Tag: Grocery Shopping

  • Busy Day Ahead

    I am in a hurry today. I was up at the normal time and turned the coffee maker on. I got the wife up and then the kid. Made the kid breakfast, packed her lunch. The wife got clothes out for the kid and helped her get dressed. Me and the kid brushed teeth together, put on shoes and we headed out for the school drop off with the permission slip for the upcoming field trip. I got her to school on time; said hello to her teacher and some of the other parents. Said my goodbyes and returned home. Then I made a meal plan for the week, and made a grocery shopping list. Then I balanced our check book, moved some money around, updated all of our bills to make sure everything was getting paid on time. I still need to shower and head out to Trader Joe’s before the old people and the young professionals pick over the store. Then I need to put the groceries away, make lunch for me and the wife, and then head back to school for the pickup. Hopefully the kid will want to go to the local park and play with her friends which will give me an hour or two hours to read, and write in my journal. Then home, play with the kid, make dinner, watch tv together, and then make the kid take a shower. Then that leaves snuggle and story time, with the kid hopefully going right off to sleep. Which will allow me to clean up the kitchen, and get the coffee ready for the morning. Then the wife and I will get an hour to catch up and fall asleep watching something on tv. And that’s pretty much my day.

    But before I head out to the store, I need to give myself a few minutes to write this blog thing.

    And all in all, most days, I’m pretty happy with this. Some days I do wonder if I am missing out, or I wonder if I could be doing more in the world. And then there are days where I am really terrible at this stay at home dad thing.

    This is where I am and I am happy. I know this because I don’t dread waking up in the morning.

    Okay, off to the store. Maybe there will be a Tottenham blog later in the day. We’ll see.

    (AND, please be kind and rewind and also take a moment to give a like, share, comment, or the greatest gesture of all, follow this blog. Please, it would mean a lot to me because I don’t want to start making TikTok videos.)

  • Not Enough Time

    I am stealing a moment to type this out. I didn’t do my homework last night. My homework being to make a meal plan for the week, a grocery list, and writing a blog to be posted this morning. What I did was binge three episodes of Ted Lasso with my wife, and then fell asleep on the couch.

    So, now I am running behind. I still have to do the aforementioned tasks, but I also have to take the kid to her dentist appointment later today. As this is titled, I don’t have enough time to get everything done.

    And I had two really great ideas for a blog. One was about showing how over the past 30 years homage, parody, and ripping-off in media have become blurred. The other was how I was completely judgmental toward guys who work out all the time at the gym. Both I thought were great ideas.

    But now I have to go.

    Maybe I’ll get to it later in the week.

  • Coronavirus: Day 17, Laundry Run

    Balance still seems to be our issue. We are trying to make sure that we keep some sort of routine during the week including doing the online classes for the kid’s school, while I’m trying to work my job, and then there is the wife who is trying to hold the family structure together, and still looking for a job, though even she will admit that it feels like a fool’s errand at this point.

    To keep that normalcy feeling, I did laundry today, which meant that I had to go out to the local laundromat. I was not excited about doing this, but just like grocery shopping, even the most mundane tasks now are sprinkled with the possibility of infection and disaster.

    Our local laundry place did have signs up saying that only people doing laundry were allowed in, and to please not bring extra people. They even suggested washing/sanitizing your hands upon entering and leaving. And most importantly, don’t hang out while your clothes and washing/drying. I went first thing in the morning, right after they had cleaned the place, and by following their rules, it did feel like it was a clean and relative safe activity. Oh, I did wash the hell out of my hands when I got home each time. I’m still trying to be safe.

    But what I did notice, and have noticed for the past few days on the streets of NYC, is that there is an undercurrent of aggression. The people who ask me for money aren’t taking no for an answer. I even had a guy ask me for a lighter, which I didn’t have, then he accused me of lying which spurting out obscenities at me. Even in line for groceries, it’s like people are looking for a problem to have with you.

    I think I am beginning to see to toll that this is having on the psychology of the City.

  • Coronavirus in NYC: Trader Joe’s Edition

    Again, 24 hours later and things have changed yet again in New York.

    I wouldn’t say there are a great number of people out in gloves and masks, but they are now clearly present wherever you go in the City.

    When I took the kid to school this morning, it was clearly noticeable that other students were absent, as parents were keeping their kids home. Also, the school was eerily quiet. It was a very rainy and cold morning, but even still, that school usually is boiling over with exuberance and energy in the mornings

    The wife and I both feel that it is only a matter of time before NYC will close all of the schools. As such, we might need to hunker down in the apartment for a couple of days. Which meant, we had to go grocery shopping to stock up.

    We are taking this seriously, but not THAT seriously. Not panic shopping over here.

    We headed down to the Trader Joe’s on West 93rd, but before we went over there, we ran some other errands, and walked around that part of the City, as we are rarely over there. Either way, by the time we got to the Trader Joe’s, there was a line out the door, that did wrap around the block. This wasn’t our first “end of the world, let’s go to Trader Joe’s” shopping experience. We dealt with Superstorm Sandy, and the Kincade Fire in California.

    So, we got in line, and it did move rather quickly. (Trader Joe’s does know how to handle a large crowd.) When we were in the final stretch of the line so we could get in, the wife and I noticed that people were taking pictures of the line. Clearly to prove to the rest of the world what happens on the UWS when shit gets real. So, being the mature and stoic people that we are, we attempted to make the most revolting faces that we could when we saw someone taking a picture.

    You’re welcome interwebs…

    It took about an hour and a half to grocery shop, which normally it takes us an hour, (See; Trader Joe’s knows how to handle a crowd.) and the people in there were all behaving normally for New Yorkers. To me that says, people are being cautious about all of this, and not panicking.

    Now, every day this week, things have changed, and not for the better. Sadly, I’m not hopeful for things getting better. I mean, it will get better and we’ll all get through this, but we haven’t hit that turning point just yet.