Pandemic Year 1: August 2020

This month of COVID Quarantine life I stayed home, with just a few visits to my parent’s house. They were in the process of cleaning out the crawl space that no one really has been in for over 20 years. So I was helping going through old toys and stacks of papers. I had a few years ago rescued most of the Lego sets, but there were tons of barbies, beanie babies, matchbox cars, and more under the house in various states of disuse. Lots of spider webs with mice pee/droppings on some things that couldn’t be saved. I threw out every single stuffed animal after having a moment to remember the ones I loved so much. I saved a few odds and ends like TMNT action figures, Addams Family action figures, Precious Places houses & figures. So many memories.

Sadly there were some things I never found, lost to time. But there were also tons of class photos, yearbooks, and it appears like every single school notice & homework assignment since pre-school for me. Took most of the month to go through things and decide what to keep, donate, or trash. Honestly, I never thought I’d see any of this stuff again. And I’m impressed with my parents that they took this COVID time to get all that shit out of the house.

Beyond that this month was tough with the extreme heat and the fires. I’ve never experienced Fires and air quality as bad as it was. There was a week where you couldn’t see the mountains. It was so strange. I remember walking Tessa and looking up the moon which was a bloody-orange from the fire. Same with the sun during the day. Didn’t help the depressive feeling of this apocalypse year.

Also speaking of depressing thoughts. I was doing my weekly Trivia with some friends. The host is now doing a hybrid from-home/live-at-bar Trivia. At one point the host said “Hey guys, don’t be dicks. For some people this Trivia is their only social interaction, their only highlight of the week.” My friends went “Really? Wow that’s sad if this is the highlight of your week.” Or something to that effect. It hurt because Trivia IS my only weekly social outlet. My other friends don’t talk to me, and I cannot blame them. I don’t have much to talk about at all either.

On happier notes, I made a bunch of co-workers laugh for a little bit. We were working on a hard project and I did an off hand comment and everyone just cracked up for a full two minutes. It was the first people I made laugh since February that weren’t my parents. It seemed strange and great.

One time this month I joined a virtual Happy Hour with the Denver Murderinos, fans of the My Favorite Murder podcast. (Of which I’m almost fully caught up with.) While it started with a weird “Tell us your favorite Serial Killer” it ended up being a wholesome group of women to chat with. Sure, we were talking about local Cults, missing persons, cemeteries, travel, and Ghost Stories, but it still was fun.

It probably was fun for me as in the heat of summer I go into a “Why is it not Fall yet? When can I start doing Halloween stuff!” Which I satisfied by starting a Halloween cross stitch kit. This time non-stamped, so made a few mistakes and had to start over a few times. Much harder when its not stamped.

Some things I watched: