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As we stretch into yet another week of staying home, we are all struggling. Struggling with keeping our businesses open, struggling with keeping our kids entertained, struggling with online schooling and of course daycare.  There simply is no answer for something we have never been through before.  I haven’t had a good night’s sleep in weeks as I am sure many of you can relate.

I don’t know where I stand with an early re-opening of the state. I totally see both sides of the argument.  I would hate to see the number of cases explode exponentially but at the same time I would hate to see a single business in Chisago County disappear the result of the stay at home orders.  More stuff for me to ponder at 2:36 am every night.

There is another aspect of the pandemic that really sits bad with me. No it’s not political.  I am having an issue with how the deaths from the coronavirus are reported  in such a nonchalant way.  “Today there were 17 more deaths in Minnesota”, “Today was a good day in New York, only 1,400 died of the virus”.  Believe me I don’t have an answer but there is something so callous feeling about reading those numbers each day posted on the state website at 11 am.  Maybe it’s me feeling guilty for immediately checking for the death toll everyday.  These are people’s parents, siblings, friends and even children.  Do I have an answer? Of course I don’t, do I ever? 

One positive note about this horrible pandemic is at the time of this paper there are still just seven confirmed cases of Covid-19 in the county.  Many more have not been teste;  but the same goes with other counties, at least  it’s a baseline to compare day to day.

Now that the governor has told us boating is now allowed and encouraged, we can get out and get some fresh air on the water.  Just a quick reminder, with the high water, the channel between North Center and North Lindstrom has become navigable again.  Some boaters have been seen boating and fishing in Bull Lake. Bull Lake is connected to the south edge of the channel and is clearly marked non-motorized boats only.  Please respect the law and stay out of this one lake with your boats with engines.

Our group of friends just got on the Zoom hangout craze.  Of course I moaned and groaned about a “couples” zoom session.  I will be the first to admit that I was wrong - it was great to see our friends again, even if it was digitally.  I will admit that I think I added nothing to the conversation but it was great nonetheless.  The downside is everyone got to see my pandemic 15 that I have put on.  Photoshop doesn’t work on live video unfortunately.


 

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