COVID-19

I remember talking about the coronavirus in January. it was so interesting because we had recently been on a cruise and now there was a cruise ship full of people who were quarantined due to this new virus.  I did not make any connections that it would spread across the world. (not sure why that didn't occur to me)
but here we are in strange circumstances. every time we check the news or our email we get updates, so it leads to more frequent checking. agitation. angst. so many closures due to "an abundance of caution" in these "unprecedented" times.
we ignored it during our ski vacation, and mostly also ignored it until my 3/1 grad school application deadline, but not possible to ignore after that.
R's not traveling. interviewing. fortunately home.
My work instructed us to work from home. I volunteered to help screen patients and visitors at the hospital. whew. no joke. doctors yelling at me for letting someone past who was then coughing their waiting room, or letting children in.
I got back to my ideal exercising with R in town, but now I have to work in the mornings because I'm homeschooling. (but not really homeschooling, because I have no training how to teach and I'm supposed to be working!)

 got to go out for a run with friends. Ms N brought up yummy banana pudding cupcakes.

 cleaning out E's room. here is his cool WA project.

 so it was just one announcement after another:

 NPR had multiple stories running. now it's even more than 3.  more like 5 or 6 stories in a row, all about coronavirus.

this was our first big shocker. news on Wed afternoon. Schools are closed, effective tomorrow! for 2 weeks.

then church was cancelled for 2 weeks.

 Then emails from everyone cancelling everything. we're doing violin lessons over skype.

 One day after we learned school was cancelled for 2 weeks, they changed that to be closed for 5 weeks! WHAT!!!!?

 all libraries closed. all after school enrichment, spring break camp. math buddies at the library. activity days at church. I don't mind having the schedule lighter.  we cancelled our game night with EL and C&N because they are over 60 years old and we were discouraged from group gatherings with more than 10 people.
social distancing and elbow bumps are the way to go.

 the Y is the only thing still open - for now. swim lessons and exercise classes/treadmill for me and parents night out.  but the crowds are gone. we've been able to find parking easily. e had a private swim lesson today since the other students didn't show up.

 we stocked up on books. then stocked up further once we got notice the library was closing.  everyone was there. the shelves were pretty empty, but we got a lot of good ones.

We haven't gotten much direction... one suggested science project was to build the highest free standing structure he could out of household items.  he got creative instead of high.
per his teacher/principal:
Seattle Public Schools has advised us to not assign work specifically. 
While Seattle Public Schools cannot provide online learning due to issues of equity and access, we are working on a plan to provide supplemental learning opportunities.
sounds like they will start doing some online "guided educational activities"...
I hope so!
my boss is being wonderfully understanding about how I'm going to try to make this work.
e wrote up his school schedule and is being GREAT implementing it at home. (2 days so far... ask me how it's going in a couple weeks)  but it's not the real deal...we're gonna have to do some homeschooling! 

crazy windy day today.  I was glad to run away from Alki.