This week, we began to lose our collective heads as our state decided that just about everything in Texas can open again. People have gotten over the initial fear of this disease and decided that it’s not worth being cautious about. Or that it’s all a big conspiracy, but that’s an entirely different kind of crazy.

In any case, my family continues to stay home. We continue to be part of the population that doesn’t succumb to this idiocy.

To repeat: If your mental health is at a point where you cannot bear to hear more about quarantine stuff, skip to the bottom of this post for a list of positives and highlights and Nice Things. We all need some of that right now!

Friday, May 1st
Local count: 1477, 48 deaths, 683 recovered. This is our largest case jump so far – 103 new cases – however, 91 of those are from the jail outbreak and so it’s actually the lowest community bump (12) that we’ve yet had. We also received word that (hopefully soon) Texas will be getting increased numbers of tests/test capacity. In sad family news, my mom informed us that my grandmother is not doing well. She’s having pains like before a previous heart attack (2015), and she feels that her brain is not working well any longer. She’s also finally admitted that taking care of my grandfather, who’s suffered from severe dementia and diminished physical/mental capacity for the last year, is now too tough for her alone. Hopefully soon she’ll be agreeable to getting some help in. In the meantime, she’s spending her energy on putting her affairs in order. We knew this day was coming, and we hope it’ll still be some time before either of them pass away so that we can come out of quarantine to be with family while we grieve.

(2018 at their 65th wedding anniversary party)

Saturday, May 2nd
Local count: 1585, 48 deaths, 725 recovered. Oy. Today’s jump was even bigger than yesterday’s, and 43 of those 108 new cases are in the community rather than the jail outbreak. I can only guess that these are coming from the folks who got sick of quarantine around Easter and began to defy orders. I see sadness in San Antonio’s future. But, as I said last week, I’m just trying to live my best life under these new circumstances, which today included a long run at the park (mask on when near others!), a Harry Potter Wizards Unite community-day-from-home event, a new book (finally found one that’s held my attention!), and lots of hanging out with my kitties.

(Clockwise from top left: Atticus, Ash, Gavroche, Nimi, Jojo)

Sunday, May 3rd
Local count: 1613, 48 deaths, 756 recovered. Not much news today. Still no word on when we’ll get testing for folks without symptoms. I spent the day reading with a break for yoga – a much-needed lazy day.

Monday, May 4th
Local count: 1652, 48 deaths, 756 recovered. Our local health authorities are claiming that all the epidemiological data says that we’ve flattened our curve here and have left our peak behind us, despite the new outbreak at the jail and the low number of tests. I guess we’ll see. Too many folks are out now without masks as a big f-you to the rest of us. My eyes keep rolling out of my head.

Tuesday, May 5th
Local count: 1677, 52 deaths, 802 recovered. Our governor, in his infinite wisdom, bowed to political pressure and is opening up hair salons and other cosmetic businesses on this coming Friday despite it being only a week past the first wave of reopening and the two-to-three-week lag time in virus data from that reopening. This is absolutely insane. Hair cuts. Really, this is the thing people are concerned with. How first-world-spoiled-brat can you get? I guess if you’re going to die, you should have nice hair and nails for the funeral, eh? It was not a good day.

Wednesday, May 6th
Local count: 1761, 53 deaths, 834 recovered. The city is finally opening up walk-up testing sites that don’t require an appointment. It’s unclear whether or not asymptomatic folks can get tested here, and city leader kinda keep dodging the question as if they’re not sure either. // Discovered today that Ambrose isn’t doing the class work for at least three of his classes, one of which (English) he has to pass or he won’t graduate. The kid despises online school and he’s just putting off everything. I hate getting involved and contacting the teachers directly, but that’s the way it’s going to have to be. In better news, I ventured out into the wide world today to see my chiropractor for the first time in two months, and was very pleased at how well they’re keeping people apart, requiring masks, wiping stuff down, etc.

Thursday, May 7th
Local count: 1805, 54 deaths, 867 recovered. It was a big news day locally for COVID19 reports. The city passed a resolution calling slang terms for COVID19 (like “Kung Flu”) hate speech. Ted Cruz, our lovely senator, blasted our city council for doing so. (I despite Cruz with a passion, and this is only another reason to do so!) Our governor, continuing in his infinite wisdom, decided that public pools could open tomorrow at 25% capacity, as if lowered numbers IN WATER would keep this virus from spreading. As if people are going to keep six feet apart at a pool. Thank god the city is choosing not to open city-owned public pools!! Lastly, schools are starting to think about what they’re going to do in the fall given the uncertainty of this pandemic. Rotating schedule for students so it’s partly online and partly in person? Expand and hire more teachers for smaller numbers in class? Continue to do distance-only? Very tough questions.

This is not a good graph. I know that it includes asymptomatic tests from our jail outbreak, but I really feel like it’s premature to open up hair salons, pools, and so many other businesses. We had a total increase of 431 cases this week, by far our largest weekly increase including our previous outbreak at the nursing home. We also had an increase in total weekly deaths this week (6). I don’t know what our local metro health is talking about in saying that we’re on the other side of the curve. It feels a bit like we were actually in a small dip before the larger climb of a mountain.

Positives and Highlights and Nice Things
Trying hard to see positives when our state is f-ing crazy and May is my own person relive-trauma-month, oy… So here goes:

• a new pillow that feels amazing and will hopefully help me improve my insomnia
• fresh pineapple
• HPWU community day
• Jason made the most delicious soup that we dubbed Hipster Soup: vegan, gluten-free, coconut-ginger-lime sweet potato soup with lentils and kale. Ha! Despite the ridiculous name, this was an amazing soup and there were homemade gf crackers to go with it.
• binge-watching Upload
• my weighted blanket arrived!
• enjoying my last run of Week 7 of Couch to 5K
• finishing a book I enjoyed and moving on to another book by the same author that I’ve also enjoyed so far

So what’s happening in your part of the world? I hope all your states are being smarter than Texas.