The Coronavirus spread rapidly across the country last week, so my firm announces Friday that we can work from home starting Monday.
I grab my equipment from the office over the weekend and start the “social distancing” experiment along with most of the city on Monday morning. Working from home reminds me of my prior gigs, but there are major differences this time, including unusually heavy email traffic and the inability to work from coffee shops.
However Monday turns out to have more than emails and bored dogs in store for me…
The first problem is finding hand sanitizer.
The nearby big-box store rations cleaning supplies and certain paper goods. You can only buy those items from the customer service counter where a cashier will eye you suspiciously. Despite the awkwardness, today’s cashier had my sympathy until she refused to sell hand sanitzer to me because the staff wants to hoard it for themselves.
Luckily, a distillery next to my apartment building just started a special: free distillery-made hand sanitizer with the purchase of a bottle!
So…during lunch, I pick up a bottle of local vodka and craft disinfectant.
Republic Restoratives in Ivy City during the Coronavirus scare.
Vodka from Republic Restoratives in Ivy City during the Coronavirus scare.
It makes me feel like an obnoxious yuppie, but I don’t care because I enjoy being a yuppie with disinfectant.
Drama on a Monday
Things get more surreal at the end of the work day when I hear sirens and commotion outside. I look out my window to find a swarm of first responders performing CPR on someone across the street.
Police and firefighters rescuing a man in Ivy City, D.C.
Police and firefighters rescuing a man in Ivy City, D.C.
The paramedics revive the man and whisk him away in an ambulance. The cops then cover his car in crime scene tape.
None of my neighbors nor the front desk guy know what that drama was about, but it was definitely not another shooting or anything disinfectant-related.
Prehistoric Precaution
After work and taking out the dogs, I make my way to the grocery store. It is packed for a Monday, but the most unusual thing is a person in a dinosaur costume to protect themselves from virus exposure.
A dinosaur costume at Mom’s Grocery during the first day of Coronavirus quarantine.
Walking around in that get-up is a little more embarrassing than buying a liquor bottle just for the free promotional disinfectant.
The Movie Mistake
Upon finishing with the picked-over grocery store shelves, I make the great life choice of ending the day by finally watching the movie Contagion…
Watching Gwyneth Paltrow in Contagion, during a global pandemic.
The virus in Contagion is more plague-like than the Cornonavirus because it kills otherwise healthy young people very quickly. However, the movie is close enough to the present situation to thoroughly freak me out.
I cringe every time someone coughs or touches a door handle. I am also mortified by how quickly things go to hell in the film. Will this happen here? By the end of the film, I vow to make better decisions as this quarantine experiment continues, and to stay away from dinosaurs at the grocery store. 🦖
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