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Kevin Pacey
03-14-2020, 12:36 PM
A thread for posters to write about their current situation, a bit or a lot, now or in future times.

A couple of nights ago, things suddenly began to change at my local supermarket. Instead of a typical low-key evening, the place was packed; apparently the (panicky?) rush is now on in Ottawa to stock up on supplies, due to the coronavirus crisis. Such things as toilet paper and diapers were apparently flying off the shelves. Lucky for me, at least that night, I had fewer than 9 items, so I passed relatively quickly through the (albeit long) Express check-out line.

In my apartment building, the social/games room and gym were also closed indefinitely that evening, again due to concerns over the virus (notices posted by meeting places). Luckily for me, I haven't used either place for a long time; concerns over my Achilles tendons have discouraged me from using the gym's equipment, and I don't much play any sort of card games any more (never mind knitting nights :)), which is what the social room is usually used for.

My Mom's in the middle of having cataract operations on each eye, so we're hoping neither of us comes down with any sort of illness. At the moment I do all the shopping, luckily within easy walking distance (while supplies last). I have to give her eye drops several times a day (due to her Parkinson's making her hands tremor a bit), including getting out of bed earlier than I'm used to, for over a month possibly. With sports cancelled, I'd be tremendously bored, except for chess variant play online, studying chess, and surfing the internet, besides taking in any news on TV or radio that's not the currently depressing, and monotonous, stuff. Watching WWII documentaries and such on DVD gets a bit old after a while.

Edit: I'd add that I have high blood pressure (under control), plus many years back I had a nasty virus that bothered my lungs a lot towards the end. Currently I'm almost 60. A local store just began asking people to bag their own groceries, and a friend told me a coffee shop he went to recently had refused to take his cash (filthy stuff, I guess). Meanwhile, Mom's surgery on her second eye has been rescheduled for quite some time down the road, for now.

Kevin Pacey
04-09-2020, 03:04 PM
Now that things are in a sort of semi-lockdown in Ottawa, I just go out to a quite limited number of nearby places.

My nearby mall has a supermarket (Metro) that now has customers greeted at the door by someone telling them to space themselves as they enter, and also personal bags are to be left at the indoor entrance (anti-virus or anti-shoplifting measure, I don't know which). People are also kept spaced as they go through checkout lines, which have plexiglass between the cashier & customer for most (but not all) of their interaction. On a separate issue, last week I saw that so-called Hot Cross buns there are now being made and sold without any (pastry) cross on top of each. It may be a bit of a war on Easter (or politically correct excuse to attempt to make more profits, by trying to sell buns to more people, of other religions) has begun, like the war on Christmas, by many retailers (i.e. no Merry Christmas greetings etc., just 'Happy Holidays'). Knowing that this country was founded on Judaeo-Christian principles and by people who obeyed such, I was rather annoyed, anyway.

Kevin Pacey
04-12-2020, 09:38 AM
It's Easter Sunday morning. Just before I woke I had an infernal nightmare that I can only recall the end of - which brings me to the battle between Good and Evil that runs through all our lives, whether we know it or not.

Anyway, at the end of this dream, all I remember is hearing the following words: "Old man, look at my life. The words rip across the years like a machine gun". A devilish allusion to an old Neil Young song, as if to rather mean-spiritedly praise it.

Long ago I had mused about Jon Speelman's comparison of chess to a fairy tale, where Good (White) meets Evil and scores 55%, in his Best Chess Games 1970-80. I did so because it seemed to me at the time that in real life (as opposed to in chess), Evil (Black) scores, say, 55% in the lives of men. Sort of like the rate of potentially poor-news symbol cards in a Tarot deck.

Anyway, at a later date I thought again on my Evil-scoring-55%-in-real-life hypothesis, and a fresh thought suddenly came to me in my mind, with a bit more volume than I'd been thinking at, as if coming from above: "We have our moments". It was a 'quote' of the voice of agent Napoleon Solo (played by Robert Vaughn), speaking of the successes of his (Good) team, in the 1960s schlock Man from U.N.C.L.E. TV show.

Whatever you might make of all this, remember that Easter is about the battle between Good and Evil. Have a good one.

Here's the wiki re: Old Man (song):

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Old_Man_(song)

Here's the wiki re: British GM Jon Speelman:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jon_Speelman

Here's the wiki re: Tarot:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tarot

Here's the wiki re: The Man from U.N.C.L.E.:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Man_from_U.N.C.L.E.

Here's the wiki re: Good and Evil:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Good_and_evil

Here's the wiki re: Easter:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Easter

Kevin Pacey
08-02-2020, 12:52 AM
This Ottawa's hot July almost had me believing in manmade global warming - until I read it wasn't a record July:

ottawasun/1august2020/Hottest July in almost a century:

https://www.pressreader.com/canada/ottawa-sun/20200801/281646782475431