Coronavirus Quarantine Diary: Day Four, Entry Three, I Teach While Wearing Slippers

I took this picture during my walk today.

It has been day four of the coronavirus quarantine but this is my third entry because yesterday my blog post was dedicated to film quotes. I've no idea how often I'll post these. Like a lot of other things to do in life, we'll just have to wait and see.

Yesterday for the first time in my 33 year teaching career (I've been teaching since I was six?) I taught online via something called Zoom. Evidently this has become a most popular medium to host classes and even more so since Covid-19 entered our lives. I found it stressful to enter this brave new world, especially as this was a totally foreign way to teach and it involved so much technology. Fortunately oldest daughter is around and she is a whiz at all this high tech stuff and has even taken classes via Zoom, so she showed me the ropes. (No actual ropes were used.)

Yesterday was a dawn of a new age for me. It was as smooth as a porcupine, folks. Actually the lesson went relatively well it was just all in fits and starts and I had to accustom myself to not being in the same room as my students. The glitches mostly were on the student's end and I came off seeing mildly competent. Of course when I teach the old-fashioned way I come off like a genius (please excuse the exaggeration, however slight). I was in normal attire but inasmuch as I was teaching out of my bedroom, wore my slippers. Students only see me from about mid waist up so I could teach pantless. I won't.

Teaching when you only see students in a little box on your computer screen is not ideal. Especially when some suddenly disappears or lose their audio. I'm used to looking students in the eye and prancing around the room. I like to get close to students without making them feel uncomfortable which I've become adept at over the years, decades, third of a century. But teachers are a resourceful lot and I made do.

After class yesterday I worked out. Well, after a fashion. I was able to stretch, do my planks, sit ups, push ups and leg raisers and compliment that with a very brisk walk around the neighborhood. It was the proverbial case of better than nothing but hardly compared with going to the gym and finishing a work out bathed in sweat, endorphins dancing about. It'll get better, I suppose.

Today was day two of online teaching and went much better, thank you very much. I'm getting the hang of it, will eventually get comfortable with it but will never embrace it.

Told ya I saw a guy on stilts

After class I went for a long walk. Went through a section of Berkeley's hideous downtown and noted that most businesses were closed except for pharmacies, a candy shop and Papa John's pizza, the latter because some people need there bad pizza, pandemic or no. I also had a great shock when crossing a street with the protection of the stop sign, a person on a bike actually came to a full stop! In Berkeley this is a rarity. Ninety per cent of all bicyclists seem to speed up the instant they note a stop sign, red light or person on foot. Many of them go careening down crowded sidewalks. For one to actually stop was mind blowing.

I'm noting a lot of other people out walking. This is a good thing. Everyone seems good about maintaining their social distance. I make it a point never to get within  a few feet of my fellow pedestrians.

As I neared home I saw someone who could walk right by a person and still maintain a social distance because this chap was on stilts. Of course. One does not normally see a person on stilts -- even in wacky Berkeley -- but these are strange times.

Yes strange times, though hopefully not the end times. I just saw that 56% of Californians are supposed to be infected with the virus within the next eight weeks. That seems preposterously high, but what the hell do I know. In any case a scary stat.

I think I'll leave it with that grim thought and maybe be a bit cheerier next time. Hey, the weekend is coming! Theaters, beaches, restaurants, sports events, parks, shops are all....not an option. Excuse me for saying this, but fuck the coronavirus.