An Almost Normal Covid Halloween

So LA County had pretty much "outlawed" Trick-orTreating this year. Which made me sad because Halloween is a pretty big deal around my neighborhood. Pretty big deal with Johnnie too, it IS after all is favorite favorite holiday. There are sooo many kids in my area and I looked forward to seeing them with their parents and joining them with Johnnie collecting his treats like he had the past couple of years. But not this year. First of all, he's on Lisa's watch this year so whatever he did was going to happen with whatever she had planned.  And for her part, Lisa was supposed to work today but closed her office for Halloween. Good for her. And so she told me that the "Woods" as her block is known had organized a controlled trick-or-treat experience for tonight. Which meant that kids went to specific houses and that those specific houses followed trick-or-treat protocols. Of that, I would learn about later on but for the here and now, since Lisa didn't actually practice piano last night, she asked if I could come by for breakfast so she could this morning.... and also come back later on tonight to participate in trick-or-treat fest. Watching Johnnie this morning was ok enough and I even brought spinach and onion so Lisa could make an omelette. I woke up fairly early actually and as if by rote I made myself tea and put a bagel in the toaster as if it was a normal weekday. Hey, I was hungry. Besides, you never know what's happening with food at Lisa's house. Better make sure YOU'RE not hungry before you get there or you're liable to starve LOL LOL. As it was she was in the middle of making waffles for Johnnie. Never anything simple right although I am framing that as a compliment actually. Especially since I ended up making the omelette while she focused on the waffles. See? I had not a care in the world since I wasn't starving hungry. It was 9 AM by this time after all. And so we did have breakfast all together and I ate more in fact... the omelette AND waffles. And then Lisa retired to the piano room and I actually gave Johnnie his shower, got him dressed and off we went. This morning i wanted to look for a wetsuit for him since I felt so sorry he froze like crazy last Tuesday. Off we went to Big 5 to look for one. And when we couldn't find anything I just stuck to Amazon at home like I should have to begin with. I mean we're not talking about a $250 wetsuit like I bought a long time ago. We're talking about a $25 one. Turned out though Johnnie was still hungry. It's like his hungry cells turn on when he's at my house. Fortunately, we had already picked up Panda Express on the way home. And since it was already 11:30 when we did get home, I let him have an early lunch.  And he got to watch his videos and he got to horseplay with me (look at the pic) and I had my QT with him this morning already.

And so for the evening I figured it would be all Lisa. I dropped Johnnie off right after lunch and I still had the entire afternoon for ME time and run some errands. I stopped at Chipotle on National to have a steak asada burrito bowl for lunch since I hadn't really done any shopping yet. And then went on to Supercuts to get a haircut. I didn't know whether it was open or not but I really did need a haircut and I did NOT want to cut my own hair. Not now. Probably not anymore.  And with good reason. Even if I did not end up with the best stylist at Supercuts, it still looked like a much better haircut than any one of my buzzcuts from the last few months. And so with that, and a 20 minute nap to boot, I felt like I had a pretty good afternoon. Even got my laundry done. AND I even got my steps in. I was already at 8000 steps before going to Lisa's. I got there at 4:30 per her request and mom and son were doing some sort of science experiment. Poor kid stuck with doing Lisa's goofy stuff LOL LOL. But hey she did do all the work with making candy packages and everything. And by 5 PM, Pablo and Allie's kids were already at the door. Look at Johnnie giving away the candy. It was like trick-or-treating was as normal. Johnnie put on his Star Wars uniform and headed off with them. And I stayed home to hand out candy. Which Lisa corrected by calling me and telling me to put out the candy by the sandbox so it would be contactless. AHHH That's the protocol. And so I put the candy out, made sure the pumpkins were lit so the kids would see, and I closed the windows. And stayed in to make Armenian rice for dinner. I mean I had literally nothing to do. I watched some YouTube, ate leftover Panini Grill so I wouldn't be so hungry and waited for mom and son to come home. They wouldn't get back until it was 6:30 PM! A full hour-and-half later! It was as if Johnnie had done regular trick-or-treating after all! I mean he did come home with a full bag of candy treats. And then I helped Lisa make the rest of the dinner. She cooked the fish that I brought last night, made cabbage and the leftover onions from Panini Grill. I made Johnnie's noodles and voila: dinner with the "fam" for the 2nd night in a row. Lisa had to make a big deal about reading a book with Johnnie and I was just fine with that. After all, I had already watched the Mandalorian yesterday. And since it's Daylight Savings tomorrow, we do get an extra hour of sleep. I got home by 9 PM and wound down in front of the TV. Turned out to be an almost normal COVID Halloween. And that's thanks to Lisa and her neighbors. Thank you all :)