You walk in and you see empty shelves. You know that you had been hearing about people buying up certain things, but you think, nah, can’t be that bad. You walk into the market, OK, someone is wearing a mask. That other person is wearing gloves, latex gloves.

Let me walk over to the paper isle. I came in here for toilet paper, I’m down to a roll. OMG, it’s real! People are actually buying up all of the toilet paper! I can’t walk down the aisle because if I do, I’m going to start laughing uncontrollably. Not because it’s the funniest thing I’ve seen, but because it is completely outrageous. Why is all of the toilet paper gone? Guess that means I need to go to another store to get toilet paper. Store #2 has some, but the shelves are really bare. Myself along with several other people comment on how incredibly insane this is.

This my friends was the beginning of me living through our current crisis. The entire Coronavirus thing hasn’t really come as a surprise to me. I watch the news. I live in the state where at the time was thought to have the first death resided. Though to be honest, I didn’t know what to feel or think. I just knew this was very crazy everything I was seeing in the overall public reaction.

At work, my colleagues were talking about how they had gone to places and certain things were out, OK, toilet paper. It all started with toilet paper. I’ve gone and read several articles on panic buying. I’ve watched several news stories detailing why and how it’s happening. Let me tell you I get it, but it’s still crazy as can be.

I started writing all of this back in March, when things were just starting to get going. It was still unreal then. Imagine that we are into May, things are still pretty unreal. I’ve been working from home since the middle of March. I haven’t seen pretty much anyone. I didn’t see my girlfriend for almost a month because after we last were together, a few days later, she thought she might have gotten COVID-19. Still don’t know if did or didn’t, should probably mention, I think I had something.

This entire situation really makes you think and wonder about your life and what life has for you. I’ve been watching, listening, reading a decent amount of stuff because I want to. I don’t subscribe to what some people say in terms of, don’t watch all of this stuff, it’ll just make you feel worse. That’s what got so many of us into where we are now. I’m happy to know what’s going on. Though I’ll admit in the last few weeks, I’ve started to not listen to current up to the minute things. I need to keep caught up on my podcast.

With living through this most interesting situation. I feel like I need to reflect on what’s been happening while I’ve been living through this.

Working from Home

My job sent out a survey asking how we are doing during this entire thing. I know this isn’t good to say, but I have to be honest. Working from home is really good. I already get to work from home every other week, so I already knew the benefits of doing it, but what will be soon 2 months of doing this. It’s really awesome! I do feel like I’m getting more work done and have less stress of someone watching over me. I can also say that technology is great in certain expects. We use Microsoft Teams, which is pretty good to use. If anyone I need to contact is around, my job is pretty simple to do.

I’m not overly upset about the personal interactions of an office because I’m still communicating with my colleagues. The biggest difference are those times when it would be better to talk to someone face to face, so you can see body language and facial expressions to get a good feel. I was listening to a story on Marketplace about one of those issues. I will admit this is a negative to it all, but that’s the only one realistically.

Personal Interactions and Going Out

In terms of going out, I don’t. With the fact that America has no real testing procedures setup, I’m good with just staying in and going out for the things I need once a week. Yes, that means I don’t go out for walks, I’m not even opening up my apartment door until the end of the week, or unless I’m getting a package. I’m able to do this mainly because I have a balcony, so it’s not like I’m not getting air or something. If the weather is nice, I like to sit outside on my balcony and just enjoy life that way.

I know some just like to say this stuff isn’t real, it’s just the flu, everyone is just making too much out of all of this, but let’s look at a few things. We have over 37,000 more deaths that have happen due to the COVID-19 than would’ve normally happened, mind you this amount was calculated in April, we definitely over 40,000 now. The fact that we have over 90,000 deaths right now and counting over the last few months is pretty crazy. The sad thing is that we have people who want to be upset at the fact that these numbers are low, or certain areas didn’t have as many deaths as originally projected. I have to say these people are sad and need to just go somewhere.

Now that this rant is over, going out and being exposed to things, isn’t that important. As long as you are keeping yourself entertained and have the mindset that I have, which is, this isn’t going to last forever you’ll be OK.

Shopping and Dealing with other people, Checking on Friends

After the initial shock of going to markets and seeing nothing on shelves. Not being able to find toilet paper and getting over the fact of how I need to shop for stuff. Everything has actually been OK.

My fear at first was, “What if I get Coronavirus? If I get it, I’ll have to quarantine myself, do I have enough food? What if I don’t get better.”

I had these thoughts, plus so many more as the time went on. Once the first few weeks were over and I got into the idea of being at home, I was OK. The biggest change was just checking in with people. I have to say one of the things I’ve read and heard from people is the idea of keeping contact with friends and family. I’ve been writing friends from all over. I really think it’s important to make sure everyone is OK. Not only to check in, but to allow me to keep sane. I really do miss my friends in Stuttgart. I’ve made a few here, but the closeness doesn’t compare to what I had.

I’ve also been checking in with people because the best information you get about what is going on in different countries, states, counties, and cities isn’t from the news. It’s from people who are living it. The one biggest thing that has bothered me during this is when I listen to CNBC, yes listen to CNBC. When I’m getting up for work and during my day, I’m listening to Siriusxm on my iPad. I don’t make time to watch TV until the evening. I digress, Jim Cramer consistently talks about his daughter in Madrid and how she can’t leave the house unless it’s with a police officer. She see’s a police officer whenever she needs to leave. Whenever I hear this, I’m like this can’t be the case. I wrote my friend in Madrid, they aren’t allowed to go farther than a certain distance, but its not like there is an armed officer stopping them from living life.

These are the things that make me just want to know the truth. When you know people and made close friendships. You have to utilize those friendships.

Certain things here in Washington aren’t open just yet, which frankly I’m OK with. I am aware that there is an economic effect to things being closed, but when you live in a liberal state like this. Health is more important than money. Some restaurants have gone to carryout if it made sense for them. I’ve gone to a few places and gotten food here or there. Some of the local breweries are selling beers to go, which I have gladly supported. It’s been good to try out some different things that they have to offer.

Well, this has been way longer than it should’ve been. Guess I had a lot on my mind. I hope everyone is being safe and doing some cool task around their homes. I have been, which I hope I’ll be able to get myself to write about soon.

If you have been doing something cool, let me know. I would love to hear what everyone is up to.

Be safe, wash your hands, wear a mask, be happy!