Jim Styro's COVID-19 Update, 2020-05-12

Here's my philosophy:  If a post gets too long, it can be intimidating to the reader.  So I view it as a bonus that I forgot to report on some important stuff Sunday.  It just means I'm well-motivated to send out another update today with the stuff I missed -

• I completed ANOTHER personal music collection last month which is called “COVID and Collected.”  New collections in back-to-back months!  It's unprecedented.

 I completed write-up of the lyric notes last night and all the necessary files have been uploaded to Box.net. If you are an interested party, send me an email and I will provide a link so you can download it.

I started work on the collection before we settled on a topic for this Saturday's Virtual Music Night - but, regardless, one thing is certain.  I have a list of songs ready-made for the "Social Distancing" collection that will be a by-product of this weekend's event.  

• Only in Pandemic World (It's like "Jurassic World" - only a virus is trying to kill you instead of dinosaurs) would I find the motivation to finish two collections in two months.  Of course, having completed remastering of the remaining Music Night cassette tape collections on CD was also a major factor.
• Another area that has seen a significant uptick in attention is special Music Night and Spinner Invitational merchandise.  I mean what home would want to be without these awesome mugs?

Or this stylish mask?

 

Not to mention shirts, baseball caps, knit hats...the list goes on and on.  Even people who are practicing physical distancing are allowed to shop.

• Things I've watched:  Jerry Seinfeld's new Netflix special "23 Hours To Kill" is VERY funny.  My bride and I give it two thumbs way up.

If this message gets too long, no one's gonna read it.  So I'm stopping.

Right.

Now.

Take care.

Jim Styro's COVID-19 Update, 2020-03-29

Didja miss me?

We've completed Week 2 of The New Normal - and nothing seems close to returning to normalcy.

Staying at home (except for food acquisition)?  Check!  [Full disclosure: I stopped at Redbox to rent movies - but cleaned them thoroughly with a Clorox wipe.  No human contact involved.]

Physical distancing?  Check!

Wrapping myself in a body condom?  Uhhh, OK - I did NOT do that.  [Full disclosure:  I don't believe this was ever recommended by the CDC.]

But I did do other stuff, like -

• Bought even cheaper gas ($1.39) at Costco than the previous week ($1.65).  

• Tried to keep active with walking & exercise.  While my walking streak was halted at 10 straight days (3/14 - 3/23). I did complete my two-mile walking route on Wednesday and again today [I have provided the screenshot from MapMyWalk below as evidence].  I also spent 40+ minutes (and the equivalent of over 12 miles according to the digital display) on Friday morning using my recumbent exercise bike.  [Full disclosure:  I have no screenshot evidence from the exercise bike.  It is a low tech device - but a quiet way to pedal away some fat.  And it is easier on my lower back.]

• Participated in 6 video conferences/chats within 24 hours (6pm Friday to 6pm Saturday).  I met with church leaders on Friday night (Zoom); my sister, Sarah (FaceTime); Olivia from church (Zoom again, to discuss slides for on-line worship service); Music Night planning with Chuck and Pat (Google Hangouts); my dad (FaceTime again); and virtual happy hour with the Burks (Hangouts again). This was in addition to multiple church group video conferences earlier in the week and VBN (Virtual Bar Night) with the Spinners earlier in the week.

Oh - and I had all my usual conference calls during work hours too.

I thought this thing was supposed provide an opportunity for me to be bored and binge watching Netflix...

I have also engaged in some "cabin fever" on-line shopping - but the most expensive item was less than $16 (a CD/ BlurayAudio set from XTC in their guise as the psychedelic throwback rockers, The Dukes of the Stratosphear) - so it shouldn't leave me destitute.  [Full disclosure:  Other items were - CD/DVD slim cases, card stock for CD package use, and CDs from David Byrne, Miles Davis & the American Hustle soundtrack.]

I have made no purchases (yet) from biologyproducts.com.  Although their uncut Sheep Heart looks like a bargain at $3.30.  [Full disclosure:  It is (you guessed it) "not alive nor is it edible".  Which - while not a surprise - may be disappointing to some.]

I have been able to remain light-hearted through the pandemic so far.  I hope I'm not becoming light-headed.

Take care everyone.

Jim Styro's COVID-19 Update, 2020-03-22

Week One of the COVID-19 "New Normal" is in the books - and all in my household remain disease-free (to the best of our knowledge).  We are asymptomatic at least - but (for the most part) trying to behave as though we have been diagnosed with the virus in order to minimize any spread.

Below are some additional things I have thought and done during the past week -

• On Tuesday, I bought gas after shopping at Costco.  The price?  $1.65 a gallon.  Never thought I'd see gas prices like THAT again.  It makes me wish I had someplace to go...
• I wrote about Glenn W. Levey Middle school the other day - but I don't know who Glenn W. Levey is/was.  (Full disclosure:  I assume he's dead.  Don't they mostly name buildings after dead people?)  I did some Google checks for Glenn - but came up empty.  I did pay closer attention to the sign in front of the school during my walk on Friday - and confirmed my earlier suspicion that being an "Exemplary School" and a "Blue Ribbon School" are the same thing.

• Speaking of walking, yesterday was my eighth straight day of walking my 2-mile route.  I have started to see more people out strolling the past couple days.  Physical (not "social")  distancing protocols were observed in all cases.  
• I was advised yesterday - and subsequently confirmed through other sources - that "physical distancing" (rather than "social distancing") is now the preferred nomenclature.  The intention is to emphasize the need for maintaining physical distance to avoid the spread of COVID-19 - but acknowledge the need that social interaction (which can be done while maintaining physical distance) is very much needed during these stressful times.
• You cannot kill the COVID-19 virus with a hair dryer.  I had a conference call for work mid-week where a lady told us otherwise - and that she expected to see people buying up all the hair dryers to blow dry their way to health.  The misinformation that heat will kill COVID-19 has been going around for a while.  Thank goodness Snopes knows better.
• Donated double red cells at the Red Cross in Livonia yesterday.  My blood pressure was a little higher than normal (I wonder why?) although I haven't detected feeling emotionally stressed.  I do know that even after 78 donations (according to my profile at the Red Cross website), I still don't like needles or the sight of blood (Imagine that!  Since so many of us love both needles and blood.)  I don't know how many years their records cover - but I estimate having given regularly for about 40 years.
• Here's the thing - my blood type is O Negative.  Only about 7% of the population have that blood type.  While it is not the rarest blood type, it is much desired by the Red Cross - because patients of all blood types can receive O Negative blood.  In the lingo, I am a "Universal Donor" - which makes me extremely popular in the blood biz.  I have already scheduled my next donation for August 15 in the hope it will forestall many emails and phone calls from the Red Cross in the meantime.  But I don't hold out much hope this tactic will work.  I'll keep you posted.
• No new items to share from biologyproducts.com.  But you haven't heard the last of them.

Take care.

0 for 2011

Just when you thought it was safe to open your Google Reader, I'm back.

It seems so wrong to me to have a blog and not write anything in it.  And yet I was able to do just that (i.e. nothing) for nearly two years.

I have missed writing, though it's not clear to me that I miss it enough to set aside time to do it consistently.  That's a concern for another day.  For right now, let's talk about what's happened since I last posted...

Part One:  January 1, 2011   (I wrote the section below two New Year's Days ago.  And I hate to waste anything.)

Having a few days off work allows me the time to think about things that I think are actually important, rather than the things I convince myself are important so that some one will direct deposit my paycheck every two weeks.  I know I can't speak for everyone (though that idea is clearly an appealing one - to me anyway, if not to all of you) but it seems that human beings need to break up existence into manageable bites in order to cope, to help make sense of and give order to things.  Why else would we approach December 31st and January 1st so differently?  Surely there isn't anything intrinsically different about these two days.  It's just that we have decided that one day is the end of something, the other the beginning of something new.

We construct the year like a container in which to place experiences, to measure our progress through life, perhaps to motivate ourselves toward a goal, or just to keep things neat and tidy in our own minds.  Having done this, I can look back and compare last year to the year before it (2010 was a definite improvement over 2009 which, using the contemporary vernacular, "sucked").  I also reflect on the milestones passed during 2010, some things I had done for the first time (appearing in a play with a leading role, having my daughter move out of the house) and other noteworthy endeavors like winning our annual golf tournament for a second time (I plan to win once every 20 years), being The Boss for a couple of months while my supervisor was recovering from heart surgery, and finishing the editing of some Wing Chun Do instructional videos.

Part Two:  2011 in Review

I think we'll just go to bullet points here.  If I don't, no one will ever get to the end of this post.

• Our family celebrated my grandmother's 100th Birthday party at her home.  And three weeks later, she died.
• UnmitigatedMe and I had lots of fun vacationing with our close friends, Leslie and Larry.
• I hurt my back.
• Our Music Night Federation celebrated it's 20th Anniversary in June and our 100th collection of songs in October.  [Have I never posted about Music Night?  Oh yes I have!]
• And, most important of all, our daughter, Ms. Partly Cloudy, got married in November.  The two of us got a lot of positive feedback by doing our father/daughter dance to Ray Charles' Hallelujah I Love Her So.

Photographic evidence:

Part Three: The Present

2012 is shaping up to be another action-packed year.  I've already sold my car, created two T-shirt designs at Zazzle, saw all 9 Best Picture nominees, and will be embarking on vacation next week to see both the Gulf of Mexico (Captiva, FL) and "The Mouse" (Orlando, FL).

With any luck, I'll share some of that with you right here.  I'm gonna try to post once a week.  If I can't do that, I may as well close up this pop stand.  Hopefully, I can make it worth your while to stop by every now and again.  Leave a comment if you're still out there.

Take care.

Busy weekend

- Had a meeting at church after work on Friday.
- Martial arts training on Saturday morning. It was Testing Day (although I didn't test) and we had a fine lunch at the New Peking Chinese Restaurant with our Wing Chun Do (WCD) friends.
- Worked the rest of the afternoon on balancing past month checking account statements. I was a little behind - as you can clearly see here.
- Saturday night, the Middle-Aged Woman, Ellie B, Queenmaker and I went to the Magic Bag Theater and saw guitarist extraordinaire Laith Al-Saadi with his trio. We were joined by their son, Beloved, and his paramour later in the evening. The two opening bands were not impressive - but Laith was fantastic. I highly recommend that you rush out and buy his two CDs immediately. If you enjoy the sound of a well-played electric guitar and you like your music with some blues, rock & soul and mixed together and drenched in melody - I've got your ticket, right here!
- After a late night out, I was back at Ambrose Academy Sunday morning to observe and help out some highly-experienced WCD practitioners who were taking their final test to become Black Belt candidates. Congratulations to Beloved and Julie - they did great.
- But I strained my back during the proceedings.
- Sang a new solo during worship for the first time later that morning. It seemed to go OK. I probably won't feel comfortable until I've done it a few times.
- Helped my good friend, Paul Johnny, shoot a brief cooking video at his house. It was fun - and he fed my a great meal of lamb ragu afterward. And nectarine cake a la mode.

That's it. Just a routine weekend.

Take care.