My agency gave Stop Work Orders to pretty much everyone including contractors like me at the same time as so many others were hit (we had weathered the previous one due to a different funding stream, which in theory should have protected us this time, too, but law and precedent seem to be out the window). I used up my remaining vacation hours and am currently on Leave Without Pay, to be furloughed next week (I think I will still be able to look internally at my company and have email for a while, but I'll have to start paying the health insurance premiums etc.). I have savings, but it's getting to me and I sometimes feel blue or squirrelly. Highlights since then:
My sister's wedding in Minnesota!
The sister who had been living with me for a few years moved to Minnesota this summer and then in October, married her formerly long-distance boyfriend. She invited most of her siblings and we and one of the nieces flew there (I masked and used Astepro antihistamine, which reduces COVID infections --
JAMA article) to celebrate, and we had a great time. I arranged a VRBO rental so we sibs & niece could enjoy time together in a house setting instead of hotels (we split the costs), and it was great to be able to wander out from our rooms in the mornings and have relaxed coffee/breakfast whenever we wanted (e.g., some at 7, some at 9) and to use groceries or get take-out/delivery instead of trying to find any MN restaurants with outdoor seating in October. We were lucky with the weather, relatively warm and clear, though the groom was disappointed the MN colors weren't out yet (some of his friends came from out of state, in addition to his local friends -- one of whom I knew from a book discussion Zoom and was glad to meet in person). The wedding itself was lovely, in a park, with a Justice of the Peace who gave an excellent and appropriate homily. Some of us had gone to the Minneapolis Institute of Art the day before, which had some
GREAT exhibitions and was right by a lovely park. We also walked around a lovely park (boardwalks and marsh!) near the VRBO the afternoon after the morning wedding.
Halloween!
My friends in Philadelphia have a neighborhood reputation for going all-out for Halloween, but they really exceeded themselves this year. They bought the row house next to theirs, intending to rent it -- it's already set up with a lower and upper unit, but they're going to have some work done inside first. So we decorated the entire lower unit (I brought up my decorations, too; other friends also came from NJ and helped) and let trick or treaters progress through it from front door to back yard (the really little kids just got the least-scary front room). The day after, one of the NJ friends taught us the board games Forest Shuffle (which I'd tried online but hadn't gotten the hang of, before) and Cascadia, both of which I liked. They had also brought real bagels from NJ (not just bread in the shape of bagels, which is all I've found in this state). We also had some backyard fire pit time.
Tree demolition and carving!
This summer, a neighbor had asked me about a couple of trees in my front yard and then the city came by (I suspect the neighbor had called them when I said I wasn't sure if they were mine or the city's to deal with) and we discussed who was going to pay to remove the dead tree and trim back the live tree that was threatening some wires. The city reps used tape measures from the porch to the trees and said they thought at least the dead tree might be the city's (the live tree was 50/50), but the city would probably send a surveyor to confirm. Months passed, and then Monday, with no notice, a landscaping firm showed up and took down the dead tree (large logs to be removed later; I think I'll be on my own to deal with the stump). They said the city sent them, and they were going to trim the live tree, too, but they left without doing that, and today showed up with a crane (it's a very tall tree) and carved back a lot of the branches, not only the ones near the street and wires, but the other side's branches that were coming very close to my roof. There's still a lot of the live tree left, but its shape is much more vertical than it used to be. I hope it lives, but since the city was paying for it all (!) and I knew it needed to be trimmed back SOME (and trimming only the street side would have made it lopsided and might have encouraged it to fall onto my house), I didn't argue. Anyway, since I'm not working, I was able to hang out and watch much of the process (I was careful to keep well back, out of their way) both days. It was very dramatic!
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