Another week has gone by

Our family has discovered Zoom. First, K suggested it; he's been using it for online classes and family reunions. I mentioned it to A and she said she's been using it for the continuing educations classes she manages. Then, last Thursday, I was attending a meeting of an association (AAWE) on Google Hangouts, but there were too many of us or something else was wrong, because communication was difficult and my telephone was not the only one to get extremely hot so we decided to use Zoom. That worked fine. Thus initiated, I launched a family reunion on Friday.
Why not WhatsApp? Well, from what I gather, that's limited to 4 phones and we needed more connections if I was to connect us and our four kids. Plus, that on the phone, which is a small screen. Why not FaceTime? That's for Apple users and we do not all have Apple products. Why not Skype? We've been really disappointed in the audio. So, Zoom, it was.
L showed us all the apartment. They've settled in. I think all the stuff left at our house is expendable, then. The children showed us their rooms and they got to see their UK cousins, too. Only E and G were not able to join us. Internet is so slow where they are, they can't do video conferences and besides, E was cleaning up after an afternoon of working on the walls of the gîte.
I would like to bake. The thing is I want to be able to buy flour to replace the bag that I will have to open in order to bake. P went to the supermarket this morning (Don't worry. He goes at 7, when they open and there are no other customers.) It was the first time since last week. There was still no flour. He got some canned fruit and some fresh fruit, but so far, we're still ok with our supplies. The boeuf bourgignon I made and froze last month is very good. There was too much sauce and that made a great oignon soup last night.
The plants are coming along fine. The radishes have sprouted. The other seeds have not yet sprouted. The planted seedlings are surviving under the winter cover. We still have frosty mornings. The weather has been beautiful since mid-March. Blue skies, no rain -- if only we could go out on long walks.
That's it. Nothing extraordinary.

It's all anyone is talking about, still!

First, family news.
We haven't concentrated so many phone calls in a single week in a long time.

• T & B, in San Diego, have been confined to their apartment since before the governor issued the lockdown for the whole state. Meals are delivered to their door and the aide is checked for temperature upon entering the building. It sounds as though they are ok. 
• J & T, in Pittsburgh, also sound ok, although J was on an errand to the pharmacy when I called. I had a long chat with T, who was still able to go to her physical therapy sessions at an ungodly early hour but that means she's the only patient there. Their son D, in California is keeping in close touch and son E, in Philly, is a nurse on the front lines of this pandemic.
• K& S, near LA, also sound fine. They have a wonderful hillside garden to get their exercise and K, even though he retired, is still teaching at CalTech. He hasn't been to the campus in weeks and is doing it all online, as is being done at most universities. I got caught up on their kids and grandkids.
• G, in Florida, also sounds good an caught me up on her kids, grandkids.
• P & G, in Six-Fours, are in good shape, missing their daily evening walk down to and along the seaside, but otherwise carrying on normally. The scheduled surgery is off until further notice, of course. Again, caught up on kids and grandkids. 

Now, for our gang.

• C, G, and the girls are safe and sound in Northampton. C is keeping the kids occupied with learning new family recipes (cornes de gazelle was the latest) and G is thinking of setting up office in the caravan parked just outside. The question is whether the wifi signal is strong enough. Of course, we cancelled our trip to see them this week. 
• E and G are carrying on as usual -- nothing new for them; they've been relatively isolated up on their hilltop for 6 years. Usually, they do go down to St. Antonin Noble Val and meet up with neighbors and friends and that is off, for now. E has gotten the veggie garden started and will be working on the walls in the gîte, now that the hay insulation is all dry. G is also keeping busy and doing fantastic artwork on the computer with the graphic tools he got recently. 
• A is working from home and seems to be the only one from her office who was set up for telecommuting. Others don't know how to log on and are skittish about downloading new applications and having documents filed remotely. Her balcony is starting to bloom.
• L & G, who, as I reported last week, just managed to move into their new apartment the weekend before the confinement started, have settled in to some sort of routine with both of them working from home and trying to keep the kids occupied. They have nice long balconies on the east and west sides, so they've done some gardening with what they had on hand. They've also discovered a floor of the garage that was apparently empty for work to be done. The kids have this gigantic underground playground and there don't seem to be other kids, so there's no problem about sharing time down there. There's also a large garden on the property, but not set up for play. We've still got lots of their boxes, here, so I don't know what they are missing. 

Here I am, trying on one of the masks.

That brings us up to us. We're fine. It's really not too different from normal. P was going out for walks, but has not gone out in the past few days -- the mornings are cold. We've got plenty of food in the house. I gave up trying to repair the back of the cardigan and started to make a replacement. But I don't do much at a time. I think I need to do some hand knitting to keep busy. I made some cloth masks.
I know they are not efficient, but there's something calming about making them. Next on the list is to make reusable disinfection wipes. I've got plenty of fabric to make squares and vinegar, but I don't have 70% or 90% alcohol. I wonder if vodka would do? We don't have that, either, but it might be easier to get at the grocery store. Also, since we might not be able to get together to do our US tax filing, I want to make a tutorial for them.

Speaking of tax tutorials, AARO's tax committee chair, Monte Silver, is organizing tax professionals to create short tutorials for AARO members (https://aaro.org/events/event-videos). So far, he's posted a few for those who have corporations and have to deal with GILTI. Other, more general tutorials, will follow. It might be worth it for some readers to become members of AARO (https://aaro.org/membership/how-to-join).

As of today, I'm going to try to be less online. The constant barrage of Facebook postings is too much.The kids have already turned off notifications from our family WhatsApp group and I agree; it went overboard last week. A daily post, and a little video call is enough. I did enjoy playing yahtzee (yams, in French) with C the other day. She had her dice and I had mine and we showed each other our throws so there was no cheating. She kept score, which is a great activity for addition and learning multiplication tables! I hope we get to do it again, this week.

Now it is time to go outside in the back yard. It's sunny and warm. The plum trees are in full bloom and the cherry tree is just starting to bloom. The plants we bought 10 days ago seem to be thriving and I can't wait to see the seeds we planted start to come up.

Then, lunch. The corned beef I made (from scratch!) turned out fine. My second loaf of rye bread was not as good as the first. It's too flaky. But we got some sandwiches out of it. About half the meat is in in the freezer and the leftover from our sandwiches will go into a "hachis parmentier" tomorrow.

It's all everybody is talking about

Last night, French president Macron also talked about Covid19.
In French, with voice-over in English; 
It was a good speech. So says all the pundits and politicians except Marine Le Pen.
People 70 years old or more are asked to stay in. Within reason. We can still shop for food. This morning, we went to the garden center. I figured that we might as well get the veggies raised boxes in shape for planting and buying seeds and sturdy plants that can live through a light freeze if we get some more. Normally, planting in France is late April and May.
This little ones will not go back to school on Monday; no baseball practice or games until further notice and I bet it's the same for the pony and piano lessons. The parents will work from home or be on "technical unemployment" if working from home is not possible and the president promised that that will be covered. Still, it would have been nice if we could have taken the kids off their backs, but since the whole reason for closing the schools is not that kids are sick but rather that they are healthy carriers of the virus and we belong to the "at risk" population.
Meanwhile, I've still got to finish that cardigan. There is a visible mistake in the back in the ribbed center section. Really, it would probably be faster to take the cardigan apart and knit a new back but for two weeks, off and on, I've been trying to repair it by hand. I think I'm about to give up. But the thought of taking it apart, including ripping back the collar, and knitting the back for the third time is just too discouraging. However, I do have the time to do it. Once that is done, I need to clean the machine I've been using. I received the special brush to clean the unreachable area in the needle bed. I imagine there must be a ton of fluff, there. I think I need to use the other machine for a while -- so it doesn't get jealous! I have plenty of yarn stash to go through. Let's see if I make any headway.
The trip to the U.K. is off. I can't get through to the Eurostar customer service and their website says traffic is normal. However, we have been instructed to stay home and, for such a short visit, it seems ridiculous to risk going and getting stuck in England, to risk taking the virus with us or contracting it there, from the kids.
Stuck at home -- but with a yard. Stuck at home -- but able to go out for walks when the weather is nice. Stuck at home -- with FaceBook. Stuck at home -- but able to go to the corner store to get fresh food. Stuck at home -- but with tons of TV channels with all sorts of programs and YouTube, which can be addictive. Boredom is out of the question. This is not hardship. Not for us.

Moving Day

Not us. It's the Parisian family that is, at last, moving into their new apartment! For the past month and a half they've been in one temporary apartment after another with occasional weekends with us. But tonight, they will sleep at home! I am excited see the new place, all moved in. We did visit a few weeks ago, during the renovation. I thought I had a photo of that, but I guess I don't. I can't find it, in any case.
This morning, after the night, here, they took several of the boxes we'd stored for them. The basement, however, is still full and it'll take several trips to empty it. We have the least needed items, so they don't have to take everything immediately. The basement will seem almost empty when they finish taking their boxes, but it will really be far from empty. I hope we get caught up in the momentum and get rid of some of our junk, too. The last time we tried that, I found my knitting machine. I took it upstairs with the aim to sell it, but it needed cleaning and some parts repair, and by the time I finished, I decided to keep it. I now have two more machines! I also found my old yarn stash, to which I have added rather than decreased. I do want to clean out the basement, though.