Surprise!

Surprise! Yes, I am back finally--at least with one post. I hope everyone is doing well. I have settled into my new routine of working from home and have been doing it now since March 19, so five months. We were given new telephones that work with the internet and a couple of months ago we were issued laptops, so I am now able to use my writing tablet, which makes reviewing papers so much easier. Things seemed to settle down a bit at the beginning of summer, and we had quite a few summer vacationers down here, but now things are pretty quiet again with kids back in school. Schools opened back up a couple of weeks ago, but my understanding is that only about a half of kids returned. A lot of parents elected to keep their kids home and let them do online school. I personally think the whole thing was overblown, but I guess time will tell the truth. I never was particularly worried about it. I know that there were many sicknesses and deaths, but that is not uncommon with any virus. The media rarely reports on flu deaths because we all know that older people are more susceptible to catching pneumonia when they get the flu. But since this was a novel virus, the media decided to make a huge deal. In the end, the number of deaths was well below the projections, but the powers-that-be have managed to fundamentally change America. Many people I have an opportunity to talk to tell me that they prefer not to go out. They have grown accustomed to being at home, and it is now their comfort zone. I imagine that as things get back to 'normal,' people will readjust, but it has been a bizarre time to be alive.

In November of last year, Ben started streaming a Pokemon game, and I thought it looked fun, so April bought it for me for Christmas. She gave it to me on Thanksgiving, and I delved into the world of pocket monsters. I really didn't think I would enjoy it, but surprisingly, I did. It got me through the months of December, January, and February, and helped me get my mind off of how much I missed my job. By the time I returned to work on February 19^th, I had accomplished most of what I wanted to, and one unintended consequence of starting Pokemon was the fact that I no longer had time for Facebook. After a few weeks of logging on very rarely, I stopped visiting the site at all, and this past week, I decided to deactivate my account. I heard from my family how toxic the environment was with everyone disagreeing on COVID and politics, and I was blissfully unaware of all the hatred and vitriol. However, Dan still visited frequently and talked about things a lot. I wished he'd leave too, but he had nothing constructive to do to get him away. On March 20^th, the new Animal Crossing game was released. Back in 2007 or 2008, April bought me the Animal Crossing game for the Wii, and I played that game for about eight years, so I was eager to play the new game. I bought a Switch a year and a half before the game even came out in anticipation. Dan always enjoyed watching me play and he mentioned that he wouldn't mind picking it up. However, Switches were nearly impossible to find with the pandemic, but one day I checked Amazon and they were in stock, so I bought one and copy of AC for Dan for Father's Day. I figured that he would start the game, get tired of it after a few weeks, and leave me to maintain things. I am happy to report that two months later, he still plays everyday and stil enjoys it very much. AND, it has gotten him away from FB for the most part.

Everyone here is doing well. April seems to enjoy her job, and she started streaming a few weeks ago. She made it to affiliate within seven streams, so she is now making money from people who subscribe to her channel. Ben has been streaming for over a year, and the money he makes is giving him enough to live on until he finds a job. Of course he is living with us (he decided not to move to Nebraska), so he does not have a lot of expenses. He applied for a job where Dan, April, and I work, and he has an interview on Tuesday morning. I pray that he gets this job, becaue he applied there a few times and was passed over. He is an excellent worker, so I know he will do a fantastic job if they will give him a chance. Matt is doing the same job he has done for several years and he still hates it as much as ever, but he is unwilling to make a change, so he lives with it. Dan and I have tried several times over the past couple of years to get back to eating healthy, but were always unsuccessful until about a month ago. We are now back to eating WFPB and walking almost every night. I did not let myself get overweight, but I did gain a few pounds, so I am in the process of dropping them so I can get back into my skinny jeans before I am required to return to the office. We are supposed to be updated by October 1^st. We were supposed to return on August 31^st, but they postponed it to see how things would go with kids going back to school. My guess is that as long as things stay relatively controlled, we will be going back in early October. I wouldn't mind working from home, and I am equipped to do so, but it is doubtful that I will be permitted to. I am still working away on my dissertation and will be defending it by the end of this term. After that I will run my research, write up my results, and then hopefully be finished. I am still shooting for the end of the year, but we shall see.

Well, I think this is a decent stopping point. I will make some blog visits a bit later. Hugs!