Quiz #89. "Covid-Good"
Unless you’re working, there is no reason to be up at 4:10AM on a Saturday morning--though work did play a role in why I was awake way too early (again) on Saturday, October 24th.
After another exhausting work week with 2 nights of just 4 hours of sleep, I completely crashed on Friday night at 8:30PM.
Awake too early on a Saturday, I decided to begin to make what the New York Times calls “Perfect Chocolate Chip Cookies.” The recipe is from pastry chef Ravneet Gill with a write-up from Charlotte Druckman of the NYT.
There are three things of note in the recipe.
First, the recipe calls for extra fine sugar which I ordered from Amazon. Sara, an excellent cook and a wonderful baker, had never heard of such a thing.
Second, it calls for dark chocolate instead of chocolate chips. You take 6 ounces from bars of dark chocolate and break them up into small pieces.
Third, you need to make the dough in advance, rolling it up into quarter-cup-sized balls that need to sit in the refrigerator for 12 hours.
Druckman writes.
What makes these cookies truly “perfect” isn’t anything radical; it’s simply an attention to detail. The pastry chef Ravneet Gill was meticulous in developing her recipe, and all of her instructions exist for a reason. When she tells you to chill your dough overnight, don’t think you can skip over that. (If you do, your cookies will spread.) When she instructs you to roll the dough into balls before transferring them to the fridge to rest, do as she says, and you’ll get a nice plump, domed cookie instead of a sad flat one. Don’t go swapping in milk chocolate for dark, and chop the chocolate into large chunks for those dramatic, dense puddles of goo.
I followed the recipe precisely and paid attention to every detail. The quarter-cup-sized balls of dough and chocolate sat in the refrigerator for 24 hours and I then baked the “perfect” chocolate cookies on Sunday morning, October 25th.
Sara and I let them cool and enjoyed more than a few with our Sunday coffee. They’re damn good. Gooey and chewy. Still, I’m not ready to call them perfect. Isn’t “damn good” good enough?
On Saturday morning, Sara and I talked about why I have been waking up too early--and what I can do to try to break the pattern and sleep later. In part, I think my wakefulness is anxiety about work, the election and the second--some say third--wave of the coronavirus ravaging the nation again. Quite simply, I remain on high alert. I am always watchful, waiting for something to go wrong even in the best of times--and these are not the best of times. Sadly, my watchfulness is now off the charts.
Beyond anxiety, though, in talking with Sara about why I’m not sleeping later, I realized it’s because 8 months into working from home, I have fallen into some bad habits.
At the top of the list, I have to admit I have not been following the advice of most experts--and more than a few friends and colleagues--who have said that you should set up a separate work area when working from home.
I’ve been working from the bed in our guest bedroom. It’s a spot that’s already set up with its own TV--and perfect for the mid-morning and late-afternoon naps that I take to get through the work day, the work night (when I work in the evenings) and the weekend. The bed/office is also the perfect spot for the dogs who love a good nap and join me during my work day and work night. In short, having my office in bed has blurred the lines between work and sleep.
Happy and Stella joined Betsy’s dogs, Fred and Brownie, for a morning nap on Tuesday morning, October 20th, when Sara had a conference call and could not be interrupted by the dogs. And yes, I was able to take a nap after snapping this picture.
By not working from bed, I also hope to ease the strain on my hands and wrists from hours on a laptop in what’s certainly been an ergonomic nightmare.
At the start of the pandemic, I ordered a special pillow for sitting in bed plus a small tray/desk that I use with my laptop.
As indicated in Quiz #83. Essential Fantasy, for months now, I have been dealing with a tremor in my left hand. On Thursday, October 22nd, I went to the neurologist for an EMG (Electromyography), a medical exam to test nerve and muscle functions. In my case, the connections between my left hand and the nerves in my neck and shoulder. The question: was the tremor the result of some kind of carpal tunnel issue?
The doctor had not warned me in advance, but an EMG is really an uncomfortable test. For roughly an hour, she zapped me with small jolts of electricity on a machine attached to a computer which measured the speed and power of how those jolts traveled up my arm. Only a few of the jolts hurt--and the doctor did warn me ahead of time on those--but mostly, the constant zaps were really just unpleasant.
And yet, the doctor had a wonderful zap-side manner. She told me at the beginning that we should just talk during the procedure--and that’s what we did. Clearly, it was a diversionary tactic--and it worked.
On one level, our conversation was nothing special, cocktail party chatter as we traded questions and answers back and forth. What do you do? Kids? Spouse? TV shows? Strange things you’ve done in the pandemic? (She met girlfriends in a parking lot and they parked their cars in 4 different directions, each seated in the back hatchback of their vehicle, socially distanced for conversation on a Saturday morning.)
And yet on another level, jolts aside, the conversation was special precisely because it was so unusual. Sitting in a room, talking with someone outside our bubble, for more than an hour, masks on and hands washed. I have a follow-up appointment this week, but the preliminary diagnosis remains that I have an essential tremor with no nerve damage between the hand and shoulder--and oh yes, she had to test and zap my right arm (where my hand does not shake) to get a baseline.
Sunday, I cleared out part of our attic where we already have a desk that had been unusable, completely cluttered with piles of stuff. That desk is now usable and on Monday, October 26th, I began to work from there, hoping it will clear my head--and our bed--for sleep. For Tuesday morning, October 27th, at least, I slept until 6:01AM.
The view from my new office. The only downside so far is that the window gives the dogs a birds-eye view of the neighbor’s roof—and the dogs go nuts if a bird or squirrel is in sight outside the attic window.
These are strange times for so many reasons. On Twitter, debates rage over whether a current athlete is better than another from just a generation ago. Who’s the GOAT? (Greatest of All Time). How can you compare Michael Jordan and Lebron James--and does it make a difference who’s the better of the two? Politicians now claim they’re the best ever and the smartest of all time. Really? Putting political, moral and intellectual considerations aside, I think most of us would be happy with leaders who are just “good” or even “one of the best.” The smartest ever? “Very smart” seems good enough for me.
And yet, we live in a time of hype where calling something “perfect” is seen as a perfectly acceptable way to draw attention. Just google “perfect chocolate chip cookie” and you’ll come up with hundreds of recipes, all claiming to produce the “perfect” cookie. As noted in Quiz #42. Out of Stock, for years now, I have been fascinated--and troubled--by state birds. Did you know the cardinal is the state bird for 7 states? Shouldn’t it be one bird, one state? Shouldn’t there be one perfect cookie recipe--and not hundreds? Does one cookie really need to be more perfect than all the rest?
Sara works for the state government in New Jersey. In these unprecedented times, the state extended the 2020 fiscal year (FY) which typically ends on June 30th. Instead, FY 2020 ended on September 30th. It’s a one-year thing, designed to get past the financial impact of covid and the extension of the 2020 tax due date from April to July.
In talking about her work, Sara has talked about grant paperwork for “the 5th quarter.” This strikes me as the ultimate oxymoron. (Shouldn’t they follow the NFL--and just call something beyond 4 quarters “overtime”?) Now that we’ve hit October, we’re now in FY 2021--and that only has 3 quarters--another oxymoron--with FY 2021 ending at the end of June, 2021.
Sara has adopted the phrase “covid- good” in these strange times. Calling something “covid- good” is her way of acknowledging that nothing’s normal--and that we’re all doing the best we can, making it up as we go along. Just finishing the 5th quarter of FY 2020 is a perfect example of “covid-good.”
Work--and most of the ways we used to get things done--are different. Are they perfect? No. They’re “Covid-good.”
What did not happen?
A. Will was not impressed with the “perfect” cookie. He especially did not like the dark chocolate;
B. Sara and I watched the new Borat movie both Friday and Saturday night. It’s brilliant yet disturbing--and we needed 2 nights because of my exhaustion;
C. On Saturday morning, Sara talked to John about our Thanksgiving plans. He told her that he’d been promoted on Friday;
D. On my Saturday morning phone call with my sisters Ginny and Susan, they both revealed that they’ve had EMG tests for problems with their legs. The phone call was delayed because Susan was playing pickleball;
E. Friends Tim and Laurie came over on Sunday afternoon for our first visit of anyone outside our bubble at the firepit. Uncharacteristically, I did not take a photo to commemorate the occasion.
Want the answer?
If you’re a subscriber, the answer will be sent to you as a separate email when the question is published.
Want more?
Here’s the previous quiz in the series: Quiz #88. The Tip.
Here’s the first quiz in the series: Quiz #1. Stella and Social Distancing, March 13, 2020
Here is an archive of all the quizzes.
The quiz is explained here: Steve’s Stay-at-Home Coronavirus Quiz.
Want to let me know how I’m doing with this quiz?
Please let me know about any typos or misspellings.
Comments, corrections and confessions welcome.
Thank you and good night.
Thanks for reading.
Thanks for sharing.
Thanks for commenting.