PLOG 5: Chili

Personal Log (PLOG)
Summer Vacation: Day 5
Pandemic Emergency Day: 75

My guilty pleasure is eating some canned chili when I don't feel like spending 30 minutes cooking a meal on the stove. I used to think that my taste preference was chili with no beans, but - thanks to the pandemic - I've realized that I also love chili with beans. Back when SHTF (stuff hit the fan) back in the middle of March, I added canned chili and Fritos to my emergency grocery orders.

After the panic buying seemed to be wearing down, the deliver services for Wal-Mart, Target, and Amazon Fresh were still lacking most canned chili varieties, but I discovered Target offered a shipping option; Target was willing to ship things they had trouble keeping in stock in-store. That's when I ordered a bunch of canned chili. Side note: my new favorite chili is Hormel with Angus beef.

For a while I felt like a master of online grocery delivery options. I spent a couple of weeks obsessing over what groceries were and were not available from the different stores. I watched closely. I got frustrated that Wal-Mart would either cancel orders or only deliver half of what was put in the cart. Amazon Fresh, similarly to Wal-Mart, was out of delivery options for a couple of weeks. I eventually figured out that going online right at or after midnight was the best was to get delivery options. I spread the word.

Target's same-day delivery service was my favorite. They delivered, every time. And they mostly got you the items they said were in stock. They won me over, but I am still willing to use whichever one has the products that I want. Blind loyalty to a brand or store would be silly in an emergency situation. One of my friends, who is very brave, goes out in person and shops at places like Costco and tells me that food is mostly in stock now; but many of the options he has found are still not popping up for delivery from the other stores. And meat is still either unavailable or really expensive.

By the way, Wal-Mart's "Great Value" brand corn chips taste just like Frito's to me and make a great addition to some chili and shredded cheese as "Frito Pie" (even if it is "Great Value Corn Chips Pie" instead).

Peace!

PLOG 4: Cooking XP

Personal Log (PLOG)
Summer Vacation: Day 4
Pandemic Emergency Day: 74

As with anything skills-based in life, I now look at cooking as something I gain "gain XP" in (as in "experience points" from an RPG or video game perspective) and "level up" as I get more experience. Basically, the more I cook, the better I get at it. It makes sense.

Thus when I went to make my sausage jambalaya, I decided at the last moment to make it chicken and sausage jambalaya. And it was amazing! I had cooked chicken and sausage gumbo and chicken and sausage red beans and rice, but I hadn't tried the combination of meets in jambalaya. I was glad I did.

Meanwhile, it's Memorial Day weekend and I can't believe what I'm seeing on the news. Tons of people have gone out to beaches without social distancing and without face masks on. They are just throwing caution to the wind. I watched interviews on CNN with people at the beach saying things like "we are all going to die eventually" and "if Trump isn't going to wear a mask, I don't need to either." They have become relaxed in the time of the pandemic. But I don't think they should be that relaxed. Those vacationers are going to return to their home towns and they could be bringing the deadly virus with them.

Peace!

PLOG 1: Pandemic

Personal Log (PLOG)
Summer Vacation: Day 1
Pandemic Emergency Day: 71 (Counting from March 13)

My summer vacation starts today. I live in Texas and have been staying at home, for the most part, for more than 2 months. It's crazy to think about. Technically in the US, President Trump declared a national health emergency back on Jan. 31; but most people didn't notice. It was the March 13 invocation of emergency powers that I think marked the beginning of this nightmare for most people so that's the day I'm going to count from for my pandemic emergency days. That was also around the time of spring break for many schools.

I had been paying attention to the news coming out of China and Europe so I already had extra groceries and such, but a lot of people quickly panicked and bought out toilet paper. I wasn't expecting that. Luckily I keep lots of toilet paper and paper towels and cleaning wipes at home. Many people had spring break vacation plans and refused to cancel them. I went into lock down mode. With a virus out there that could ruin my health, hospitalize me, or even kill me - I didn't want to take any risks.

I'm so lucky that I have my teaching salary. We went into "at home learning" mode and I was able to keep my job, but millions of people are now unemployed. There are people out there struggling just to have money to eat, let alone pay their bills. It's going to get worse as this situation continues because people will run out of savings. I also think the housing market is going to have huge issues.

Looking at the positives of this situation: I no longer eat fast food or delivery food like pizza. I cook all of my meals, which should be healthier (but there's also stress eating from the anxiety of the pandemic). The more experience I've gotten cooking, the more confident I feel as a chef. BTW, I love all of the Zatarain's products. Easy to follow instructions, just add meat, and you have a meal in about 30 minutes that is absolutely delicious; I've cooked a lot of jambalaya, red beans & rice, gumbo, and dirty rice during the pandemic.

I also have more time to read and, now that the school year is over, to write. I spent some time playing Minecraft and playing The Sims 3 (with a legacy challenge in the works). My 2 cats have gotten spoiled that I'm home all the time. They are getting plenty of attention now.

On the downside, I use my school laptop and iPad for everything and they are now blocking Discord. That means I can't play D&D online with all of the people in the Discord communities. I do have a few friends who play over Skype, but it's not the same without roll20 and Discord. It's still fun, but it's just 1 game about every 2-4 weeks. And I'm certainly not going to have people over to play in person like in pre-pandemic existence. Even with facial masks, it's just not safe to sit in an enclosed area with people for hours.

Well that's all I've got for the blog today. Hopefully there will be more good news in future personal logs. Peace!