Pandemic Daze: What To Spend Money On When You're Not Traveling

 Like many people who are fortunate enough to still have discretionary income, our spending habits have changed during the pandemic.  We've been sticking close to home since March (with the biggest adventure being moving to our new home in August), so travel spending in particular has decreased sharply.

In our pre-pandemic days, we went to New York City pretty frequently, at least once a year.  Every time we went, we discussed the idea of getting a cronut at the Dominique Ansel Bakery.  For the uninitiated, a cronut is a cross between a croissant and a doughnut, which debuted in NYC to great acclaim in 2013.  By "great acclaim," I mean long lines to get one.  While I imagine the line situation must have eventually subsided, we always concluded that we were too tired and stressed out to make a special trip out of our way (and probably stand in some sort of a line) to try a pastry.

I'm not sure at this point when we'll next travel to NYC (or anywhere else, for that matter).  But a few weeks ago, when I was perusing the food section of the NY Times, I noticed a story about how the Dominique Ansel Bakery was going to start shipping cronuts, at least for a limited time.  Scott and I decided this was our chance to try them.  I signed up for emails to alert me when they were ready to start taking online orders.

I saw the first alert email about 20 minutes after it landed in my inbox; I clicked on the link and found the cronuts had already sold out!  About two weeks later, I got a second alert.  I was faster that time, and managed to land a box of four cronuts.  I got a bit of sticker shock when it came to shipping, however.  Overnight shipment for the cronuts ended up costing nearly as much as the cronuts themselves!  I considered dropping the whole idea at that point, but felt like we were already too intrigued by the idea of ordering cronuts.  Plus, we hadn't been spending money on travel.

The second surprise was that even after ordering, we had about a two week wait to receive them.  They finally arrived late yesterday afternoon.  Here's what we got:

According to the literature they sent with the cronuts, flavors change every month, and are never repeated.  Our particular cronuts are filled with chestnut ganache.  And they are delicious!  But, I probably won't order them again.  There's the expense factor, of course.  Also, as delicious as they are, they are almost certainly better fresh from the bakery, as all fried foods tend to be.  It also turns out that four cronuts is a lot for two people--they aren't huge, but they pack a powerful punch and sit like lead weights in the stomach.  Of course, one day when we aren't social distancing, it may be easier to go in on a box with two other people, thereby limiting both the expense and the calories.  But I think in the future, I might be more receptive to visiting the bakery in NYC, whenever I may go again.

The Cliche Of The Lost Sock

 So many jokes have been made about missing socks, especially the notoriously hungry dryers that eat them.  However, the lost sock joke is on us right now.

Hardly a week goes by in our new place without Scott or I having to search for a lost sock.  Sometimes the missing sock is found clinging to other clothing, which, or course, could happen anywhere.  But part of the problem has to do with our current laundry configuration.  

We have a small stackable washer and dryer that sits in a small space sandwiched between the wall of a closet and our hot water heater.  The small size means that we do smaller and more frequent loads of laundry, which means that sometimes we'll find the "missing" sock in our next load.  Socks also sometimes fall by the side of the washer/dryer unit.  It's hard to see when this happens, and retrieving these lost socks involves the use of a flashlight and one of those grabber tools (which, tellingly enough, the previous owners were kind enough to leave for us!).  

I lost a sock yesterday.  Unfortunately, it's a sock I like.  In recent years, I've upgraded my socks, and no longer buy the sorts of multipacks that you can find at places like Target and Walmart.  My feet are more comfortable with the nicer socks, but naturally, losing a more expensive sock seems like a bigger problem than losing a cheap sock which probably didn't have long for the world anyway. I looked through my hamper and carefully checked all the clothing that went into the dryer with it.  Nothing.  I looked along the sides of the washer/dryer with a flashlight and still didn't see anything.

In desperation, I started running the grabber tool along the sides of the washer/dryer to see if I felt anything soft.  I did!  I grabbed it and pulled it up...only to find that it was a sock that didn't belong to either me or Scott!  It was a colorful sock with owls printed on it, the sort I would remember if either of us had a pair.

I'm hoping my sock will turn up soon, so that I can use it, but I'm cheered to think that it's probably not lost forever, at least.

Getting Rid Of The Boxes

 Finally buying a home after years of renting has felt very liberating.  We've had so many addresses over the years, some of which we stayed in for a long time, and some of which we stayed in for just a few weeks.  The common denominator was always that I knew we would be moving on.  I know there are people who rent for their entire lives for a variety of reasons, but I always knew that we were ultimately looking to buy someplace, once we knew where we were going to be for the long run.

"Moving on" is of course a euphemism for sorting all of your worldly possessions, filling trash bags, making multiple runs to donation centers, and, of course, packing boxes.  In my experience, way more boxes are needed than you think, and if you have to buy them, they can be expensive.  When we moved in to our last place, we kept some of the moving boxes that didn't get too beaten up.  We flattened them and hid them in closets and under the bed.  We did this primarily because we didn't know how long we would be staying there, but in the end, we stayed for four and a half years.

There are also the boxes that come with large pieces of styrofoam that are perfectly contoured to cushion whatever item was stored in it.  We kept quite a few of those, too.  After all, we wanted to protect our sewing machine and food processor in transit, didn't we?  Naturally, these boxes take up much more space than regular moving boxes, since the styrofoam can't be flattened.

Then there are the reusable sorts of boxes--the plastic storage boxes and the suitcases.  We had quite a collection of the latter, owing to our time working in Kazakhstan.  

Anyway, one liberating aspect of putting down roots is that we got rid of nearly all the boxes we had been holding onto!  The moving boxes were the first to go, and we got rid of them as we unpacked them.  Then we got rid of the boxes with styrofoam.  I felt almost arrogant throwing them out--how did I expect to pack these items for the next move?  But there may or may not be a next move; what we have very definitely right now is limited closet space.  The last ones to go were the plastic storage boxes and the suitcases.  We did a purge of possessions so that we would need fewer plastic storage boxes.  As for the suitcases. we almost always do carry-on when we travel.  We kept our carry-on suitcases, one large suitcase to share as needed, and a duffle bag that folded up into the suitcase.  All told, it's probably still more suitcases than we truly need (especially at the moment, when we're barely going anywhere at all!).

I must be in for the long haul with this home.  At this point, I couldn't pack up even if I wanted to.

Breathing A Sigh Of Relief

As is the case for many others, the lead-up to this election took a toll on me.  I voted very early, and then tried to limit my consumption of coverage.  On Tuesday night, I drank some chamomile tea and went to bed early (where I proceeded to toss and turn for much of the night).  And then the next morning, we still didn't have any answers.

All of which leads me to say that I am breathing an enormous sigh of relief right now.  Not just because I'm a Democrat and someone from my party won, but because I think Trump has been so completely destructive and divisive.  I shuddered to think what another four year term could bring.

Four years doesn't sound like a long time, but a lot can happen.  Looking back on my own life, since the 2016 election, I have had three jobs, attended four universities, earned one graduate degree, mourned the loss of one beloved pet, adopted another beloved pet, and bought a home.

A lot can happen to a nation in four years, also. I think it suffices to say that within less than one year, 237,000 Americans have died from COVID.  That is a staggering number, and likely would have seemed staggering even if it had been spread out over four years.

I don't know what a Biden presidency will bring, but I think it's fair to predict far less drama, far fewer tweets, and a move to bring people together rather than sow discord.  At this point, that is enough to give me hope.

Pandemic Daze: Getting Back On Mass Transit

 I may have mentioned this on the blog before, but if not, I'm an adult who doesn't drive.  I got my license when I was 16, and I know the basic motions of driving, but in terms of driving safely on a highway, or even crowded surface streets, I'm not sure I'm the best person for the task.  I've had brief periods of picking it up again, but the skill has never really stuck.  I typically use a lot of mass transit, and then use Uber for times when mass transit is too inconvenient or if I get into some sort of a jam.

As a result, it has felt very strange to have not taken any mass transit since mid-March, on the last day I went to my internship during my last semester of grad school.  We lived near a Metro station at our old place, and we are even closer to one now.  But I haven't been going to all that many places since the pandemic started.  Also, at least initially, Metro was practically begging people to stay home and not take their trains or buses unless it was absolutely necessary.  I knew I would be back one day, though.  I'm definitely not one of those people who is glibly predicting the demise of mass transit; after all, before the pandemic consumed all of our attention, we were discussing the disastrous impact of climate change.

Today turned out to be my day.  I took a basic life support class this morning.  Scott drove me to my class, and I thought I would take an Uber back home.  But then I saw how walkable the area was between the building where my class was being held and the nearest Metro station, and decided to go for it.

I ended up getting somewhat of a Metro double whammy.  When I arrived at the station, I discovered that it was closed, but that they were offering free shuttle bus service to the next station.  So I got to rejoin the world of mass transit by taking both a bus and a train.  It felt strange because in the pre-pandemic days, I would have been on top of things like weekend station closures.  When you take Metro all the time, you usually see signs telling you about upcoming station closures or delays.  But not having ridden Metro since March, I was thoroughly out of the loop.  I had plenty of money on my SmarTrip card because I had lots of places to go in early March, before life shut down on us so suddenly.

The train itself was fine.  At least late morning on a Sunday, there were few enough passengers that it was very easy to socially distance.  Everyone I saw was wearing a mask.  I don't know how many opportunities I'll have in the near future to take Metro again, just because I don't have that many places to go right now.  But it was nice to experience a tiny piece of my pre-pandemic life again.

A Gift Finally Enjoyed

 Over 40 years ago, on the day I was born, one of my aunts and her then-husband bought me a bottle of wine.  They used the label on the bottle as a sort of gift tag, so it was easy to distinguish from any other bottles of wine my parents may have had around.  I think this is a clever gift for a baby, provided the parents have space to store it.  It spent decades tucked away in my parents' linen closet.

The one funny thing that nobody could have predicted is that I'm not much of a drinker.  I'm not a complete teetotaler, since I will drink, but I have a hard limit of one drink per occasion.  Often, on occasions when I drink, I'll do something like have half a beer and let Scott have the other half.  I like the taste of some alcoholic drinks, but they're not as much of a treat for me as some other things (like chocolate!).  I also don't seem to get the buzz that most people get from drinking.  And, even at my advanced age, I've never truly been drunk.  My recollection is that nobody remembered the bottle of wine by the time I turned 21 (which happened when I was studying in Mexico anyway), and even if anyone had, I wouldn't have necessarily made a beeline for it because being able to drink legally just wasn't that big of a deal for me.

It did resurface at some point, though, and my parents brought it up a couple of times when I visited.  Finally, maybe a year or two ago, they asked me to take it with me when I left.  I took it, and it sat on my kitchen counter.

Then we decided to move.  There is nothing quite like moving to make me thin out my belongings, and I decided that this bottle of wine shouldn't move with us.  So, I decided to give it a try...and it tasted really good!  I was surprised by how good it tasted to me, since as I said, alcohol is typically not a big treat for me.

We've been drinking small amounts of it with the chocolate we eat for dessert most nights.  The flavors go well together, and it's fun to think of people picking out a bottle of wine for a new baby.  I'm glad I'm getting to enjoy this gift at long last, after all these decades.

Pandemic Daze: The Triumphant Arrival Of The Chinese Toilet Paper!

Remember the early days of the pandemic, when a few people were hoarding massive quantities of toilet paper for the sheer joy of ensuring that nobody else had any?  As I wrote at the time, I wasn't initially concerned because timing had worked out so that I had just purchased a 24 roll pack of TP right before people started panic buying.  But as time went on, and we didn't see any appear on store shelves, we became more concerned.  At that point in time, we started looking online more regularly.  Scott lucked into buying some TP made by American brands and shipped from somewhere in the US that arrived reasonably quickly.  But before that happened, I ordered an unfamiliar brand of TP from China.

This TP was slated to arrive anywhere from April 24 to May 15.  That window passed.  Several weeks thereafter, I contacted the seller, asking for my money back.  The seller got back to me, and essentially pleaded for me to not demand a refund, saying that they had given my package to the international courier a long time ago, and citing imminent financial ruin if they had to refund my money.  They promised to send me a second package of TP in return.  I grudgingly agreed.  I didn't know if their tale of financial woes was legitimate or not, but given the state of things, it seemed plausible.

Many more weeks passed, but this long-awaited TP finally arrived on Monday!  I was surprised when I saw the package.  Given that it came from China, I couldn't think what else it could be, but it seemed awfully small for 24 rolls of TP.  Then I opened it, and found 24 weird, adorably tiny rolls.

Here is a picture of one of the rolls next to one of our regular rolls for scale:

And check out how large its cardboard tube is:

If nothing else, this Chinese toilet paper is providing me with good entertainment, and I think the individually wrapped rolls will make halfway decent packing material for our probable impending move.  After that, I suppose we could try using it for its intended purpose, or maybe distribute the rolls as pandemic gag gifts.  Either way, I got a kick out of receiving a package I had long ago given up on.