The Earth still spins, and I am still here. Armed with nothing but a rapidly dwindling Netflix queue and a cabinet full of snacks and beverages I don’t need, I have managed to make it another week within the four walls aside from the daily trip to the mailbox and evening sojourns on the back deck to pretend I’m vacationing in the rainforest rather than just overlooking a backyard that has become horrifically overpopulated with ivy and kudzu. Without my mobile phone I wouldn’t know what day it is and wouldn’t have a chance if asked the date; the calendar is just a mash of goo now. But somehow, I press on, and so follows the continuation of these, the End of the World Journals.

Tuehurday, April 0.75, 2020

8:00am: I have moved my “office” from the dining room to a new set up next to a window in the den. It’s a larger room so the anguish of my staring into monitors manipulating spreadsheets all day is less likely to stain the walls and furniture, as was happening in the dining room. The window also lets in natural light, that thing I used to revel in for hours a day in parks, trails, and sporting venues.

8:30am: The power has gone out two consecutive days here in the early morning hours. Each time for greater than three hours. My Corona brain has me thinking that this is the part of this Quarantine Opera where the zombies are introduced and then I make sure the doors are locked extra tight.

9:45am: It’s currently raining. The cleansing rain revealed two vehicles in front of the house that we’d forgotten we owned as they were covered by Mt. Everest sized mountains of pure Georgia pollen. The vehicles, however, are of no use as I have forgotten how to operate a car since I haven’t driven in what seems like several years.

11:30am: Working now by this window in the den has put me closer to my neighbor’s backyard which means I am privy to all of the construction noise from, yes, the chicken coop. And if you think that I’m trying to BS you about this chicken coop, check the sounds from the work site.

Perhaps one day I can be the househusband to a ridiculously highly employed woman too so I can just say, “F it, I’ll build a chicken coop today.” On second thought, no, I can’t be trusted with that kind of free time.

As a note to future generations reading this journal. I LOVE my neighbor, he’s a cool guy. If he weren’t a New Orleans Saints fan he’d be ideal.

2:45pm: The mother person, the only person I’ve seen (aside from my neighbor from over the fence) comes into my workspace. She sits quietly and then asks with wanting eyes if she can go to the store. I peer over the monitor and tell her no. Flatly and sternly. She pouted and went back to her room. Finally, after decades, retribution and sweet revenge for being told I couldn’t go to that party at my friend’s house that one night in high school.

4:00pm: I have reached a month since I have seen the smiling face of my barber.  I lament the reflection looking back at me in the mirror but I find solace in the fact that men all over America are suffering a similar fate. I imagine the first day the barber shop opens will look like an open casting call for Sanford and Son in 1973, disheveled afros and beards everywhere. 

4:05pm: Man, I should be a barber. Talk about an immediate financial windstorm! 

5:00pm: The monthly test of the tornado siren just started. Any other time I wouldn’t give this a second thought, however, present circumstances abounding, I’m starting to think they’re making sure it works for the next time the power goes out and, you know, zombies.

7:30pm: I had cake and ice cream two days ago. I had cake and ice cream again yesterday. I am currently eating cake and ice cream. I haven’t had this much cake and ice cream since a 6 foot animatronic mouse sang “Happy Birthday” to me at Chuck E. Cheese for my 10th birthday. Funny thing is, I don’t really like cake and ice cream, except during quarantine, in which case, bring it on.

10:00pm: My nightly “vacation” on the back deck came to a shocking end tonight. An owl, not a friendly Harry Potter message carrying type, but an I’m-hunting-for-something owl hooted LOUDLY and swooped about 20 or so feet overhead (owls are huge and creepy-looking by the way). The animals are emboldened, human absence from outdoors has accelerated their takeover plans. I fear a war is brewing. For now, I will go indoors, I don’t want this saga to end with me eaten by a family of owls. I’m too cool for that.

Until the next…I remain.

~Skrap