Use Your Words - Coping with Lockdown

Today’s post is a writing challenge. This is how it works: participating bloggers picked 4 – 6 words or short phrases for someone else to craft into a post. All words must be used at least once, and all the posts will be unique as each writer has received their own set of words. That’s the challenge, here’s a fun twist; no one who’s participating knows who got their words and in what direction the writer will take them. Until now.

My words are:

collection ~ ideal ~ lantern ~ minimal ~ paranoia 

They were submitted by: Wandering Web Designer - Thank you, Rena!

While in last week's secret subject post "Long Day"I felt like going home and crawling into my bed (and hibernating till this is all over and we can go back to normal), today's post is about the things we can still do and that we are grateful for. 

For starters  all my friends and family are healthy!

I'm usually running around all day to try and get everything done at home and at the office before leaving for hockey practice, and I sort of thrive on the fact that on most days things run smoothly. 

These days the challenge is a different one. How do we get through the day without leaving the house, or with minimal trips to the store. I have to admit, the more I consume the news, the more I tend to get into some sort of paranoia mode.

People who sneezed, may have touched the item I'm about to buy. This lady who just brushed past me looks scruffy, I hope she's not sick. What part of keeping your distance does she not get, anyway?

To make up for it I try to stock up on vitamins. Here are five a day (even though you can hardly see the ice berg lettuce and the avocado.)





I pray that our appliances won't break down. While I have considerably less laundry (no practice, plus hubby doesn't need dressy shirts, cause no meetings) I don't want to find out how long we might do without washing our clothes at all. There are only so many PJs we own! Doing dishes by hand is not on my list of fun things to do either. 

Hubby and I still go to work. Our office is a ten minutes' walk from home. Two or three coworkers who need to physically be there, join us. The others work from home. Our corporate clients who sent their employees home, are running us down with the same requests over and over: they need hardware and home office access for them.

Well, our distributors' warehouses are wiped empty. Laptops, webcams and screens can't be ordered, because guess what, they are produced in China, and they've had other worries these past weeks. It'll probably be months till the tiny Swiss market will get their orders.

Anyway, for the time being, we are still busy, which is a good thing because the thought of being confined in our house 24 / 7 is not ideal, even though we are lucky to have enough rooms for everybody to get some space to themselves. 

Colin finds a way to busy himself during my work days. He occupies the meeting room and is quite happy about almost unlimited screen time. Occasionally he gets some school work done, too. Starting this week he's on official spring break. 

I don't worry about school. He's in sixth grade, he's supposed to start high school in August, and he's a smart guy, he'll be fine. The latest is now that our state asked schools to get ready for distance learning. This will be interesting.

Need is the mother of invention! 

Grocery stores are out of yeast? Many people got into sourdough making and other baked goods. Needleworkers are sewing their own face masks. Others have gardening projects or started a 5,000 pieces puzzle. Courageous individuals are even cutting their own hair! Forgotten musical instruments have a revival. So do roller skates and running shoes. 

A friend of mine and his neighbour play table tennis on their rooftop terrace. Unfortunately every now and then a ball jumps over the fence and lands anywhere. They ran out of balls at some point. It was inevitable, right? They reordered online, but we all know these packages have a delay because postal workers are overwhelmed. A friend's son sent then a gift box containing a chocolate bunny, a nice card and their only ping pong ball. While it was being cherished, it still ended up being run over by a tram. The entire FB community was bummed! 

I am amazed by the collection of fun memes and videos I have accumulated within three weeks already. I have also become a member of a handful new FB groups. Homeschooling, cooking, helping each other out, it's really nice. People are mostly upbeat and try to make the best of it. 

Here's a cute template for younger children to document their Corona experience for a Time Capsule.

Of course there are the occasional complainers: why are the clothes and toy sections of the supermarket sealed off, don't they want to sell their stuff? One person was super annoyed because she couldn't purchase a light bulb at the market. It's right there, she claimed. Just beyond the tape. Well, we're on daylight saving time, it's only dark between 8:07pm and 6:52am. Use a candle in a lantern for the one room you need light in!

It's all very well for me to say that now. Just wait two more days when I run out of coffee. It's a long story, and I won't share it. I have decided while it's a personal nightmare, it's not the end of the world. Just be aware. Something is brewing, and it's not my coffee!!

Apart from a few items like eggs,  flour, corn meal, yeast, toilet pater and other tissues we get pretty much everything we need.

What I find most amazing: Nature has no idea what ordeal we are going though. It is recovering: the air and the animals appreciate the break from air and vehicle traffic. Pictures found on social media, sources unknown: 

Ducks on a usually congested street at the Opera district, a deer in Nara, Japan, the Canadian / U.S. Border where the wait can easily be two hours, swan on a canal in Venice, Italy - thanks to less boat traffic, sediments stay on the ground and Downtown Los Angeles freeway... enough said!

Wrapping up, I'd like to give a huge shout-out to health care providers, along with grocery producers, sales people and postal workers who are putting themselves at risk while doing such an incredible job day after day! Thank you and keep it up!

This post has been inspired by our mutual blogger friend Carol's post:

So here's to hoping that all of the above may stay that way! #knockonwood

What's going on at your neck of the woods, how are you coping? 

Let me know below, and please don't leave before checking out my blogger friends' posts:   

                                                                                                                                                                                                   

Baking In A Tornado
Spatulas on Parade

Wandering Web Designer

On the Border 

Part-time Working Hockey Mom

Sparkly Poetic Weirdo

Follow me Home

Climaxed

Also, please check out today's A - Z post about all things Swiss. 
I is for International Organizations based around here. The post includes sightseeing in Geneva and even some delicious macarons.

Palace of the Nations at Ariana Park