[Day zero and day 1 of the Virus Diaries]
We had our first ration rage incident last night.
For context, you should know that 8 year-old Louisette has inattentive ADD and she takes Ritalin. She barely eats as a rule—here is the aftermath of a typical breakfast:
That is lemon butter and honey on white bread. She has eaten one bite and then declared herself full. Obviously, we’re long since given up on the idea of a healthy breakfast and we just try to get her to eat SOMETHING. Ritalin is known to suppress appetite but this is a typical breakfast even when she hasn’t taken her tablet yet.
One thing that DOES happen in the late afternoon/evening is that the effect of the Ritalin wears off and she is suddenly very cranky and starving. And also super duper vague (as in, you can tell her there’s a new toy for her on the kitchen bench and she won’t be able to hold the thought in her head long enough to walk through the house and get it).
A meal that’s easy enough for me to make and that she consistently likes is frozen chicken nuggets and fish (it’s a victory if we can even get her to have hot chips). She has 3 nuggets and one battered fish fillet, with tomato sauce, mayo, and lemon juice. I have stocked up on nuggets but we only have two fish fillets left. So last night I added a nugget to the tally but only gave her half a fish. While it was cooking I told her that I had done so and explained why, and she seemed fine with it.
When she collected the cooked meal, however, she screamed and sobbed because her piece of fish was so small. Chris calmed her down and she ate her dinner in the end. But that was our first rationing experience and it sure wasn’t pretty. Poor Louisette. She is an extremely sweet and gentle girl but coming down off Ritalin severely heightens her emotions. She and TJ are both slightly flagged (not tested yet but Louisette is on a waiting list) for being on the autism/asperges spectrum as they’re very very particular about certain things, especially Louisette eg how her shoes feel when she puts them on, and ALWAYS having a hat on outside even if it’s literally just to walk to the car. (The one exception is when swimming.)
I don’t cope well with rationing either, so there are fun times ahead.
Yesterday Chris and Tim were both feeling much better and I had some errands to run (picking up and dropping stuff outside people’s houses). My junk food supply is very strong but low on non-chocolate lollies (I’m intolerant of pretty much everything but if I eat a variety of things I think the effects are less). I really love Kool Fruits (they’re like round mentos) and there is a particular local shop that usually has them, but didn’t have them the last two times I went there. So I thought I’d go in real quick and see if they had any, since no one is making me quarantine myself and it would be a very quick visit with theoretically less people that a big supermarket.
It was unusually crowded, so clearly I wasn’t the only one targeting a smaller shop in hopes of getting some food supplies. I bought a LOT of lollies and 1 litre of lactose free milk. I’m quite anxious about running out of lactose free milk because it’s one thing I’m NOT intolerant to. I have enough for about a week, and it’s extremely hard to get at the moment.
Chris has actually gone to work today, so I’ll most likely ask him to attempt to do some shopping too. I would rather he stayed at home, but at the same time I can see that it’s important to not abandon society altogether just yet. And I want more STUFF.
We have settled into our coronapocalypse outfits. I wear pajamas; TJ wears undies and nothing else; Louisette wears undies, a dressing gown, and gumboots.
With the exception of hangry Louisette, everything is quite peaceful. My kids love staying at home doing nothing. You should have seen the joy on TJ’s face when I told him we’d skip school for at least the rest of this week. Here’s an approximation:
I’m doing some school work with the kids each day (less than half an hour, which is actually plenty for most primary schoolers). TJ is in Kindy, which like many schools is doing Jolly Phonics, in which letters are introduced in roughly the order of usefulness, and each letter comes with a song and a dance move. I was able to quickly figure out where he’s up to (‘h’) and do that with him. The only hard part is that he desperately wanted to keep going. Adorable, non?
Today is ‘r’.
Louisette is in Year 3. We’ve already been practising Spanish numbers as her class has been doing Spanish for years whereas she’s only just started. I only got around to doing school stuff with her quite late yesterday, so I stuck to Spanish because I knew that even hangry Louisette would enjoy that. Today we’re doing clocks—every time I get up, I adjust the hands of a clock and ask her what time it is on my way past.
Uh oh. Tim just had diarrhea. Still no sign of fever, but that’s ominous. Or not. He had dried fruit on his breakfast, which is a classic diarrhea-inducing food.
Speaking of my cute little disease vector, here’s a fun fact: he always insists on having company when he goes to the toilet. He then sings songs (“In the Jungle” is a favourite at the moment; I love hearing him sing it around the house… Louisette does not), asks maths questions (“Mum, what’s 7 half of?”) and talks about computer games (yeah, that’s gonna be a thing forever I think). Last time he went to the toilet he decided it would be funny if he threw his undies around and played with them like a kitten with string.
And now he’s singing, “Peach is a stinky butt-butt” over and over. (He’s playing Mario Kart.)
Kids are gross, is what I’m saying.
Chris and I decided long ago that if any member of the family got covid-19, we would separate the house into two zones – diabetic me in the master bedroom and ensuite; Chris and the kids in the rest of the house. At the moment we’re doing a soft version of that. Chris sleeps in his study and only uses the main bathroom. I only use the ensuite. This is great for me, because I get the biggest bed to myself. (This of course inspired the classic pre-divorce question, “Daddy, why don’t you and Mum sleep in the same bed any more?” which amused me because I’m odd. And because we’re actually not getting divorced. Side note: I bet divorce rates go up after mandatory quarantining. I recommend quarantining your house in sections, for both health and sanity.)
Hmm. Tim just had diarrhea again. It’s a rare symptom of covid-19 and there’s still no fever in any members of the household, but it is a bit suggestive that he’s had a sore throat and diarrhea.
Now that I’ve told you that my 8 year-old still has tantrums and my 5 year-old is just a windmill of gastro, here’s a little dialogue I overheard yesterday:
Louisette: TJ, is it all right if I go into your room and play with your blue monkey toy?
TJ: Sure. Actually you can keep it forever.
What little angels, right?
Last night I dreamed that I ended up with twelve orphaned kittens that I oh so graciously offered to find homes for—hoping, of course, to get Chris to agree to keep at least one.
I have dreams about getting another kitten at least once a week. If I can think of a decent excuse to get a second kitten in real life, I will grab it with both hands. But of course we have Zipper, and one cat is sufficient for survival. With a cat, my immediate family, chocolate, books, and the internet, I can survive most things.
Here’s Zipper yesterday, annoyed as usual that I’ve gotten the camera out.
And I noticed yesterday that my potatoes have sprouted. Which is good!
About two weeks ago I set aside three potatoes (ie one of my rare safe foods) to plant a “The Martian”-style food source in our front garden. We’ve actually grown potatoes there before, so I feel mildly confident that I can make them grow. Of course, things escalated a lot sooner than I expected so it’s unlikely they’ll have time to grow before all of Canberra is on lockdown. Still, I’m proud of them. Especially since the basil plant I bought a week ago is already looking melancholy.
Anyway…
Resource of the day:
Fried Rice
Ingredients:
Cooked rice
Any vegetable you got, cut up small.
Any meat/eggs/tofu you got, cooked and cut up small.
Soy sauce if you have some.
A dessert spoon full of sugar.
Any oil you got.
- Fry in a pan.
- Eat.
Tim is currently liking fried rice with peas, corn, egg, and soy sauce. (Can you tell that that’s what he eats when Chris and I are eating maple marinated salmon?)
Recommended donation of the day:
Order some Chinese delivery or takeaway food. Restaurants may well close soon, and apparently some Chinese restaurants are being avoided due to people being racist. Eat that yummy yummy food while you can! Order lots, and freeze some for later. I know meat (and for that matter potatoes) are in short supply at the moment, so this is a handy way to stock up on protein.
Recommended personal action of the day: Disinfect (but don’t wet) your phone and keyboards.
Recommended hoarding item of the day: Order hot water bottles online. If a lot of people are staying home with heaters on (when the weather gets colder), we may have power outages. Save electricity and protect your family by having something that only requires ten minutes of electricity (to heat the water) every coupla hours. In fact, most hot water taps are sufficient for a hot water bottle even after the electricity is off (as you have hot water stored up in your water heater).