Plan B

When we bought our house the immediate plan was to get it paid off in 10 years. That way when Hubby retires we’ll have plenty of money banked thanks to years of living without a mortgage payment. Then we’ll sell the house and use that cash to buy a smaller place outright that’s located somewhere nice where we’ll live out our days with minimal expenses. But it’s been 5 years now and we aren’t even close to halfway paying this thing off yet. We aren’t even a quarter of the way there. And, considering how much money we have to put towards upkeep and updates every year, we might be lucky to retire before 2097 when everyone is a sentient head living inside a jar and the president is a ficus tree. Which, to be honest, sounds like a solid improvement over the present state of things…

Shelter in (some other) Place

Because quarantining at home is boring, I might as well do it on the beach.

By the time March rolled around this year it was already looking like going on the Caribbean cruise we originally planned for our May wedding anniversary was not only a spectacularly stupid idea, but a month later it was literally impossible. At least not without a "heist movie" level of planning, scuba gear, and probably grappling hooks. And frankly that sounded like too much work to get onto a cruise ship, so we accepted the fact it wasn't gonna happen.

Things I Know About the Apocalypse

I always assumed that we’d be using bottle caps as money, so I could not have guessed that the new currency would actually be toilet paper. I’m now using actual dollar bills to wipe with because we’re down to just 15 rolls of TP and that’s basically my daughter’s college fund. Which will be entirely online, of course, because in a few years we’ll all have our eyeballs replaced with small computer monitors that face into our skull towards the optic nerve. That just seems like the natural course.

Anyway, I don’t understand why toilet paper is such a rare commodity in my area. There are other things equally as hard to come by, like bleach, Lysol products, and cleaning supplies in general. I have to assume that everyone in this town never cleaned their houses before March 15, 2020. At around the same time there was a sudden lack of certain medical supplies. This is especially worrisome when you actually NEED those things for, you know, medical reasons and not just to wipe down your groceries when you bring them home.

Fun things to do while in quarantine!

Idea 1.) Take up a hobby that you’ve always wanted to explore!

For me that’s always been carving moon rocks into whimsical animal shapes. But if you think it’s difficult acquiring genuine moon rocks under normal circumstances, try it during an international pandemic.

Idea 2.) Spend four hours waiting in your car outside of the local emergency room!

Looking out from my Box of Solitude

As an introvert, I’ve been preparing for this my entire life.

I mean, this whole “shelter in place” thing is sort of my job. I wake up every morning, make tea, open my office blinds, and sit at my computer. When I get hungry, I eat. When my bladder gets full, I eat. When I’m tired, I eat. Sometimes I even wash my hands.

I can’t seem to wrap my head around the fact that so many people are having a hard time with this right now. It’s, like, not that hard. Amazon delivers almost everything I need, technology allows me to communicate with other humans, and my superior resourcefulness takes care of the rest. For instance; did you know that when the toilet paper roll runs out, you still have a marginally usable material that most people just throw away? Unrolling that cardboard tube not only gives you something to do for 30 seconds, but it’s also a TP alternative that lets you know when you’ve been wiped.

I've Aged Like Fine Saliva

It came on me fast, man. Outta nowhere. Like, one minute I’m spending quarters in the arcade at the mall, and the next minute I’m spending dollars on Metamucil at the pharmacy. I seem to spend a lot of time in the pharmacy lately. Because apparently I’m “at the age” when one does that.

That phrase gets tossed at me more often as the years go by. People are like, “You’re at the age when you should probably stop dying your hair outrageous colors like some teenager.” Or, “You’re at the age when bifocals are no longer a stigma. Really.” And, “You’re at the age when you should look at your lifetime of bad choices and at least try to do something good before your eminent demise, you witch.” But the worst one is, “You’re at the age when you should probably stop drinking whiskey with breakfast.”

Hot & Sour Soup and Bad Blogging

So apparently I'm really bad at this blogging thing.  I guess I didn't realize it meant posting something on a more regular basis than once every 8 months.  Haha... ha.

Well, I didn't intend to make a recipe post as a "come back" but it seemed the quickest and easiest thing to do right now.  And it's one of my favorite recipes!

Hot & Sour Soup.  (with crappy cell phone photos)

 This is my original recipe that I adapted from various recipes for hot and sour soup that I've used over the years.  I tend to cook a lot of Asian inspired food because it gets most of its flavor from spices and herbs, rather than from fat or meat.  And you rarely see cheese on a Chinese menu, so that makes converting these recipes to vegan a lot easier!