Pandemic Update: May

Wow, it has been almost a month since I wrote a post about the Coronavirus. It's a little hard to gather thoughts on what has happened over that time, but here we go.

First, on a more macro sense:

Cases have about doubled from about 750,000 on April 19 to 1.4 million today. That is really incredible progress to double the count in a month compared to doubling the count daily or weekly as it was before. That is also impressive because testing has become much more available. In Utah, you can get tested if you any single symptom and most states are similar. As the count has flattened and now decreased most of the attention has turned to how and when to reopen the economy/country. There are so many differing opinion on the right way and time to do that. Many states across the county have started the process over the last couple of weeks.

In Utah, our plan included a red, orange, yellow and green phase. We moved into orange phase around May 1 and today the governor announced that we would move to yellow phase starting tomorrow. So far, cases have been fairly flat over the last 3 weeks or so, so it will be interesting to see if that holds as we open more things. One thing that has changed over the last month is masks. The majority of people now wear masks at the grocery store etc. However, there are also many who refuse to wear a mask or don't have access to one. We just barely found one in the garage that I have been using. Utah started a program to send a mask to every Utahn and so we ordered one for each of us from there, but have not received it yet. We don't enjoy wearing masks, but are happy to do it to help be part of the solution and be considerate of others.

 The picture is tiny, but Utah's total cases are nearly 7,000 now.

Okay- a few things on the personal side then:
-As we moved from red to orange we decided that we would allow Lydia and Austin to play with the Wardell's who live next door (but not other friends).
-We have had some increased contact with family members, although most of that is from Lydia's baptism, see below.
-I think there continues to be a high level of stress for both Shantel and I. This has not impacted us so significantly, but we worry about the economy and the country and especially the health of my parents. I think that being able to deal with that stress is so important and to understand that many people (if not most) are feeling some of those feelings.
-I continue to work from home. Eide Bailly has provided guidelines for what it will look like to reopen our offices, but it is unclear when that will happen for Utah. I envision that I will work from home at least through the summer, but we'll see. The expectation is that raises will be small, if any. They may delay making raises and promotions until further into the summer or fall/winter. Bonuses are expected to be significantly smaller or may not happen. The annual profit share (paid in January) may not be made, but it is undecided at this point.
-We continue to have church at home. We have been blessed to partake of the sacrament each week and have had a few really great lessons (and at least as many if not more that did not go so fantastic).
-There still have been no live sporting events and it is so lame. Golf is trying to return in June (and seems like they can more likely make it happen), the NBA and MLB are still unsure what will happen. The NFL is acting as though the season will happen, but there is a large worry about a 2nd wave.

Here are a few pictures from other happenings.

I love working from home and seeing my family. By far my favorite thing has been that the kids have been really liking to play "Sharks and Minnows" and "Freeze Tag." It has been so much fun to sneak down for 15 minutes to play with the kids outside.

I have issued 3 or 4 audit jobs over the last month which has been so great. You can see my piles stacked on the bed from when I was reviewing the Utah Retirement Systems financial statements.

Lydia was baptized! We'll have a whole separate post to talk about this. Attendance we very limited due to the circumstances, but we were so grateful and happy she was able to be baptized and confirmed a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. 

We have continued to have various game nights with friends. Shantel had a Relief Society game night she helped organize.

Then our friends the Perkins shared a taste test date night from home with us and we got to try a bunch of different chocolate and rank them. It was so much fun. 

Lastly, someone wrote an article about how "Groundhog Day" is the perfect quarantine movie. I totally agree and finally found it on Netflix and convinced Shantel, who has never seen it before, to watch it with me.

Through all of this, I am so grateful to be married to Shantel and have the children that we have. Being with them makes life so wonderful and I love them. The last stage in the Utah plan is green, which is called, "the new normal." I don't know when or if life will ever be like it use to be, but I am grateful to share it with Shantel.