Tag: lock down

Four Years

Today is March 13, 2024. It’s the fourth anniversary of the world turning upside down.

Four years ago today was a Friday. At 5:30pm, when the work day ended, my staff and I packed up our desks and brought everything home. We were told that for the next couple of weeks we, meaning everyone in the entire company, would be working from home. The goal being to ride out this Covid-19 thing. Social distance, shelter in place, keep everyone healthy so that we don’t overrun the hospitals.

Today is the fourth anniversary of the start of the Covid-19 lockdown. Well, it’s the start of things for me. My wife had already been working from home for two days by that point.

Four years later and Covid-19 is still a thing. So much so that I am going to take a rapid test today to see if my sore throat is a Covid symptom or not. We’re still working from home more than not. Three days home, two days in the office. Nothing is quite back to normal, though it’s reasonably close now. At least we can go out and do stuff now, even if there’s still a chance of getting sick.

We are adjusting, I guess. It’s never going to not be a thing, but at least we’re managing.

Happy fourth Covid-aversary, folks. Celebrate by wearing a mask or something. HoHoCoughCoughCoughHo.

Post Covid Hockey

A couple of nights ago I went to a concert for the first time since Covid came around. I knew I was missing live music after four years or so, but I wasn’t really aware of how much I was missing it.

So now what?

How about hockey? I’m watching the Bruins play Tampa Bay right now (tied at one in the first period). When was the last time I went to a hockey game? My Flickr account tells me I went to a Bruins game in February 2016. Was that the last time? It might be, I am not sure.

We are going to a game next month at my step kids’ school. Should I try to go to a UMass Lowell game before then? I hope I will be feeling the same sort of I-can’t-believe-how-much-I-missed-this feeling that I got on Saturday at the Letters to Cleo show.

I miss our pre-Covid world.

Back Home for Reals

We got home to Boston and that’s when the Covid test came back positive. We dropped our bags off at the house and then went to the doctor and then went to the pharmacy. It took hours. Finally by 4:45pm we got home to stay. We’re in quarantine land now and that’s a pain in the ass, but it’s also a good thing. We’re going to be living with Instacart and Amazon for a week or so. Doordash is bringing dinner as we speak.

We are back to 2020 lockdown again. I was really hoping we were done with this shit forever, but there you go. Get well soon, us.

Three Years Today

Three years. Bullshit.

Today is March 13, 2023. On March 13, 2020 we left the office in Waltham at 5:30pm and the Covid-19 pandemic lockdown started. I mean we all had our own individual experience as we did not have a functioning Federal government at the time, we just had a nazi cunt in the White House pretending to run a Federal government. We were all sort of left on our own while more civilized societies worked together. Yeah, I ‘member.

So Jen’s company sent everyone home after work on Wednesday and my company sent us home after work on Friday. The kids both came home around the same time. Bellana was on Spring Break and they just had everyone stay home. Harry was still in high school so his experience was more closely similar to mine. Just one day he was told to stay home and telecommute.

So that’s how it all started. Today? Today the pandemic is still a thing, but our society is more or less ignoring it. Very few of us are still wearing masks. Most of us in the Tech industry are still working from home for the most part, but we’re being pulled back into the office more and more often. My company has us coming in once a week. My fingers are crossed that at some point soon we’ll eliminate that requirement, but that hope is not based on any actual evidence. Jen’s company closed their buildings, but they are still pulling people in to temporary work sites now and then. I don’t know anyone who is still 100% working from home.

In my family, we’re all vaccinated up the wazoo, and every time a booster is made available we jump on it. It hasn’t stopped anyone from contracting Covid-19 but it has drastically reduced the severity for most of us. Jen and I haven’t caught it at all. Three years of precautions have been successful for us. Sure, we’ve over done it and we continue to over do it to some extent, but we’re still Covid-Free.

And that, folks is the long and the short of it. They told us to expect to be working from home for a couple of weeks and it’s turned into three years. It’s not even unusual anymore. It’s not even “the new normal” anymore. It’s just normal now. As Bruce Hornsby and the Range once said, that’s just the way it is.

Happy third quaren-versary, folks. Do something fun at home by yourself to celebrate.

Two Years and Seven Months

Two years and seven months ago today, at 5:30pm, my personal Covid-19 pandemic lock down began. 3/13/20 was our last day in the office. We are not particularly locked down at this point, but we’re pretty much still isolated. We’re going to stores, I’m visiting Mom regularly (and need to visit Dad more often), we’re just spending as much time as we can afford to away from everyone. We’re wearing masks and being good, virus-conscious humans.

I am so friggin’ sick of it. I miss my friends, I miss playing in the band, I miss my family. Granted, my step kids are both in Vermont so I would be missing them even without our personal lock down, but you get the point. I want to travel, though we can’t afford it, I want to do things.

I want to go to hockey games again. The Bruins won their opening game last night. They beat The Capitals 5-2. I listened to as much as I could on the radio. Probably not as much as I would have liked, but a nice chunk. UMass Lowell is currently 2-1, with all three games being non-conference games. They play in Michigan tonight and tomorrow, two more non-conference games. The first Hockey East games are next week. I have been able to catch at least a little of each game on the radio. I’m not sure if they cover road games on WUML Lowell 91.5 FM, but I think we’ll find out tonight. As for the kids’ school, University of Vermont… 0-4 with all games being in conference. Yeah… pretty grim. I haven’t tried to find them on the radio. It might not be worth it.

In closing, I watched She-Hulk while doing my walkies. Teeny Tiny Spoilers Ahead. It was season one episode nine, the first season finale. I did not realize that I so desperately needed to hear something like five seconds worth of Richard and Linda Thompson music in the MCU. I did need it though. I really, completely needed it. The episode was great, but at the end when they snuck in a few seconds of I Want to See the Bright Lights Tonight just made my fucking week. Props to K.E.V.I.N. and the gang.

Packed

I’m in the office today. Not my office but another of my company’s buildings that is 35 miles further from home. The first 10-15 miles of the commute was brutal. After that it was just a matter of trying to go fast enough to make up for some of the lost time. I got to the parking lot with a couple of minutes to spare.

Speaking of the parking lot, I have never seen it this full. Even pre-pandemic, I never saw this place packed the way it is. There is a conference here today. We are not going to it, but we are involved in a couple of things that are sort of related to it. I’m the guy hiding in a conference room, sitting as far away from everyone else, and only removing my mask to consume sustenance.

I really want to go home now.

At the Office

I’m at the office, sitting at my desk. Tomorrow I’ll be at the office, but not my building. I’ll spend the day in a conference room.

I have seen two other people on my floor (the third floor, if you’re curious). One is sitting at a desk about 100 yards away. The other is a custodian cleaning a conference room. That’s it. I kept hearing noises and eventually determined that it was a tree branch tapping a window. Kinda creepy, actually. I’m listening to a Walking Dead podcast on headphones to drown it out.

Okay, back to work for me.

2.5 Years

I haven’t written one of these in a while. Today is September 13, 2022. Exactly 2.5 years ago we worked in the office. It was a Friday. The following Monday was the first day the whole company worked from home. That makes today the 2.5 year anniversary of the symbolic end of the pre-pandemic era.

2.5 years. Two and a half trips around the sun. Given that we were expecting it to last a couple of weeks, I would say that our expectations were off by a smidgen. We still have not had a case of Covid-19 in the house. We are still also mostly locked down. Coincidence? I have to go in to the office tomorrow afternoon, and all day on Thursday. Thursday is going to include an event with a pretty huge number of people. I am going to mask up and try to stay away from people. Hopefully that will be enough.

Working from home was something that I was pretty unsure of pre-pandemic. I heard of companies that had their staff 100% remote and I thought that was something that wouldn’t work for me. I had a day or two at home at various times in the past, but full time at home? That wasn’t for me.

Now? Now it’s indispensable. Now it’s a requirement. I have to spend a day and a half in the office this week? Outrageous (not really, I’m just being dramatic)! Working without wearing a t-shirt and sneakers? Blasphemy!

Full time(ish) remote hasn’t been without it’s difficulties though. One of the arms on Jen’s super swanky office chair broke today and now we may have to get another one. I gave her my super swanky office chair (which used to be hers anyway) and I am in a less than super swanky chair that is still perfectly fine. The point is, a new chair is an expense that we wouldn’t have to worry about if we were working in our respective company’s offices. That and, you know, electricity and ISP bills and stuff.

Still… working from home is pretty freakin’ sweet and I want to do it for the rest of my career. One upside of the lockdown, I guess.

Now if we could just get rid of the damn virus. We’ll be getting the Omicron specific vaccine as soon as we can.

Am I Ready for a Concert?

Covid-19… our house might be the most locked down house in America at this point, even though we’re not really that locked down anymore. We’re still trying to do the right thing.

I just found out that Jeff Beck is playing in Boston in October. Tickets aren’t on sale yet, and they are probably too expensive for me with two kids in college, but… oh boy. He’s 78 years old and he’s the only person left on my “you need to see him before he/you die(s)” list.

When I first made that list, probably back in 1988 or so, I had already seen Rush so they weren’t included. The list was Eric Clapton, Jeff Beck, Jimmy Page, Steve Howe, and Steve Hackett. I saw Clapton in 1990 and again in 2004. I saw Page in 1988. I saw Howe in 1989 and again in 1991. I saw Hackett in 2019. Jeff Beck is the only one left.

The clock is ticking. There won’t be many more opportunities. Like I said, the guy is 78. I would really like to go, but even if I did have money to burn I don’t know if I would. I don’t know if I am ready to go to a concert, or an indoor sporting event, or anything like that yet. We’re going to Disney World in January, but that feels like a long way off. It feels like a full universe away. A concert in a 1500-2000 seat venue? Less than two months from now? I don’t know if I can wrap my tiny brain around that. I want to, but… friggin’ pandemic.

Movies

We’re doing it. We’re going to the movies. Thor Love and Thunder. We’re going to mask up and go into a movie theater for the first time since the pandemic started. Sweet Christmas does this feel weird.

Am I nervous? Yes. Both Covid-Nervous and nervous that the movie won’t live up to the hype, but the real focus of this mini-discussion is the Covid-Nervous. I know it will be okay but it’s still stressful.

I did a simulated 5k walk this morning. I actually just finished. I figured if I did that then my legs would be so beat I wouldn’t be able to get up and run away if the theater fills up too much. I am kidding, of course.

Okay. Breakfast then flick. That’s the plan. Yikes!