PREPARING TO DEAL WITH THE CORONA VIRUS IN AN ORGANIZED MANNER

I am not a medically trained person, but I have to talk about the corona virus as it related to being organized. So, do not take anything I say as medical advise, I am just talking doing things sensibly and what I have learned from life over the decades.

I tend not to panic quickly. My husband leans the other way. So I have been working very hard at not saying anything to get him started. But there are realities to the situation that must be dealt with.

I was suppose to go to NYC to a client this week to deliver her corporation taxes and help her mail them out, do her books, and calculate the amount of of sales and sales taxes owed on them for the year ending February 29 so I could go home and file her sales taxes online – as they have to be. I was not happy at the thought of going to Manhattan even before some cases of the corona virus came to the NYC metropolitan area – including in my home county, but I needed to go. My husband was in a panic of my going. I told him that I had figured I would wear a pair of disposable plastic gloves from my car, on the subway and walking until I was at the client and inside. I would then turn the gloves inside out as I took them off and throw them out. I would then put on a second pair – carried in my briefcase – to come back to my car and toss them out the same way when I got back to my car. He was still upset. I finally gave in and mailed the tax returns to the client after calling her and telling her I would do so. I also asked her for her February sales so I could prepare and file her sales tax return. I completed the corporation return and it was mailed to her this past Monday – due the end of the week on Friday. I then prepared and filed her sales tax return and told the state to debit her bank account (the only way to pay the sales taxes) on this coming Monday, so that on the off chance she did not have enough money in her bank account she would have time to get some money into the account. Today I telephoned her and she had just received the tax forms so I was able to help with the returns and I also told her how much to subtract from her checking account for the sales taxes. Breath a deep sign of relief. I was sure that the tax forms would go astray or she would have would have problems dealing with them alone. While I wanted to ignore the threat of the Corona Virus and go to work – I was realistic about it and made my husband feel better.

Last Sunday when we went to Costco and Bjs as we do for something to do on Sundays, they were no longer handing out samples at Costco for fear of the corona virus and large sections of the store – mostly paper goods - were empty. He had planned on buying more toilet paper despite our having at least half a huge package we bought a couple of months ago there and was starting to panic that they did not have same. The store was also limiting how much of certain items one could buy. We drove up the road to Bjs (a similar type of store) and were able to buy his package of toilet paper. They were not as sold out as Costco was. Apparently there have been major runs on toilet paper. When husband brought up buying more I mentioned that we had most of the package yet – but he insisted. Per a segment on a news show, apparently it is considered a comfort item that makes people feel better to have an excess of.

He has also been looking for hand sanitizer (We have two large, unopened bottles, plus a started one, the smaller bottles that we transfer it to for use, two very small bottles that we carry in our pockets (which normally do not have to constantly be refilled – but right now are refilled nightly), and, as I pointed out to him, whatever we have in the house of items like this – is also in our little RV.

Over the recent years we have become rather bad at food shopping. While I used to keep a list on our refrigerator of what I needed to buy, would check for sales & try to buy food items on sale, and would do regular shopping (Mondays for the week, Fridays to fill in any extra for the weekend) that has all slowly disappeared since husband is home with me all the time. We have gotten to the point that other than stocking up before storms, we basically eat lunch (at Wendys) and then go out to buy “something for dinner”. We have gotten to the point where we basically have 3 or 4 dinners we make, buy deli turkey once a week for dinner and eat out (or take in Chinese food) Friday through Sunday. So deciding what to buy and shopping for it without getting him into a panic was not easy.

I brought up the idea after dinner the night before - rather off hand “I guess we should have some extra food in the house just in case.” At lunch I brought up the subject again. As we left from lunch he asked where I wanted to go for the food – we food shop at Walmart Neighborhood Market, at different supermarkets, and at a regular Walmart (same are smaller here than elsewhere) which is next to a supermarket which by default is the one we normally shop at. At the same time that the corona virus is starting to spread – our state's law on stores not using the standard lightweight plastic bags went into effect on March 1. So people are panic shopping and learning to deal with bringing bags (or buying them at the store – although our county was not one of the ones requiring a fee per bag, stores are allowed to charge for the bags – and they do – better we should have a fee as it would be cheaper than stores are charging for the bags) at the same time.

I suggested we go to the Neighborhood Market first as we tend to buy items that do not need to be refrigerated there. It was like it had been announced that a 2 week long snow storm was coming. Shelves and refrigerated cases were empty. (Then again, this store over the past several months has not had full shelves – and cans are often dented and boxes look like they had been stepped on.) We bought what we could find. We were looking for the soups that husband has before dinner (½ can of either Campbells Chicken Noodle or Vegetable soups) or the heavier soups that he likes if we eat lunch home (Campbells Split Pea, or Progresso Lentil) We bought cereal (we have for late night snack) and some items as we could find them – the soup shelves were almost empty so we bought what we could and moved on. I did have enough bags in the store with us for the purchases. (I have been keeping the bags when we get them - and using them for other things - so we have years worth of plastic bags and before that I saved the paper bags. I am combining the contents bags that we use in the bathrooms and bedroom for garbage pails liners so 1- 2 bags are tossed out with the garbage of all 4 pails.) He has started panicking over having hand soup also and this Walmart did not have – any.

We drove to the supermarket and stopped in at the small Walmart next to it first to see if it had the common items – soup and hand soup – that the Neighborhood Market did not – neither did this store.

In the supermarket the “what should we buy to eat” started. I bought at least 2 weeks worth of the foods we actually eat. I had actually come up with 4 meals to be repeated and that would still leave us 6 meals short. We bought eggs – not something we ordinarily eat, but could be used for lunch or dinner or in one of the cake mixes we bought – if we end up stuck in, something to eat that we should not eat, if not – they will keep for holiday dinners. Made sure to buy enough diet soda to last. We bought a loaf of bread = I was actually surprised that they were not out. I knew I was low on some frozen vegetables and we bought some to fill in. (Good thing basement freezer is running again.) Bought some potatoes as I had stews on the list of things to cook.

So we have a good start – but going to the stores and seeing the shelves empty put him into panic mode. He is trying to over come same, but it not easy. We wrote up a new list and will go out tomorrow to buy some more items.

We renewed the only medications we take that were not recently renewed.

We don't plan on being stuck in the house - but if we are, we can go for at least two weeks now. We need to keep up filling what we use to keep the 2 weeks of food in the house.

THOUGHT FOR THE WEEK – Prepare but don't panic. Government divisions in the most countries seem to be acting properly and making decisions as needed and telling people what to do without overdoing it and causing panic.

While instructions and information seem to vary, good common sense is your best friend.

In articles I have read about the world wide flu epidemic  in 1917 there were considerably less deaths in the US and other countries which shut down places that large numbers of people would be than those, such as England, which did not. So avoid crowded places as much as you can.

You know the rest – you have been hearing it on the TV and radio – wash your hands frequently and/or use hand sanitizer frequently. Apparently even just rubbing your hands together vigorously if nothing else is available will help.

We will get through this as people have gotten through epidemics back to the start of history. I hope that you and yours will get this as easily and with as few problems as possible.