The banner is NOT a selfie—oh, hi!  I’m Don McClure. You might remember me from group posts such as “It’s Called ‘Fútbol’, You Bastards” and “Don’t Say ‘N*gg*r’, Cr*ck*r!”. Today all I’m doing is the intro and random pics, because Dunstan, Col. Duke LaCrosse, and LemonJello bring you this dispatch of Pandemic Cabin Fever. Take it away, talent!

Dunstan

I’m doing great.

Oops, sorry.  That’s supposed to be, “Under the circumstances, I’m doing great.”  Because yeah, people are dying and the economy is collapsing, and nobody knows what the future holds for any of us.  But personally I’m hanging in there just fine.

Not a big surprise, considering that I live alone, so I have nobody to annoy me during quarantine, and am used to going long periods without *sob* the touch of a woman…. Where was I?  Oh yeah.  I have plenty of booze and I like to cook, and I’m happy to alternate amusing myself between reading books, posting on some dick joke blog, and playing various computer and board games.  I’m even working on a puzzle occasionally.  I haven’t even been watching much television yet, though I’m sure I’ll resort to that at some point.

My latest obsession has been running a simulation of a tournament of 64 all-time MLB teams, which I shall now describe in great detail.  (20,000 words snipped)  Anyway, that should keep me busy for a while yet.

Working from home has gone fairly well.  Fortunately I don’t have to do a bunch of boring conference calls, as most of my work is reading and writing.  I do find it helpful to maintain a regular routine, though I usually postpone my morning shower to my lunch break.  I have the odd situation of being very good friends with my boss, which means that I get like five phone calls a day from him, which range from the 9 am “let me repeat a bunch of stuff I already said in emails, because I’m really just calling to make sure you’re awake and getting work done” call, to the 7 pm “my wife is dealing with the kids and I’m drunk, so I need someone to chat with” call.  The real grey area is in the 3pm -5pm range, where I don’t know if I’m being asked for cooking advice or getting a tedious rant about work stuff, and so I answer the phone like I’m the coach of the Cowboys* getting a call from Jerry Jones.

* I will not dwell on which Cowboys coach I would be — that way lies madness.

Of course, I was supposed to be leaving on a two-week vacation this weekend, so there is that little bit of annoyance, which I try not to think about.  And I will murder anyone who makes jokes about a staycation.

Via postimages.com

Col. Duke LaCross

I reside in Salt Lake City, Utah. Utah is one of the seven states that refused to issue some type of stay-at-home order. This, despite having the only thing this state is really known for (besides copious amounts of mormons) the Utah Jazz, being wood football’s COVID-19 ground zero. Thanks, Rudy! All hell broke loose here on March 11^th when the NBA shut down and the President gave the first of many ripped out of his gourd speeches on the virus.

I’m currently a teaching professional at a local municipal golf course and on March 12^th I ventured down to the course in a rainstorm to get a quick round in on my day off. When I got there, my boss was boxing up all of our merchandise on the floor and stowing all the displays in the storage room. “Just in case the shit hits the fan and there’s looting going on,” he said. I helped him stow the shop and played a quick round. The next day, he gave us the rundown. Our direct competition (another local municipal golf system) had shut down a week earlier and we were going to do the same, but the department wanted to stay open for the weekend. They obviously smelled the blood of a competition-free weekend in the water. Nobody else wanted to work, so I ran the course that entire weekend under a few conditions. 1. We offered only two items on the menu (walking nine and walking eighteen). 2. We had no rentals of any kind or merch sales available. 3. We stopped taking cash as payment. 3. We turned all the cups upside down so they were flush with the level of the lip of the holes. It was barely recognizable as golf anymore, but we were packed all weekend anyway. We ceased operation the following Monday.

My furlough lasted all of eleven days. They made the decision to re-open the courses the following week under even more restrictions. 1. All rounds are prepaid on our app or online. 2. We’re locked in the shop and no longer take any transactions. When players arrive, they call us in the shop. We make sure they have a reservation, click a checkbox and send them to the tee. 3. We aren’t allowed to do any private or group instruction. This part really sucks because without lesson income, my take-home pay is somewhere around $10.00 an hour. Making things even shittier, they brought us back on the last day of the pay-period which meant we technically didn’t miss a check and are ineligible in Utah to collect unemployment for the time we were off. Fucking diabolical. We’ve been open ever since and we now do literally nothing but answer the phone and squirt every touchable surface of the building with Lysol. I know that when I got into this business twenty-seven years ago, that’s exactly how I pictured it would go.

Social Stuff

Now, just because our doofus of a governor hasn’t issued any hard orders outside of banning dine-in at various restaurants and bars as well as the gyms, schools and salons, the bulk of the people here at least have taken it upon themselves to self-quarantine for the most part. Since my timing is awesome, I’d gone and decided to start something resembling a relationship right before all the shit started going down. It’d been a tough winter after all the weirdness with Colorado girl in the Fall. I dated a nurse briefly over the winter and after my skin-removal surgery in January, but my recovery was a long, tedious slog and she gave up on waiting for me to recover enough to be able to hang out regularly. That stung, but right at the beginning of March I met a girl on one of those “swipe-right” apps and we’d gone on a couple dates and hit it off splendidly.

She’s a pretty hot mom, BYU grad, former Mormon, and former missionary. Definitely not the type I typically go for, but she had recently renounced her faith after her oldest son came out and was subject to some pretty awful treatment from her fellow faithful. It led to her divorce as well. She’s been holed up in her house with her kids. I don’t blame her for that, and we talk and text every day but it’s really tough not being able to actually hang out together. Instead we just leave various gifts for each other on each other’s porch. I’ve cooked dinner for her and her kids a couple times during the quarantine and left it in a cooler on her porch, like a Grubhub that she didn’t have to pay for. She’s a pastry chef that specializes in French, so she leaves all kinds of good stuff on my porch.

Other stuff

So other than going to work, or walking 18 holes by myself a few times a week, I’ve done my best to just stay home like we’re supposed to. I’ve been watching a ton of streaming stuff, usually recommended by Hot Former Mormon Girl, and she’s got a pretty good batting average on entertainment. I’ve been cooking a ton and really have been trying to expand my repertoire. I’ve baked a few times, cinnamon rolls, sticky buns, and Cookies. My meals have been pretty fair as well. I’ve smoked a pork shoulder, Braised lamb shanks with orzo, made deep-dish pizza in a cast-iron pan, roasted more chickens than I can count and grilled shitloads of steaks. If nothing else, my roommate and I have eaten well.

My mom lives nearby and is getting a little older so I take her dinner several nights a week and borrow her treadmill. I was kind of a gym rat before all this went down, and I promised myself that I’d do at least some heavy physical activity every day and have stuck with it. Whether it be running on the aforementioned treadmill, swinging and squatting with kettlebells, plain old burpees, situps and pushups, or some combination of the few, I’ve remained committed to fitness. I’ve come too far with weight –loss surgery and loose skin removal a few months ago, to just sit idly by and get fat again. But I really miss the gym.

I also mounted a bidet to my toilet, so thankfully I should be able to stretch the five rolls of TP I have left into June. You still can’t get any toilet paper, flour, yeast, Clorox wipes, hand sanitizer or NyQuil anywhere in this state. It’s bizarre. If push comes to shove, I can always steal shit from work.

Via postimages.com

LemonJello

Location: Fortress LemonJello, outside the hot zone of Our Nation’s Capital 

Current Status: Alive. Lady LemonJello still has to go to her job. OrangeJello stayed with us for a couple weeks before returning to the mountains of NC and her apartment.  LimeJello started a real job a couple weeks before the plague, so he’s working from home.  TangerineJello had her junior year of high school curtailed, and I believe she’s hibernating in her room, only coming out for meals and an occasional brief conversation.

I work at a museum. I delayed working from home for as long as I could, We closed to the public and I used that time to get some overdue work done in the galleries, but eventually we were all sent home. I can go in if need be, and some of our administrative systems don’t allow for connection outside the government network, so I venture out for a day every couple of weeks.

I’ve set up in the garage, so I spend the bare minimum of time doing actual work and the rest of it playing CIV, working on scale models and enjoying the company of Imaginary Internet Friends.

I can’t really complain. I’m getting paid. I can pay my bills and being quarantined at home certainly isn’t the worst working conditions I’ve endured.

I have beer. I have bourbon.  I will survive.

We wanna hear how you’re coping. Send us your lockdown tales,  Gronk / MRSA musings, existential grievances, etc. to [email protected]. Be well.