Cash on the Barrelhead

I'm old school. Or at least old school-ish.

For any purchase under $20, I prefer to pay cash, and am still capable of being a bit shocked when the twenty-something in front of me at Dunkin Donuts swipes their debit card to buy a couple of munchkins. But unless I'm just running in for something quick - and that's not happening these days, when preparing for an outing to the grocery store requires more foresight and planning than the Shackleton Expedition - I always use my debit card when I'm at the grocery store. At CVS, I'll use cash for a small purchase, unless there's no self-checkout kiosk available that is cash-friendly.

For online buying, I use PayPal or the card that gives me the most bennies. 

I also write checks. Sometimes.

While I have transferred money to someone else's bank account, I mostly write checks when the transaction is personal - a birthday present - or occasional - my once a year support contract with the HVAC folks. For my regular, monthly transactions, however - phone, cable, condo fee, Blue Cross, credit cards, etc - payment is either automated or taken care of through my bank's online bill pay app. 

My political donations all happen through Act Blue because, of course, I'm never going to make a political donation to anyone who doesn't think and do Blue.

In the past, I seldom gave any money to anyone stemming for change on the street corner. If it was during opening hours, and we were near enough by, I'd direct them to St. Francis House. If not, I might buy them a cup of coffee or hand them a buck. These days, anyone asking me for cash gets $5 - I withdrew a decent enough supply of $5 bills from the bank a few weeks back - which I put on a ledge or on the ground at a social distancing distance. "I don't want to give you anything," I tell them. "And I don't want you giving anything to me."

While I did have to make a special request for all those fives, I do always have cash around. And if I get much below $100, I make a trip to the ATM.

But cash is definitely on the wane, and I wouldn't be surprised if, during my lifetime, we saw the end of cash. Cash on the barrelhead? Forget about it. (Not that anyone knows what a barrelhead is in this day and age...) 

As a cash-ish person, I was drawn to an article in the Washington Post entitled "The End of Cash."

Economists see great payoffs in a cashless society: lower costs for businesses and new tools to manage economies, stymie tax evasion and fight money laundering. Critics see an erosion of privacy, frightening new powers for governments and another sign of widening inequality. Central bankers, meanwhile, worry about losing control of the supply of money to digital networks like Facebook.

We've been steering away from cash for a while. According to the Fed, in the US, "debit cards first beat out cash as the top way to pay in 2018." Other countries are even further ahead when it comes to a preference for digital over folding green. 

Despite all this doom and gloom (or comfort and joy, if you want to look at it that way) over the demise of cash, we're still a ways away from a cashless society.

In most developed countries, however, the value of cash in circulation has risen since the financial crisis of 2008-2009 along with the number of digital payments, suggesting cash (in large bills) is being increasingly used as a store of value in uncertain times, especially with rock-bottom interest rates on savings accounts.

On the anti-cash hand, some merchants are afraid of handling cash because they believe that coronavirus might be lurking on those Benjamins. 

If and when it happens, I will miss cash.

I'm of the generation that grew up with a piggy bank, and there was nothing more satisfying than the clink of change heading in through the slot. And nothing more satisfying than using a table knife to sluice a nickel out of said piggy bank so you could go buy a popsicle or some penny candy.

I'm of the generation that was thrilled to open up a birthday card from an aunt, uncle or grandmother and find a dollar bill. Better yet, a five. 

It's still comforting to have a change bucket on hand so that, if worse comes to worst, you can roll those quarters, nickels, dimes and pennies and come up with enough money to pay for something or other.

One of the pleasures of international travel is seeing what another country's currency looks like. Sure, the Euro bland-ized things a bit, but it's still fun and interesting to find Ferenc Deák's visage on a forint, and Google him up. (Hungarian statesman and Minister of Justice. He was known as "The Wise Man of the Nation". We sure could use a Ferenc Deák around here these days.)

While it's been a while since I'd bend down to pick up a penny from the sidewalk - and I'm pretty much off nickels and dimes, as well - I'm still always happy to spot and retrieve a quarter. Bills are even better. When I was 4 years old, on a family outing to Crane's Beach, I found a $10 bill sticking out of the dunes. I still remember the thrill of it all. Ten bucks! A fortune! 

As an adult, I've found larger amounts that must have just fallen out of someone's pockets. $40 once. $50 another time. My husband found two twenties in a gutter in Central Square as he was climbing out of a cab. 

Finding cash in an amount too small to report to the police but too large to ignore is absolutely having fortune smile on you.

And is there a better feeling than reaching into a pocket and pulling out a bill? Sure, your hopes are dashed when it turns out to be a one, but if it's a ten or a twenty: pure gold. (One time it backfired on me. I was in CVS, paying for some small purchase, and remembered that I had a five in my pocket. Except that, when I went to pull it out and put it on the counter, it turned out to be a panty shield. Unused, but still... The clerk looked at me like I had two heads. My sister Trish asked me whether I was expecting a tampon in change.)

Truly, worry about the demise of cash is the least of anyone's worries these days. 

Still, I'm one of the olds who will definitely miss cash.

Take me out to the ballgame organist

I'm not a Facebook fan. I don't use it personally and, while I do miss keeping up with friends and family, and their kids, grandkids, and pets, I'm mostly happy that I canceled my account and got the hell out of that particular Dodge. 

But since I am an occasional FB poster for a charity I volunteer with, I do maintain a sort of account using my real first name, the acronym for the charity, Christmas day as my birthday, and - for my icon - a smiley face wearing a Santa cap. (Ssshhhh. Don't tell anyone I have this fakish account. Honest to God, I'm not a Russian and I don't troll.)

Anyway, I think you need to be on FB to look at stuff on FB, so I'm now just as glad I have my fake-o access so that I can listen in to Seventh Inning Stretch, which I did for the first time yesterday. And will be checking in on regularly from now on.

Seventh Inning Stretch is the brainchild of Fenway Park organist Josh Kantor who, each afternoon at 3 p.m., does a half-hour-ish long organ concert from his living room, at an organ decorated with a couple of baseball bobbleheads, baseball cards, and a Red Sox cap. Josh (who's also a part-time music librarian at Harvard) has been performing this wonderful public service since baseball season didn't begin, and will continue until things are back to normal. 

Yesterday, I took in my first Josh Kantor concert. Josh played a tune, then spoke a little about what was on his mind. I'm not sure if this is the regular format. I'll know more once I've tuned in a few more times, which I plan to do. Anyway, yesterday what was on Josh's mind was the 73rd anniversary of Jackie Robinson's major league, breaking-the-color-line baseball debut. (For Boston locals, it was also he 7th anniversary of the Marathon Bombing.)

He - Josh, not Jackie - also made a pitch for a donation to whatever your local foodbank is. (You can find your local foodbank by going to Feeding America and putting in your zipcode. Mine is the Greater Boston Food Bank and thanks to Josh's prod, I threw a few bucks their way.)

I take it the formal start of the Stretch is, as it would be half-way through the seventh inning at the ballpark, the playing of "Take Me Out to the Ballgame." Instead of singing "I don't care if I never get back", we are asked to sing "I do care..." Which I do, indeed. I didn't stand and stretch, which I would have done at Fenway,  but I did sit and sing. I even teared up a bit. (Have I mentioned how much I miss baseball?)

In honor of Jackie Robinson, Josh than played "Lift Every Voice and Sing," the (unofficial) African-American anthem. Lovely.

Assisted by his wife Mary Eaton, Josh then started taking requests from the FB chat request line. (Mary is a minister who works with Boston's homeless population.) 

Josh can't handle all the requests - during any given Stretch there'll be hundreds of them - but he has incredible knowledge and range, a photographic memory and the ability to hear a tune once and be able to play it by ear.

During yesterday's concert, Josh took requests for, among other songs, "Dancing Queen," "I Want to Dance with Somebody," "In the Navy," and the Beatles' "Taxman." (Normally, yesterday would have been tax day.)

I was disappointed that he and Mary ignored requests for local 1967 hit, "The Man They Call Yaz"; the theme from The Banana Splits; and "Una Paloma Blanca." This latter request completely cracked me up, as the requester wrote that this song was "a memory from my wretched middle school years."

Maybe we'll hear these gems next time. And, for me, there certainly will be a next time. And a next time. And a next time.

The show is sweet, heartfelt, and tonic to the ears of anyone missing the organ music at Fenway Park, or wherever it is that their boys of summer play. 

“This is a long haul,” says Eaton, known as the “Rev. Mary” on the show. “It’s not that we’re bored. It’s that people are working really hard to figure out what to do and are exhausted mentally, physically and spiritually and need to stretch, just to give themselves permission to rest in the middle of the day. To have a respite. We need it.” (Source: Wapo)

Yes, Mary, we do need it. A grateful Red Sox Nation thanks you and Josh for taking such good care of us in our time of need.

Worst people in the world award

https://www.cnn.com/2020/04/09/tech/instacart-shoppers-tip-baiting/index.html

Pandemics bring out the best in people - all those workers on the frontlines in hospitals and grocery stores; philharmonic orchestras playing "Hang On Sloopy" via Zoom (and yes, this is a thing); meme-makers; et al.  - and, on the flip side, pandemics apparently bring out the worst in others. 

Case in point: the Instacart users who are promising big tips, only to cancel them out once the goods are delivered.

In late March, Instacart worker Annaliisa Arambula accepted a grocery order that came with a big tip: $55. The store was just down the street, everything the customer wanted was available, and the order seemed to go off without a hitch.

But an hour later, Arambula checked her earnings on the Instacart app and the entire tip was gone, with a message saying the "customer modified the tip post-delivery." She ended up making just $8.95 from Instacart on the order.

"I was flabbergasted. I couldn't believe it," Arambula told CNN Business.

Demand for grocery delivery is surging amid the Covid-19 pandemic, and many customers are struggling to get the items they want or even a time slot for a delivery. Some people are dealing with that by offering big tips, as high as $50 or more, to entice Instacart workers to pick up their orders. But some of those people have turned the tactic into a bait-and-switch, offering up the big tip and then taking it away as soon as the person who risked their health to get them their groceries has made the delivery.

Before accepting a "batch" -- which can consist of one or a few orders from different customers -- workers can see the items requested, the store location, the payment Instacart provides workers for the job, and the tip being offered. Instacart allows customers to change a tip for up to three days. Some workers told CNN Business tips can make up half of their income or more.


"It's very demoralizing," said Arambula, who lives in the Portland, Oregon, area and has worked full-time for Instacart since June 2017. "I don't pretend to be a hero, like a nurse in a hospital ... but I literally am exposing myself [to coronavirus] and when I return home, exposing my own family to the possibility of transmitting this disease. When you know that it's somebody who's just doing it to game the system and to get their order when they want it, it's really frustrating." Arambula's husband is currently unemployed and at high risk for Covid-19 because he has diabetes, so they are relying on her work for Instacart to pay their bills.

Instacart is one of several delivery companies now expanding rapidly due to demand spurred by the pandemic. Last month, the company announced plans to bring on another 300,000 full-service shoppers in North America to service the increased demand.

An Instacart spokesperson told CNN Business the vast majority of people in March adjusted their tip upward or did not adjust their tip after delivery. Moreover, the spokesperson said, the company recently removed the "none" tip option for people, so users who want to tip nothing must manually change a tip to $0. The spokersperson said this could deter users from doing so. People can also leave feedback and rate a worker in the app, something Instacart claims typically happens if and when a person removes a tip.

"It's a crapshoot"

Jenifer G., who became a "full service shopper" for Instacart about a month ago and asked to be identified by her first name and last initial for fear of retribution, said she has already experienced a handful of bait-and-switch tippers in Pennsylvania. She said one person originally put a $32.94 tip on a 27-item order from Sam's Club, only to replace it with a $0 tip after delivery. Another person changed a $13.31 tip on a 38-item order from a different store to nothing after delivery.

"It's a crapshoot," said Jenifer G., who noted half her earnings come from tips, either in cash or through the app. "These are affluent communities that I'm delivering to. There's almost no need to not tip, especially because not only is this a convenience for you but we're in a pandemic right now."

An Instacart spokesperson said that tips are always left up to a customer's discretion and would not comment on specific instances of tip baiting occurring. In an email to Instacart customers provided to CNN Business, the company encourages people to "please consider tipping above and beyond to reflect the extra effort of your shopper."

Being able to change a tip is not uncommon for on-demand delivery platforms. But other services such as Uber (UBER) Eats and Postmates, which offer on-demand meal deliveries, allow customers to change tips for shorter windows of time, between one and 10 hours.

Bryant Greening, an attorney and co-founder of Chicago-based law firm LegalRideshare, told CNN Business that a few dozen Instacart shoppers and drivers have reached out to his firm to voice concerns over the practice. His law firm has discussed the possibility of litigation against Instacart, or even individual customers.

"It's truly evil to bait and switch in this type of environment," said Greening. "Their livelihood and well-being are on the line. When these shoppers and drivers see a high tip, it's an opportunity for them to put food on the table, so they're more willing to take a risk on their health to achieve that goal."

While Instacart is benefiting from a surge in customer orders in recent weeks, workers have criticized the company for not doing enough to ensure they're adequately protected and paid during the pandemic. For more than a week, some workers have been on strike until Instacart meets their demands including hazard pay, an expansion of its coronavirus pay to include those with underlying health conditions and a default tip of 10%. One day before the planned strike, Instacart said it would change its default tip setting from 5% to the most recently used percentage a customer chose to tip.

Jenifer G., the Instacart worker, said she feels the company should mandate a 10% tip "that sticks no matter what" on all orders until stay-at-home guidance is lifted and only allow people to tip above that should they choose.

"I can't strike, I literally cannot afford to, but I'll [only] shop during 'boost times,'" she said, referring to high-demand times of day when Instacart pays a few dollars more to workers.

In addition to having their tips slashed at the last minute, some Instacart workers are also the target of seemingly tone-deaf remarks from customers. Carilyn, who started working for Instacart about one month ago and asked to be identified by first name only for fear of retribution, told CNN Business she also had a recent experience with tip baiting. When dropping off an order recently, she said the customer told her it was "unethical" that she wasn't able to find toilet paper and updated her tip to $0.

"I tried my best. A lot of people are detached from the situation going on," said Carilyn, who is based in Florida. "They really don't see what we see. We know things are a no-no, like soap, and toilet paper, you barely find eggs if you're lucky."

(Because workers tend to be tipped a percentage of the total order cost, when high-demand items can't be found in store -- in this case, toilet paper -- the tip shrinks accordingly. But in other cases, customers enter a custom tip amount and then take it back after the delivery.)

Fortunately for some, like Carilyn and Jenifer G., the majority of recent tips have been authentic. Carilyn said she took home more than $360 in cash and in-app tips last week alone -- a good week for her. Jenifer G. also noted that she's had people leave cash tips in envelopes at their door.

While some workers said they have grown wary of large tips because of tip baiting, others sometimes risk picking up low tip orders in the hopes the person will pay more in cash. It doesn't always work, though. Jenifer G. said she recently picked up a 112-item order from Aldi for a person who put a $1 tip in the app and there was no cash tip waiting.


"We always say: No matter what, never trust a tip," she said.

Healthy Choice? Maybe not if you have teeth

Like pretty much everyone these days, my freezer is pretty well stocked.

Going from memory, I have in there: my very own version of stuffed peppers - enough for 4 meals; a few pieces of my sesame chicken; a large container of house-made (one of my  favorite restaurantisms, from back in the day when we went to restaurants) pasta, chicken and broccoli with white wine sauce; and a dinner's worth of peppered chicken and couscous (one of my best recipes, by the way). 

I also have a commercial chicken pot pie, some pie crusts (no, despite my mother's best efforts at teaching me, I'm a disaster when it comes to making my own crust), a container of pesto, and some frozen waffles. Then there's a package and half of tortellini. Also uncooked boneless/skinless chicken breasts (okay, I'm a cooking wuss), and a couple of pounds of ground beef. 

Although I never eat frozen vegetables, I do have some bags of peas, cauliflower, and green beans, bought in panic and preserved for the day when I run out of fresh veggies and can't get to the grocery store. Also a bag of frozen pineapple chunks. (Yet another panic buy.)

I have a half-pint of blueberries, and a small amount of blackberries and raspberries in baggies.. 

A pound of butter. Some rolls. 

And on the sweet side: A couple of my orange-chocolate pound cakes - they freeze very nicely and it's good to have something to pull out and bring as a house gift. Some raspberry brownies my sister Trish made. (Unbelievably delish.) A few pieces of Daddy's Favorite (barmbrack, an Irish tea cake). 

And two-and-a-half quarts of Gifford's of Maine black raspberry with chocolate chips froyo. 

Oh, and some ice.

I did have two loaves of Aunt Peg's Soda Bread - on reserve for my sister Kath and cousin Barbara, since the world shut down on St. Patrick's Day before I could hand them off. Alas, in order to make room for all of the above, I had to defrost those loaves. I gave one to a friend in the building, and was forced to consume to the other all by my lonesome. (Don't you know, there's a war on. I had to do my part.) I promise to bake more soda bread when this is all over.

Oh, and there's some ice in there.

What I don't have in my freezer is any frozen dinners.

Not that I've never had a Lean Cuisine or a Healthy Choice in my past. They are, after all, the height of convenience. But even I - who hates to cook - much prefers making something from scratch and having leftovers.

So I didn't have to check and see if I had a not-so-healthy Healthy Choice chicken bowl in there - and item that has been recalled. All 65 tons of it.

According to a USDA news releas, Conagra Brands, is recalling nearly 131,000 pounds of Healthy Choice Power Bowls Chicken Feta & Farro, which were produced Jan. 23, 2020. (Source: USA Today)

Good thing I didn't have any Healthy Choice in my freezer, because chicken, feta, and farro would have been just the sort of combo that appealed to me.  

"There have been no confirmed reports of adverse reactions due to consumption of these products," the release said, noting Conagra learned of the problem after receiving consumer complaints about rocks being in the products.

The rocks were categorized by Conagra as "small" ones, "that likely remained from harvesting ingredients contained in the product."

Well, that's comforting. Unless you don't want to break a tooth and have to see a dentist who may not be interested in getting anywhere near you and your germ vectors.

Years ago, I was having lunch in a restaurant and there was a small rock in my salad. Fortunately, I didn't break a tooth on it. Another time, I thought I found a small rock in a Stoneground Wheat Cracker. Turns out that small rock was a piece of a molar...

Anyway, Conagra is warning consumers not to eat what's in those bowls, and you wouldn't have to warn me twice. And I do have to say that I don't need any further warning not to eat any food whatsoever that comes from an outfit named Conagra. Doesn't exactly say "hmmm, hmmm good" now, does it?

Happy to have a freezer that's full, and happy that - as far as I know - there are no rocks contained within. I know that anything that I made myself is rock-free. I will inspect carefully when I decide to break into the frozen peas or pineapple chunks. Especially the frozen peas, which are Birds Eye - a Conagra brand. And I'll have to be careful when I fish out a Vlasic kosher dill pickle, as that's yet another Conagra brand. No avoiding the big guys, is there???

Bon appetit!

Remembrance of holidays past/thoughts of holidays present

Not that, as a completely non-religious (irreligious) person, Easter itself doesn't have a ton of meaning for me. Still, my equally non-religious (irreligious) family has continued to celebrate it with a get together, even though my fervently religious (super-Catholic) mother has been dead now for nearly 20 years. Our get together is at my sister Trish's, where we eat ham, potatoes, veggies, cole slaw, pineapple raisin sauce, and carrot or Jack Horner spice cake. And drink copious amounts of wine. The appetizers at Trish's always include jelly beans and other Easter-baskety treats, and everyone who wants to bite the head off of a Peep gets to do so.

Not this year.

On Saturday, I celebrated Easter with my brother Rick, the only person I see up close and personal these days, as he is also single and lives alone, and we're limiting our exposure and disease vectors by not socializing with anyone else. I did have a virtual cup of tea with an old friend on Zoom the other day, but that doesn't count. And Rick got together with one of his buddies, sitting 15 feet away in lawn chairs in Bob's back yard, having a couple of beers. (Rick got to pee in the bushes before he left, Bob's wife having figured that if she wasn't letting her kids and grandkids into the house, she sure as hell wasn't going to let my brother use the bathroom!)

For the occasion, I ordered a catered tenderloin dinner, which was way pricey and absolutely magnificent. I never cook steak, but I like it on occasion. And this was an occasion. After dinner, we Zoomed with Rick's daughter Caroline for a bit.

Yesterday, I had left over tenderloin dinner, and a drive-by, keep your distance visit from my sister Trish and her daughter Molly. Trish delivered some left overs (won't need to fake cook for a couple more days!) and a couple of home made masks -  one using fabric from a polished cotton summer jumper my mother made for me in the late 1960's: cream colored, decorated with butterflies. The jumper was handed down to Trish at some point, so we both have a sentimental attachment to the fabric. Trish was saving all sorts of fabric swatches for a quilt she's planning on making some day. (I told her to make sure she still sets some of the memory lane fabric aside so that I can wrap the novel I'm going to write someday in it.)

The two lovely masks Trish made should hold me until some of the many different masks I ordered from Etsy start showing up, which I'm hopeful will be this week. All those handcrafters on Etsy are overwhelmed with the demand, so items that were supposedly shipping out over a week ago are languishly somewhere in the work-in-progress pipeline. Probably on the cutting room table.

Trish's mask works a ton better than the one I cobbled together using a dinner napkin and rubber bands, which was way too heavy and kept slipping off.

Yesterday, the weather was lovely - very Eastery - although, as history tells us, Easter can be anything from springy and balmly to last gasp of winter blizzard conditions. I took a long walk along the Esplanade, which runs along the Charles River. It was relatively crowded, but not crazily so. I will observe that about 75-80% of the walkers had on masks - up from maybe one quarter a week ago. And that 99% of runners and bicyclists are still going without. I guess they need the freedom to hock a loogie without the impediment of a having a fabric covering across their face.

The weather was lovely, as are the spring flowering trees. We usually have forsythia out by this point - and they are glorious - but the magnolias and cherry trees don't generally pop until later in the month or in early May. Nice to have, if it weren't for the ominous aspect that their early appearance is likely due to global warming. Sigh...

On my walk, I passed by the Hatch Shell, where the Boston Pops performs their 4th of July Concert. I used to go back in the day when you could show up five minutes before hand, throw down your blanket and enjoy the concert and fireworks. Then it became a thing, with half-a-million people jamming their way in. No thanks. I did go a couple of years ago to the July 3rd dress rehearsal, and that was enough of a hassle. In the wake of the 2013 Patriots Day bombing, the security was insane. Is it just me, or do soldiers carrying automatic weapons take away some of the enjoyment of an event? So, generally I put the concert on TV and watch the fireworks out my window. Or I go up to my sister's in Salem and watch their lower key but excellent concert and fireworks her town puts on. Last year, I wasn't in an especially patriotic mood. Nor was Trish. So we both just sheltered in place, although I did look out the kitchen window at the Boston fireworks.

No concert in either location this year, I'm afraid.

As for Patriots Day, that's coming up next Monday.

I walked by the finish line of the Boston Marathon the other day. Normally, that area would be buzzing this week: the finish line repainted, the stands and barricades erected, bright yellow daffodils in pots covered in blue foil - Marathon colors - everywhere. Not this year. The race is now rescheduled for September. We'll see about that.

Throughout the week, the city would start to fill with runners, recognizable because they're all walking around in their Marathon jackets. Each year, the jacket is a different color. This year the color scheme is red, white and blue. (The year it was teal, I had the coincidental misfortune to order a little jacket from LL Bean in what turned out to be the exact same color as the Marathon jacket for the year. Once I started seeing the runners touring around in their jackets, I was a bit embarrassed to be sporting mine. I could see people side eying me, That woman's a marathoner???)

As for the Patriots Day Red Sox game - my favorite game of the year and, yes, I did have tickets - that won't be happening. I know that baseball is talking about some weird limited season in which all the teams play to empty stadiums in Florida and Arizona (where there are a lot of ballparks because those states are spring training locations). But I'll believe it when I see it. And it's hard to imagine anything more depressing than watching a ballgame when there are zero fans in the stands.

This Patriots Day won't be as awful as the sorrowful 2013 Patriots Day. But it will be right up there.

I'm afraid there won't be so many jolly holidays until the COVID-19 pandemic is quelled. Let's hope we get some relief soon. I really don't want to "celebrate" Thanksgiving and Christmas while sheltering in place with my butterfly mask on...

Musings/amusings

Well, yesterday I was taking my walk when, near Boston's Government Center, a man (large white dude, 50-ish) on a bicycle came barreling down the sidewalk at me. I started to move out of his way, then thought he was zigging to my zagging, and moved in the other direction. My course correction apparently threw him off, perhaps in much the same way as seeing a large man on a bicycle barreling down the sidewalk right at me threw me off a bit, and as he pedaled by, he yelled "fucking ho" at me.

"Fucking ho"?

Say what?

Say what the fuck?

And, no, I had not called him an a-hole. Not until he called me a "fucking ho." At which point, I did yell at him: "You're not supposed to be riding a bike on the sidewalk, you asshole."

Coronavirus madness.

Meanwhile, as my cousin MB informed me by text this morning, someone was found on Tuesday on my street, just up the Hill from where I live, at the corner of Beacon and Joy, in broad daylight, suffering from a gunshot wound.

To say that this is not the norm in this 'hood would be an understatement.

Anyway, it turned out the the man who'd been shot - a non-fatal injury, by the way - was fleeing the "quote unquote scene of the crime" (to quote Arlo Guthrie's Alice's Restaurant, which is something I've always wanted to do, and likely have in the past). The scene of the crime was the Soldiers and Sailors Monument which stands on a hillock in the middle of the Boston Common. And is pretty well known as a must-avoid drug dealing location. So while it's terrible that there was a shooting there, and I really don't like the idea of guns being fired in an area I walk through quite frequently, at least it wasn't some sort of innocent bystander thing - someone walking their dog or a little old lady heading over to the Roche Brothers to take advantage of geezer grocery shopping hours.

A bit of local excitement.

Mostly, things are, of course, pretty grim.

But it's not all awful.

The Shedd Aquarium in Chicago let its penguins waddle around checking out the exhibits. There are a number of videos floating around that show this. The one embedded here is pretty good. And the whole thing is pretty cool, other than the fact that it's kind of sad that the penguins only get to see their fellow sea creatures under such circumstances. On the other hand, penguin life - as anyone who's watched the documentary March of the Penguins well knows - is nasty, brutish, and short. Not to mention cold and dangerous. So maybe penguins are better off living in an aquarium. By the way, according to The Google, penguins are highly intelligent. Not intelligent enough to avoid a life that's nasty, brutish, short, cold and dangerous. But when compared to many other critters, plenty smart enough.

Anyway, I found the penguins being able to wander around the Shedd amusing and, oddly, somewhat uplifting.

Less uplifting, but certainly amusing, was the incident in NJ, where the police were called in to break up a gathering that was in violation of the state's no large gathering order. The bunch of 40- and 50-somethings were getting together to watch a Pink Floyd tribute band perform. Amusing, of course. But also a WTF moment. Who wants to risk their life to watch a Pink Floyd tribute band???
New Jersey has been pretty hard hit by the coronavirus, with more than 1,500 deaths to date. By point of comparison, Massachusetts has had 433. Yes, NJ has a larger population (8.9 million vs. 6.9 million), but that's still proportionally a lot more deaths per capita.

Guess there's just more folks, per capita wise, who don't mind dying if they get to hear a knock-off version of "Another Brick in the Wall." Shine on, you crazy New Jersey diamonds.

Me? I'm content to be in Massachusetts, even if there is a Masshole out there who called me a 'fucking ho.' Seriously. Maybe he was from New Jersey? I didn't have time to react to his accent.

That's all for now. Chalk it all up to pandemic fatigue.

Think I'll go bite the head off of a Peep...

Well, you can choose to alienate your customers, or...

The gym I go to - which is part of my phsycial therapist's setup - is pretty much a dump. The equipment is old - often second-hand goods from other gyms that are upgrading - and patched together with duct tape, baling wire and spit.  The toilet seats, in the ladies room at least, don't fit on the toilets. They're the wrong shape.

The gym did get new carpeting and a paint job last year, but the AC still doesn't work most of the time. 

A few years ago, a bunch of us chipped in to get a new TV to replace the rotten one that was there. You can't hear the TV over the radio, anyway. That radio is tuned to an old fogey radio station that doesn't play anything much after the early 1980's. Fine by me, except that it goes back to real oldies. Real old fogey oldies. And it's hard to build up an exercise head of steam when the beats are Eddie Fisher singing "Oh, My Papa" or Patti Page with "How Much Is that Doggy in the Window." The more current oldies are often the B-sides you've never heard, or a song you know, but covered by an off-brand act. At 9 a.m., they blare Kate Smith's "God Bless America." 

There are, of course, ample upsides. First off, the guy who owns and runs the place is a peach. He's smart, funny, kind, and one hell of a physical therapist. I love him. The employees are all great, too, as are most of the patients/gym denizens. Someone's always bringing in baked goods - sometimes store bought, sometimes homemade - and while this might be a crazy thing for a gym, it's actually not a crazy thing for this gym.

Whatever the coming holiday - and that includes Valentine's Day, St. Patrick's Day, the Fourth of July  - or when any Boston team is in the playoffs - the place is decorated with balloons. In the appropriate color scheme.

On Opening Day - alas, there wasn't one this year - you can get a hotdog, cooked on what I'm pretty sure is a non-OSHA approved indoor grill, and a beer all day. 

It won't be happening this year - and may never happen again, for reasons that I'll save for another time - but on Patriots Day, my place hosts a party. A lot of runners show up. And a lot of non-runners. A fun event. 

It's also headquarters for a charity focused on families experiencing homelessness or poverty. It almost goes without saying that I got sucked into volunteering for Christmas in the City. (Check it out: that's my copy you'll be reading.) Pretty much everyone who works out or gets PT there gets somehow involved in Christmas in the City, and by mid-December you can't even get to the rat-arse equipment because there are donated toys all over the place. Up to the ceiling donated toys. 

I love it, and had been going there 3 days a week for 12 years. I miss it. A lot.

Compared to my gym, Boston Sports Clubs are ultra-deluxe.

They're not the top of the line, fanciest of the fancy fitness places. They're nowhere near, say, an Equinox. But they ain't free, either. (And I think some of "our" rat-arse pieces of equipment are their castoffs.)

And now they're being sued by members because they're still collecting monthly fees, even though they shut down - and laid off all their employees in mid-March.

“They shut their facilities, shut down the phone lines, and made it impossible to quit,” said Lenny Kesten, of Brody, Hardoon, Perkins & Kesten, the lawyer for the plaintiffs. “It’s appalling behavior to take people’s money when you know you’re not providing them with a service.”

...“If they didn’t lay off their employees, I might have let it ride,” said Paul DelVecchio, one of the four named club members filing the suit. He said he and his wife, Lynne, were charged $140 for April membership at BSC’s South Station gym on Atlantic Avenue, even though it’s closed.

“It doesn’t seem right. They’re trying to work both ends,” DelVecchio said. (Source: Boston Globe)

Yes, you can quit your membership, but to do so members are supposed to show up in person or send a certified letter. Which doesn't work out so well if all the locations are closed. And if you're supposed to stay home, anyway.

Yes, they have put in place the ability to quit or suspend membership for the duration, but the instructions on how to do so haven't been all that clear or timely. And people who wanted to quit or suspend ended up getting charged for April. Insult to the injury of having missed out on a half-month's worth of service for March.

Like many (most?) businesses, Boston Sports Club was caught off guard by the sudden end of the world as we know it. Who wasn't? So the fact that they weren't immediately prepared with an action plan isn't surprising, or especially shameful. (Sure, people have no doubt been telling that they need to have a Disaster Recovery, Business Continuity, and other "what if" plans in place, but, like a lot of good ideas, the idea of having these plans often ends up towards the eternal bottom of the corporate to-do list.)

But Boston Sports Clubs have been really been terrible in their response to the crisis - and other gyms have stopped charging. 

Massachusetts AG Maura Healey is now on the case, and I wouldn't want her going after my company. (There's also Federal law suit that was filed in New York against the parent company.)

Live and learn, but companies really should know by now that in time of crisis, you really do need to communicate with your customers. It's almost as if these guys went out of their way to alienate theirs.

On the other hand, your in good hands with Allstate Insurance. Because folks sheltering in place aren't doing as much driving these days:

Allstate expects to give back more than $600 million, with personal auto customers receiving 1 percent of their monthly premium in April and May, according to a statement Monday. American Family Insurance said it plans to return about $200 million to its auto insurance customers through a one-time payment of $50 per covered vehicle. (Source: Boston Globe)

Fifty bucks may not seem like a lot of money, but fifty bucks is fifty bucks. Stay at homies can use it to do a bit of shopping on Amazon. 

The company is also offering free identity protection for the rest of the year and payment relief for struggling customers.

Good thinking on Allstate's part. Doing the right thing before being asked, let alone walloped with a potential class action lawsuit.

So which company is going to end up with happy and loyal customers?

Don't be a litter bug - especially wtih those buggy gloves and masks

A few years ago, it was nip bottles. Everywhere. This was first observed by my sister Kath and her friend Deb, who were coming across empty nips - mostly Fireball Whisky and Raspberry Stoli - on their walks in Wellfleet. Then I started noticing them around here. One litterer upped the ante: an empty pint of Captain Morgan's. On my front steps.

Then last year I began noticing dental flossers. Everywhere. I've never actually seen anyone using a flosser out in public - isn't this something folks do at home, in the privacy of their bathrooms - but there they were, on the ground, all over the places.

Dental flossers? Huh? I mean, nip bottles kinda-sorta made some sense. But dental flossers?

And now, in the past few weeks, it's disposable gloves and masks.

On every walk I take, I come across one and/or the other. I began taking pictures - here's one from Sunday afternoon, in the Boston Public Garden, where I also spotted a couple of rolled up hospital johnnies. I don't even want to go there.

At first a bit shocking, after a day or two, spotting blue or white jazz hand latex gloves, or a disposable or homemade mask, became a big nothing. It's everywhere. And I do mean everywhere. Why bother to record them. Plenty more where that came from apparently.

ABC News did a report on it, and it's becoming a worldwide phenomenon.  

Galway is my favorite place in Ireland. Their City Council recently posted shot of gloves strewn all over the city with this note:

If using plastic gloves when out in public or when shopping it is essential to dispose of them properly.

Please dispose of these gloves in the nearet bin or bring them home with you and dispose of them in the general waste bin. Littering is never acceptable.

Gaillimh Abu! 

I've also seen pictures of gloves all over the streets of Paris, another one of my favorite cities.

And, of course, gloves and masks are being tossed across the U.S. of A., from sea to shining sea.

This litter is your litter, this litter is my litter,

From the Redwood Forest to the New York island...

I understand the desire to get rid of these little beasts. I wore a pair to the grocery store the other day, and by the time I got home, there were pools of sweat in each of the finger tips. But I waited until I got home to peel them off and toss them in the trash.

Does wearing the gloves do any good? 

The CDC is okay on our using them, as long as we dispose of them properly, which doesn't include the option of tossing them on the ground the minute you feel the urge to purge.

But here's what WHO has to say:

The World Health Organization has said people are better off washing and sanitizing their hands than using plastic gloves because bacteria and germs that stick to gloves could be spread to another person.

So maybe I'll just reserve use for when I'm cutting up chicken in my very own kitchen, and forget wearing them on when I'm on the outside world. 

If others still want to wear them when they're out and about, fine. Just don't toss them on the sidewalk outside my house.

On the mask front, we're now being encouraged to wear them when out and about, and I'm in compliance. While I await deliverance - the assortment of masks I've ordered from Etsy - I'm getting by with artisanal, hand-crafted masks of my own. 

I have two, one is bandana-based, and then there's my more medically-appearing one, created using a cloth dinner napkin and rubber bands:

I'm guessing that the effectiveness of amateur-hour masks in terms of preventing the catching or spreading of COVID-19 will prove to be minimal at best. This entire effort is likely the equivalent of taking off our shoes before getting on a plane. Still, I predict that by the end of the week, people will be calling out anyone who dares venture out sans mask. 

Maybe once everyone gets there supply of $10 a piece cloth masks from Etsy they'll be less likely to toss them aside than they do the flimsy paper disposable ones.

I will observe here that every place I've seen discarded nip bottles, dental flossers, gloves and/or masks, there is a trash receptacle no more than 10 seconds walk away. Same goes for the streets of Galway. Bruscar (litter) cans are all over the place. What is it with people? Sheesh!

Randomly disposing of masks and gloves is especially foul. If I touch a nip bottle or a dental flosser, it's probably not going to kill me. No such guarantee when it's PPE we're talking about.

When the country first began paying attention to littering back in the late 1950's or so, the campaign slogan was "Don't be a litter bug." Time for an update: "Don't be a litter bug with your buggy litter."

I want Kelly Loeffler's investment advisor. Sheer genius!

If you haven't been following the news that closely and/or obsessively - and who can blame you: even a news junkie like me is rationing herself to 0-1 news shows per day, and reading a couple of articles online; I figure if it's something major, I'll see it on Twitter and can pursue from there - you may not have heard that a few senators made some suspiciously timed stock market transactions that might lead someone to believe that they traded on insider info on the pandemic.

Right after a late-January meeting in which senators were informed about the seriousness of coronavirus/COVID-19, Richard Burr (R-NC) unloaded some hotel shares (Wyndham) from his relatively modest portfolio. (Less than $2 million.) The pandemic is especially inhospitable to the hospitality industry, so this was definitely good timing on Burr's part. And it doesn't look all that coincidental.

On the other end of the portfolio spectrum, Kelly Loeffler (R-GA) is the wealthiest senator, with a fortune estimated to be about half a billion. 

Shortly after the private briefing from health officials, her advisors made some particularly shrewd purchases, buying shares in a company that provides telecommuting software and also making an investment in a company that makes personal protection equipment (PPE). Hmmmm. 

Loeffler may not have directed anything and anybody, but it's hard not to see that pillow talk (her husband is the chair of NYSE, among other things) may have wended its way into the ears of her investment advisor. Or maybe they're just really good at reading the tea leaves. They may, in fact, have figured out the "info" coming from the White House, and shamelessly supported by the R senators who actually were privy to the truth, was pure BS.

It's entirely imaginable that these advisors, on hearing about Wuhan, did a bit of calling around to experts. And, unlike the White House, they might actually have faith in expert advice. So they may have been just canny enough to decide that any company that enabled telecommuting, or that produced PPE, was going to be on the upside of the downfall of the economy. But the optics for Loeffler sure are terrible. 

Loeffler may not have much longer to serve in the senate, anyway. She was appointed to fill in the term of a senator in ill health, and her appointment wasn't all that popular with some of the more rabid far righties in Georgia. They wanted fire breather, grand Trumpist Doug Collins to get the nod. And Collins, who's opposing Loeffler for this senate seat, is using the financial fishiness as a key element of his attack line on Loeffler. (I say let them eat their own.)

Whatever comes out of this, and it may all get lost in the pandemic shuffle, there really is something unsavory about politicians trading on insider info - especially when, like Burr and Loeffler, they're out there in public downplaying things. 

Anyway, all I can think about is what must be going through Martha Stewart's head just about now? After all, Martha spent a few months in an orange jump suit for a pretty venial a sin compared to what's alleged Loeffler and Burr have done.

Meanwhile, if Loeffler's advisors figured out Citrix wa a good buy all on their lonesome, I want them for my finanical advisor. Sheer genius!

Shut-in

There was a term in use when I was growing up that doesn't seem to be much used these days, but I expect it will be coming back into fashion as we continue to shelter more or less in place. Shut-in.

I had friends growing whose ancient grandmothers lived with them, never leaving the house. In one instance, I don't believe the ancient grandmother ever left her bed.

The old lady next door became a shut-in after making an ill-advised attempt to walk down her steep front steps during an ice storm to get to Midnight Mass one Christmas Eve. After breaking her hip, Grandma L became a shut-in for the last few years of her life.

There was a rest home just up Main Street from us. It was for people who didn't need a nursing home, but who had no place to go. Most of them were shut-ins, although there was one man (named The Runner by my grandmother) who, whatever the weather, wearing suit pants and a white shirt, buttoned up to the neck, ran by every day on his way to wherever he was running, and ran back by a few hours later. This was in the 1950's. People didn't jog. Except for Roger Bannister breaking the 4-minute mile, people didn't run.

There was a mother-daughter duo who lived up Winchester Ave. from us. They seemed ancient to me - the mother in her 60's probably, the daughter in her 20's or 30's - who didn't seem to do much of anything, although once a week they walked out together to take the bus down city to go shopping. They were modified shut-ins. (I just found the daughter's obituary. She died in 2011 at the age of 80, so in the 1950's she would have been in her twenties It appears from the obit that the daughter had been married at one point - we always referred to them as The Flynns, although as it turned out, that was the daughter's married name. "There they go again. The Flynns," my grandmother would announce whenever they walked by. There's a vague mention in the obit that at one point she'd worked as a bank teller. And that one of her greatest joys was cooking holiday meals with her mother. She "went out of" O'Connor Brothers, the funeral home my family "went out of," too.)

There was a shut-in who lived on the top floor of a three-decker, across Main Street from my grandmother's three-flat on the corner of Winchester and Main. My grandmother called him The Blue Jay, and he sat on his front porch - in Worcestere three-decker terminology, his piazza - leaning, looking out, watching the world go by.

There was plenty of world to see.

This section of Main Street was quite commercial. There were two grocery stores - Morris Market and Kaplan's. Vic-the-Blind-Barber's barber shop. The Paree Beauty Salon. Sol's Maincrest Pharamacy. A drycleaner/tailor. An electric repair shop that also sold lightbulbs. On the corner of Winchester, kitty-corner from Nanny's, there was a used car lot. Across Main, a double-wide triple decker, set well back from the street, sold gravestones out of the front yard.

Lots going on as, other than purchasing a gravestone or a used car, people had call to stop in at all these shops pretty regularly.

We knew that The Blue Jay had nothing to do all day but hang on his porch, watching, because my grandmother was sitting in her kitchen window all day watching, too.

Although, oddly, we didn't use the word when we spoke of her, my grandmother was a shut-in.

Nanny had been a school teacher, retiring at the age of 70. I was just two when she retired so, although we lived in the same house, I don't remember her going out teaching. I remember her sitting in her kitchen.

She did move around a bit, hobbling into her parlor to bang away at the old upright: Mockingbird Hill, I Wandered Today to The Hill Maggie, The Blackhawk Waltz.

When it was nice out, she hobbled out to her piazza and sat.

She also got out to hang her washing up on the clothesline that swung out from her piazza.

But her trips to the outside world were few.

She went out for rides with our family, with my Aunt Margaret's family when they came up from West Newton, with my Uncle Charlie (with whom she lived).

When we moved out of Nanny's house to our own standalone house on the next street, she came to dinner every Friday.

She got out for holidays: Christmas Eve and Thanksgiving with us, Easter and Christmas Day at Margaret's.

Once in a blue moon, she got out to visit her sister Alice, the sibling she was closest to. Alice lived in a three decker next parish over. When I tagged along on one of these visits, Aunt Alice gave me a handkerchief with Pluto (the Walt Disney dog character) on it, which was quite nice, given she had eight kids and plenty of grandchildren of her own. But Alice died pretty young - late 70's, I think. So no more visits with Alice.

Nanny kept up with friends - mostly her fellow teachers - via phone, which must have been a challenge, given that we had party lines back then.

And she had visitors. My Aunt Margaret up (at least) weekly. My father daily, even after we moved. My sibs and I would stop in fairly often, as we cut through her yard to get home from school. She made us cups of sweet milky tea, fed us brown-edged wafers, and gave us Brach's toffees, peanut brittle, or left over ribbon candy, gone all sticky. Nanny's candies of choice were a bit odd, given that, after a time, she lost some of her teeth. (She lived to be 96, a few weeks short of 97.)

Her brother Arthur was a retired cop who worked as a driver for O'Connor Brothers. When there was a funeral down the hill at Our Lady of the Angels, Arthur would swing up and park the hearse or the family car in the driveway and come in for a quick cup of tea. I was impressed by his fancy clothing - funeral parlor men wore formal dress at the time - and the fact that sometimes he gave us nickels to buy popsicles.

Somewhere along the line, a nursing home was built in the field next to my grandmothers. Her brother Pat who, like Nanny, lived to great old age, ended up there, and Nanny would go out onto her piazza and wave to Pat.

Nanny did get out to go grocery shopping with Charlie, and I must have accompanied them at least once, as I have a pretty clear memory of Nanny leaning on the shopping cart.

Nanny was mostly a shut-in, however, thanks to her seriously arthritic knees. The Trainor Knees, named after her family. The Trainor Knees precluded her from going to Mass, but I'm pretty sure she wasn't all that interested in going to Mass, anyway. Priests would regularly visit shut-ins back in the day, and I don't recall a priest - other than a priest friend of my Aunt Margaret's family - ever paying a call on Nanny. When the parish priests went door-to-door to take the annual parish census, she refused to answer the door.

Who knows if there was anything that could have been done about those seriously arthritic knees. They ran in her family, just something you learned to live with. At any rate, she never went to a doctor. The one time I remember her being sick, down with the flu, I found her and Charlie huddled in the parlor, shrouded in blankets, sipping blackberry brandy. (Neither was much of a drinker.) She was well enough to complain to me about Rose Kennedy's jet black hair. Did she dye it with tea, Nanny wondered?

Once a year, my family went to Nantasket Beach for the day and Nanny came with us. We sat on my father's old Navy blanket, under an umbrella, on the sand. Nanny spent the day, in a silk dress, pearls (fake, I'm sure), earrings, her spring topcoat, her hat, and her sensible nun-like shoes, on the Pavillion, enjoying the seabreeze. At lunch time, one of us would pop up to hand her a sandwich.

I don't know exactly what Nanny did all day to occupy her time, other than watching out the window. I don't remember her sitting there reading anything, other than the newspapers, but she was quite brilliant, so I'm sure she read something. (When she left her house, at the age of 92, to live with Aunt Margaret after Charlie died, we found a book by William James, checked out of the library during the 1920's and never returned. So she did read.) She recited poetry and bits from Shakespeare she'd learned as a girl.

There was the piano, and the phone, and the small b&w television in the kitchen, which she always had one. During the Watergate hearings, when any of the pro-Nixon Republicans was speaking, she would lean over, and using a pole she had rigged up, turn the sound down.

She liked to watch Lawrence Welk, but mostly to make fun of the regular performers.

There was a cat-food ad that featured a cat doing the cha-cha, and Nanny always wondered how they got the cat to dance backwards.

When my cousin Barbara was married in 1966, Nanny was unable to go to the wedding. She wasn't able to get out for my father's wake or funeral in 1971, nor for my Uncle Ralph's (Margaret's husband) or my Uncle Charlie's a few years later. Who sat with her, I wonder? Probably one of her nieces. Surely she didn't sit there alone while her sons were being buried...

Nanny never seemed bored, or at a loss for something to say, some opinion she wanted to share, some story she wanted to tell.

Other than getting out for my walks - my knees are a little wonky, but I don't (yet) have the Trainor Knees - I'm pretty much a shut-in myself these days. As we all are.

So far, so good. Maybe the ability to cope well is in my genes... Or maybe I should wait and see how much I like it if it stretches on and on and on...

Trust me, I'm essential

Charles Street is the main shopping drag in my neighborhood, and a lot of it's still open for business. Essential business, that is.

The wonderful little neighborhood drugstore - Gary Drug - is still open. This is an old-timey gem, incredibly well-stocked for how tiny it is, and we're lucky to have it here. And unlike with the Cheers Bar - just up the street from me, and closed for the duration - at Gary Drug, everybody really does know your name.

The wonderful little neighborhood hardware cum general store - Charles Supply - is still open. This is a family-owned, family-run business that's now run by the son of the original proprietor, who's so local, he even lives over the store. Like Gary Drug, it is a fabulous neighborhood resource, and we're lucky to have both of these stores in our midst.

The not so wonderful little neighborhood grocery store - DeLuca's -  is still open - and I've used it in a pinch, as in when my regular still-open but further afield grocery, Roche Brothers, ran out of flour on the day I wanted to bake Irish soda bread, and I got to get some fancy organic flour there - for twice what I'd have paid for King Arthur.

The supremely wonderful (I'm sure of it, although the only thing I ever bought there was an orange) neighborhood butcher/grocer - Savenor's - is still open. It's a bit foodie, and pretty meaty, and I don't cook much meat that's not chicken, so I don't shop there. Julia Childs bought her meats at the Savenor's in Cambridge. 'Nuf said.

I just checked, and the packies are both open. And some of the restaurants are doing takeout. I didn't notice whether the dry cleaners are still operating. Nor the real estate agents. (Can't imagine there's much going on there these days.)

Our wonderful little Post Office branch is open. Neither snow nor rain nor COVID19 is going to stay these couriers. 

All of the above are on the Massachusetts essential list.

But the cobbler is closed, as are the fancy clothing stores (mostly aimed at size 2-wearing 20 somethings), the gift shops, the place that sells the $100 dishtowels and the $200 cotton nightgowns. The jewelers. The precious little kids' store. The place I've never been in, the one with the clawfoot tub in the the window, the one that looks like it sells only loofas and soap. The nut store. (Boo-hoo.) The antique stores are shuttered. The store that sold antinque doorknobs, andirons and weathervanes had already closed. The nail places are out of the picture. As is the picture framer.

Every state has its own list of what's essential and what's not. Some states - Florida and, I believe, Georgia - consider churches on the essential list. Anyone who knows anything about Massachusetts would understand that religion is not considered essential when it means gathering hundreds of people together under one roof in a sure-fire COVID19 transmission zone. In both Florida and Georgia, Catholic bishops have suspended services for the duration. They're asking folks to watch on the Internet. It's not clear how many other churches will follow suit. A few megachurches in the South have announced that they will continue to run services, apparently believing that God will protect them. But I'm pretty sure that the coronavirus bows neither to man nor to God. Sigh. I do, however, feel bad for those who had weddings and christenings planned, or who neeed to have a funeral.

Massachusetts has been shut-downish for a couple of weeks now, the decision to be revisited on May 4th. 

In the meantime, our governor, Charlie Baker, has been getting an earful from businesses that want to be declared essential. 

Baker did yield on some requests, widening the (original) list. Examples include: chiropractors, bicycle maintenance, landscapers, real estate agents. Also, gun distributors are allowed to be open, but not gun shops. Recreational marijuana? Still deemed nonessential. (Medicinal marijuana has been considered essential from the start.) (Source: Boston Globe)

Which reminds me that I passed the chiropractor on Charles Street, and they're open. But the yoga studio isn't. 

I guess I don't understand why a gun distributor could remain open, but not a gun shop. Not that I need either. In other parts of the country, the rootin' tootin' gun stores are considered essential. And I read the other day that since the pandemic started going pan, more than 2 million guns have been purchased in the US of A. NRA must be de-lighted.

And, for crying out loud, if ever there were a time to put recreational marijuana on the essential list, this would be it. Not that we have one in the 'hood. 

In a few instances, the governor became more restrictive. Most notable among those: hotels, motels and short-term rentals can now only be made available to medical workers and other people fighting the spread of COVID-19, or for people displaced by the pandemic. Hotels had a blanket exemption under the earlier ruling.

While hotels can stay open for COVID-19 related purposes, many had already closed due to lack of business.

Golf course owners and managers were among those that tried and failed to be deemed essential, though they did get some clarity on a related front — that landscapers can continue to maintain the courses during the shutdown.

The weather's been too awful for golf, anyway.  If and when it improves - it is spring, after all, albeit spring in New England - golfers will no doubt be going bonkers, and I'm sure plenty of them will be sneaking in on the back nine.

Small retailers who've been shuttered are looking for exemptions to allow them to do curbside pickups, which seems fair, although merchandise from small shops can be shipped out. It seems kind of dumb to fly a couple of books all over the country to transpo hubs when the purchaser lives two blocks away. But I don't make the rules. 

Although it's been a week now since I've been in a store, I'm happy that the essentials are doing their essential best to make sure we have Oreos, paper towels, Tylenol and postage stamps. 

Me? I'll be sheltering in place, out only for my walks and when I really need something. I'm home, and it's a happy place. And here, well, you can trust me, I find that I'm plenty essential.

Play ball...

I wasn't as looking as forward to baseball season as I normally would have been.

I love baseball, but the Olde Towne Team has been on my shitlist.

Last season, they were god-awful. I went to a handful of lackluster games that gave fans precious little to cheer about. Sure, I had been expecting a droop after their big, winner-take-all season in 2018, but 2019 was droopier than droop. It may not have been as bad as 2011 season, when they collapsed in September, blowing what seemed like an almost insurmountable lead in their division and failing to make the playoffs. That was the year of the fried chicken and beer scandal, when it turned out that during their month of epic collapse, players who weren't on the field were gorging on Popeye's chicken and beer while playing video games in the clubhouse. Yay team!

Although last season was pretty much a suck fest, I still bought tickets for a few 2020 games, including what is always my favorite game of the year, the Patriots Day morning game (11:05a.m. start time) played on Boston Marathon Day - with the exception of 2013, the best day of the year in this city.

And today, I would have been sitting there at 2:05 p.m., parked in front of my TV, watching the home opener vs. the White Sox.

Yes, I would have been watching, even though I'm mad the Red Sox let Mookie Betts go. Even though I'm mad they paid Chris Sale a fortune to not play. (He had Tommy John surgery the other day, so will miss whatever ends up remaining of this season.) Even though I'm mad about whatever they were doing with stolen signals - but I'm mad only if it turns out to be true. In that case, I will remain mad at former manager Alex Cora, the supposed ringleader of the cheating scandal, whom I like well enough, even though I think he helped blow the 2019 season big time.

I like baseball. I like the game. I understand and appreciate the game pretty well for someone who never played it. (But who grew up with a baseball player father - high school, semi-pro, Navy League during the War - and a ballplayer brother  - high level high school and Babe Ruth League - who both loved baseball, were extremely knowledgeable about the game, and were excellent athletes.) I actually like the slow pace, the boringness of baseball. I can appreciate a pitchers' duel, but I really love a slugfest, especially a one-sided one. (Our side, of course.)

I like the history of baseball, the lore. I like that, as a kid, I listened to the games on the radio with my father back in the day when most weekday games weren't televised. I like my memories of our annual pilgrimage to Fenway Park to sit in the bleachers to see the Sox play. I like that I got to see Ted Williams hit a home run in my first game, which was during Ted's final season. I like that I got to see Mantle and Maris hit back to back dingers during the year they battled it out for the home run crown, which Maris won with 61 HR's.

I've seen some truly awful games at Fenway, and some gems, but I have never not enjoyed being at Fenway Park. Aside - maybe -  from the game in which they blew a 10-run lead in the 9th, and that Yankees game that we left during a rain delay (a cold, windy, early May rain delay).

I've watched some truly awful games on TV, some games that were great and broke my heart, and some pure gems. Although I'm such a chicken, I refused to watch much of any of the comeback games against the Yankees in 2004 when, down in the ALCS 3-0, the Red Sox came battling back to become the AL champs and go on to win their first World Series in 86 years. I did see the tale-endings of those games against the Yankees, as my husband would come and drag me out of bed (where I was hiding under the covers) when it looked like something exciting might happen. Which in three battle-back games, it did. And I fully watched the seventh game in that series, knowing that, at that point, there was no way that the Red Sox were going to lose to those damn Yankees. No way, no how.

But today's game, and the foreseeable season, are called on account of coronavirus, so today at 2:05 p.m. I won't be sitting in front of my TV. As it turns out, heavy rain is predicted for this afternoon, so the game would probably have been called anyway. Still...

I'll be missing baseball.

During the season, I watch at least part of pretty much every game. I take in a few in person. I read the baseball news. I even watch post-season games when the Red Sox aren't in the play-offs. When baseball ends in late October (and sometimes even in early November), I miss it. I always look forward to the season starting up again, to the home opener.

When the world is in such a terrible place at the moment, it seems sort of wimpish to fret about baseball. But I'll be missing it, and, in honor of the season that isn't (and may never be), I'll be sheltering in place wearing a Red Sox fleece. And looking foward to hearing that eternal cry, the sound of summer, the sound of spring: "Play ball!"

Just April Fools

While I have what I'm pretty sure is an excellent sense of humor, I've never been especially fond of practical jokes. I'm sure that in grammar school I must have done some April Fools jokes of the "you've got mustard on your lip" variety. But practical joking is just not my thing.

Admittedly, on occasion something mildly amusing occurs on April Fools Day. There was a time when some wags (Harvard Lampoon-ies?) came up with a fake front page of the New York Times and slipped it over the real version of the newspaper that was sitting on the Cambridge doorstep of every Harvard professor. I can't remember the full story line, but I remember at the time thinking it was pretty funny.

Google does something every year - or so I've read - with wonky techie pranks - but I can't recall any of them. And they're not doing any joking around this year. (Prank called on account of COVID-19.)

Mostly, for me, April Fools Day is now and has always been a non-starter.  

In honor of the day, though, I thought I'd look up its origins on Wikipedia. But the origins are a messy mass of whatever. Did April Fools have something to do with The Canterbury Tales? Or a 16th century Dutch military victory over Spain? Or - wait! what? - does it come from Noah sending a dove out of the ark on April 1st to see if the waters were abating? (Did they even have months at the time of the flood?)

While something April Foolish seems to go on in most Western countries, the only place that seems to take April Fools really seriously is Odessa in the Ukraine.

Since 1973, they've celebrated it as a holiday called Humorina, with a festival, a parade, street fairs, and concerts. But, thanks to the coronavirus, Ukraine is pretty much shut down, so I'm guessing that Humorina is shut down, too. 

Nothing these days seems to be much of a laughing matter... 

Yet there are still some things out there that provide joy, things worth celebrating - even if it's not a dud of a non-only-in-Odessa holiday like April Fools. And here are a couple of them, shots I took on my walk yesterday.

I was getting sick of my usual Boston-side-Esplanade-up-and-down-Charles-Street-twirling-around-the-Public Garden strolls, so I cut over the Salt & Pepper Bridge and walked on the Cambridge/Memorial Drive side of the Charles. Not that this is a particularly riveting shot of part of the not particularly glorious Boston skyline is all that hot. But the sky was so blue. The water was so blue. (Shot was taken from the Mass Ave Bridge, at about the 86 Smoot mark.)

Back on the Boston end of things, I passed these trees in way-early but still most welcome blossom.

We are in a no-fun zone for sure, but as long as I can get outside for a while each day, some of the doom, some of the gloom, starts to lift.