Self-isolating in Grand Rapids: week 3.5

Sarah Bernhardt, detail, 1876, by Georges Clairon

Michigan is now number three in the nation in number of Covid-19 cases and deaths: 14,225 cases confirmed with 540 deaths. Most grocery stores are trying to implement processes to limit the number of customers in the store at any given time but this must certainly be challenging for the big boxes like Meijers. For us, we plan to move to start using Shipt this coming week.

The past few days Susie has turned to making masks for us and prepping for a couple of upcoming pastry blog projects. If you haven't been following her projects so far, check out her website.

Tonight is family Zoom night so we'll be videoconferencing with Susie's siblings and our nieces and nephew this evening. The future of long-distance communication, perhaps? Anyway, it's worked well so far and makes us feel more connected with a larger world, no doubt about it!

rotisserie, outside a butcher shop, rue Mouffetard, Paris

Gotta end with a laugh. . . God knows we could all use one right now.

She's looking at you

And she's wondering what the future holds for you; her future is already long past.

 

Dreams, 1896, by Vittorio Matteo Corcos

B-24 Crash in Italy April 3, 1944

Entry by Navigator LT Tunis Vanden Berg, in a log recording his 8th mission flying on the B-24 "Raunchy But Right". Home base, Stornara, Italy. Outline is used for all his 35 missions.

• Target: Budapest, Hungary
• Bombs: 10 500-lb demolition
• Enemy opposition: no fighters but heavy, intense, accurate flak
• Damage to enemy: no planes shot down
• Damage to plane: almost completely destroyed
• Remarks: The roughest mission ever. Our controls were shot out and we crashed near our home base. Everyone got out with a few minor injuries, how I don't know. We really laced up the target, but good. The Lord was with us.

According to Capt. Roy Lassiter, pilot, they lost power to three of their four engines. "I felt helpless," he told a reporter years later. "I had six to eight seconds to put the plane down. We hit a stone fence. the plane broke in two under my seat, and I fell out on the road." The co-pilot was thrown clear into another field and several Italian boys helped out out the fire.

Crew no. 12,  745th sqd 456th bomb grp B24 raunchy but right - Kneeling: SGT Holliday nose turret gunner; LT Lassiter, pilot; LT Richards, ex co-pilot; SGT Natoli Upper turret gunner; SGT Hill Engineer; Standing: SGT Keefer belly turret gunner; LT Eckert bombardier; LT Vandenberg, navigator; SGT King, tail turret gunner; SGT McNeil, radio operator. The men never again flew as a crew but they remained lifelong friends

Self-isolating in Grand Rapids: week 3

Young Man at the Window, Gustave Caillebotte

Michigan stands at some 10,000 confirmed cases of Covid-19 and that number is most certainly higher. Some 337 deaths have been reported so far.

It's been three weeks since Susie and I sequestered ourselves. We stay in touch with her mom regularly along with a few friends and relatives. A Zoom conference the other day allowed Susie and her siblings to meetup and chat and that was trés cool indeed. . . .

This past Tuesday we took advantage of special hours for seniors to go shopping at the nearby Meijer's and D & W Food stores. We both felt oddly anxious, particularly at Meijer's which was packed at half past seven in the morning. I mean, really, feeling a bit nervous about buying groceries? What must so many others in our world be experiencing right now is beyond my comprehension.

We are in the midst of a pandemic not seen in modern memory and the two of us wonder what we will learn from this terrible crisis. Certainly one lesson is how totally bankrupt the GOP has become: the values and ideology that once gave the Grand Old Party its strength are no more. But this is really old news. It's the mind-numbing realization that the greater good is anathema to many -- but not all -- Republicans who seem to be unable to grasp the singular importance of saving lives no matter the cost. Bidding for ventilators on ebay? Seriously?

While some companies in Michigan are taking advantage of the crisis for profit -- and I'm thinking of Menard's here -- others, such as Long Road Distillery has turned it's operations from making spirits to making hand sanitizer. That's the real American spirit come alive.

It's going to be a very long month. . . and the last one for so many.

Let me leave you with a smile, compliments of an old friend -- if you think you've got food problems. . .

Self-isolating in Grand Rapids: week 2.5

Among the Flowers, 1892, detail, by Louise Abbema

As of late Sunday Michigan ranked no. 4 in the nation with number of cases of Covid-19: more than 5,400, 112 deaths in the state reported so far, and no end in sight.

With the exception of a short trip out for supplies the past few days have found us at home. There was a gathering of several neighbors sitting on chairs out in the street, each keeping a safe distance but mostly everyone around here is staying indoors. Or so we hope.

The weather has been cooperating, though, if that's any consolation: some rain but the snow season seems to have passed us by and the temps have been really quite pleasant.

I mentioned our trip out for a few groceries -- we both remarked that it felt like dealing with black marketeers: we pull up, make a call and are told to drive around to the side door. A man scurries out with a bag and then disappears back inside. At another place we simply pull up, I stay in the car and Susan dashes up to the front door where there is a cooler. She reaches inside, grabs a bag with our name on it and back to the car. We pull clear of the building and are gone in a flash.

And speaking of the French Tarte, since I last wrote she made a coconut pound cake, white whole wheat sandwich bread and chocolate-pistachio croissant spirals. And yesterday (Sunday) she made coconut ice cream and tested a new recipe using Danish laminated dough to make a substantial almond filled Danish Kringle.

For myself, I'm catching up on updating digital archiving information on one of my other blogs and have scheduled a couple of posts here that some of you might find interesting in coming weeks.