Surprisingly I found a fellow listed (Charlie) who looks perfect. He’s attractive and his interests are similar to mine. He’s exactly my age. He is a good communicator, a musician (although he’s shown with an electric guitar), politically he sounds like me. He says he likes reading, and hopes to find a Travel Partner, Casual Relationship, Friendship. Sounds like a good fit. His only negative is that he lives in Riverview which is about ten to twelve miles away. He may never respond but I did send a message to him.

There are also a couple who for some reason attract me. One, Jerry, has a friendly look, like John had. Problem here is he lives in Tampa and that can be a bit of a trip. He really looks pleasant. I’ve reached out to him, but don’t know if he’ll respond.

Those I’ve sent “I’m interested” messages to may never even go back to OurTime to find the words I left for them Oh, well… It’s a fun way to pass time.

Loneliness is zeroing in on me. With no one to talk to or share things with, I’ve reached a point where I realize I have to take action. I’ve done a few things that help.

— I went out the other night and lined up with others (at a distance) to watch a lovely sunset. At least there were people to talk to.

— I have watched music concerts put on by Jay Ungar and Molly Mason and played along on my autoharp. I’ve even waltzed around by great room (sometimes with Sophie in my arms). It has been fun and helped my mood.

— I have shopped online where I purchased a power source called a Morphie Wireless Powerstation Charger and Car Jump Starter. Hurricane season is approaching. If I were to lose power, my Morphie will run cellphones, computer, emergency radio, and even a tv. It can also be used to jump start my car.

— My toaster died. I purchased a new multi-function appliance called The Ninja® Foodi™ Digital Air Fry Oven with Convection. It works as a toaster (up to nine slices at once), a convection oven/roaster, a dehydrator, and an air fryer. It should arrive in a couple of days. (I got a darned good price on it.) That’ll keep me busy as I learn how to use it.

— I’ve been using “Our Time” to try to find someone I can talk with. (Yup, I’ve gone to an on-line dating service.) My first effort failed but I hope I can eventually find a friend. It’s difficult when you’re isolated inside. I hope to find a gentleman to communicate with even over the phone.

This Irish Times article should be read by every last person in this country.

Read it and weep, my fellow Americans.
From the Irish Times
April 25, 2020
By Fintan O’Toole

THE WORLD HAS LOVED, HATED AND ENVIED THE U.S. NOW, FOR THE FIRST TIME, WE PITY IT

Over more than two centuries, the United States has stirred a very wide range of feelings in the rest of the world: love and hatred, fear and hope, envy and contempt, awe and anger. But there is one emotion that has never been directed towards the US until now: pity.

However bad things are for most other rich democracies, it is hard not to feel sorry for Americans. Most of them did not vote for Donald Trump in 2016. Yet they are locked down with a malignant narcissist who, instead of protecting his people from Covid-19, has amplified its lethality. The country Trump promised to make great again has never in its history seemed so pitiful.

Will American prestige ever recover from this shameful episode? The US went into the coronavirus crisis with immense advantages: precious weeks of warning about what was coming, the world’s best concentration of medical and scientific expertise, effectively limitless financial resources, a military complex with stunning logistical capacity and most of the world’s leading technology corporations. Yet it managed to make itself the global epicentre of the pandemic.

As the American writer George Packer puts it in the current edition of the Atlantic, “The United States reacted … like Pakistan or Belarus – like a country with shoddy infrastructure and a dysfunctional government whose leaders were too corrupt or stupid to head off mass suffering.”

It is one thing to be powerless in the face of a natural disaster, quite another to watch vast power being squandered in real time – wilfully, malevolently, vindictively. It is one thing for governments to fail (as, in one degree or another, most governments did), quite another to watch a ruler and his supporters actively spread a deadly virus. Trump, his party and Rupert Murdoch’s Fox News became vectors of the pestilence.

The grotesque spectacle of the president openly inciting people (some of them armed) to take to the streets to oppose the restrictions that save lives is the manifestation of a political death wish. What are supposed to be daily briefings on the crisis, demonstrative of national unity in the face of a shared challenge, have been used by Trump merely to sow confusion and division. They provide a recurring horror show in which all the neuroses that haunt the American subconscious dance naked on live TV.

If the plague is a test, its ruling political nexus ensured that the US would fail it at a terrible cost in human lives. In the process, the idea of the US as the world’s leading nation – an idea that has shaped the past century – has all but evaporated.

Other than the Trump impersonator Jair Bolsonaro in Brazil, who is now looking to the US as the exemplar of anything other than what not to do? How many people in Düsseldorf or Dublin are wishing they lived in Detroit or Dallas?

It is hard to remember now but, even in 2017, when Trump took office, the conventional wisdom in the US was that the Republican Party and the broader framework of US political institutions would prevent him from doing too much damage. This was always a delusion, but the pandemic has exposed it in the most savage ways.

Abject surrender
What used to be called mainstream conservatism has not absorbed Trump – he has absorbed it. Almost the entire right-wing half of American politics has surrendered abjectly to him. It has sacrificed on the altar of wanton stupidity the most basic ideas of responsibility, care and even safety.

Thus, even at the very end of March, 15 Republican governors had failed to order people to stay at home or to close non-essential businesses. In Alabama, for example, it was not until April 3rd that governor Kay Ivey finally issued a stay-at-home order.

In Florida, the state with the highest concentration of elderly people with underlying conditions, governor Ron DeSantis, a Trump mini-me, kept the beach resorts open to students travelling from all over the US for spring break parties. Even on April 1st, when he issued restrictions, DeSantis exempted religious services and “recreational activities”.

Georgia governor Brian Kemp, when he finally issued a stay-at-home order on April 1st, explained: “We didn’t know that [the virus can be spread by people without symptoms] until the last 24 hours.”

This is not mere ignorance – it is deliberate and homicidal stupidity. There is, as the demonstrations this week in US cities have shown, plenty of political mileage in denying the reality of the pandemic. It is fuelled by Fox News and far-right internet sites, and it reaps for these politicians millions of dollars in donations, mostly (in an ugly irony) from older people who are most vulnerable to the coronavirus.

It draws on a concoction of conspiracy theories, hatred of science, paranoia about the “deep state” and religious providentialism (God will protect the good folks) that is now very deeply infused in the mindset of the American right.

Trump embodies and enacts this mindset, but he did not invent it. The US response to the coronavirus crisis has been paralysed by a contradiction that the Republicans have inserted into the heart of US democracy. On the one hand, they want to control all the levers of governmental power. On the other they have created a popular base by playing on the notion that government is innately evil and must not be trusted.

The contradiction was made manifest in two of Trump’s statements on the pandemic: on the one hand that he has “total authority”, and on the other that “I don’t take responsibility at all”. Caught between authoritarian and anarchic impulses, he is incapable of coherence.

Fertile ground
But this is not just Donald Trump. The crisis has shown definitively that Trump’s presidency is not an aberration. It has grown on soil long prepared to receive it. The monstrous blossoming of misrule has structure and purpose and strategy behind it.

There are very powerful interests who demand “freedom” in order to do as they like with the environment, society and the economy. They have infused a very large part of American culture with the belief that “freedom” is literally more important than life. My freedom to own assault weapons trumps your right not to get shot at school. Now, my freedom to go to the barber (“I Need a Haircut” read one banner this week in St Paul, Minnesota) trumps your need to avoid infection.

Usually when this kind of outlandish idiocy is displaying itself, there is the comforting thought that, if things were really serious, it would all stop. People would sober up. Instead, a large part of the US has hit the bottle even harder.

And the president, his party and their media allies keep supplying the drinks. There has been no moment of truth, no shock of realisation that the antics have to end. No one of any substance on the US right has stepped in to say: get a grip, people are dying here.

That is the mark of how deep the trouble is for the US – it is not just that Trump has treated the crisis merely as a way to feed tribal hatreds but that this behaviour has become normalised. When the freak show is live on TV every evening, and the star is boasting about his ratings, it is not really a freak show any more. For a very large and solid bloc of Americans, it is reality.

And this will get worse before it gets better. Trump has at least eight more months in power. In his inaugural address in 2017, he evoked “American carnage” and promised to make it stop. But now that the real carnage has arrived, he is revelling in it. He is in his element.

As things get worse, he will pump more hatred and falsehood, more death-wish defiance of reason and decency, into the groundwater. If a new administration succeeds him in 2021, it will have to clean up the toxic dump he leaves behind. If he is re-elected, toxicity will have become the lifeblood of American politics.

Either way, it will be a long time before the rest of the world can imagine America being great again.

Last night I watched an “online” concert by Jay Ungar and Molly Mason. I have always enjoyed Jay’s fiddling. (He wrote “Ashokan Farewell” and his playing can make me very emotional.)

As they played, I couldn’t help but get up and dance. Sophie watched me with a questioning look so I picked her up and carried as I waltzed. It felt good. Despite the long period since I’ve tried to dance, those waltz moves came back quickly.

Some of their tunes were ones I know well. Jay and Molly invited their audience to join in so I finally found my autoharp and played along. My wrist hurts today, but it was worth it.

Earlier in the day, I found a book of Judi Morningstar’s tunes, including one she wrote and dedicated to me!! Click this link for “Sharon, Queen of the Reception” I also located my harp instruction books and the strings needed to fix my harp.

As I listened to the music played on my computer, I was motivated to get back to playing. Yes, after John died, I promised myself that I’d practice my harp. It’s been impossible with my extra long manicured fingernails, but I’ve been cutting them down and I can now consider playing.

First I need to replace two broken strings. I think I can handle it. John always did that sort of stuff, but I have the instructions so I can try.

My harp looks great as a room decoration but it’s lovely and deserves to be played.

Will I ever stop shopping for toilet paper? There’s been such a shortage that I feel I must buy it if I see it. Yesterday I ordered a huge package from Sam’s Club. My pack will contain 32 rolls (218 sheets per roll) and should arrive next week. I already had a braggable amount. So many jokes about the value of TP. I’m a wealthy woman with two and 3/4’s boxes of “forever” 12-inch rolls and dozens of regular double rolls. According to the comments, with that supply, I could attract most any guy. I’m rich!!

I wash my hands a lot to avoid virus germs. Today I replenished my bottles of liquid hand soap. I’m really going through it fast. I now have eight full bottles. And if push comes to shove, I have a box with about a dozen bars of soap.

I ordered shampoo and cream rinse today. I buy it from Sam’s and I am having it shipped.

Six boxes of Kleenex is probably sufficient, five rolls of paper towels, and four bottles of Tide.

I only have two partially used big bottles of hand sanitizer. (Wish I had more but I might have some small bottles stored away.)

I am all set to withstand the problems associated with store shortages. I will get by.

Funny thing is, I always thought that my big fear living here would be hurricanes. Little did I know it would be a pandemic. My storage of supplies was so I’d always be prepared for a bad storm. No matter what weather is shoved at us, it won’t have as great an impact as crona-19 has had.