CV Diary 14: Who says solitary confinement isn’t fun?

 Looking back on it, all my time in isolation has had its upsides, including a bunch of life hacks and new games that can pay big dividends in any future pandemic, snowstorm or hangover. Just in case we end up with a second wave in the fall, or sooner, you’ll want to bookmark this list of new pastimes I discovered while in the hole…

1. Child torture: Make small donations to obscure and questionable charities in honor of your adult children. When they receive the acknowledgement and ask you about it, tell them you’ve changed your will and now all your money is going to the left-handed, eleven-toed Nigerian mining engineers’ retirement fund.
2.  Rescue mission: Isn’t it time that you finally disassemble your dryer and find out where all those unmatched socks have been hiding? Hint: They’re usually inside the motor housing.
3. Spice inventory: Try to remember why you bought eight jars of parsley as you dig through the hundreds of spices in your kitchen cabinet. Instead of organizing them alphabetically, try ranking them by anti-oxidant strength. 
4. Scavenger hunt: Open up the junk drawer in your kitchen and grab all the weird plastic pieces and tiny screws that fell off your appliances over the past ten years. Now, set the oven timer, if you can figure out how, and try to find where they fit, assuming you still have the appliances.
5. Face mask fabrication: Anyone can make a face mask from a handkerchief or a kippah. Join the big leagues by creating unique PPE supplies from those blue jeans you were hoping to fit into some day. Bonus: Tell your friends the jeans were actually loose on you, so you sacrificed them for the greater good.
6. Artisanal crafts: While everyone else focuses on sourdough bread and lutefisk recipes, revive the ancient art of making rubber band balls and chains of paper clips.
7. Improve your view: Bite the bullet and get rid of all your skinny clothes that…let’s face it…you are never going to wear again and all the souvenir coffee mugs that you never use and the pens that don’t have any usable ink anymore and…voila…your home will be so much lighter that it will rise off its foundation and you can see over the trees.
8. Make $Millions on eBay: Self-quarantine is the perfect time to finally assure a comfortable retirement by selling all those Beanie Babies, baseball cards, coins, stamps, Pogs and every other “collectible” that you just knew “will be worth something someday.”

 
Normally, we’d say, “don’t try these tricks at home,” but not this time. Of course, it’s a good idea to make sure your homeowner’s insurance is up to date, just to be safe.
 
 
Last year on Fathers Day, we chronicled the missed opportunities among unengaged dads. Next week, we look at a different kind of role model. What kind? Just click here to subscribe and you’ll be the first to know.

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