Day 8 - LA County enters Red Tier for the first time

Terraza, upstairs…

Terraza, downstairs…

3/22/21. Monday

7:30-9:30 – L. and I have a free breakfast coupon to redeem at Terrazza but it is only valid between the hours of 7:00 and 10:00.  I’m up and take the best shower I’ve had in awhile under the “rainforest shower head.” Light make-up and Covid-19 uniform. At 9:00, L. stirs and we leave our hotel room at 9:30 and go downstairs.

9:30-11:30 – Breakfast is beachside and beautiful. I have the 2-egg breakfast, over easy, with bacon and potatoes, coffee, and a Mimosa.  L. has the lemon ricotta pancakes.  The weather is great and we are a just a couple of yards away from the beach and the bike path so we can watch people walk their dogs and ride their bikes. It’s not crowded here and I’ll attribute that to the fact that it’s a Monday and everyone is working.  I’m not because I’m RETIRED!!  L. and I talk and linger for a long time.  We have no time constraints and we’re not holding up a table for any of the customers. This is so great.

11:30 – 1:30 - We finally leave and head up to our hotel room, where we get some reading in before our massage appointments.  R. is dog-sitting at our house so L. checks in with R. to see how she’s doing.  R. texts a picture of he and the dog having coffee together. I’m so glad R.’s there – our dog really loves him.

1:30 – 3:30 - I ready my 2:30 class and L. and I report downstairs to the Sea Wellness Spa for our 2:00 massages in the couples’ room. The therapists are masked, L. is masked, and I’m double-masked.  My last massage was at the Mission Inn, in an outdoor, enclosed “piazza.” This massage is in a room with no ventilation and there are four people in it. I keep my mask(s) on, but it is hard to breathe lying face down. When I later ask L. what she did with her mask, L. said she just pulled her mask down under her nose and breathed normally. Great.  I’m a little concerned that L. and I are crammed into this tiny room with the therapists breathing all over us.  Maybe they’re vaccinated?

Still, with that said, this is one of the best massages I’ve ever had.  Was it worth the risk of getting Covid-19?  Of course if I were to die from Covid-19, then no. But a mild case with no “long hauler” symptoms? Maybe… My body has been so sore lately from my Insanity workouts and the massage really helped.

The spa locker rooms are open, but we’re told by the hostess that we’re not allowed to “lounge”, take a shower, or use the Jacuzzi or sauna.  There are also no “treats” lying around, like lavender-infused water, fruit, or short-bread cookies.  I miss that part of the spa experience…BUT the massages were wonderful!

3:30-4:30 -  Back upstairs and everything is going well with my 2:30 class- it ends in about an hour. More reading. I finish Strangers:

This a memoir written by the Dear Amy advice columnist – syndicated in over 100 papers – about finding love and getting married at age 49. A single mother for decades and dating extremely sporadically, the author moves back to her hometown of Freeville, NY  [population 425 as of 2019] to take care of her ailing mother after her daughter, Emily, goes away to college. While in Freeville, Amy runs into a fellow divorcee, Bruno, a contractor, with whom she went to high school, and after a few more chance encounters, they start dating and eventually marry.

Bruno has three daughters [two are adopted] who live at home and an ailing mother of his own. Two daughters are juniors in high school and the third is in elementary school.  One of the juniors gets pregnant and has the baby shortly after Bruno and Amy marry.  Then, the same daughter goes home for a visit to the Dominican Republic and comes back with a boyfriend, who also moves into the house, and they get married.  While the daughter is hard at work, completing and filing paperwork, trying to make her husband a US citizen, she gets pregnant again.

While all of this is going on, Amy’s mother becomes sicker and sicker, eventually dying, and Bruno’s Mom gets sick and also dies.  Several aunts, on both sides, die along the way. Throughout all of this, Amy and Bruno stay together, his Dominican daughter and brood move to one of Bruno’s rental homes, and the other daughters eventually leave for college [the book spans about 10 years], leaving Bruno and Amy empty nesters.  Throughout it all, Bruno renovates Amy’s mom’s home so Amy can use it as an office where she writes her advice column.  Most mornings, Amy leaves the home she and Bruno share to walk the three blocks down Main Street to her mother’s old home where she works.

The last decade is a shit storm for sure, but everyone gets through it and comes out the other side as a truly blended family, to include acceptance and friendship. It’s an inspiring memoir, if a bit disingenuous, although the author does paint some of those years as incredibly difficult.  I think most people would have left the marriage within the first year or two, but she stays and seems better for it.  Of note is the fact that Amy keeps referring to herself as “middle-aged”, even when she is dating Bruno at age 48.  I’m 50 and don’t view myself as middle-aged so each time she references herself in this manner, I think, “Wow – I guess I’m middle-aged, too.” It was a somewhat sobering realization. Highly recommend the book.

4:30-5:30 – L. and I go to the 4th floor to the bar/restaurant to redeem another free drink coupon. Happy Hour is indoor seating inside of a beautiful atrium, with blown-glass, blue-green pendants of all shapes and sizes, hanging from the ceiling throughout this huge space.  Wait staff is gloved, wearing an N-95 mask, and a face shield – seating is at 25% capacity.  Virtually no one is here. The walls of the restaurant are floor to ceiling windows overlooking the sea and the bike path. We’re elevated and the view is breathtaking. Unfortunately, we see a homeless man eating take-out under a palm tree.  Although there is a trash can a mere 2 feet from where he is seated, he finishes his food and leaves his trash, having no qualms about littering. Disgusting.

-L. and I order fries with special dipping sauce to share. I also order a glass of champagne and L. orders a mocktail, at Happy Hour prices. We’re told that we can’t use the drink coupons until Happy Hour ends, which is in 30 minutes, so at 5:05, I also redeem my “free drink” coupon. Yay!

-5:30 – 6:00 – A quick dash upstairs and I ready my 6:00 class. Then, L. and I leave for our dinner reservations at Meat on Ocean, a restaurant that specializes in meat and seafood.  It’s on the strip, with a view of the beach, and seems to take up an entire block, it’s that cavernous. This is indoor dining as well, but the entire front of the restaurant is open-air and facing the beach, since the wall is virtually non-existent to take advantage of that great sea air.  Seating might be at 50% capacity, but the space is so big and it is so breezy in here, it doesn’t seem to matter – I’m not concerned.

6:00-8:00 – Dinner is excellent. L and I order tempura for an appetizer which is some of the best tempura I’ve ever had, even though this is NOT a Japanese restaurant. We also split the Chilean bass.  It’s very good and we have leftovers to take home.

8:15 – 9:00 - Back at the hotel room and there is a crisis of sorts with my 6:00 class.  It seems I forgot to load the Google slides for this chapter and everyone is asking about them.  I haven’t responded to the students for 2½ hours.  L. airdrops the slides from her laptop into my Canvas shell and I send out an apology email blast to my students explaining that my WiFi was down and I was only just now able to deploy the slides.  What a disaster!  I’m pretty upset about it. Class ends a short while later.

9:00-11:00 – Meanwhile, L. has several assignments due by midnight and is working on a couple of essays for her critical writing class.

-I do a blog post.

11:00-1:00 – L. is done (for now), so we watch a couple more episodes of Broadchurch and then call it. Great day!