May 23, 2022

After working for much of the past week I was looking forward to getting out to do some adventure/exploration and take photos.  I had fun plans for this week.  We were planning to visit the Capital Reef National Park yesterday.  I had also been rallying some co-workers to start a community message board to help us to plan activities with each other and one of my co-workers who had many phone numbers planned a potluck for tomorrow night.  I had also finally made an appointment with a local hairdresser to freshen up my do.

However, after not being sick for about two years, COVID got me so now I’m in quarantine for the week.  No need to worry about me though.  I am triple vaxed and so far it feels like I have an annoying cold.  I would have gotten tested to confirm my COVID status, but it turns out that is not so easy out here.  I started feeling sick on Saturday night and the everything in this town is closed on Sunday.  Today I called the local clinic and pharmacy.  The pharmacy did not have home rapid test kits and the clinic charged $150 for testing.  I’m pretty sure it’s COVID so paying that much for a test to confirm it seemed pointless.  The free tests you can get can only be shipped to a residential address so I have my mother sending me some she has and I ordered a couple from Amazon.  I figure they will get here before my symptoms subside so I can use them to figure out when I test negative.  I do need a negative test result to go back to work after all.  Oh well.  So here I am in isolation for a bit.  I will have to put off some fun and social activities for a bit, but it’s not the end of the world.

I hope we may get a good milky way photography opportunity during our quarantine since this is an activity in which we rarely encounter other people and I won’t be getting up early for work for the week.  I have been mostly working the opening shift and starting at 7am which has taken a bit of getting used to.  I also finished the cross stitch I had been commissioned to do for a fellow photographer that we met at White Pocket and am not starting on a much more difficult design of Bryce Canyon at night.  It seems like a fitting one to do as Bryce is in this area where we are staying for the summer.  This is the pattern I am working off of.

Luke has brought out the video game we started playing over the winter, Divinity 2, so we are playing this again.  Rather, he is playing it mostly while I stitch on the couch.  There are lots of isolated places around here with no people to walk or take photos so if we start feeling better perhaps we can do some local exploring in areas where the tourists don’t go.  

The owners of Loop SxS Adventures wanted to come out to visit us this week with their toys and obviously that cannot happen so hopefully they will still be able to come once I am fully recovered.  My Mom and a member of our art association are coming for a visit in a couple of weeks so fun times are ahead.  

We also haven’t made a YouTube video in a few weeks so maybe we can use some of this time to come up with some creative video ideas.  Between Luke having to fly home for his brother’s memorial and me starting the new job, there just hasn’t been as much time for making videos.  That is OK though.  We had lots of time to play so it was time to work again and replenish some funds that were getting pretty low.  

If any of you have been through quarantine already and have advice or tips for me then please let me know in the comments!  Keep yourselves well and find the little things that bring joy each day.  Sorry for the lack of adventures and fun photos for this week.