Since I first wrote this post during the pandemic quarantine in 2020, our poor Frodo has sailed off to the Undying Lands. 😊
Who is that masked man?
Report from the Sirota Quarantine Cave: Jacqueline and I are doing fine. We’ve both been “sheltering in place” since she got back from a trip to Utah in mid-March. I suppose we’re more cautious than most, but hey, when they refer to “high-risk groups” they’re talking seniors (check) and people with underlying health conditions (double check). So yeah, we prefer paranoia over dying any day. As of this writing there are over 240 Covid-19 deaths in San Diego County, the majority of victims over sixty, and all with underlying health conditions. Case closed.
But we’re not exactly suffering. With masks in place we take walks around the ’hood, with most neighbors passing by just as cautious as us. (After all, this is a 55+ community.) We each make one trip a week to one of the local supermarkets. And we cruise the coast every so often to get a whiff of ocean air. At home we have hundreds of books and nearly 1,200 DVD and Blu-Ray movies, as well as Netflix, Acorn, BritBox and Prime Video. Jacqueline is missing her trips, and I am seriously missing baseball. But we’ll get through this. Meanwhile, we’re in no hurry.
Frodo is on the job!
We had a housekeeping crew—three or four people—routinely clean our abode, but we postponed the service at the outset of the pandemic. We’ve been doing it ourselves, which is not our favorite thing. To alleviate some of the work, Jacqueline ordered one of those robot vacuums. While setting it up, the electronic beastie pulled away from me and glided over to the charging dock. I moved it a bit farther away and it did the same thing, and ditto a third attempt.
This prompted me to say, “The Ring is trying to get back to its Master.” Jacqueline thought this was hilarious.
We named the robot vacuum Frodo.