The Mandelbear's Musings

There's a lot of great music online these days. Only problem is that anything with lyrics totally blocks my ability write. Or, really, do almost anything else that requires thought. (I can drink.) This bear does not multitask.

I am, however, finally getting a few things done -- decluttering the garage, a little cooking, a little singing practice, a little other housework, ... Okay, a lot of housework. I'm staying ahead of it, I think, but only just. At least I got the vacuum cleaner unclogged. Apparently Ticia isn't the only one with hairballs.

The garage is difficult. I have a tendency to go in there, look around, and find that everything I look at brings up so many memories and regrets that I just stand there. Like so many things, I've been neglecting the decluttering that I know I need to do. I finally figured out how to deal with the stack of forty-odd boxes of books -- I can shift a box if I only have to slide it, and I can shift one to another stack if I empty it half-way. I have at least glanced into all of the boxes in the stack; there are still some things I'm missing, though, and I can't tell whether I just overlooked them, or whether they're in one of the other boxes that I dismissed earlier based on what I could see in the top layer.

Washington is in Stage 1 of its Safe Start reopening plan. "High-risk populations" -- i.e. everyone in this house -- are supposed to "continue to stay home, stay safe" until Stage 4. At a minimum of three weeks per stage, that works out to the middle of August at best. (Some counties are transitioning to stage 2 early because they have no active cases. It could happen here too, but that doesn't really matter...) The real question is whether it will be safe for me and Colleen to come out even with physical distancing and similar measures, if there isn't an effective vaccine out by then. Which there won't be. Maybe next August if we're lucky. We'll discuss her risk tolerance sometime in August.

Meanwhile the CDC's reopening plan has finally come out, censored of course. Fortunately, you can find the leaked drafts below in Wednesday's links. There are a couple of good links/quotes about grieving on Sunday, and some stuff about boundaries on Friday that I'm hopefully going to turn into a post soon. (I meant to do it this weekend, but I fell into a rabbit hole (more links halfway through Friday) instead.)

This ended up a little disconnected. Sorry about that.

( Notes & links, as usual )