Charlie

I actually filed and paid our 2019 taxes by check on March 13 (silly me!), so I assume we will be getting a direct deposit into the account on which the check was drawn. Right?

I suspect that many men who become aware of their sexual attraction to other men at a young age become introverted simply in self-defense. I realized I was homosexual in adolescence and was very shy until my very early twenties. Once I was out of college and on my own in a gay urban community, I became more self-confident socially, and was lucky to find a partner and friends who basically taught me how to at least behave like an extrovert, even though I still am in that "Introspective Introvert" category.

Back in December, I used a ton of frequent flyer miles to purchase a one year membership in the Star Alliance airport lounges, because I expected to be doing a fair amount of leisure flying in 2020. I haven't used it, I'll bet I never get to use it at all, and I'm sure there won't be any refund.

Although I have always thought of myself as something of a loner, this crisis has made me more aware how much of the meaning I get from life is from social interaction. Before I retired, I looked forward to having more time to sit at home alone and read and listen to music. Instead, I moved to Southern California and ended up spending my most enjoyable hours playing tennis and socializing at a tennis club. I now live in a 55+ community, where I have also discovered the pleasure of playing Bridge and other games with groups of residents. All those activities have suddenly been stopped by government orders, and I have lots of time to sit at home and read and listen to music...but I don't feel like doing that now.

It sounds to me as though this young man is really concerned about the fact that his partner would go back to paying for sex if they were to break up. Does he have a nagging worry that the older partner finds him desirable basically because he is putting out for free?

The young often engage in dangerous behaviors because they feel that the consequences they are warned about won't happen to them--whether it's AIDS, gonorrhea, addiction, rape or unwanted pregnancy. With COVID-19, the news is basically reinforcing the belief that they are going to be OK, because only older people are going to get really sick and even die. And many of the young never get wiser as they grow older, if they were lucky enough to escape those consequences when they were young.

They look like something out of a Tom of Finland illustration.

I get gas frequently in Oregon, and I have never considered tipping the attendant. I grew up in the era when you were not supposed to pump your own gas, so every fill-up was done by an attendant, and I never knew of anyone tipping the attendant in those days, so why do it now, especially since they usually expect you to do all the other things that they used to do, like clean your windows.

After many days of cold, wet windy weather, suddenly today the sky is blue, the breeze is light, and the temperature is rising. As I walked to the mailbox just now, all that I kept hearing in my head was, "Pourquoi me reveiller, O souffle du printemps...?"

NJ and OR are the only states without self-service.

I was in Texas in February, before the price of oil stated to fall, and I paid $2.39 for hi-test at one station in a small town in west Texas. At the time, I was paying almost $4 in Palm Springs.

If I remember correctly, that was actually a line in one of her movies.

The one constant in the supermarkets I have been to here in Palm Springs the past two weeks has been long empty shelves in the canned foods area. The other day at Albertson's there was a single can in the Progresso soup section: split pea with ham. There were a dozen cans of sardines, and I bought half of them (I love sardine sandwiches). Eggs and yogurt have also been hard to find.

Blush:oops:. Yes, I was a literary scholar, back in the days when Eliot was considered one of the greatest contemporary poets.

Plenty of straight men were raised by single women with no significant male figures in their lives. Freud's theories were interesting intuitions about patients in his personal practice, not scientifically grounded or supported by any rigorous research on his part. As always, correlation is not proof of causation. The fact that my spouse and his next younger brother are gay and their two younger brothers are straight, and all four were raised in the same household by a strong father and an equally strong mother, does not not prove or disprove anything about why the four brothers turned out the way that they did.

T. S. Eliot, "The Waste Land." "April is the cruelest month, breeding Lilacs out of the dead land, mixing Memory and desire, stirring Dull roots with spring rain." I used to be able to quote a lot more of it, but it goes on for another 400 some lines. "Shantih. Shantih. Shantih."

Actually, I was somewhat serious. Many elderly people in particular cannot groom their own feet, and need to go to nail salons to get their toenails cut. Leaving one's feet ungroomed for a couple of months is not healthy. Making an appointment with a medical professional for that kind of procedure seems inefficient.

When a close friend and former colleague died several months ago, I started trying to find former colleagues who I thought might want to know of his passing. Since he retired almost 30 years ago and I retired almost 20 years ago, and both of us then moved far away from where we had lived and worked, I had lost touch with many people. It took a lot of work to find some of the people I was most interested in finding, and many of them turned out to be deceased, too. For the latter, Ancestry.com turned out to be a useful source of information. For the living, Beenverified.com surprisingly turned out to be the most useful. Since my late friend and my spouse have the same first name, one of those I contacted by email sent me a lovely sympathy card and flowers before he realized his mistake.

Unfortunately, pedicures are not considered a reason for nail salons to stay open as an essential business. One can only get one from a podiatrist. One of my neighbors found a podiatrist available to do one for her the other day.

That should help with maintaining social distancing.

Purell is being sued by several plaintiffs who claim that the company has no scientific proof for their claims of killing 99%of viruses. Even the CDC says to to use hand sanitizer only when soap and water isn't available.

I saw a couple of articles today about people in rural areas becoming upset by the number of urban dwellers trying to escape to places they consider "safer" from the disruptions of COVID-19. They are afraid that a) they may be bringing the infection with them, b) they will use the limited resources available to locals, and c) if they become ill, they will overwhelm the scarce medical facilities in most rural areas. At Joshua Tree, the small town near the national park, people from LA are taking long term contracts on the rentals usually used by short term visitors to the park. You may find that the neighbors of that Virginia farm are not as welcoming as you expect.

I avoid the "senior" hours, because seniors are a majority of the population in my area. It's easier to shop at other times.

Eat breakfast Walk dog Read Internet Eat lunch Walk dog Get mail, pay bills Read Internet Walk dog Eat dinner Read Internet Walk dog Go to bed Two mornings per week I vary the routine by shutting off the computer and playing tennis with friends. Some afternoons I take a break from the news and play Rummikub with a neighbor. Shopping is erratic, depending on what I need.

How could I have forgotten the "rubber bands" hanging on the back of my bedroom door?!