Dan's Quarantine Birthday

Last weekend was Dan's birthday, you know, the one where we're in quarantine because Corona. (That's my best Millennial impression, BTdubs.)

My dad sent Dan a funny video of a guy singing a barbershop quartet version of "Happy Birthday," via the split screen technology of which we've been seeing a plethora as of late.

Dad typed this greeting at the bottom: "Remember to stay six feet away from everyone. Of course, you probably already do that."

In case you haven't read my other blog posts, my husband, Dan, is quiet.

Because Dan is quiet, and I, although chatty due to social anxiety, am a homebody, his quarantine birthday wasn't much different from other birthdays.

Plus, Dan and I are forty-somethings, and, as anyone over forty will tell you, our birthdays stopped counting about ten years ago.

So . . . for his quarantine birthday . . .

Dan got a new video game to keep him occupied during quarantine. Come to think of it, I give him a new video game every year.

We went on a birthday bike ride "to see the eagles," as Dan says. A family of bald eagles has nested in a tree on the Greenbelt near our house. Every weekend, we check on the eagles. Of course, we were doing that before quarantine because simple pleasures and everything.

Dan ate ribs and German chocolate cake. Barbecue and German chocolate cake are the same birthday foods he requests every year.

We ended his birthday watching a superhero movie, albeit from our couch rather than from one of those luxury cinema seats.

This year, Dan chose Dark Phoenix.

 

"Matt Talbot released a new demo on Bandcamp!" Dan exclaimed that afternoon. "Did he do that for my birthday?"

Chances are not many of you know who Matt Talbot is, so let me tell you.

During the '90s, Talbot fronted (and still fronts from time to time) a "space rock" band called Hum.

One evening, not long after we met in the early 2000s, Dan was playing a tune on his guitar while I was hanging out with some friends at his apartment.

He made the comment that if a woman ever guessed the song he playing, "I'm going to marry that girl."

I didn't "name that tune," but he married me anyway mostly because I was familiar with one of the band's better known singles.

In other words, Dan loves Hum and Matt Talbot, and the fact that Talbot released a demo on Dan's birthday was (inadvertently on Talbot's part, I'm sure) serendipitous.

I suppose that made Dan's quarantine birthday somewhat unique.

For the latest blog updates, visit and "like" Rebecca Turner-Duggan.

STAY-AT-HOME Week 5: Dan and I Are Like Banksy

This week, I cleaned out my classroom for the summer and distributed my students' personal effects. We were given two hours, and I won't be back in my classroom until August.

I was doing alright until I started sorting the props for this year's spring musical, The Little Mermaid. The kids had brought several items from home for the musical, and I labeled them and put them in front of teachers' doors.

One of the sixth graders had left a note on one of the props: "For the Sailors ."

"That scene was looking so good . . . " I told my husband, Dan, who was helping me, as we walked back to my classroom one last time. That's when I started crying.

I came home to news updates on protestors from ultra conservative groups at the Capitol, defying stay-at-home orders, and pictures posted on Facebook of people gathering with family members and friends, not in their immediate households, because . . . MY RIGHTS!

With great freedom (and rights), comes great responsibility. Spiderman taught me that. Or was that "with great power?" Semantics.

Some of those MY RIGHTS protestors have asked why only the deaths have been reported. They say the US has a 98% COVID-19 recovery rate. Why isn't that being reported?

I don't even know if this statistic is current or accurate anymore, but let's consider a 98% recovery rate.

So that means there's a 2% death rate? Let's say you are at a party or in some sort of group where fifty people get sick with the virus. That means one person dies. That's not good.

This is a public health issue no matter what your gut/non-medical opinion tells you. #science

In other words, it's not all about you. That's actually in the Bible. Or you could watch Spiderman.

Boise is better at social distancing than some of our neighboring cities and communities to the [cough cough] west, but Dan and I still heard the following things while wearing face coverings on the Greenbelt.

Of course, the Greenbelt nearest our house ventures close to Eagle, a ritzy, conservative bedroom community. Make of that what you will [insert eye roll here].

"You gonna rob a bank?" an older gentleman asked us while his wife laughed at his amazing joke.

"No, but you're going to make into my blog," I called to him (when he was most likely out of earshot). "I'm kind of famous" if by famous, you mean my close friends and some of my family think my blog is awesome.

"That's impressive," another gentleman, running with his wife and another young adult male, said.

He may have been paying me a compliment, but I was feeling feisty.

"Just following the Governor's orders," I replied.

The woman scoffed at me, and I added, "Some of us have asthma."

I mean, it's fun to be ridiculed while exercising.

"Do you have your Banksy face covering?"

These are the things Dan and I say to each other now.

The other day, Dan and I went on a walk through our neighborhood, wearing our Banksy face coverings, of course.

The people wearing face coverings and practicing social distancing in our neighborhood were the hip, cool-looking, younger adults. I include Dan and I in that category (so maybe youngish to GenXish is a better description).

Let's be honest, the people not doing those things in our neighborhood and--ahem--in the rest of our state (dare I say, at the Capitol on Friday?) were not as hip and cool-looking as us.

Be hip and cool-looking like us.

Social Distancing Week 1: Tales of Working From Home
STAY-AT-HOME Week 2: Tales From the Outdoors
STAY-AT-HOME Week 3: Our New Routine 
STAY-AT-HOME Week 4: This Week, I Clean My Own House

For the latest blog updates, visit and "like" Rebecca Turner-Duggan.

STAY-AT-HOME Week 4: This Week, I Clean My Own House

My husband, Dan, and I are on week number four of social distancing. As I said last week, we have established a new routine. My sister-in-law asked if we wanted to kill each other yet, and we both shrugged our shoulders and said no.

"We don't have kids, so we just stay in separate rooms and out of each other's hair," I said. "It's kind of like when we're both at work."

Of course, there was the time Dan was listening to LOUD music—and I mean DEATH METAL—while I was planning music lessons.

And there was the time Dan came out of the office and said, "Pretty crazy both of us listening to podcasts on double speed."

I guess it sounds a little chaotic in our house during this work-from-home time.

I am learning the art of the teleconference call. Between school and community groups, I use Google Hangouts or Zoom multiple times a day. I'm not going to lie. It's nerve-wrecking, and I always end up with sweaty armpits.

Dan and I are still trying to support local businesses. Boise people: Rediscovered Books has an online ordering system, and they will deliver to your front porch.

Fun story: I ordered a book by one of my favorite authors, thinking I was just getting the paperback version. They must have delivered whatever was available in the store because I ended up with an autographed copy!

I am going to sound like a horrible, snotty, overly privileged person, but for the first time since moved in, I cleaned my own house this week.

Yes, Dan and I have house cleaners, but there is an explanation . . . kind of . . .

When I was moving out of my apartment and into Dan's house, my mother advised me to get a housekeeper.

"It was the best decision I ever made," my mom said. "It's not that expensive if you have them come every two weeks. You are like me, and you will obsess over cleaning every little thing. It will take you five hours every weekend, and it will stress you out."

So, Dan and I hired a cleaning service. They even have a green cleaning option, and I can concentrate on stressing out about other things.

Because they care about their employees, as do we, the cleaners are practicing social distancing for now, and their services are temporarily canceled.

For the first time this week, we cleaned our own house. Actually, I thought I would be cleaning while Dan took care of other #adulting projects, but Dan approached me when I was pulling our cleaning products out of the cabinet.

"How are going to split up the house? Do you want me vacuum?" he asked.

It reminded me of another lesson I learned as a kid. My sneaky mother taught me about gender equality by introducing me to the Marlo Thomas' Free to Be You and Me. Dan's comment specifically brought to mind Carol Channing's "Housework."

Social Distancing Week 1: Tales of Working From Home
STAY-AT-HOME Week 2: Tales From the Outdoors
STAY-AT-HOME Week 3: Our New Routine
STAY-AT-HOME Week 5: Dan and I Are Like Banksy

For the latest blog updates, visit and "like" Rebecca Turner-Duggan.

STAY-AT-HOME Week 3: Our New Routine

Last week, I mentioned my husband, Dan, and I don't have a problem social distancing. This week, I discovered there might be a reason for that.

Apparently, GenX-ers are awesome, and Dan and I happen to be GenX-ers. (I know it is difficult for you to believe that I, so youthful and fresh-faced, could have been born in the seventies, but I totally was.)

Parade.com even consulted the scientific experts who agreed that GenX-ers are self-sufficient.

“This generation enjoys taking on responsibility, while also maintaining their personal freedom and prioritizing work/life balance," says Shannon O’Neill, Ph.D.

And they used to call us the Slacker Generation. Ha!

 Name this 1989 film!

Last week was technically my school district's spring break. This week, I was back to work, and Dan and I fell into a new routine.

Dan, being a software engineer, has more experience with the art of the teleconference than I do, but I learned a lot about Zoom and Google Hangouts over the last few days. Most of the time, Dan and I are in teleconferences at the same time, Dan on Zoom and me on Google Hangouts.

Dan's work space is our office.

My work space is at our kitchen table among the plants, and I mean A LOT of plants. It's like working at a greenhouse, which could be worse, spoken as my father's daughter. (My father is Houseplant King, like "Tiger King" only without the inhumane exotic animal stuff.)

Notice the piano in Dan's work space? Who is the music teacher in this equation? Who actually needs a piano, I ask?

Dan and I do a good job of keeping the lines of communication open during our work week.

For instance, it is not unusual for me, from my perch at the kitchen table, to text Dan important questions like, "Do you want a coffee? Asking for a friend."

I also started setting an alarm every hour to remind myself to get up and move. My movement of choice is to walk laps around my kitchen and living room.

I have been known to yell throughout the house, "TIME FOR LAPS!"

Originally, I wanted to yell, "LAP TIME!" but Dan was worried he might be on a phone call, and that could be taken the wrong way . . .

So many people have used this time of social distancing to tackle projects at home, to take up hobbies that had been set aside over the years, to binge on Netflix.

We haven't done any of those things although Dan did finish his 3D puzzle. 

However, I've been busy NOT cleaning or reorganizing closets!

Social Distancing Week 1: Tales of Working From Home
STAY-AT-HOME Week 2: Tales From the Outdoors
STAY-AT-HOME Week 4: This Week, I Clean My Own House 
STAY-AT-HOME Week 5: Dan and I Are Like Banksy 

For the latest blog updates, visit and "like" Rebecca Turner-Duggan.