Jefferson City, Missouri: COVID-19 Unfolding, Part 8888: Brown Paper Bags and a Jug o' Green Sanitizer

 

Brown paper bags with N95 masks inside. November 2022. Credit: Mzuriana.

 Over time, since the onset of the pandemic in 2020 (presumably), I've retired various of my cloth masks as they've shrunk in the dryer (whoops) or otherwise just seemed too tired to carry on. Or better said, put on. 

Awhile back, when they were plentifully-available at the Big Box pharmacies, I collected a supply of the government-subsidized N95 masks. But I didn't use these unless I had to because they:

1. Are kind of uncomfortable;
2. Are awkward to don and to take off;
3. Mess with my hair in the back of my head; and
4. Do not lend themselves to attachment to and hanging from a lanyard, which I prefer to use at times when I don't need the mask on, such as when I'm outdoors or going to a restaurant (I don't want to place my mask on a restaurant table and I don't want to scrunch it up into a pocket or purse - these kind of defeat the purpose of having a mask to begin with, given the dubious safety of surfaces it would touch)

When my hostess came down with COVID, the cloth masks weren't going to cut it. I pulled out my supply of N95 masks to wear inside the house. 

I had a limited supply, so I looked up how to reuse them, which is where the brown paper bags come in. 

The N95 bags are reusable, but the best practice is to:

• Drop the used mask into a brown paper bag;
• Close the bag; and
• Let the bag sit for a week. 

I like this North Dakota guide to healthcare staff because of its use of both "don" AND "doff." To don a mask feels fairly contemporary, but to doff one's mask is charmingly anachronistic, to wit: 

The mask can be placed on a clean paper towel or in a breathable container [e.g. a brown paper bag] when removed for breaks/eating.

Best storage for reuse during a shift would be a labeled breathable container to prevent contamination when redonning and doffing.

Continue to practice social distancing.

Hand hygiene should be done after doffing and before donning and again after donning.

I also bought a giant bottle of green sanitizer and a demi of disinfecting wipes. 

Giant green bottle of sanitizer. November 2022. Credit: Mzuriana.

Medium bottle of sanitizer and a demi of disinfecting wipes. Credit: Mzuriana.

While none of these would protect me from zombies or vampires, they were my weapons of choice against my hostess' COVID. 

They seemed to have been successful. We're both in the clear now.

Mobile, Alabama: COVID-19 Unfolding, Part 8888: Bag o' Masks

 

Bag o' masks for COVID. January 2022.

 

Doing my part to contribute to the historical record for COVID, I present my bag o' masks, above. 

Each has a history. 

My daughter, Kit, made the yellow and aquamarine-navy masks for me. I like the cheery fabrics she chose.

The sage green terry masks below were the first cloth masks I bought, back in Tucson. 

Sage green cloth masks. Tucson, Arizona. May 2020.

 

The Alabama mask is one of three I collected at Alabama welcome centers. 

Alabama state mask. March 2021.

 

I have others, including a Black Lives Matter mask that I bought from an employee who made them, at an enlightened Best Buy in Jefferson City, Missouri. Some employees at that Best Buy wore this mask, and it impressed the hell out of me that the Best Buy management in Jefferson City supported their employees in doing so.

Black Lives Matter COVID mask. Made in Jefferson City, Missouri.

I had a lovely mask that a friend made for me; it had a watercolorish fish design on it. I gave this mask to my mother; it was so beautiful. Alas, it's been lost to the unknown somewhere. 

Other bags

April 2014: My Louisiana Dance Bag

In COVID's early days: March 2020: Tucson, Arizona: COVID-19 Unfolding, Part 9: A New Kind of Dance Bag

In Silver City, New Mexico, January 2013, my dear festival bag on the motel room door:

Hat and bags, in for the night. Silver City, New Mexico. January 2013.

I still have the hat. And the small black bag.

 

 

Relocation: COVID-19 Unfolding, Part 8888: A Good Omen in Mobile

 

 

Masks preferred sign, Ben May Library. Mobile, Alabama. July 2021.

When I set my Maps to Birmingham back in summer 2020, I set it for an Ethiopian restaurant. I had lunch there immediately upon my arrival at my newly chosen city. 

When I set my Maps to Mobile the other day, I set it for the main branch of the Mobile public library system: Ben May Public Library. 

After being amongst COVID collaborators in Missouri for two weeks, the sign on the Ben May Library thrilled me. "Masks preferred" - such a succinct, firm, and pleasant statement. When I walked in, my spirit lifted again because every library employee wore a mask. 

Having already been entranced by the lush live oaks in the neighborhood, which leaned over the shady street with loving arms, and then that masks preferred sign - my brain shot out a swoony splash of good chemicals. 

 Mobile, I like you mighty fine so far.

Missouri: COVID-19 Unfolding, Part 8888: False Hopes Unmasked

 

 

Harriet, ER nurse during COVID. Artist: Tom Croft.

Early July 2021.

I left Birmingham on Wednesday, June 30, bound for central Missouri for the start of my annual interregnum between tourist residencies.

I felt such promise for the coming summer and fall, for the resumption of a more normal life. Dancing again! Listening to get-down blues in small, crowded bars! Flying to New York with one of my descendants! Places to go where I can wear pretty clothes. Wearing earrings again!

But then I entered Missouri. 

Butler County. A convenience store. No one wore a mask. No one, except me. Having just left Birmingham, where indoor masks were still de rigeur, I was astonished. I returned to my car. Looked up the fully-vaccinated rates for Butler County. Only 20% of the population in Butler County were fully vaccinated as of the day before. 

Reynolds County. A convenience store. No one wore a mask. No one, except me. Rate of fully-vaccinated people in Reynolds County as of the day before: Only 15%. FIFTEEN percent. 

Phelps County. A convenience store. Only two people (me included) wore a mask. One employee did have a mask that hung from his two ears, protecting his upper neck. Rate of fully-vaccinated people in Phelps County as of the day before (and this is the home of the University of Missouri-Rolla, where presumably, thousands of students will descend in only weeks for the fall 2021 semester): 30% fully-vaccinated as of the day before. 

This defies logic.

As of this writing, on July 3, 2021, Missouri is a hotspot in the United States for COVID upsurges and for the Delta variant, in particular.

The state forced workers to return to work at the Truman Building in Jefferson City - masks not required. No one is asked if they've been vaccinated. Cole County - home of the state government! - has a 37% rate of fully-vaxxed, but with many Truman Building employees commuting from the rural adjacent counties, the rate of vaccinated state workers in the Truman Building is surely much lower.

Sure enough, this past week, 15 Truman Building employees in one area of the building tested positive for COVID. More than 100 employees were sent home. One of my friends works in the Truman Building. He was so angry. The state had tried to keep the information about the building's outbreak from the workers there.

Barely anyone is wearing a mask inside stores in Jefferson City. The Republican governor has asked the White House for help with dealing with COVID in Missouri.

That spark of good cheer I had when I left Birmingham?

Gone.

 

Birmingham, AL: COVID Unfolding, Part 8888: Of Masks and Earrings

 

Widowed earring on Alabama map. February 2021.

Earrings and lipstick. If I am out, they are on me.

Until a couple of weeks ago, that is.

I suppose there are earring-wearers out there who are sufficiently mindful about removing masks to avoid losing an earring, but I am not among their number. 

After losing two earrings now since COVID began, I have surrendered to reality and my ears will henceforth go nekkid until we are a post-mask world.

I lost my green-glass dangly earring on laundry day last week. I knew I had to have lost it somewhere between my parked car and my various stops inside the laundromat: the change machine, the washing machine, the dryer, the folding table. 

I re-traced my steps twice, scanning the ground surface like a search-and-rescue spotter, to no avail. (A detour into the efficacy of search rescue eye scanning here.)

Before I left the premises, I asked the laundromat attendant if anyone had turned in an earring. "No," he replied, "but there is that homeless guy who comes around here all the time, and he was walking around holding an earring up with his hand, and talking about it being good luck for him or something, and then he left to go wherever he goes when he leaves here, still carrying it." 

So there you go. My earring, lost to me, but out in the wilderness, on a new journey. 

And I had not even been its first caretaker, as it was a rescue earring I had acquired in a Goodwill in South Louisiana. 

The day I gave up wearing earrings outside is the day I also gave up my irrational wearing of lipstick behind a mask. 

 

Some other thoughts on earrings, lipsticks, and masks

23 Best Mask-Proof Lipsticks

... Are Face Masks Leading Us to Kiss the Cosmetic Goodbye? 

Prevent Losing Earrings While Wearing a Mask

 

Tucson, AZ: COVID-19 Unfolding, Part 21: Masks

Two of my COVID masks. Tucson, Arizona. May 2020.

Getting some

I bought a set of three masks. My decision-making process was a recipe of

• Two parts --> best-scientific-thinking-at-this-time +
• One part --> Emotional attraction to the sage green color, which overrode a third important best-scientific-thinking-at-this-time feature (multiple layers of fabric).

Before I bought the masks, I did use the folded-over-bandana-mask-with-two-hair ties model. That actually worked pretty well, except for five buts:

1. My bandana mask had a tendency to slide down my nose, which exposed two COVID entry portals, also known as my nostrils. 
2. Ergo, I had to touch the outside of my mask to nudge it back up over my nose, which meant I may have been touching a contaminated surface. 
3. I couldn't wear my earrings with the bandana mask because the hair ties got caught up in them. 
4. Sometimes a hair tie slipped off an ear.  
5. The bulk of the folded-over fabric obscured my looking-down vision, making it treacherous to negotiate steps. (This is a real thing: Recently, I read of someone who broke her arm when she stumbled due to impaired vision caused by her bulked mask fabric.)

I coulda joined the legions of crafty souls who have made their own masks, selecting from any of the plethora of so-called easy templates, but I'm neither skilled nor interested in such things, which is why my mother pretty much made my 8th grade sewing project for me, which was a lovely mossy green jumper made of a faux suede. The color was my favorite and the texture so soft.


I regret that I won't have that COVID Era cultural memory of homemade mask making that so many people around the planet will, but, well, whatever.

Around the ears or around the neck and head? 

I opted for a design that has two slender elastic strings, one circling the top of my neck and the other circling my head above my ears. Because a good fit without gaps is important, I liked that I could adjust the fit of either elastic string.


A little titillating

It amuses me that my masks remind me of old-timey halter tops from the 70s. To wear a halter top on my face makes me giggle.


The fabric is from athleisure wear, so it feels comfortable to touch.