Sheltering at Home Week 3
The coronavirus is out there. It could get me, which is why I’m doing a lot of weird stuff lately — besides washing my hands for twenty seconds umpteen times a day.
Like:
Slathering an envelope with sanitizer for twenty seconds before mailing it to my daughter — just in case I’m exhaling coronavirus microbes and they’re mean and tough enough to survive the 3-day trip to Christina’s mailbox in LA.
Washing the romaine lettuce that Jon got delivered to our house by a local supermarket. And I don’t mean rinse the lettuce in cold water. I mean sink it for the prescribed twenty seconds in a tub of warm water and dishwashing liquid. Agitate. Rub. Then rinse in cold water so Jon doesn’t notice that the lettuce has wilted a bit since he last saw it.
“Some of the lettuce was a little slippery when I made the salad tonight,” Jon said over dinner.
“I washed it with dish soap,” I said. I was sheepish, but only a little.
Jon did not scold. I notice that he is indulging my new-found microbe phobia. He expects to be locked down in this house with me for weeks. He is picking his battles. Cabin fever is a thing. Even the New York Times knows about it. A little soap in the salad? He lets it pass.
A few days later, when I dunk the baby potatoes in their dish soap bath, I am careful to give them a good rinsing.
(See my update on washing vegetables below!)
Asking Jon to drop his pants on the garage floor after a run to his favorite coffee shop for a pound of No. 3 grind espresso. He doesn’t drop his pants when he gets home, but he does take off his sweatshirt and drop it in the garage, as requested. He leaves his dust mask in the basket I’ve provided, so he can use it again. He washes his hands, face and what’s left of his hair for twenty seconds each. I toss the sweatshirt in the washing machine.
Going public here with my true feelings about Donald Trump. I tried my best to be reasonable, rational, kind even, in last week’s post. Lots of people cheered it on. And I’ve lost only one subscriber because of it. So far. For those who missed the post, it’s “Will Donald Trump Be the Death of Me? Pardon My Rant as I Shelter in Place”
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Need a distraction from the weirdness that is our life right now? Go to “At Tuolemne — Celebrating Getting Born.” Or “Gray Hairs, Wrinkles. And Kids Who Won’t Stop Growing Up.”
Note: I’ve done a little on-line reading, and here’s what I’ve concluded — for now!
An article in the Huffington Post says that food experts are warning against using soap on your fruits and vegetables, as soap can irritate the gastro-intestinal tract and even cause symptoms resembling coronavirus infection.
Sources keep saying that there’s no evidence that the corona virus is borne on food. I kinda don’t believe that. How is the slick skin of an apple different from the slick surface of a railing or doorknob? Why can’t an infected person who picks up an apple and puts it back spread the virus to the next person who picks up that apple?
I’ve read elsewhere that vinegar is effective against bacteria, but not viruses. We don’t have anywhere enough vinegar in our house to use to clean our fruits. So that one is out for me.
So, my advice to all is to read up on various sources, on-line probably, and make a decision.
I think I’ll keep using dish soap and rinse really, really well — on peelable foods like bananas and oranges. Also apples. But NOT potatoes!
This article in the Huffington Post says that food experts are warning against using soap on your fruits and vegetables, as soap can irritate the gastro-intestinal track and even cause symptoms resembling coronavirus infection.
Sources keep saying that there’s no evidence that the corona virus is borne on food. I kinda don’t believe that. How is the slick skin of an apple different from the slick surface of a railing or doorknob? Why can’t an infected person who picks up an apple and puts it back spread the virus to the next person who picks up that apple.
I’ve read elsewhere that vinegar is effective against bacteria, but not viruses. We don’t have anywhere enough vinegar in our house to use to clean our fruits. So that one is out for me.
So, my advice to all is to read up on various sources.
I think I’ll keep using dish soap and rinse really, really well — on peelable foods like bananas and oranges. Also apples. But NOT potatoes!
I feel a bit less weird about my post-shopping routine. Thanks for sharing your process!
My wife of 35 years has multiple sclerosis, making her particularly prone to infection. When I go out, I wear the blue latex gloves, provided by the hospital following her recent breast cancer surgery (yet another reason for caution). She has started referring to me at Papa Smurf.
Our stores have curbside pickup for online orders, so I have them place the bags in the bed of my pickup truck (required by law in Texas…or so I claim). When I return home, non-perishables remain in the truck bed. I carry the rest into the laundry room, where they are scrubbed with dish soap and hot water and rinsed for a ridiculous amount of time. I do the same process when I have items delivered.
Now, the part my wife finds particularly weird. I am old school when it comes to news. I love my newspaper in it’s non-digital form. The Austin American Statesman is delivered (thrown) onto our driveway at 5 am. I leave it there until late morning, then retrieve it using metal tongs. I place it into an old microwave and cook it in two 60 second bursts. After it has cooled, I can get my daily dose of bad news.
My wife blames me for the stay at home order, due to my recently spending a small fortune on field recording gear to replace the old gear I use for interviews in and around Austin. The arrival of my new gear coincided with the imposition of stay at home, so my interviews for The Plutopia News Network are now done online. So blame me! I can take it! : )
Scoop. It’s great to hear from you and to know that you are still in the news business.
Like you, Jon and I love our daily printed newspapers. They arrive in (not-eco-friendly) plastic bags. I’ve been carefully emptying the newspapers out of the plastic bags onto the garage floor, washing my hands and then going back to pick up the papers. I’ve wondered whether the papers might be carrying some microbes, but, having no way to sanitize them, I just carried them to the breakfast table and read them there. San Francisco Chronicle and New York Times.
I like your microwaving strategy. That’s what I’m going to do from now on. Thanks!
Hope you and your wife continue to do well, Papa Smurf.
Your Trump rant was very mild compared to what most of us are saying about Generalissimo Bonespurs.,
Well. I did tone it down a bit. But mostly for my own mental health.
We’ve been taking a lot of similar precautions too, as we have some high-risk people in our household and family group here in southern CA.
For washing vegetables, I recommend submerging the vegetables (or fruit) in warm/hot water and adding a few drops of Castile soap, which has good cleaning agents but not as many chemicals as regular dish soap. You let the soap and vegetables sit in the water for a few minutes, then agitate and rinse them off. We have also cut down on the amount of vegetables we eat raw, and cook most of our vegetables now.
For clothing removal, my midwives recommended that anyone who returns from a public place remove their clothes in a “staging area” outside or in the garage, then put that clothing into the laundry immediately, and take a shower and change into “inside clothing.” And leave shoes outside. It’s a lot and we don’t always follow every protocol exactly, but that’s what was recommended.
As for applying sanitizer to something you’re sending, unless you have a large stock of sanitizer and aren’t worried about running out, I wouldn’t worry about spreading your germs to Christy because they’ll be dead in a few days on a paper surface, BUT other surfaces or handlers might come in contact with the letter in transit, so it’s good practice for Christy to clean it herself when she gets it, or just put it in full sunlight for a day when it arrives if she’s very concerned about it. That’s what we’ve been doing with all our mail/packages — either wiping them down when they arrive, putting them in full sunlight for a while for the UV rays to kill anything, or doing a “quarantine” system in which we put them in a box and leave them there for 3 days so any droplets or lingering virus can die.
Please stay safe during this time and keep writing as you are doing! We love you!
That’s what I’ve been doing with magazines that come into the house — I let them sit isolated for three days. Same for the paper grocery bags that the groceries come in. I leave them in the garage for three days, then use them to collect compostables. I hadn’t thought of putting things in the sunlight. Hmmm. That’s a thought.
All these measures are time-consuming and annoying, but given that we are making such a huge sacrifice by staying home, sigh, these small additions make sense to me.