What is the new normal?

Bridal Veil Falls

This last week was met with a lot of changes and uncertainty. The first week of homeschooling for my wife and working in an office with only two people in it. Using the hour lunch time to get away from the office to socialize and let steam off. A freaking EARTHQUAKE. That is just a few of the changes.

Homeschooling

Homeschooling has been so crazy. We have a boy that apparently does a lot better when someone else is teaching him. He gave my wife a lot of trouble this week, but things got a little better the end of the week. I think they are getting use to it and I’m hoping this week will get better!

The teachers are doing a good job and keeping the kids going and there is plenty of work for them to do and some are complaining it is too much. It’s rough

Work Environment

Everyone showed up to work on Monday a little curious at how things were going to play out. We all met to discuss our plan and what people can expect. There are 8 of us there in the office and we all have our own room. We decided that if anyone wanted to work from home they could, but everyone decided they were fine working secluded in their offices.

Monday night someone reported that their sister came in contact with someone who came in contact with someone who tested positive with the virus. It’s a major Kevin Bacon situation, but he really didn’t want to get anyone sick, so he decided to stay home. This decision sparked a major scare and everyone decided they should work from home the rest of the week.

I on the other hand, have a school going on in the home and wanted to limit my distractions, so I stayed in the office. The office was so boring this week, but I was productive. I had to give a training on writing unit tests for NodeJS APIs and it was odd to do it all online without a room of people. Very interesting.

Social distancing

I love socializing and i’m going stir-crazy staying in all the time. I miss going to church each Sunday and visiting with my neighbors and all the friendships I’ve made there. I’ve been calling my friends, but seeing someone in person is a lot better. I can’t wait until things are back to normal, so I don’t have to fear being close to someone anymore. 🙂

We have tried to get out of the house over the weekend, but it is a little different. My wife was so ready to get out of the house on Friday, so we stopped at Purple Turtle to grab some food. We then drove up to a lookout and ate dinner and watched videos on my phone. After that, we drove around Alpine/Highland looking at some of the huge houses up there. It was different, but we all had a blast. The boy sat in the back playing games on the phone and checking out the houses with us.

Saturday afternoon, we went up to Bridal Veil Falls and viewed the sights. We were doing a virtual scavenger hunt that is going on, so we had fun getting pictures of various things and having a blast all while not interacting with people. The park in Provo was a bit crowded, so we had to take off.

Earthquake

Wednesday morning, I was getting my boy up for school sitting on his floor and all of a sudden, the house started to shake! It sounded like a huge truck was driving by, but we don’t live by a road with a lot of traffic. I ran downstairs to make sure my wife was OK after the shaking stopped. I ran outside to check on the gas and structure. It was small, but it freaked me out and I wasn’t sure what to do. There have been a ton of aftershocks since then, so it’s crazy. I guess it is normal, but I wouldn’t know. We are not prepared and that freaks me out.

This week

I’m going to start working from home this week and see if I can do it. I cleaned my office up and made room for me to work from home. The 3 monitors on my desk are going to be missed, but I can make do.

We missed the stores closing on Saturday, so I have to go get a few groceries. I’m hoping the numbers start going in the other direction with the infections and thins get better!

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