My COVID19 Journey

[FitzTheRuke]

Good luck, Fitz.

Thanks. I appreciate it.

Good luck to you. You have a bunch of people rooting for you (from the other end of an Internet cable) to kick this thing. Keep in touch.

I knew ENWorld posters would have my back!

Red Green

Good Ol' Red Green

Hey, Fitz. Hang in there.

I'll do my best, thanks.

Wow, I hope you recover quickly! I'm in pretty good shape, exercising regularly and eating right, but I have asthma, so I'm pretty anxious about catching it.

I hope so too. Don't get it, please. Stay safe.

* * *

It occurs to me that my original post didn't give YOU ALL anything to do other than feel sorry for me, or ask questions, so I'm gonna put this up there: Out of a sense of community, and to keep me entertained in my quarantine, if you've got nothing better to do and you are inclined, tell me about yourself. Where you're from, what games you like or dislike, what you do. I mean, you can keep it vague-ish (I guess I kind of did, even while revealing some personal stuff). It's up to you. But I wouldn't mind getting a conversation going here, other than just get-well wishes (which are nice). Any takers?

Oh also:

UPDATE: Monday March 23 - Well, as I expected, in the afternoon I got worse again. When it comes to fever, I hadn't had more than a minor one for a few days. I got medium-bad (I mean, I've had worse, but it wasn't fun, let's say). Though I had a nap, I didn't shake it, and for the first time, I lost my appetite for dinner. I had chills over night.

Today - So far, I'm really weak, but as usual, I feel a little better than I did last night. Though not as recovered as some of the mornings. I'm not buying this "getting better" thing this time, though, and I'm gonna stay in bed as much as possible.

 

[The Green Hermit]

I'm from Washington State, along the southern coast. My family is a giant game family, but D&D is our only non-video/computer game RPG. We will try just about anything we can get our hands on, though.

Right now, to make things Super Fun, we are prepping our house to sell and we are in the process of buying another one. For some reason, all our little projects keep on turning into BIG projects. Fortunately, Home Depot is still open. Other than that, we are making sure we get our workouts in every day. Along with the whole staying healthy thing, it gets us away from the computers we all work/school on all day now.

 

[FitzTheRuke]

1) I'm from Washington State.

2) Right now, to make things Super Fun, we are prepping our house to sell and we are in the process of buying another one.

1) Not too far away!

2) I feel for you. My family of four is in a 2-bedroom condo. We bought it as a stepping-stone to get closer to my store, while we waited for a larger condo (3-bedroom, bigger footprint) to get built (the new one is a block from my store). That was two-and-a-half years ago. The new one was supposed to be done in October (it was supposed to be done earlier, but October is the latest, which it probably won't make now, though they're still building it). At any rate, I was expecting to sell this one at a profit, in order to afford the new one, which I've only paid 15% down on. Real estate is probably totally borked at this point. Who knows if any of this will happen?

I don't want to go too far down this rabbit-hole, but I really, really feel for you. I hope it works out okay!

 

[Theo R Cwithin]

Thanks for sharing your experience. I really had no idea what the "mild" form of this illness entails, and hearing a first-hand account is helpful.

As for me, I too am stuck in a real estate quandary, since I'd left my home and job a couple months ago on a quixotic quest in search of A New Place to Live Happily Ever After™. But this pandemic thing is putting the kibosh on road-tripping, and city-exploring, and house-hunting until... next Tuesday? The foreseeable future? Kingdom come? No idea.

Now I'm more or less stuck in small-town Texas with just a suitcase and a fistful of dice*, in a land of red dust and socially-distant scrub brush, where the internet cuts out whenever the wind blows.

Spoiler

The wind always blows.

As far as the pandemic goes, I'm in decent shape and single, so I'm not too concerned for myself... but I'm staying with my parents in a rural county with a high older population and limited medical facilities. For that reason, I'm hesitant to travel around and risk bringing The Bug back with me. Hearing your account makes me think I'm right to be a overly cautious.

In the meantime, I'm clawing at the walls, completely uncertain how to get on with life. Reading ENWorld is a nice little escape from the worrying and overthinking. It's nice to hear others' trials and tribulations and triumphs.

So be well, Fitz, and thanks for starting the thread!

* Because, of course, no self-respecting gamer is ever caught without a handful of dice.

 

[FitzTheRuke]

1) Thanks for sharing your experience. I really had no idea what the "mild" form of this illness entails, and hearing a first-hand account is helpful.
2) As for me, I too am stuck in a real estate quandary...
3) Now I'm more or less stuck in small-town Texas with just a suitcase and a fistful of dice*

1) Yeah. Mild's pretty bad. I mean, apparently some people carry it without getting symptoms (which is good for them, but terrible for other people when they pass it around unknowingly. Also, I suppose someone could be still "mild" AND be a lot worse off than I am. Yikes.

2) Sorry to hear that. The uncertainty of... anything... is hard to take. One of my friends has theorized that people who live with anxiety and depression are actually handling this situation better than people who formerly had not a care in the world. I don't know how true that is, but I'm honestly not doing too badly, even with everything crashing down around me. YET. I mean, it really depends on where things go from here.

3) I love selling (and owning) dice. Whenever a person comes in looking for a present for a gamer, I say, "You can always get them dice!" To which, the ignorant always answer, "I think they might have dice" or "I don't know if they already have dice." To which, I answer, "Seriously. You can never have too many dice."

Thanks for sharing! I found your writing style very uplifting.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

I’m down in the D/FW Metroplex. I’m 52, and living with my 74 year old folks (for a variety of reasons) AND a 70+yo family friend who had fallen on hard times in early 2019.

I also have 2 aunts in their 60s living in the area, one with her youngest son, the other with he 60+yo fiancée.

My Dad’s an MD, but his practice was shut down by the operating group until things normalize a bit. So he’s largely staying home, doing paperwork.

That leaves me and my 25yo cousin as the best options to run most of the errands for the 3 households right now. No need to expose the others unnecessarily.

Last night, I cooked a @22lb turkey & some veggies. Soon, I’ll be delivering half to each of my aunts’ places.

Side note: Kroger’s store brand turkeys are going for 65¢/lb for 10-14lb birds. That’s cheaper than most meats available in stores, and Kroger had piles of them. That could make for a few meals for not a lot of money, which is only going to be increasingly important as the current crisis continues. I’ve already put 2 in my maternal aunt’s freezer for future use, and will probably get more.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

This is that meal I mentioned: an oven-steamed turkey & veg I did last night to split between my two aunts’ houses.

 

[The Green Hermit]

Side note: Kroger’s store brand turkeys are going for 65¢/lb for 10-14lb birds. That’s cheaper than most meats available in stores, and Kroger had piles of them. That could make for a few meals for not a lot of money, which is only going to be increasingly important as the current crisis continues. I’ve already put 2 in my maternal aunt’s freezer for future use, and will probably get more.

I would definitely be stocking my freezer. My family devours turkey all year long, so we buy a bunch of it whenever we can find it. Fortunately, we also have two freezers (and will get a third after we move).

 

[FitzTheRuke]

This is that meal I mentioned: an oven-steamed turkey & veg I did last night to split between my two aunts’ houses.

Looks delicious! MMMmm Turkey.

 

[Umbran]

Out of a sense of community, and to keep me entertained in my quarantine, if you've got nothing better to do and you are inclined, tell me about yourself.

Sure. I'm in Boston. I'm one of the board moderators and have been.. for a long time. I love and play D&D, but it is by far not the only game I play. Right now, for my regular group I run an Ashen Stars game, which I think is about to wrap up. I play and NPC in the occaisional live-action game. I taught my goddaughter how to play D&D a couple years back, which was really awesome to see, especially when she decided to run a game for her own friends, and it remains one of their top activities.

And, I'm working from home, and my wife is showing upper respiratory symptoms. Maybe it is covid-19, maybe it is bronchitis (which she also often gets, and the initial symptoms are nearly identical). But, she doesn't qualify for testing, so we just kind of have to sit here waiting to see if she's going to get really bad or not...