…..airfares are coming down……probably get a great deal on a cruise….

Friends of ours are Las Vegas habitues.  “You guys going?”  “Dave!  Have you seen the strip?  Las Vegas is a ghost town!”  

Other snow-birding and vacationing friends have also written along similar lines….“We came home early (or didn’t go).  Glad to get back in the country.  It’s not a good feeling out there.”

But ruined vacations are not really the big news for them or anyone – lives ‘on hold’ is the new normal.  Their only news is ‘we are getting in the garden’ or ‘I am gonna power-wash the deck’…..most folks do not have much news at all. Self isolation kind of does that to ya….

So, we’ve been taking inventory just to add some excitement to our lives. We are literally bean counters. Sal’s ‘food’ list will likely reach in excess of 225 separate items that are stored, like pasta, beans, boxes and cans-of-stuff but not any frozen or fresh stuff. If you add up everything we likely have 300 different edible items. Add cleaners and off-the-shelf hygiene and medicinal stuff and the list could easily reach 400 or more separate items.

Those are the products and do NOT include how much of the product we have. Volumes vary. Olive oil is one product but we have lots of it. Same for flour, rice and the like. But some products are in low supply like wasabi powder and won ton wraps. I only have enough wasabi for six months and we are bereft of won ton wraps…..but no one is panicking over won ton quite yet.

I have 3 full packages of papadums. A bit low on nori. We’ll survive.

I have also ‘wondered’ about projects. I am unlikely to go in to town for any materials so I am looking through junk piles to see what I have and I have enough crap to make a lot more crap. I will basically take off-cuts and make more smaller off-cuts. and saw dust. I am hoping to make a solar oven. Maybe get a birdhouse from it all, too…..probably not….

The big panic is over quilting material. Sal claims a paucity of material despite reams of the stuff everywhere. Fact: quilting and hoarding are on the same behavioural spectrum. Her hobby does not bode well for the future. And she kinda likes cats…..when I die….and if she starts getting cats……OMG!

If that giant quilted hairball-syndrome should happen and I am not dead, I will be sure to have the option of assisted termination written into a living will. Quilting and cats is almost enough to send me screaming from this mortal coil by themselves. But, if we are still lacking won tons, just end it all painlessly for me, please.

Just went fishin’….buddy caught a nice Ling for us. We put down prawn and crab traps. Nice day.