Category Archives: Journal

I would like to thank the people who have offered comfort for my fear, fear related to Attila having to return to the workplace, being at high-risk-for-complications, and Covid-19. Your feedback and warmth are very much appreciated!

Fear is a healthy response to danger, the danger is real, I value my response because it facilitates staying alive. Fear keeps us sanitizing, keeping our distance from people, ensuring a healthy diet, regular exercise, getting enough sleep (working on that!), and taking the every day precautions needed to keep the virus out of our lives. When Attila was off work, these fears were fairly easily managed, we had a great deal of control and agency.

Fear is a little more challenging to deal with when Attila goes to work, where he does not control where he stands, where other people stand, who is in the washroom when he is in the washroom, who enters the building, if someone forgets to put their mask up after bringing it down after being in an isolated area, what kinds of risky behaviour (e.g. family parties, we see them all around us) other workers are participating in, well there are just too many variables that we either have no control over, or no knowledge of. So it is going to take more time to develop a workable system of denial about the risks, what kinds of information to push to the back on one’s mind and ignore for the sake of sanity, and what kinds of information require research, consideration, and even action. This will take some time, and is subject to constant ongoing change as the workplace evolves in various ways, e.g. a change in tasks and juxtapositions of fellow workers. This fear is a dance with danger; it isn’t comfortable, nor should it be. This is much more difficult for Attila than it is for me, in that it makes being in the workplace very high stress. My challenge is to deal with the feelings of helplessness that accompany the fear, and as I watch Attila look increasingly pinched and tired with each passing day.

Attila’s workplace is certainly not as high risk an environment as a long-term care home, but it is as high risk as some of the manufacturing plants that have experienced outbreaks and shut downs. His employers have now responded to the health threats with altered and safer work stations, temperature and symptom monitoring, mandatory masks supplied by the company, a lot of hand cleaning stations, and other measures. Although this is reassuring, and one cannot imagine what further precautions they might take, it is not a guarantee against contracting the virus from an infected individual, in the enclosed spaces where they all work.

It is my opinion that a way to reduce the death rate (per capita) in Canada is for the federal government to offer the option of early retirement with full pension to individuals who have comorbidities that put them in danger for complications, and are 60 or over. This group, between 60 and 65, with comorbidities, has to work to pay the bills and survive. This group is not receiving the protective measures that I think are necessary for their particular situation. This would free jobs for younger people who feel they are facing little to no risk. Companies need the support of the federal government to offer such a choice to this compromised older group of employees. (I have suggested this to our Prime Minister, Justin Trudeau.)

Of course, the focus on the tragic profit based, long-term care home situation is paramount, but the additional measure I suggest would allow many vulnerable people to remove themselves from the workplace, stay out of harms way, flatten the curve, and reduce the death rate per capita for Covid-19.

The New England Journal of Medicine has an interesting opinion piece on this issue:

https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMp2013413?query=recirc_mostViewed_railB_article

Worldly

Weather

19°C
Date: 10:00 AM EDT Thursday 4 June 2020
Condition: Mainly Sunny
Pressure: 100.9 kPa
Tendency: Rising
Temperature: 18.9°C
Dew point: 15.0°C
Humidity: 78%
Wind: SW 13 km/h
Visibility: 24 km

Quote

“It is only prudent never to place complete confidence in that by which we have even once been deceived.”
Rene Descartes
1596 – 1650

Good news on the hydro bills, time-of-use billing has been postponed again until October 31st, but the price jumped from 10.1 cents per Kwh, to 12.8 cents per Kwh. It could be a lot worse! I hate time-of-use billing because hydro gets to decide when I can do what around the house, which feels incredibly intrusive.

The weather certainly is changeable! The hot and humid weather we had last week has moved on, and in its place we have cool, windy, sunny weather. I prefer the cool sunny weather, it is lovely for sitting in the sheltered porch, working out of doors, having the windows open in the heat of the afternoon, and Mist Cottage maintains a lovely 21C day and night, without the aid of the heating/cooling system.

Our new routines are beginning to take form, changed sleeping schedules are the hardest to deal with. I go through an extended period of sleep deprivation when the sleeping schedule changes, so these shifts are going to take me a long time to adjust to. When I add the stress of Attila working with people in an enclosed space, our health issues, and Covid-19, that makes it all the more difficult to adjust to the sleeping changes. I managed four hours of solid sleep last night, which is pretty good. All things considered, we are off to a good start.

Food is another big adjustment. Attila needs portable food, good nourishing food that will sustain his energy during his shift at work. So flour milling and bread baking become more frequent, and Switchel is made weekly. Switchel is a great, healthy, high energy beverage, made with apple cider vinegar, ginger, and sugar. I cut down Attila’s sugar consumption in the Switchel by replacing half of the called for amount with stevia, it tastes the same to us.

All of Attila’s projects except the garden are on hold. My projects will progress as they are, only more slowly because I am taking on all of the domestic responsibility again, such as bread making, beverage making, meal preparation, and soon garden produce preservation. It will take us both time to find a new equilibrium with our schedule, and become accustomed to the daily worry over Covid-19. We will get there, but this is going to take time.

The garden is a source of great joy for both Attila and myself. He does almost all of the work of course, it is his project, but I have some input into what gets planted, and where it is planted. And we get a lot of pleasure sitting on the back porch, surveying the new life in the garden, the birds, the squirrels, and the rabbits.

There are still a few jars of last year’s Dandelion Jelly, so none needed to be made this spring. The rhubarb is doing very well. So far we have harvested about 5 pounds of rhubarb, and baked one Rhubarb Crisp, and two Rhubarb Upside Down Cakes. Today another Rhubarb Upside Down Cake will be baked. The rhubarb harvest is plentiful enough that there will be some to freeze for winter baking.

Last summer a hanging planter of ever bearing strawberries was purchased. The runners were planted in my raised bed and they did well considering the crowded conditions in that raised bed. All in all that one purchased planter yielded about one quart of strawberries last summer, not the best strawberries, but nice nevertheless. In the autumn the plant was removed from the planter and planted in one of the ash log raised beds, and the runners were moved from my raised bed to a hugelkultur bed that Attila built this spring.

Worldly

Weather

14°C
Date: 9:00 PM EDT Monday 1 June 2020
Condition: Partly Cloudy
Pressure: 101.7 kPa
Tendency: Falling
Temperature: 14.2°C
Dew point: 7.9°C
Humidity: 66%
Wind: WSW 13 km/h
Visibility: 24 km

Quote

“It’s easier to put on slippers than to carpet the whole world.”
Al Franken
1951 –

When we bought this broken down, abandoned, very small house 10 years ago, it was a “tear down”. We have been renovating for this whole time, mostly addressing structural issues.

Covid-19 means our income, which was just a few dollars above the poverty line, has dropped way below the poverty line. We are managing to buy our food, and garden supplies, keep up with the mortgage and monthly bills. But long-term, I think our remaining, larger renovation plans are cancelled, probably forever.

One of my long-term wishes was to update the original kitchen cabinets. They were hand built, and sturdy, but the cupboard doors don’t close and the drawers drop down when you open them, and they don’t provide a lot of storage. We make them work.

Accepting that we are probably never going to get around to updating the kitchen cabinetry, and knowing that we need more storage and counter space, I decided to put function over form, budget over aesthetics, and ordered two new cabinets that were on sale, to complete the kitchen. These babies make a HUGE difference for day-to-day food preparation and preservation!!

They look beautiful to me, as I see them through the lens of making our time in the kitchen so much more enjoyable. We now have room for food in the kitchen, that was previously stored in the basement, which will reduce my time conveying items up and down a narrow, tricky stair. We now have drawers that don’t flop down when you open them, and fall out when opened too far. We now have cabinet doors that close. I guess none of those things are a very big deal in the larger picture of human life on earth, they are just a very big deal to me right now. My kitchen is completed, bring on the summer and fall harvests for preservation!

Worldly

Weather

23°C
Date: 11:00 AM EDT Saturday 23 May 2020
Condition: Mainly Sunny
Pressure: 101.8 kPa
Tendency: Rising
Temperature: 22.7°C
Dew point: 10.1°C
Humidity: 44%
Wind: NNE 15 km/h
Humidex: 24
Visibility: 24 km

Quote

“If we attend continually and promptly to the little that we can do, we shall ere long be surprised to find how little remains that we cannot do.”
Samuel Butler
1835 – 1902

The weather was lovely today, perfect for sitting out on the back porch and enjoying the sunshine. Perfect for gardening (Attila), and perfect for watching gardening (me)… my kind of watching sports!

The long weekend is over, it was a busy one. We stayed very close to home, as we figured others would not, and we intend on keeping safe.

We did, however, venture out once in the car. A month or so ago I had ordered a red currant, a high bush cranberry plant, two strawberry plants, and a horseradish plant. They were finally ready for pickup. The company had advertised delivery to vehicle, so we thought we would take a chance. We brought all of our protective gear, just in case we needed it.

It went smoothly enough, I called the nursery and prepaid. Then I called from the parking lot, and the fellow left the cart with our order by the back of the car. We discovered he had forgotten the horseradish plant I had paid for, so I phoned him from the car and he brought it over and left it at the back of the car. Attila loaded everything and no one came near us. It was a successful adventure.

We were the only people taking such precautions. When we arrived there were about six people standing about together, chatting, at the entrance to the nursery, and a staff member was chatting less than six feet from another customer. Two older women wore masks, that was refreshing, but they were only protecting others, not themselves, and the others we saw didn’t give a toss.

On Saturday I milled two 1 gallon jars of whole wheat flour. On Sunday I baked five loaves of bread, and one loaf of 10o% whole wheat Squash Spice Raisin Bread. I bake exclusively with whole wheat flour now, that I mill myself. On Monday I baked 9 100% whole wheat hamburger buns. That was my first attempt at hamburger buns, and we were very pleased with the results!

Today Attila and I canned 13 500-ml jars of Coleslaw. Attila chops and prepares the vegetables. I prepare the syrup, the equipment needed for canning, and can the coleslaw. It is a lot of work, but it is a great go to for the vegetable portion of a meal. We have already consumed 10 jars of Canned Coleslaw, and I imagine we will be making more by the end of May. The only expensive ingredients is the red pepper, the rest is as cheap as it gets, cabbage, carrot, and onion.

We are growing cabbage and carrots in the garden, fingers crossed we get a harvest!

Attila has been off work for two months now, and isolated for two months. I’ve been self-isolating since February 27th. The isolation seems normal now.

Good news from our pharmacy! They now deliver, one day a week, and so we do not need to brave the store to get our medications. What a relief that is. When last we had our prescriptions refilled, Attila had to go into the store to get them, they didn’t deliver at that time. Now they do. Now, if only the local grocery store would wake up and provide delivery service! I live in hope.

Worldly

Weather

20°C
Date: 7:00 PM EDT Tuesday 19 May 2020
Condition: Mostly Cloudy
Pressure: 102.5 kPa
Tendency: Falling
Temperature: 19.8°C
Dew point: 3.5°C
Humidity: 34%
Wind: NNE 16 gust 28 km/h
Visibility: 24 km

Quote

“We cannot direct the wind, but we can adjust the sails.”
Bertha Calloway
1925-2017