The zoomerang and other things

Life in Ludlow

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The “lockdown” or “self-quarantining” or “plain common sense” affects almost all of what we see, think or do these days. Nonetheless, this week I can offer up a couple of items for your consideration even though I will return to the virus impact later.

We get some help mowing and weeding around the house these days, given our status of having too many birthdays. However, there is an area with ferns that appears to produce replacements for those removed in mere nanoseconds. As a result, BJ or I will occasionally safari into the more challenging parts of the yard on a “fool’s errand” to remove the new ones. A more aggressive strategy involving a herbicide could be the only way to get them under control.

We had a bird fly down the chimney into our closed fireplace a week ago. After several discussions centered on the 98% chance that if we opened the door the bird would take up permanent residence in the upper reaches of the living room ceiling, we decided to give it a chance to fly back up the chimney. Alas, in spite of the bird’s efforts for a couple of days, it failed to get back to the heavens of our skies and instead went to heaven by another route.

A small mouse recently met the same fate on our lower level after surprising us with a couple of unwelcome and way-too-visible dashes around the inside of our home. BJ was astounded when the mouse spent part of the last minute of its life openly feeding on the peanut butter in the trap, without activating it! Guts Ball!

While we were on a walk last weekend the normally quiet and withdrawn, (not), Cathy Pappas interrupted her drive home by stopping to talk with us. She commented on how she thought the picture of me at the head of this column two weeks ago was so entertaining. My hair was askew and I had on a mask. Cathy is easily entertained. We particularly enjoyed the conversation with her since we neither see her nor much of anybody else these days. (Uh, oh, there is that virus effect again.)

Now for some Rotary and virus information at the same time. Memorial Day is this weekend, and the East Jefferson Rotary Club will again put up almost 300 American flags in Chimacum and Ports Ludlow and Hadlock. Unfortunately you will also see more cars as we practice “social distancing” by avoiding being too close to each other, unless you are in the same family like Pete and Helen Leenhouts in the big red truck! You might also notice they are harder to identify, as many will be wearing the currently stylish face masks of 2020.

Just when you are about to “zoomerang” with all the online meetings with somewhere between two and 25 people, along comes the Rotary District Conference. This is an event held every year to celebrate the people and programs of the Rotary district, in the 92 clubs in Western Washington and the Vancouver Peninsula. This year it was scheduled to be in Victoria last weekend. Instead, about 800 people attended via Zoom. There were six sessions throughout last Saturday culminating in a “party” with almost 300 folks on Zoom at one time. If that doesn’t cause you to “zoomerang,” nothing will.

Unfortunately, many participants in these online meetings also think this is an opportunity to try out for “Arthur Godfrey and his Friends”. (Don’t lie, you know what I am talking about.)

Love a curmudgeon while “zooming” and have a great week!

(Ned Luce is a retired IBM executive who is running out of things to talk about in Port Ludlow.)