I decided to do one more prompt: Draw an object and give it a face. This is all I could come up with.
Just this morning I had my first emotional hiccup during all this. Having seen a sign yesterday that the UPS Store was open, I took a pre-paid package to drop off this morning. I waited for the people inside to come out, and then entered. There was a floor-to-ceiling sheet of thick opaque plastic separating the counter and masked agent from the public, with a little rectangular hole for us to see each other through. Irritably, he asked, Can I help you? I told him I wanted to leave the box. Ma’am, he replied snippily. We’re having a shelter in place. I can’t take your package. Very rudely. And for some reason, it was like a slap in the face. I felt attacked and stupid and shamed. The thing is, I’d known that the USPS is open, and had figured that UPS is also an essential business, per their “open” sign. Such a minor little thing to be bothered by. Guess it was just the straw that broke the camel’s back, or perhaps Mr. Creosote’s last wafer-thin mint.
E-mails (and blog comments) are sustaining me. I’ve been corresponding with a few people I’m rarely in touch with, so that’s good. Thanks to those who write (and call) me!
Elana and I took a short walk today. I learned, by eavesdropping on the cellphone conversation of a woman we passed on the sidewalk, that it’s supposed to rain all weekend, so it’s good we got out. We passed an interesting tree.
Oh, man, according to that website I told you about a few days ago, the Covid-19 infection count in the U.S. has jumped by over 15,000 people today alone to top 100,000, and the day is still young. California’s numbers are relatively low compared to New York’s. The New York Times says this is why:
The pace of testing in California had remained stubbornly low for weeks, but it appears to be on the rise. Still, the state, with twice the population of New York, has conducted far fewer tests for the virus. Limited testing in California may mean that the state may never get a clear handle on how many are infected.
My wonderful friend Vicki, who’s a hairdresser, just e-mailed me with information about what color dye I need in order to wash away my own grey. I thanked her but allowed as how dye in my hands could be disastrous. She disagreed, saying that as long as I know how to paint between the lines, I can handle it. I had to convince her of the danger of such a proposition and my incapacity in that realm, so I sent her this image from my mother’s scrapbooks (Mom just had all 60 of them digitized!). I colored it in Sunday school when I was three, and am not much improved today.
obviously, don’t touch your hair. lol.
i received an order for a pair of boots from a while ago from costco. ups delivered them. they didn’t fit and costco said to put them out front and ups would pick up and they did. could you do residential pickup?
Hi, Marianna!
> could you do residential pickup?
That hadn’t occurred to me. Good idea. I ended up calling the company (LL Bean) to which I was returning my defective slippers and they gave me a USPS label to paste over the UPS one, so the US Mail came to the rescue.
Thanks for writing!
What a lovely hand-face.
That’s really weird about UPS. Shipping companies *are* allowed to remain open during shelter-in-place – them’s the rules – and indeed, I just dropped off a return at FedEx two days ago. So the UPS guy was wrong.
Your coloring-between-the-lines is LAHVLY. Very innovative and artistic.
Well, if you try dyeing your hair and mess it up real bad, nobody will have to know, as you’ll still be sheltering-in-place a while longer. So it’s a great time to try such things. Perhaps you could dye your hair blue!