July 20-July 31st, Week 19 and 20 Covid Mandatory Masks inside and out!

So we were back home and it was just as hot in Maryland as it was in Tennessee. Our plants and lawn were looking pretty sad. Thank goodness the weeds were doing well. We picked up Cookie on Saturday and the kids gave her a bath on Sunday.  I also got busy washing all our vacation clothes. We already unpacked the van Saturday and Sunday I was busy putting everything away(after my tv mass of course).  Then Scott and I got busy outside. He cut the grass and I was pulling weeds and trimming bushes(again!). We have a discount lawn care service for spraying weeds and fertilizing, but we have not been very happy with their service. Tom thought the lawn service would be able to keep up with maintenance better than he could since he spends most of his free time on his classwork. However, this company seems to do the bare minimum which keeps Tom and I running up to Home Depot for weed killer and sprays. The past several years I noticed a white fungus on my crepe myrtle leaves and it seemed to spread to several other bushes this summer, so I broke down and bought some spray that seems to really be helping. Maybe I will actually get some decent looking blooms this year. I've given up on my lilies and the tomatoes, squash and cucumbers. The deer seem to really enjoy our plant buffet. At least they don't touch the jalapenos! We are getting a very nice, diverse collection of peppers. I also decided to plant a few marigolds in my flower box to see if it might help keep the deer away(although over the years they have become less picky about what they eat). The worst thing I found was having to clean up deer poop in the back yard!  We certainly have quite a variety of wildlife. For the first time I spotted a big old raccoon crossing our neighbors backyard on Sunday morning! I wonder where he was headed. Looked like our shed! I hear they like hiding in the sewers in our neighborhood. I was also sad to find two dead bluebird babies in the nesting box when we got home. I noticed the parents were no longer around so I cleaned out the box. The babies seemed awfully big so not sure what got to them. Heat maybe? It seemed rather late in the year to be having babies still in the nest, and our temps in Maryland were in the upper 90s with no rain while we were gone. Fortunately I am sure the parents will return next year. And Tom continues the battle with the squirrels. He discovered the squirrel cage he bought at Home Depot was just too small. The squirrels could reach in and get a snack without actually going into the trap all the way. He got desperate and decided to add poisoned bait, which the squirrels dragged out and into the yard. Not so smart since Cookie also wanders around the backyard and eats just about anything she can find. So we waited for a big rain to hopefully wash away any remnants. You just can't win. The squirrels figured out how to get sunflower seeds from the non squirrel bird feeder and they empty it pretty quick. Faster than the birds.  One exciting discovery I had involved the milkweed I have been trying to grow. I was happy to see several of the plants were coming up nicely in my flower bed. The only weeds I really wanted to grow! But the big surprise was to see 4 monarch caterpillars munching away on the plants!  I was beginning to get a bit worried about the butterfly population this year. There seems to be a lot less butterflies this summer and I was wondering if the COVID got to them too!  Only now have I seen a few of my usual yellow swallowtails starting to visit my cone flowers and butterfly bush. So the monarch caterpillars are a real treat!

It's interesting to walk through the neighborhood  since there seems to be so much more activity. Since most everyone is home these days, there always seems to be a crowd out on the street-walking dogs, biking with kids, running or just walking and socializing. And everyone seems to go at the same time which makes sense-early in the morning or later in the day when it is not as hot. Or when people are not working. We spend a lot of time criss crossing across the street and sidewalks and dodging cars and bikes to keep our social distancing. There are a lot more home improvement projects going on and lawn work. More backyard gardens. Lots of new puppies. More family visits outside.  Maryland remains in Phase 2 Covid recovery. Our Governor just made masks mandatory for inside spaces, but also outside spaces where social distancing is impossible, like the beach. Ocean City was getting a bit crowded, and fights were breaking out on the boardwalk. They had to increase the number of police in the area which is unusual for that area. Maryland is looking at closing down indoor seating in restaurants and bars because of the widespread illness in warm states like Florida, Texas and California. We still have outdoor seating for restaurants and bars, but not every building has space for that set up. And sometimes the weather is not conducive to sitting outside-too hot or raining, stormy. Many small restaurants around Baltimore are closing permanently due to the pandemic and loss of business. They just can't keep up with the limited services. Most stores are still open however, but as I mentioned before, some businesses, including large retail stores are closing or going bankrupt. Definitely the Amazon, UPS and FedEx vehicles stay very busy in our neighborhood. Marylanders seem to be fairly comfortable with wearing masks, at least in our area. Many summer time activities have been cancelled though this July including all outdoor summer concerts, Baltimore's ArtScape Fair and Columbia's Festival of the Arts. Allison's Anime festival was cancelled as well as the upcoming Renaissance Fair. The County Fairs and State Fair have all been cancelled for August and September as well. Some programs have gone virtual/online, but I just can't get into that. Not the same experience. We would probably be coming home from work at this time and catching up with the Summer Olympics in Japan. Postponed to 2021, but they reported if they can't get it up and running safely by next summer, they will cancel altogether. What an economic catastrophe for Japan. 

We stopped in to our neighbor's house, Dan and Gloria, to catch up after returning from our trip. They were celebrating their wedding anniversary and decided to take a quick trip down to Williamsburg. Busch Gardens and Water Country USA have all been closed and do not appear to plan reopening at all this year. That may also include the very popular HallowScream Event and Christmas Town. Instead, Dan and Gloria walked around the near empty outlet stores and historic village of Williamsburg. They also ate out at the local restaurants which they also reported as being near empty. Not so great for the local economy. But they enjoyed a quick getaway. Dan has also been mostly working from home and Gloria is not taking on any more nursing jobs until the pandemic is over. Or maybe not even then! She would prefer to retire at this point. 

Allison enjoyed our trip to the mountains so much, she couldn't wait to get back  out with mother nature and her D and D friends. They had all planned a camping trip to West Virginia over the weekend. First she wanted to make sure she was COVID free since they were all sharing tent space. My COVID test at work came back negative the week we returned from our trip, but Allison wanted to make sure she was in the clear. She tried to schedule an appointment at our medical center, but they turned her down since she had no real symptoms or reason for testing that they could see. Instead she told them it was for work, and they scheduled her a drive through appointment after having a telehealth video chat with a nurse. She was very excited to learn her test came back negative and she had the all clear to spend the weekend with her friends that she hadn't seen in person since March at the start of our lockdown. So two vehicles showed up with all the camping gear and 7 friends and 1 very large, black labradoodle dog on Friday morning. I also decided it was time I met her friends, so I helped Allison pack her stuff in their SUV including my corn on the cob pot(which did not survive the cooking fire). Most of the kids are scout graduates, so they know how to camp. One actually is a manager of REI so he had a good time showing off his fancy camping equipment(why didn't he bring a cooking pot?) I must say though, they are a very nice bunch of "kids". They all hopped out of their cars to say hello, and I even brought Cookie out for a visit before they left. They had reservations at a campsite called Seneca Shadows in West Virginia, about a 3 hr drive. Fortunately they had beautiful weather and spent their time hiking the nearby Seneca mountain and splashing in the river, cooking all their meals over the campfire and gas grill and just relaxing. They even sampled some of Allison's butterscotch whiskey we bought in Tennessee(and loved it!). On Sunday they headed home with a stopover in Harper's Ferry for ice cream. They also had to help clear the camp road of a fallen tree(putting all those good scout skills to use).

And during the week, the group decided to take advantage of their COVID free screens and actually get together in person for D and D which they also  have not done since March. 

Allison continued to have  an eventful week after returning home from vacation with an apartment tour. She was interested in a few apartments near her work and was hoping for an available place this August. Unfortunately there were not any places available in the buildings we checked out back in April, so we decided to take a look online to see what else might be in the area. We were excited to find a very nice complex nearby that offered in person tours of their model. Tom, Allison and I ran over after everyone got off work during the week for a quick preview of the facility. The complex consists of apartments and condos with open parking spaces or rental garages. It has a beautiful Club house complete with exercise room, lounge, game room and movie room as well as a pool with grills, fire pit, fountain and eating area-looks like a resort hotel. Sadly, all the common areas are closed right now due to COVID. We're hoping we all can use the space next year. I am especially hoping to swim in the pool! We were excited to see they had some apt openings available in August which was the timing Allison was looking for since she wanted to move before Scott goes back to school. She thought he would enjoy spending some time at her new place and we thought we could use Scott to help move stuff! So when she got home from her camping trip she filled out the application and secured an apartment on the parking lot level! She really did not want a ground floor apartment for safety and noise concerns, but the upper levels did not have balconies in the 1 bedroom spaces. We thought it would be nice if she could enjoy some outside space, so now she has her own patio. Also, as an added safety feature, the front door is inside the building with a security entrance. So that made her feel a bit more secure. She has a large open kitchen with island, all appliances including fridge, microwave, dishwasher and gas oven/stove top, a large bedroom with walk in closet, linen closet, front coat closet, laundry closet with washer/dryer and large bathroom. Wood and carpeted floors. We are very happy that we won't have to carry all her furniture up the stairs or squeeze it into the elevator! Especially since we have to move some big furniture including her bedroom set and bed, a table with chairs, desk and book shelves, coffee table, end table, lamps and our leather couch, love seat and a few recliner chairs!(maybe she should have taken the bigger apartment!). This is actually in her budget and she really did not want a roommate. Too much drama. She plans on moving in on August 20th and has already signed up for cable and internet and renters insurance. I also mentioned to the facility manager during our tour that Allison works at nearby Northrop and that is why we were interested in the place and she said Northrop employees get  $100 off of their move in costs! It pays to be chatty! She can also pay extra at any time for a dog or cat. I may have to let Cookie spend a night or two since Allison has been so good about taking her out for walks everyday!

There has also been a lot of discussion about going back to school. Here in Maryland they have decided to start the fall session at the end of August online with all sports canceled. They are looking to have fall sports in the spring(not sure how that works if you need to share fields and gyms, but that's the plan.). The private schools are being allowed to go back in person, including the catholic schools. Some of our neighbors were considering transferring their kids to the catholic schools, especially high school. No one is very crazy about having all online. They feel they are not getting enough instruction. Some neighbors are talking about signing up for homeschooling and others getting creative and joining forces with a small group of kids in the same grade for study groups and learning sessions. Our neighbor asked me if I knew of any tutoring services.  Personally I am so happy Scott and Allison are done with elementary and high school. So much stress for parents and teachers. However, we still have college to contend with and Scott has most of his classes online as he received his Fall schedule.  However, he has several in person labs which are pretty important for engineering and necessary to take with the classes. So we plan on having him return to school at the end of August. WMU families have also been chatting online about plans for returning to school. Since some students only have online classes, parents have decided to keep their kids home to save money and to decrease the risk of infection. Or skip taking classes at the large universities and signing up for undergrad requirements at their local community colleges. Other parents have kids living in apartments and don't feel it is much different than staying home. We all feel comfortable having Scott in his own dorm room. Scott pretty much holes up in his own room in front of the computer here at home anyway. And he has his own car at school, so he can drive himself to the off campus Engineering building for his labs. No public transportation required. He has a plastics and a machine processing class this coming semester that include hands on lab work.  Dining Halls are mostly Grab and Go, but they plan on having some distanced seating available. Classes are scheduled straight through from Sept 2 to Nov 20th when students will return home for Thanksgiving holiday and complete the semester and take finals online through distance learning. The school does not want students leaving and returning with risk for picking up the virus. Recently parents have voiced concerns over the risk of students having off campus parties that could increase the risk of spreading the virus and cannot be controlled by campus police. The school is also recommending students be tested for COVID upon arrival on campus, but there is still the chance that they may pick it up at school afterwards. Mostly they are relying on students reporting any symptoms. And this is not just at Western, but all the large universities in Michigan and here in Maryland. I've seen reports that California plans on having all remote learning at their Universities. For now, we plan on taking Scott back to school at the end of August and I have been picking up hand sanitizer, masks, gloves and cleaning supplies for him to pack in his Back to School stuff.