Charlie

The city of Palm Springs yesterday imposed uniform restrictions on all grocery stores. People who do not wear face masks will not be served. A store with more than one entrance must use one as the only entrance and the other as the only exit. An employee must be stationed at each door to monitor how many people enter and exit; the store can contain no more than 40% of the legally allowed number of customers at any one time. Someone must clean each cart that enters the store. Aisles must be marked with one way directions, and distancing must be maintained as much as possible. Checkout stations must be marked with six foot divisions. Checkers must be masked and must be separated from the customer by a plexiglass shield (that is something that not all stores will be able to implement immediately). This morning at 9:30 I stopped at Trader Joe's in Cathedral City--there is none in Palm Springs, so they don't have to follow PS rules--because I saw there were only three people on line to get in. Everything mentioned above was being done except the one way aisles, but I noticed that many customers were automatically lining up and moving along up one side of an aisle and down the other side of the aisle, which only creates distancing in one direction. However, it's a store that only has a couple of clearly defined aisles, so the one way designation would be very difficult to produce in the rest of the layout. It's also a rule that requires the shopper to plan ahead and know exactly where everything is in the store, so I think it may be the hardest one for customers to follow.

It's OK, the guy is just checking for crabs.

Rub-a-dub-dub, three men in a tub.

Seeing this old thread revived caused me to re-read it all, and this post reminded me that since you wrote it five years ago, through the miracle of the Internet I recently happened to find the high school year book of my first partner, who like you went to a public high school in Texas. It was fun to see his photos there, in which he looks so potentially gay to my jaded eyes. I was amused to see that his classmates had voted him "Most Sophisticated" in their senior class of 1958--little did they imagine what that would entail in the remaining 33 years of his life!

Whenever a guy wanted us to do it in front of a mirror, I always seemed to lose interest. Different strokes for different folks.

+1. But I can't imagine anyone would ever call you "judgmental"!

This morning I played doubles tennis again for the first time since our courts re-opened. Unfortunately, in the blazing sun it was 96 degrees, and we have to wear face masks. We managed to play for an hour and a half, but I was feeling pretty shaky by the end, not only because of the heat but because it is hard to breathe properly with a mask over nose and mouth.

Just now I tried to give myself a haircut with scissors, and suddenly I realized: that was my father in the mirror looking back at me! I need to find a barber soon.

You sure do, sweetie!

We just got a notice from our hospital listing all the things you should go to the ER for in addition to COVID-19, including the things you just named. I don't want to die of a heart attack because I'm afraid of catching a virus!

The temperature in Palm Springs at the moment (6pmPDT) is 100 F. I hope that discourages the virus from visiting if restrictions are loosened.

OMG! You certainly were versatile!!!

The community college in which I taught had a nursing program which was probably the best program in the school. Whenever I got a whole class of student nurses, I felt I had lucked out, because they were the most enthusiastic and responsible students I had, year after year.

Because of California's attempt to limit the use of plastic bags, for the past couple of years grocery stores have been required to charge customers who don't bring their own bags for the use of the store's bags. That law has apparently been suspended, because some stores will no longer let you bring your own bags into the store, so you have to use the store's plastic bags. I would much rather use my own bags, and pack them myself.

OK, today I tried Ralph's (Kroger) for the first time in a couple of weeks, and I was aware that not much was being done about social distancing: no one way aisles; no markings for people to stand while waiting, except at checkout; no directions about bagging; no protection for checkers other than masks; someone cleaning carts only at one of the entrances. My local Albertson's is much more serious; they even make one line for customers (6 ft apart) checking out, and an employee assigned to directing those on line to the next available checker. However, Ralph's did have two spray bottles of Fantastik in the cleaning supplies area, and one package of Charmin on the tp shelf.

I love HGTV, but I'm sure no new episodes of most of their programs are being produced ("Christina Sheltering on the Coast"? "Our Quarantined Town"? "House Hunters Watch Video Open Houses"?). They're going to be scheduling even more re-runs than usual.

He is obviously permanently logged on here.

It is worth a trip to see Fallingwater if you are interested in architecture, even though it is not that easy to get to.

Our HOA management just sent an email announcing that our private tennis and pickleball courts will reopen starting tomorrow, but we must observe distancing and wear face masks.

Riverside county announced yesterday that they will allow golf courses to reopen for recreational play (no tournaments), but with all sorts of restrictions on the players and course management. They also said tennis and pickleball courts can reopen, but players must wear face masks. When tennis was still allowed, we were managing to keep social distancing, but it seems to me that would be much harder on the smaller pickleball court. I will definitely need a different kind of mask than my usual one to play tennis.

I shop at both chains in Palm Springs (Albertson's/Von's and Ralphs), but every one of the stores seems to change it's patterns from day to day, and I don't shop frequently enough to make any valid comparison.

It swelled with joy.

Someone wrote to our local paper asking whether they should soak their produce in clorox.

I think it's sexy, too, but it must be hard to cover these days with a face mask.

Me, too. Make sure you use your handle here in the card.