I wanted to update my readers on what’s been happening since my last post.

We’ve been taking this pandemic seriously for some time in our house. I had been forcing my family to wash their hands when they returned from school or shopping or outside of our home for a number of weeks. Our church had eliminated handshaking for the sign of peace, and receiving communion from the chalice. I told my daughter that she couldn’t go to her friend’s birthday party, which I truly hated doing. (The mom ended up postponing.)

For our food and paper supplies, we almost always buy in bulk so we were ahead of the curve on others’ panic buying. Today when I went out, there was no toilet paper, no tissues, no hand sanitizer, no bread, no water, almost no soup, and almost no pasta at our Target. I’ll keep my list for the next time we’re out. Last week, we did our regular monthly shopping, and since we were already out, we ate at Chili‘s. I mention Chili‘s because they were doing a great job with the COVID-19 guidelines at that time. (They have since closed and are providing take-out only as required by our state.) They sat people away from each other. They asked people at one table to share menus. They were constantly cleaning empty tables. We left a 25% tip, which is higher than usual. At my haircut, I had my hair cut much shorter than usual and again, tipped well above my regular amount. The hair place has since closed, and I don’t know if the stylists will be getting paid.

We do need to remember our local small businesses at this time. Some of them will not recover, and if we are able, we should be doing everything we can to support them while also acting responsibly during this pandemic. Our comic store (yes, we have a comic store) is providing curbside and mail order delivery as well as limiting the amount of customers in the store at one time. They were wearing gloves, which protects them.

Our kids are home from school and will be at least until April 1st, and I need to shout them out. They’ve been checking their emails every morning and doing their schoolwork before video games or movies. We haven’t limited their screen time because they’ve been acting responsibly and not fighting. Win-win. Now to get them to do dishes and cook dinner without asking. Ah, but I ask too much in this time of Corona.

My husband was already working from home, and so far, that’s been continuing to go along well.

My church is closed for mass and other activities. All of my retreats have been canceled. My Cursillo workshop was canceled. My monthly writing group was canceled as well as Red Hats. I do know how necessary these decisions were and how difficult they were to make for the organizations and people involved, but these were mental health lines for me (and I’m sure many others), and I will need to work through that, and come up with alternatives for myself. I’m sure I will share them with you.

Posting will continue. I have an upcoming Supernatural post. Supernatural returned to television on Monday, and will continue on Mondays until the series end, currently scheduled for May 18th. This may change with the pandemic situation as filming on many, if not all television series and movies has been ceased.

I have continuing Lenten and spiritual posts that will be published.

I will also use the increased inside time to work on my books. At least that’s what I’m telling myself.

For upcoming coronavirus posts, there will be some changes. There will be several posts in a row so I can organize the COVID-19 posts by topic and then create an information hub that will be found on my home page. That information hub will be updated with a date as individual posts are updated. Posts are expected to include where to get accurate information, news articles and media interviews, social distancing, things to do in quarantine, educational websites and activities for your children (and for adults), a religious post, mental health resources, voting, how you can help, and whatever else comes up in the next few weeks.

These new posts may seem familiar with some items having already been published previously.

I welcome your own suggestions for additions to my COVID-19 posts. Those can be made through comments below or through email.

As with all things, we can get through this. This is scary and unknown, but I have faith in us. We’re stronger together, and we are together in this.