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Welcome to the April 2020 edition of
Micki's Latest Gossip

Spring has arrived!


Despite the pandemic and all that has changed in an effort to quell it, the flowers and trees are blooming. Stay-at-home orders have given us more time than normal to notice, view, and appreciate the incredible beauty of spring. Here are some photos I snapped with my phone during some of our now-daily neighborhood walks.

Work In Progress
You'd think that with all this time we have at home I'd have plenty of time to whip out the sequel—my WIP. For the first couple of weeks at home, however, my writing muse was on vacation. I could read. I could critique my friends' writing. Cooking and rearranging furniture, working in the garden, and teleworking for my day job all came easily. 

But thanks to an invite to a virtual writers' retreat, my muse has flitted back into my world. I've been able to find time in our stay-at-home routine to review my initial synopsis and start working the manuscript again. I've even been able to write a couple blogs. 

My main character, 11-year-old Zahra, is actually dealing with something like a pandemic in my WIP. That may be why we all got a little freaked out. But she's dealing with her crisis, and I mine. And we're back on track. 

How has the stay-at-home order affected your life?

Five lessons from the new normal


Our lives have been interrupted and the world as we knew it changed abruptly and dramatically over the past month. As with any life experience, I've learned a lot—already. These are nuggets of reality I'll carry with me and likely pass on to my future grandchildren as we chit-chat in the herb garden. Or while the family is gathered around the fire pit on a cool spring evening...just like that spring when the Coronavirus upset our lives beyond anything imaginable outside a science fiction movie or history class.
  1. Let's start with something I have to get off my chest before I self-combust, creating a mess Hubby does not want to clean. I've learned that I despise the phrase "new normal." READ MORE

VIDEO OF THE MONTH
I've added a Virtual Story Time page to my website. Chapters 1, 2, and 3 of Thurston T. Turtle Moves to Hubbleville have been released. 
I'll be recording and posting every chapter of all three Thurston T. Turtle books in the coming weeks. Enjoy and share with family and friends that have youngsters age 5-8. The preschoolers might like them, too!

Earth-Friendly Tip from Zahra
There is still a shortage of toilet paper. Every time we venture to the store, we look for it. And every time, we find the shelves are still bare or bare again. Our timing is awful. 

Zahra and her kind may wear clothing, but they don't use paper products, including toilet paper. And, until what? a hundred or so years ago, neither did humans. 

For those of you running low, especially if you don't have a bidet, there are options. 

You could use a makeshift tabo, or scoop, to rinse off your parts (this is basically a manual bidet option). Of course, you'll need towels to dry off, as well. We might opt for the tabo when we finally do run out. That's the upside to having small bathrooms with toilets in very close proximity to sinks and tubs. 

You could also use reusable cloths, much like cloth diapers. In my mind, this option would require a bucket of bleach water next to the toilet for used clothes.  

Zahra's Earth-friendly tip for April is:
Rinse and pat dry.

Zahra would be thrilled if we all eliminated paper product use altogether. Our household has already transitioned to using dishtowels and cloth napkins over paper towels and napkins. Toilet paper is our next hurdle. We may find out in the coming weeks whether or not we can do without!

What's your toilet paper-less strategy for coping?

My Personal Gossip
Last month, right before non-essential procedures were cancelled en masse, I was fortunate to experience my very first colonoscopy, scheduled with my triennial endoscopy.

Apparently, that's not what they're called anymore. In today's lingo, my procedures were a lower and an upper endoscopy. 

Call them what you want. After blowing three veins before they finally affixed my hand with an IV, I heard the doctor mentioning to his OR mates something about my stint as a writer for the newspaper...and then...

"Dave, is that you? Why are you in the operating room?"

He was not. I was in recovery. The prep kit was as expected. My brunch after all was said and done was likely glorious, though the memory is foggy. The results were perfectly fine.

Now that you're caught up, how about some recent gossip?

I've changed somewhat since last month. I can now get all my laundry for the week done in one load that I don't actually fold and put away. Yes, it's wrinkled. But then, I'm teleworking and the cats, dogs, and bunnies don't seem to mind. I don't think our kids, their girlfriends, or Hubby mind either. When mom sets the bar low, it takes the pressure off the rest of the household.

And yes, we have two bunnies in the house. Not because of Easter. Rather, my youngest has had a pet bunny for a few years now. And my oldest's girlfriend, who is hunkering down with our family, brought her bunny into the fold.

Apart from that one evening when we had the dogs and bunnies outside at the same time and a chase ensued (no dogs or bunnies were hurt in the inadvertent incident), all the creatures have been getting along swimmingly. Even the human ones.
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Copyright © 2020 Micki Bare, Author, All rights reserved.


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