Signs of the Times

PLUGGING ALONG: This week, we've been doing the best we can with what we have to work with. We have no Internet, and two adults who are working at home and two kids who need to do schooling 'online.'

We have limped along with our hot spots on our phones, thanks to T-Mobile. (I really am going to write them a thank you letter.)

Amidst all this, the kids entered an online art show sponsored by the Renton Arts Commission. The call asked students to share art based on their COVID experiences. 

By the way, it's worth noting they were submitted before our anti-masker in chief was diagnosed with COVID-19.

Here's what CJ shared. ... (I encourage you to click on the image to see its larger version.)

"These word clouds, shaped like the contiguous USA, contrast the terminology and vocabulary used by current President Donald Trump as compared to mainstream media reporting on the deadly pandemic. The left word cloud is composed of two articles about the reported death toll hitting the 200,000 mark: With Flags, Crosses and Photos, Mourning 200,000 Dead from the New York Times, and We’ve reached 200,000 deaths. Our response has gotten even worse than it was at 100,000 from the Washington Post. Meanwhile, the right word cloud is composed of two speeches given by Trump: On the Coronavirus Pandemic, given by Trump on March 11, and the speech he gave at the ill-fated Tulsa rally on June 20, which highly likely resulted in the COVID-19 death of Republican politician Herman Cain."

Below is what Annabelle cared to share. (Again, I would click on the image to see it in a larger scale.)

"Title: COVIDland
My visual arts entry sums up a slice of my life during the COVID-19 pandemic. My family (and others) have taken to playing many more board games to pass our pandemic times. That led me to imagine this COVID inspired parody of a classic board game, Candyland. Gloppy the chocolate swamp monster becomes Germy, who's made of hand sanitizer. Mr. Mint, or rather Mr. Mask, is complying with guidelines and wearing a face covering when in public. It was a lot of fun coming up with these silly puns in these unsettling times."

 

Spoke too Soon

LITTLE GREENIE: A couple of days ago I was lamenting the end of our gardening season and the fact that we haven't a single squash.

Imagine my surprise yesterday when taking the dogs out for their morning water when I spied this little green guy.

THE GREAT PUMPKIN!!!

It's pathetic, but we'll take it! 

CUT THE CORD: A little hiccough here. ... We worked so hard Saturday helping make 80+ meals for Teen Feed, all I wanted to do Sunday was sit and watch football. I was preparing to do just that for the Seahawks' kickoff when we lost signal.

It happened to coincide with our neighbor going gangster on trimming a tree where our fiber optic cable runs. :(

Well, accidents happen, and so we call, chat and text CenturyLink to find out they can't have a repair person out here for EIGHT DAYS!

Um, Christian and I both work at home and our kids are both doing distance learning, with CJ's college starting today. That's not acceptable.

However, that's what it is after repeated please for help. Awful, horrible and terribly inconvenient.

For now, we're limping by with hotspots on our phones, paying more for our T - Mobile, but that's not sustainable. 

$#&+@ pandemic.

So, expect even less blogging from now to who knows when. It's all via my phone for now.

Feeding Frenzy

SEASON'S FLEETING: Because of the pandemic, which means we can't go much of anywhere or do much of anything, this has pretty much turned into a gardening blog, and, ironically, it wasn't a great year for growing around here.

Our squash blossoms will be nothing more than pretty flowers, our tomatoes were small and skewed green. We had a big storm blow in at the end of last week, so I had the kids go out and pick what they could before the rains came. Guess some green tomato salsa is in our future.

TEEN TIME: This week included the fourth Saturday of the month, which meant another Teen Feed dinner. Our contribution included the kids making a couple dozen snickerdoodle cookies (they made a batch of 'regular' and a batch of vegan).

Big ol' burritos were on the menu, so we cranked out 20 pounds of chicken (Kennedy contributed another 10 pounds), and a couple friends provided even more protein. We also made four pounds of refried beans, bought dozens of tortillas and big bags of chips. (The side to the burrito was a box of nachos.)

Saturday morning we made 80 little cups of jalapenos. 

We also filled dozens of kinda big cups of salsa.

We packed the Fit to the gills and headed north about 4:30. We were the clean and prep team, staying at the shelter kitchen until about 6 p.m., when the meal service crew came in. 

Thanks to everyone's generous donations, the kitchen crew reported being able to make 120 burrito meals. Yay team!

RERUN: We posted here awhile back about a captivating presentation we sat in on, "Hidden Child of the Holocaust Shares His Story." It featured Peter Metzelaar telling his tale of being a Jewish child in hiding during WWII in Europe. You can now  watch a recording of that event on The Museum of Flight's YouTube channel.

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You can also listen to an interview with Peter on the museum's podcast, Flight Deck, from back in March

FAR OUT FILMS: The Museum of Flight recently announced their participation in CineSpace, a virtual film screening presented by NASA and the Houston Cinema Arts Society. It features a collection of the best short films created by filmmakers of all ages. 

CineSpace is a short film competition created by NASA’s Johnson Space Center in partnership with the Houston Cinema Arts Society. Amateur and professional filmmakers share their works inspired by, and using, actual NASA imagery.

You can watch the event via the musuem's website. It runs Oct. 4-10. Registration is here: https://form.jotform.com/202585852675163

We're looking forward to checking it out.