I understand my absence has gone noticed. I am okay! Just laser-focused on my sanity, which doesn’t involve commenting about the news for more than 280 characters. I have a couple of posts about AI and contact tracing technology I want to write, but all my typing seems to be going towards a novel rewrite.
So, apropos of nothing, here are some mental health tips that work for many!
- Move a little! Here’s a great little 8-minute workout you can do with about twenty square feet and a chair.
- Getting some fresh air is probably extremely safe, as well, even here in
the plaguelandsNYC! - Set hard stops for beginning and ending the workday
- Wear real pants for at least a few hours every day
- Nothing bad will happen if you ignore Trump a little. My husband and I have sort of both faded away from the news, much to our benefit
- Nothing bad will happen if these tips aren’t for you!
- It’s okay to just be like Samwise sometimes
I was hoping to find, as a companion piece, a good picture of him looking grumpy, or being mid-complaint; alas I don’t seem to have any. But you get the idea.
Open thread!
Brachiator
Why wear pants at all?
MoxieM
Adorable kitty being adorable! excellent.
For anyone who needs more teeth-gnashing reasons, i’ll just post here what I posted late on AL’s thread a while back. My adult kid who lives and works in Germany, but does not (yet) have the equivalent of a green card, is working from home. Her hours were cut to 50%. So, the German Federal government is making up the difference to 80% of her salary. How sweet is that? Also her (amazing, excellent) health care is in place, public transit (also amazing, excellent) continues to be subsidized, etc. and more. For a non-citizen, non-permanent resident.
There’s more but so few of us have dental coverage that I’ll leave it at that.
Major Major Major Major
@Brachiator: Many find that it helps with having a rhythm to your day and adds to a feeling of normalcy. I have a friend who has indeed gone the other direction and likes it too. Updated the post to note that these are not one-size-fits-all!
Yutsano
I will have you know I will be wearing shorts and I expect to not be so harshly judged for my sartorial choices. Now good day sir. I said good day!
Yutsano
@MoxieM: Imagine if Teddy Roosevelt had pushed harder for setting up a Bismarck model in the US way back in 1905. American health care would probably be amazing today.
Major Major Major Major
@Yutsano: Real shorts are great too! I understand other genders and nationalities sometimes wear additional kinds of legwear as well. It’s the “real” part that’s relevant to the tip
Benw
Now that the weather is warming up here in NY I’m wearing exclusively band t shirts and board shorts. Today’s ensemble is GnR and Billabong
M. Bouffant
@Brachiator: Exactly. Indeed, it’s going to be too damn hot to wear pants soon.
Brachiator
@Major Major Major Major:
I’m just kidding with you. I agree with you. I had been working from home before the pandemic, and I found it useful early on to develop a routine to help provide focus.
But I later was able to relax my rules considerably.
ETA. The one thing I had to enforce. Friends and family sometimes had to be reminded that when I was at work, I was at work, even though at home. Perversely, some would think I was magically more available just because I was at home.
Also, I tend not to have tv or radio on, or even listen to music while at work. I will check in on the Internet during breaks or significant lulls.
scav
I’ve got to don the full carharts today to deal with some thorny and sappy plants. I figure that leaves me with a positive net trouser surplus that I will donate to anyone that wishes to lounge blissfully for a bit.
Betty Cracker
I’ve worked at home for more than a decade, but today was the first time a pet (of mine) went completely ape-shit during a work-related phone call. Stupid Badger!
Roger Moore
I would say the part about wearing pants and the part about hard stops to the work day go together. I think it’s easier to get working if I put on work clothes and start work on my usual schedule.
MoCA Ace
@Major Major Major Major: Thank you for the clarification. As my wife has yet to recoil in horror or uncontrolled laughter when she walks into the “office” I assume my boxers (sweats on cool days) are indeed real and not just a figment of my imagination. So I’m good to go!
Major Major Major Major
@MoCA Ace: Have you considered a nice kilt?
AliceBlue
I’ve found some great exercise videos on YouTube. Silver Sneakers (exercise for old folks) has a 7 minute yoga flow video that’s easy to do and has really helped with the stiffness in my back and hips.
I took ballet class for many years when I was growing up, and I’ve enjoyed the Sleek Ballet Fitness series. They feature two British former ballerinas who are absolutely delightful.
zhena gogolia
@Roger Moore:
My version of that is wearing earrings. (But comfortable pants and no bra. The only things that cheer me up.)
The weather is so weird that I’m still wearing my winter clothes, though, and that is depressing. Snow tomorrow night.
Great advice from Major Major. I can’t focus on Trump right now. I’m trying to focus on all the good, well-meaning, intelligent, hard-working people in the country.
Steeplejack
Bougie swine!
Black_onion
Trump’s personal valet tests positive for coronavirus
President Donald Trump and Vice President Mike Pence have since tested negative for the virus, the White House said Thursday.
https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/white-house/military-official-working-white-house-tests-positive-coronavirus-n1202061?cid=sm_npd_ms_fb_ai&fbclid=IwAR2fkX-P9AAHhB-tRleZtx5ixxEFIi-CCigCCeWyNTmNVGm_StzZ5XDN1KQ
zhena gogolia
I had my last Zoom class yesterday and my last Zoom committee meeting today (at least one that I’m chairing, there are more to come that I have to attend). It feels like a relief, although colleagues who ended classes earlier tell me the real depression sets in now.
The students were молодцы. I feel so terrible for them all.
Yutsano
@Betty Cracker: Obviously Badger was bovvered! You must pay attention to me now Mama! :P
Quiltingfool
Cat topic: Last week I purchased a wool pressing pad – great for pressing quilt blocks. I have 2 wood TV trays I repurposed into small pressing tables by my sewing machine. Why 2? Well, when I had just one, I had to fight the cat in order to use it. So, now I don’t have to move her – she just goes to the table I ironed on because she likes the warmth. Okay, back to the wool pad. I just ordered another one today as the cat REALLY loves the wool pad. I feel bad moving her, because she just conks out and I hate to wake her. Plus, if I had lots of pieces to press, she would give me the stink eye so to make me hurry up, I guess! Now, I will not have to move her, she will move herself! Lord, the things I do for that cat!
Jeffro
I had the best of intentions today, I really did, both for my work and home “to-do” lists.
Other than planning a Mother’s Day post-hike brunch with my kids and putting a few things up on eBay, I’m not really sure what happened.
Waiting for my post-lunch caffeine to kick in and then I’ll try to get at least a couple things done off of the work list…
Boris Rasputin (the evil twin)
@Brachiator: Because kilts are expensive.
If Trump isn’t on TV, does he exist? Will he vanish at once, or dwindle away? How can we set up an experiment, short of crazy-gluing the lock on his bedroom door?
BruceFromOhio
Great tips, thank you! Establishing and sustaining a routine have been critical to keeping my shit together. Get up about the same time, get dressed in real clothes, get online and established in the virtual presence, breaking for lunch away from the computer, and clocking out at the same time every day have been really essential. It also distinguishes the workday from the weekend day, provides a veneer of normalcy where nothing is normal. And no alcohol or weed before 6pm! Unless its the weekend.
The biggest benefit has come from turning off the fucking news, staying the hell away from the Twatter and Facepalm, and only going for updates once or twice a day from Reuters, Bloomberg, Balloon Juice, Lawyers Guns & Money, and Jezebel. Pretty much in that order. Will occasionally muddy the boots with a visit to the NY Post, just to feel dirty for a minute or two.
Zoo cams and beach cams have also provided pleasant distractions.
We will get through this.
Steeplejack
@Quiltingfool:
You made the right choice—less trouble in the long run. Cats are connoisseurs of texture!
Major Major Major Major
@Quiltingfool: Classic!
Major Major Major Major
I’ve also been playing a shitload of Elite Dangerous, but “lose yourself in a space opera MMO” is not really a mental health tip.
GeriUpNorth
@Quiltingfool: When I first moved to my current house I would find the cat sleeping on the bathroom rug all the time, and couldn’t figure out why. I finally realized that the heat vent in the bathroom was in the bottom of the vanity facing forward, and when the cat was on the rug the heat blew straight out on her. I finally found some heating pads meant for cat beds and now she mostly curls up on her own bed.
zhena gogolia
We started watching Sex and the City from the beginning last night. I completely missed it when it was all the rage, as I miss most things that are all the rage. Now it’s like looking at old tintype photographs — people gathering in crowded places! Land lines! Huge cell phones with antennas! Hailing yellow taxicabs! It’s totally addictive.
Major Major Major Major
@GeriUpNorth: Samwise likes to spend all day and night laying in this one corner with his head smooshed against the wall. Turns out that’s where the living room steam riser is.
Yutsano
@BruceFromOhio: I need to get up and shower and coffee myself, but there’s a great Jeffrey Stein tweet I’ll share as soon as I have addressed my personal Lazlow’s hierarchy. Back anon!
BruceFromOhio
@zhena gogolia: They’ll get by. My senior moved out, packed the car, and headed for Maine for the summer. Its in the past now.
narya
I have a dedicated little space/desk, and I do have a hard start/stop time. I’m also finding it helpful to put on a “work” shirt (I’m on zoom a lot), and change at the end of the day the way I normally would when I get home. It also turns out that I am exercising a bit more–I can go for a run, take a shower, blah blah blah, and still have plenty of time to get online by 9. I’m probably working shorter hours (it’s not unusual for me to be in the office by 8 or even a bit before that), and I’m good with that. I do need to move more during the day–not running around the office for meetings (we’re spread over two floors, so up/down stairs for meetings a lot) and not walking to/from public transit turns out to make a difference in overall joint stiffness. Will be interesting to figure this all out when (a) the kitchen renovation starts if (b) we’re still working from home.
WaterGirl
@Betty Cracker:
You take that back!!!
signed,
Still Crushing on Badger (and why haven’t we had a photo of him in forever??)
evap
I’ve been doing that 7 minute workout (note: 7, not 8) for several years and I try to do it every day that I don’t run or take a Pilates class (the studio is all online now, of course, and it actually works well). One of the exercises — lunges — hurts my knees so I substitute some Pilates bridging. You can get an app for the workout and I highly recommend it!
Ruckus
@Yutsano:
The only time I wear long pants is when it’s 60 or below. The only time I wear real pants is outside. I’m home – I’m comfortable. Isn’t that what home is for?
Major Major Major Major
@evap: it’s seven minutes and fifty seconds.
Brachiator
Before the pandemic, I would get up, get dressed and walk down to a local coffee shop for breakfast, then come home and start work. It worked for me to have that defined event of opening the door and getting to work. Maybe it was the psychological equivalent of “going to work.”
On most days I will still go by and get takeout breakfast.
Ruckus
@Roger Moore:
My work pants are shorts. Of course I also wear an apron at work.
oatler.
My tighty whities were good enough for the pizza guy last night, plus it’s 108 degrees here.
JoyceH
My exercise routine has been to take house walks. I walk back and forth through the house and count my laps. After my February bronchitis, one lap would leave me wheezing. But I’m up to twelve laps and recently added some pedaling. I hope to emerge from quarantine a lot stronger than I started.
And I got a flirt pole for the dog and that is great exercise for her.
TaMara (HFG)
@Betty Cracker: LOL. I can usually count on a dog bark or two, but what really quacks up my clients is when the ducks come to the open patio door and make a racket.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
So how’s the Super White Alpha Male genes are proof against the Chinaman Virus Trumpy you ignorant racists quack?
https://www.yahoo.com/news/military-aide-assigned-white-house-155424382.html
Some coughing in the White House?
Salty Sam
Reporting in from the tropics: Sarong is very comfy too!
TaMara (HFG)
Agreed. I tune in to our local morning news because they are generally bright and upbeat. Then about half of Nicole Wallace’s show in the afternoon and that’s it for me. My mental health thanks me.
Ruckus
@narya:
I’m still working off and on, practicing for retirement. I am getting more and more into it. I keep working every so often, just so I don’t peak too soon.
J R in WV
Glad to hear that you’re OK in hell-hole NYC.
Be more like Samwise the Cat sounds like great advice!
Boxers and a Tee are the uniform of the day mostly, unless someone is here to work on the tree damage. Or when I go to town, which even tho I have a great industrial respirator feels more like Russian Roulette than shopping. Even Russian Roulette when you don’t know how many rounds are loaded into the cylinder of the revolver.
Is the novel about Eels — or is this a new one?
I’m still searching for a reliable willing building contractor to repair damage from the tree falling on our house — rural problems. So far no one has been willing to come out and look, much less actually lift a hammer!!!
rikyrah
But….”believe all women”😒😒😒
Baud
@rikyrah: I didn’t even know about that. Fauci must not be a Democrat.
MagdaInBlack
@rikyrah:
Another Jacob Wohl production.
rikyrah
pamelabrown53
Don’t forget to moon gaze tonight. It’s the last full supermoon of 2020.
Major Major Major Major
@J R in WV: Eels, yeah. Realized it needed to be set in the mid-2030s, among other things. I’m six published stories richer and have a much better handle on what I’m doing…
Ceci n est pas mon nym
As I am the dog-walker in our house, I put on not only pants, but socks and shoes for much of the day. I mean, I’d be happy to walk the dog barefoot and pants-less, but the neighbors would object
I could be juvenile and snicker at the juxtaposition of this comment with the “no-pants” discussion, but I’ll pretend that I’m mature and nothing of the sort crossed my mind.
pamelabrown53
@Ceci n est pas mon nym:
Just take your pants off, go outside tonight and howl!
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@rikyrah: I don’t know if you saw this yesterday, it seems to have remained in the fringes of twitter (which I’ve been sucked into lately) but some woman in Colorado claims Biden grabbed her ass and asked her if she wanted to join the Mile High Club in the 70s. The most interesting part was all the would-be Katie Halpers and Ryan Grims advising her to scrub her social media before they were “attacked”. She couldn’t erase the record of her and her husband’s contributions to the trump campaign. Hard to read all the tiny screen shots, and were it not for the quarantine I probably wouldn’t have bother. Link provided for anyone who wants to go a-spelunking.
CaseyL
I am truly sympathetic to people going stir-crazy, but have to say the quarantine is bothering me not one little bit. In fact, I wonder if I should be worried at how little I mind it, how much I actually LIKE it.
(I’m WFH, so finances aren’t a worry; this would all be very different if I weren’t employed and still getting paid.)
Today there is a lot more traffic than over the last few weeks, as Governor Inslee slowly re-opens things. Construction is one of the first businesses to get started again, so my guess is I’m hearing people heading off to job sites.
My days are: make breakfast for me and kitties; make coffee, check email and tasks, follow up on what needs to be followed up on. Then: do whatever I like that doesn’t involve going out (unless it’s a weekly grocery run or, weather permitting, long walk). Go out on deck to see how tomatoes, lettuces, and strawberries are doing (they’re all growing very nicely, thankyou). Sit in the sun, petting kitties.
Check work stuff. Read. Get on internet. Do some glasswork.
Call/text/Skype friends and family.
Rinse. Repeat.
At some point I will want to get out – to see friends, go road-tripping, hiking, shopping, or to a festival (Folk Life and SIFF are probably not happening this year) – but so far, all I can say is, if this is what retirement will mostly be like, I am so there.
rikyrah
This muthaphucka here😠😠😠
Baud
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
This tweet showed up underneath the one you linked:
Roger Moore
@zhena gogolia:
The key point is to enforce some kind of separation of your work life from your home life. For me, part of that is putting on work clothes. It’s not that my work clothes are that different from my non-work clothes, but I feel more like doing work when I’m dressed for the day than I would be wearing PJs.
Similarly, I have a work-provided computer, and I try to make turning on and off the computer something like a commute. When I turn the computer on, I have gone to work, and I need to focus on my work- at least to the extent that I’m ever perfectly focused on work. When I turn the computer off, I’m done for the day and can go back to my personal life. Having that ritual helps to provide some degree of separation between my personal and work lives that might otherwise be hard to maintain.
jimmiraybob
Or, invent a game to see how many days in a row you can go without putting on pants.
This has sports-league implications.
Brachiator
@narya:
I participated in a Zoom conference the other day, and the one clothing compromise I made was to wear a sweatshirt that didn’t have a spill stain on it.
Roger Moore
@Quiltingfool:
Think of it as the cat having let you know the perfect design for a cat bed. Unless these things are super-expensive- I don’t know how much quilting supplies cost- I doubt they’re that much more expensive than buying a traditional bed. It seems like a reasonable price to pay for both you and the cat being satisfied.
JoyceH
@Baud: that is so awesome. Even better, downthread from the Biden clipping is a newspaper clip about Trump evicting an elderly stroke victim. Compare and contrast!
Roger Moore
@Ruckus:
My work clothes are jeans and a t-shirt, so I’m not getting particularly fancy by getting dressed. My comparison is to just staying in my PJs. I just can’t get focused for work when I’m in my PJs.
Brachiator
By the way, if you are a remote worker and are an employee (not self-employed), you do not get any deduction for home office expenses, because of the Trump tax law passed in 2017.
This may be important if you do not receive any reimbursement from your employer and have purchased any equipment yourself.
As far as I know, there are no deductions allowed for remote education expenses for school kids. College students may be able to take some expenses.
It will be interesting to see if Congress addresses any of this in the future.
Major Major Major Major
@Baud: wow! Retweeting!
Yutsano
@BruceFromOhio: As promised: even the woodland creatures are supporting the Bezos Post. Would also accept the best kind of Fox News.
Boris Rasputin (the evil twin)
@rikyrah: This is standard behavior in what Mrs. Rasputin calls “the White-haired Pinhead.” Now if he could only stay the hell out of our lives things might get better.
Chyron HR
@Baud:
JOE’S A COP!!!!!
narya
@Roger Moore: Yeah . . . I don’t wear PJs, so I would need to put on something anyway. My workplace is pretty accomodating, but I don’t think “naked old broad” would be regarded as acceptable workplace attire over zoom.
@Ruckus: O how I wish I could retire now . . . I’m a few years short of full SS benefits, a few years short of paying off the mortgage, etc., short of Medicare eligibility, etc. I’m making the WFH work (I’m listening to a HRSA webinar right now), and, tbh, it’s probably healthier for me to be working since I live alone and don’t want to go out, but it would be nice.
joel hanes
@pamelabrown53:
One splendid night, in maybe 2000, we were at the Strawberry Music Festival in Camp Mather, California, when an enormous full moon rose over the peaks to the east.
The band stopped between numbers, and first one, then several, then then then entire crowd broke out into wolf-howls that went on for several minutes.
Yutsano
@Major Major Major Major: Inb4 FAKE NEWS!!!
NotMax
That’s just crazy talk.
zhena gogolia
@Baud:
Sounds like the “shortcut” scene from Hot Fuzz.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fuEG_PSb_Ts
rikyrah
NotMax
@oatler.
Everything before the comma describes the plot set-up of umpty-ump (how to phrase this?) independent flickers.
:)
Gravenstone
@oatler.: Did you at least tip commensurate with the emotional distress of having them see you in tighty whities?
randy khan
Samwise appear to have perfected working at home.
randy khan
@rikyrah:
Every time I see one of them around other people without a mask, I think about how many people they’re probably killing by modeling exactly the wrong behavior.
rikyrah
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
the thing is….folks have screenshots of all her social media.
This ain’t 2016
Folks aren’t playing with these clowns😠😠
rikyrah
@CaseyL:
I feel you
James E Powell
@rikyrah:
No, Ms. Vanderpool, just no.
Ruckus
@jimmiraybob:
My record is forever. But my level of shame is very low.
Another Scott
We have several kinds of exercise equipment that we’ve accumulated over the years in our basement. I’ve been using them much more now, in the plague times, than I have in years, and it’s good.
E.g. It used to be that I could only tolerate being on the stationary bike for about 32 minutes at most (doing intervals) because it was so boring and annoying – even while watching TV. “OMG! I hate this!! When can I stop!!!1” But I’ve found that if I do it while reading short stories and the like on my phone, I can easily go an hour. It really does help to find something to “zone out” with, to turn off (or override) that part of the brain that we listen too so much during the day.
tl;dr – Homer had it right. ;-)
Cheers,
Scott.
Ruckus
@narya:
I’m 70, going on 71, so retirement is beginning to look not just nice, but necessary for some semblance of sanity. Whatever the hell sanity is…….
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@James E Powell: O! to see the end of “[Person I saw say one funny/clever/cutting thing on a cable hit] MUST BE OUR NEW [candidate/spokesperson/Vice President]!”
mrmoshpotato
@Major Major Major Major: Are hot pants considered real?
Brachiator
@mrmoshpotato:
Depends. Are we talking about spray-on pants?
Shana
I love when cats are sleeping on their backs with their paws all curled up like that. Just so cute.
A friend recently convinced us to give South Korean dramas a try. We’re two episodes in to Romance is a Bonus Book (I think that’s what it’s called) and so far enjoying it. We’re also stepping back from some of the news sources (evening MSNBC mostly, still reading blogs and the newspaper) so this should keep us occupied for ages. We don’t binge so an episode a night is about our limit.
Quiltingfool
@Roger Moore: Miss Spoiled Rotten sleeps anywhere she wants! She does like quilts, though…I’ve found most animals do. The wool pads aren’t too expensive, and having two will make us BOTH happy!
BruceFromOhio
@Yutsano: reading up on the sports pages, perhaps? Most excellent.