My First COVID Test

I took a home COVID test yesterday… my first time having to do that. Initially, I believed the result was positive because it turned pink right away, and there was a pink line and a blue line… I knew seeing two lines wasn’t good. 

I immediately quarantined myself in our bedroom and sealed the door shut with duct tape. I thought about digging a moat around the bed to keep intruders at a distance but decided not to… just like I chose NOT to wait the required fifteen minutes for the test to run its course. 

 

The test (on the table in our den) continued to do its thing while I was barricaded in the bedroom. In the end, the blue line disappeared leaving just the one pink line… a negative result.

 

When informed of this, I released myself from quarantine and strolled down the hallway as if I were Jake Blues on the day he was released from Joliet. Our daughter Cassandra called and told Laura that it takes two pink lines for a positive result… “Just like a pregnancy test,” she said. Never having taken a pregnancy test, I remarked something to the effect “Yeah, I take those tests all the time… it being modern times and all.” 

 

I looked at Laura and said, “You better not get me pregnant.”

 

Anyway… I don’t have COVID… just a waning head cold. Even though I lost my voice for a while, I'm feeling much better… mostly thanks to Laura. She takes such good care of me.

 

That’s it… a little humor on this Christmas Eve morning… in case you are in need of a laugh or two. Take care all. And Merry Christmas.

 

Tobogganing

I wish I could go tobogganing again. 

When I was a kid living in the shadow of the ADK, my older brother, me, and four of my cousins got a hold of a six-person toboggan. We took it to our aunt and uncle’s dairy farm, pulled it to the top of the highest, steepest hill we could find, and tobogganed down onto a frozen pond at the bottom of the run.

 

I remember being surprised at how quickly it picked up speed. We did a straight shot… no turns… and spun out on the ice. Afterward, we pulled it back to the top of the hill, changed our seating order, and rode back down again.

 

We did this until everyone had a chance to ride up front.

 

I would give almost anything to be able to do it again… the six of us on that frosty winter day. 

And afterward, how wonderful it would be if once again we could scamper into that warm farmhouse… to sit around its cozy kitchen table with our aunt and uncle, all of us with a cup of hot cocoa… to help us thaw out… while we laugh about those of us who may have fallen off the back of the toboggan on our way down the hill… or were sling-shotted off as we spun out on the ice.

 

So much fun it was. For sure… what I wouldn’t give.