No-Tie Shoe Laces?

While in Illinois last month, my daughter gave me these No-Tie Shoe Laces. She said they were supposedly kids' size but that they fit well on her shoes.

I made the mistake of using the shortest size at the bottom first which didn't feel right. It hurt to take the silicon plug ends out through the little holes.

Art took pity on me and redid the laces using the wider size silicon ties at the top of the card.

OK, so far so good.

I'll have to wear them a while to see just how much I like them. Meanwhile I'm keeping my regular laces, just in case.

POSTSCRIPT:

OK, it's been a while now and I used it several times. The first couple of times, it felt too tight on one side, but it must have stretched out a bit because it's now quite comfortable. I like it. I like it.

Preparing for a Hurricane?

We went to an AARP workshop about hurricane preparedness last year. All Island Rollshutter was recommended to put up barriers for windows during a dreaded storm. Actually, there aren't a lot of companies that do this here so we decided to just give them a call.

Their president came out and assessed that most of our windows could be barricaded, but not all. We just wouldn't have a place to store really big barriers. Therefore, we opted for astroguard hurricane fabric.

They would be secured with these strong straps that would be screwed into the wall or concrete.

I sure hope they work. They look strong, but will they hold up to a hurricane. I don't know.

They had to drill screw holes into the concrete pillars to hold up the fabric which left crumbly divots. It was rather unsightly and people did notice.

I was also worried that the unprotected concrete would weather and deteriorate making the screws pop out.

We found some caulk that was supposed to work on concrete and I went to work. I used a straw to prevent the caulk from going into the screw holes and then smoothed the area.

Since we'd just had the house painted last year, I had paint to cover the caulk. I was very relieved to see that the pillars no longer looked pockmarked.

I also painted over the areas that they had patched and it did improve the appearance so I didn't notice it so much anymore.

However, we did have a few more problems. One of the astroguard fabrics was not hooked up on 3 sides like they are supposed to so they'll be coming back to install more screw holes.

Ah well... I'll deal with that when it happens. I just hope all this helps when a real hurricane hits.

POSTSCRIPT: Well, now that we're all rather quarantined, we haven't had the company out to correct the Astroguard problem. I hope they stay in business to finish this project.

Danger on Facebook

A couple weeks ago, I got this email.

When I saw this, I totally freaked out! This was a password I had used before. I skimmed the rest of the letter. It was fake because... come on... no, I don't visit that kind of website and certainly don't do what it says I do. On top of that, my web camera was totally disconnected a couple years ago after I read how it can be turned on somehow. So I knew it was fake. But the password was familiar. It was one I used on my old Facebook account that I deleted a few years ago.

I contacted my techie son-in-law who told me I should change any other account where I used the same password. When I checked my accounts, I hadn't used that password in many places so I could change them pretty easily. 

Then I saw that Jalna of Photos By Jalna had written about this very thing a few days ago. I thought I'd better warn all of you not to be taken in. Even though the information it purports to have about you is fake, some people might still be taken in to send money to this evil person.

Everyone is stressed out right now and perhaps vulnerable.

Please be careful.

POSTSCRIPT: What a surprise! They just reported this scam on the afternoon news. I guess Jalna and I weren’t the only ones hit by this evil. 

Watching Amaryllis Bloom

I had this post scheduled to go up in early March. And then Corona hit us so I've moved this post to April, but gosh! It's almost May! What are the chances that the situation will improve by June?

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When we first arrived in February for our two week stay with our daughter and her family in Illinois, we saw that a pot of Amaryllis bulbs had been given to them for Christmas by a wonderful friend.

Tight buds were now growing tall next to the window. We wondered if they would bloom while we were there. We did not think so. And yet... a couple of days before we left, they started to bloom.

We couldn't believe it! Blossoms burst forth on two of the stalks. And then the day after we returned home to Hawaii, Tiffany sent us a photo showing how the third stalk had also bloomed. And there were still three more stalks showing the promise of continued bloom.

Spring is still a ways off but what a lovely way to raise your spirits in winter!

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And now spring is almost going into summer. I guess I'm just looking wistfully back to early February when all I was thinking about was the bloom of a flower.

Repairing My Sewing Machine

I'd  been having problems with my sewing machine after working it hard for the last three weeks. I did take it apart and thought I'd fixed it, but gradually... it started to do some weird things again.

One of my friends in our group of four tai chi mask making women that I belong to had a sewing machine repairman come to her house to fix her machine a couple of weeks ago. Myra had gotten his name from another sewing buddy.

I was figuring on giving him a call when I was done making masks, but then decided to call him earlier than planned. Myra had told me that he was very busy, but since her machine was old and had no computer components on it, he could make time to come out to fix her machine.

I was figuring on Rick coming to our house a few weeks from now, but it turned out that he lived close by so he could stop over early the next day.

Rick said he had 2,000 clients and was now servicing 30 machines a week with the mask making fervor in full swing.

Then I was worried about having someone coming into our house with Coronavirus lurking all about. I felt bad mentioning this to Rick on the phone, but he said he was even happier to do the work outside on the patio or carport. He said he would be wearing an N95 mask as well. And he did.

OK... there was a lot more to tuning the machine than I ever imagined. He took off the entire back of the machine and began oiling, tweaking and air blowing here and there. He said I was using very old, bad thread. He said I needed to change my needles more often. Sigh... I know. I told him I couldn't buy newer thread right now. He understood. He showed me where I should oil the machine and how to maintain it. Do you know I paid twice as much as he charged when I brought it to the sewing machine shop about a year or so ago?

Well... I'm back in operation again with a few more people to make masks for.

I did ask Rick if he'd like me to put his name and number on my blog for some free advertising. He declined saying he can hardly keep up with the orders he has already.

Oh yes. I shall be having him service my machine from now on.

Testing for Cotton

I've been making a whole lot of masks....a whole lot of masks. In fact, for the past several weeks, I've spent just about every day from morning till night making masks for friends, relatives and neighbors.

I'd gotten material from a friend and from my daughter, but since they were not labeled, I couldn't tell if they were cotton. They do recommend cotton for masks. They all felt like cotton, but when I ironed several of them on the highest heat, I noticed that it did tend to stick.

I had one black fabric in particular that really felt like cotton so I made 11 masks with it and gave them out.

Then my friend's son mentioned that a burn test might help to tell if a certain material was cotton.

A burn test? Hmmm.... I thought about my hot iron.

I also found a very old sheet in mom's linen closet that really felt like cotton, but didn't list the material content.

It did say Pequot so I looked it up. I discovered that Pequot Cotton Mills was from Salem, Massachusetts and closed 1953.

I then looked up how to tell cotton from synthetic and yes, it was a burn test.

And you know engineer Art is always into experiments and projects. So we got several fabrics that I was considering for mask making.

The Pequot sheet fabric is definitely cotton so I'll be using it for mask lining. It's thick and stiff which will keep it away from the nose better.

It burned steadily and the ash was powdery which indicated it was organic cotton.

The two red checkerboard fabrics caught fire quickly, curled and left hard residue.

I can be a bit more confident now about the fabrics I'm using.

It was a fun test to do and I think I'll be making another mask for my friend's son. 

Food Expiration Dates

We've not gone food shopping in weeks. Luckily, we have friends and relatives who have brought an abundance of food (and really yummy treats) for us. This photo shows just a bit of it. I didn't take photos of the other things because it went straight into our tummies or refrigerator.

One particular cousin (you know who you are) brought over enough meals (with desserts) to last us at least 4 days!

However... I digress.

I was planning to write about expiration dates and got distracted.

I wrote earlier about how Art and I had inventoried everything in our fridge, freezer and cabinets. Ummm... I saw that my flour (which I keep in the freezer) had expired. Our eggs will expire in 9 days. Hmmmm...

Then Art saw an article that was quite important for these non-marketing days of COVID Stay-At-Home.

This article was in the Star Advertiser, but I found it on the New York Times website.

Apparently, you don't have to worry about vinegars, honey, vanilla, other extracts, sugar, salt, corn syrup and molasses. They can last almost forever.

Regular steel cut or rolled oats will last a year, but would you believe instants oats will last almost forever? What the heck!

The article goes on to say that flour can be used no matter how old it is, but whole grain or whole wheat flours will get a metallic or soapy odor after a few months. White rice will also last for a year, but not brown.

Nuts should be frozen or they'll go rancid.

Mustard lasts forever! Yahoo!

But the thing I found most interesting was eggs. This is what it said:

"How long? The Julian date printed on each carton (that’s the three-digit number ranging from 001 for Jan. 1 to 365 for Dec. 31) represents the date the eggs were packed, which, in most parts of the country, can be up to 30 days after the egg was actually laid. The sell-by stamp can be another 30 days after the pack date.That’s 60 full days! But odds are good that they’ll still be palatable for several weeks longer than that. You’ll run out of hoarded toilet paper before those eggs go bad."

 And look! 077! I think that must  be it.

I guess that means the eggs were packed on March 17th.

I'm going to assume my eggs will be OK for a while.

The article says that the expiration dates are not actual expiration dates. They are the manufacturer's best guess for when the product is at its peak quality.

It's so good to know this as I contemplate how many days we can go with the food supply we have now. I can tell you one thing...

My yet untouched spam will probably last beyond the 2023 expiration date!

Rainbow Jello

Again, this is another post that was moved forward because of COVID-19. Mask making is still keeping me busy.

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I wrote yesterday how we brought over nishime for Diane and her family that mom prepared because I'd mentioned to her how much Diane loved it.

Well...

When I presented mom's gift to her, Diane had something prepared for mom as well.

Would you believe she made...

Rainbow Jello!?!

I couldn't believe it! 

These are the actual rainbow colors:

Oh my gosh! I can just imagine what it took for her to get just the right jello color combination to get indigo.

If you ever want to try this yourself, I found this recipe on Must Have Mom's website.

How did it taste? Awesome! I think you just enjoy this a whole lot more because you know the love and effort that went into it. You also feel like you're really enjoying a taste of a rainbow. It's so much fun!

And mom? Oh yes! She was absolutely floored and loved every delicious layer of it.

Nishime

This post was written a month ago, but has been moved forward several times because of COVID-19.

Diane and I have known each other since kindergarten.

She lived in the same sugar plantation camp as me so many decades ago and we ran free in each other's homes.

Diane has also brought over special treats for mom when we were on the mainland and in the years we've been back. Therefore, when I mentioned in passing how much Diane loved mom's nishime (classic Japanese chicken and vegetables dish), mom decided she just had to make some for her.

Still, I was surprised to hear her starting to cook at 4:30 in the morning!

At 90 and tiring more easily, I told her we would help because it requires a LOT of preparation. In the past, she would not accept our help because she liked doing everything juuuust so.

There's a variety of vegetables you can add and mom loves to include a lot of different things. Along with the chicken, there's carrots, konbu (seaweed), tempura (fish cake, I think), konnyaku (konjac gel), gobo (burdock root), shiitake mushrooms, aburage (fried tofu), araimo (dasheen), takenoko (bamboo shoots), and I'm sure I've forgotten something. Sometimes, she'll put in hasu (lotus roots).

It's not my super favorite dish, but Art loves it and he's often telling mom that she should add more carrots or more konbu.

Therefore I peeled and cut more carrots for to make sure he had enough. He took care of adding more konbu himself. In the end, since she likes konbu also, it was a win-win.

Frankly, I like konnyaku and tempura best.

I also peeled the araimo. Mom used to look for frozen araimo because the liquid in the araimo is really a skin irritant. I used a kitchen glove and then washed the araimo in salt water as mom directed.

At last, the nishime was done and we were able to bring some over to Diane's house to enjoy for dinner. Yes, Diane and her family were thrilled and mom is pleased as punch too.

As for mom, Art and me, we loved having it for dinner too.

Recording COVID-19 Family History

We spent happy times this winter on the mainland.  We were in Maryland in December with my son and his family.  We then went to Illinois at the end of January into February to see my granddaughter dance in a grand performance. I was a bit nervous even then traveling on a plane with the possibility of someone who might be carrying the Coronavirus because they'd already been talking about Wuhan and how the disease was traveling.

A couple of weeks after we returned in February, so many of my friends were already getting ready with sanitizers and hand wipes. It was difficult to find even then.

We had a Viking cruise scheduled for May which we then set aside for another time.

I decided to record our winter travels in a photo book; especially for the grandkids who love the books.

Things steadily got worse. Travel Restrictions! Quarantines! Lockdowns! No Need to Wear Masks. Not enough protective equipment for health care workers! Businesses closed! Everybody Needs to Wear a Mask! Social Distancing! Stay-at-home Order!

Photobooks have a maximum of 100 pages at Costco. I had 17 more pages left but decided I might print it anyway.

However, as our daughter and son started sending photos of what they were doing during the COVID Stay-at-Home crisis we realized that this was an important moment in history. So I started adding pages to document this historical time.

I've started to add newspaper headline photos, Coronavirus statistics, etc. I'm documenting as much as I can.

I hope our government can learn from this crisis and not be so very slow and disorganized next time this happens.

Because, I fear it will.

What Day Is It?

I keep forgetting what day of the week it is. Have you had that problem?

We had a lovely schedule that kept everything in order. Monday and Friday was my Zumba days. Tuesday was our Open (farmers) market, doctor visit days. Wednesday was our special day to walk with friends. Thursday was our tai chi day. Friday was the day Art did his Meals on Wheels. Saturday was a chore day. Sunday was a day of relaxation for Art when he could read the newspaper cover to cover for 2-3 hours. Now the paper is so thin, he can finish in half the time.

And so I keep forgetting what day it is. It’s quite disconcerting. I wonder when we’ll all get back on schedule again.

Ibuprofen (Motrin, Advil) vs. Naproxen (Aleve)

Before going to physical therapy to fix my frozen shoulder (adhesive capsulitis) about 15 years ago when we lived in Chicago, my therapist told me to take Motrin (4 tablets). That's double the recommended dose, but my therapist said I'd be fine and to take it with food. He said therapy was going to be painful and I needed to take the pain meds.

Since that time I've always taken Motrin for all my shoulder and/or back pain (WITH FOOD). I'm careful because I have a friend and a relative with painful ulcers due to taking pain meds without food.

One of my friends told me that she needs Aleve because Motrin doesn't really help. That got me thinking. I know Motrin is an ibuprofen. Was Aleve the same? What about Advil?  So of course, I did a little research.

Motrin and Advil are ibuprofens. Aleve is a naproxen. They are both NSAIDs (Nonsteroidal Anti- Inflammatory Drugs),

I got the following information from Drugs.com.

Ibuprofen is short acting, while naproxen is long acting and more likely to cause stomach upset.
Ibuprofen acts more quickly but lasts between 4-6 hours so the meds have to be taken more often. Naproxen has to be taken just twice daily.

However... there's always a however... If you take too high a dose of ibuprofen you run the risk of a cardiovascular problem. For somebody with a heart problem even a low dose could possibly be a problem so it should be taken after consulting your doctor. Naproxen doesn't appear to present that problem.

In summary:

"In summary, naproxen (in dosages up to 1000mg/day) or low-dose ibuprofen (in dosages up to 1200mg/day) are preferred if NSAIDs are deemed necessary in adults. At these dosages, risk of cardiovascular events in people with no pre-existing risk factors is low, although risk of GI side-effects may be higher with naproxen."

So there you have it. I guess I'll just stick to Motrin like I did when I walked during the Great Aloha Run. I just took a tablet at the start and middle of the race with cookies which worked perfectly.  And no, it was not an excuse to eat more cookies.

Mask Making Hui

Ever since our mayor mandated that everyone needs to wear a mask when going out of their house, anyone with a sewing machine has been making masks for their friends, family, neighbors, etc.

I have now made over 50 masks for relatives, friends and neighbors as well. In fact, it's all I've been doing every day for the last three weeks.

I've even enlisted Art to help at times. Here he is removing some stitching from my son's aloha shirt. Yes, Keola did give me permission to sacrifice his shirt to the cause. In fact, I've been making some masks to send to him for the whole family in Maryland. He didn't need them earlier because they weren't leaving the house, but eventually, it would be good to have a little protection.

Sewing machine repairmen are inundated with calls and can't meet the demand fast enough. Even though I just had my machine tuned and serviced less than a year ago, it started to make some terrible clanging, chugging sounds. What to do?

I got out my instruction manual. I looked at the photos. Took a deep breath and started taking it apart. Yes, yes... I know I should have called Art. I found a huge lump of lint under the "feed dog." I oiled the bobbin holder.

And then I tried to put it back together. That's when I started sweating. Did I totally goof up? I tried again for 15 minutes. And no... I wasn't going to call Art.

I went back to the manual and checked again. Uh oh... could it be? Was I really trying to put a part in backwards?

Yup. That was the problem. I put it back together and YAY! Double YAY! The clanking was gone. And it's running smoothly and the stitches are neat again. What a relief!!!

(Art did tell me later that's why he takes photos of each step when he takes anything apart. He was proud of me though.)

I started sewing more masks.

And that's when I ran into the next problem. I was out of elastic!!!  I had ordered more on Amazon but it won't be here until the end of the month.

And here's the wonderful thing. Art and I belong to a group of four couples that meet every Thursday for tai-chi which is now cancelled until the pandemic is over. We also go out to dinner every couple of months (which is also on hold). Well, all four of the women sew and we starting texting each other with ideas, hints, and alerts if we saw something we needed was on sale. The daily texts have been awesome in keeping us motivated and focused! We are all sewing for our families, friends, etc. It's sort of a hui. That's a Hawaiian word that means a group working together for a common cause.

We all had different ideas for the materials we could use for elastic including hair ties, paracords, shoe laces, ribbon, etc.

The latest idea was horizontal strips of t-shirt. And you know what? It wasn't too bad.

This is what I've been doing from 8:00 AM to probably 7:00 PM. My kids think it's stressing me out, but it's also kept me from being bored. It feels great to be doing something useful that might be helping someone else here.

Therefore, I must apologize for not being able to visit you for the time being. I'm bound to run out of material soon though...

Then again, my son does have another aloha shirt I can take apart.

Deteriorating Washer Cover

Our washer/dryers sit outside on our patio. I'm afraid that's where they have to go. There's no place to move it indoors. In fact, many people in Hawaii have their washer/dryers outside on their patios even though it's then subject to salty moisture.

I made a cover for the machines about 10 years ago and it lasted for perhaps 8. I didn't want to attempt that again so looked online but couldn't find anything that fit the bill.

A friend of ours had a set that looked like it might work though it looked rather flimsy. The great thing, however, was that you just had to zip that top off which made it a lot easier for mom. Taking off the cover each time we use the machine is quite bothersome.

Sure enough, in a matter of months, it fell apart and you can see the rust on the machine. The rust is our fault. We knew the cover was tearing but were slow on replacing it.

Happily, our friend had given us two covers so I got out the second one to replace it.

Then I thought of something. I'd used water-based polyurethane on a pencil case my granddaughter had designed on me a while ago. Could it work to protect the washer?

You can see how thin that fiber cloth is. I gave a pretty thick coat of polyurethane to the cover.

And here it is.

We shall see how long this survives our Hawaiian climate.

Headphones Solving a Marriage Dilemma

Remember me saying a while ago how Art and I complement one another? I can't smell or taste, but he has an acute sense of both. I'm near sighted. He's far sighted. I'm better at spelling. Art? Spellcheck was a godsend for him. Hearing? I can hear very well. He has hearing aids.

Well... for several years now we've had a little problem that we kept dealing with in different ways.

The TV is in my office along with my desktop computer that has all my photos with which I write my blogs. We also don't have the same taste in TV shows. Yes, we both like to watch Trevor Noah, Bob ♥ Abishola, Young Sheldon, Mixed-ish and Magnum PI, but there's a bunch of science fiction or sports programs that he enjoys when I'm trying to work on a blog post.

I've used noise cancelling earbuds that work, but the (not long enough) cord gets in the way. Then there's the fact that since he can't hear as well (even with his hearing aids) he misses a bunch of the dialogue and often asks, "What did he say?"

So I had this bright idea!

Wireless headphones!

I found one on Amazon and asked my techie son-in-law, Ed if it would work with our (sort of old) TV.

Ed checked the model #, etc. and said it should work out so I ordered it.

Unfortunately, the directions weren't very explicit and Art had a difficult time figuring out how to make it work. I was ready to send the headphones back to Amazon. However, before I did that...

I texted Ed who walked us through the procedure.

We had to go to SETTINGS on the TV, down to SOUND and then SPEAKERS. If you chose TV Speakers, his headphone and the TV could be heard. If you chose AUDIO, only Art would hear the sound from the headphones.

Perfect!

How awesome is this?

Hail Oh No!

We were talking to our daughter on Skype when we started to hear pinging in the distance. I wondered if someone was throwing pellets at their window. Tif got up to check outside and realized it must be hail. She asked if we wanted to hang on while she checked outside and we said yes.

What a shock! In the 35 years we lived in Chicago, we've NEVER EVER seen hail this big. We reminded Tif how we saw cars pock marked with hailstones in the University of Kansas parking lot when we went there for a college visit during her junior year in high school. We hoped her car was not damaged as well.

The following morning...

Yup! There was a cracked windshield and numerous dings all over the car. As if we weren't already upset about COVID-19, we sure didn't need this!

Open Market

Farmers Markets are called Open Markets here in Hawaii. The Open Market we go to starts at 6:30. In winter, it's pretty darn dark.

This is what it looked like in January about three months ago. (I was going to post this much earlier but with COVID-19 happening, all the posts I'd had scheduled had to be moved.) You have to inspect the vegetables with a flashlight in winter. Even then, we'd come home with veggies that didn’t exactly look wonderful.

Still, I sure do miss those fruits and vegetables and the sellers we came to know. I miss seeing the people and talking to everyone as we looked, laughed and made our purchases. It feels like such a long time ago.

I miss that time.

Blood Sugar Discovery!

Visiting our daughter, Tiffany and her family in February was very special since we got to see our granddaughter dance so beautifully in their ensemble performance.

My daughter and family do eat the regular amount of carbs which is a lot more than I normally eat. And yet when I tested my glucose each morning, it was at 115 or lower. (You're supposed to keep it below 100, but I aim for 110.) My glucose had been spiking before that.

When we got home, my blood glucose rose again dramatically. What the heck! Art, ever one for problem solving said he thought it could be the fact that Tiffany rarely had desserts at night.

He then suggested an experiment. He does love to do experiments. He proposed that we skip evening desserts. We'd gotten into that dessert habit because mom LOVES having desserts after dinner. OK... fine. I do, too.

And this is what happened. The red circle on the left is when we were in Illinois. You can see what happened when we returned home. The red circle on the right is when I stopped having desserts for this experiment.

Sigh...

How about a dessert after lunch? We'll see.

Stackable Ice Trays?

I sometimes have trouble getting the ice cubes out of ice trays so when I saw these apparently stackable ice trays at Ross (a while ago) that would make it easy to remove ice, I thought I'd give them a try.

Those colored bottoms are flexible so you can pop the ice out. But how would you make them stack without falling into each other?

OK... I'll admit I'm not the sharpest knife in the drawer because I stared at this forever before getting the AHA moment. Sheesh!

You're supposed to offset the trays!

They really should provide diagrams for people like me. Daaaang!

To Mask or Not to Mask?

I've already given out homemade cloth masks to our mail carrier, to friends and to relatives despite the CDC saying we don't need them if we aren't sick. And yet I've also heard that 10 to 25% (I’ve even heard 80%) of people infected with the virus are asymptomatic and may not show symptoms. They probably don't even know because we don't have enough tests!

Unfortunately, I’ve used up almost all of my scrap materials (though my daughter says she’ll send me some of her remnants to make sure I don’t go out) and have totally run out of elastic. I ordered more elastic from Amazon but it won’t get here for a month. It’s coming from China! The elastic I got before from Amazon which came in 3 days was actually a little too stiff and thick. I’m hoping the one I’ve now ordered is more appropriate.

I really think we should be wearing masks. I don't feel self conscious wearing a mask in Hawaii but my kids in Illinois and Maryland don't want to because of Trump's Chinese Virus taunts. I imagine lots of Asians are nervous because of the prejudice they're now experiencing. It's crazy!

And now this:

From the Kyodo News Service:

"Prime Minister Shinzo Abe said Wednesday the government will distribute cloth face masks to roughly 50 million households in Japan as stocks of disposable masks have run out at drugstores and other shops amid the coronavirus outbreak."

Yup. They're sending out cloth masks in Japan to every household.

Hmmmm.... What do they know that we don't seem to understand or believe?

POSTSCRIPT 1:
Would you believe our Oahu Mayor Caldwell was just on TV yesterday afternoon asking everyone to wear a cloth mask when they go out of the house?

POSTSCRIPT 2:
A friend just sent this video 1to me.

Better Hydration Flasks for COVID-19

Hydro Flask insulated hydration bottles or flasks are extremely popular here in Hawaii. Lots and lots of friends at my Zumba class used them since we do need to keep hydrated during exercise. I have always loved the two that I have. We also have several of the Thermos brand.

The first (Thermos) one on the left was given to me by my son-in-law. We have 3 of the middle (Thermos) ones which Art and I used for a long time. The Hydro Flask on the right is what I switched to when I read so many good reviews about it.

However, when I was drinking out of my Hydro Flask at Zumba a couple (was it a couple?) of weeks ago something (with COVID-19 in mind) occurred to me.

My son-in-law's Thermos has a button you press in front and you drink from that protected spout.

Our old Thermos has a button in the middle that you press to allow water to pass through to the lip of the flask.

So the two Thermos bottles allows you to avoid putting your mouth where your fingers touched.

However......

Here's the problem with the Hydro Flask. You have to always touch the lip area to snap open the cover before you can drink.

Sigh...

I guess I'll switch to the Thermos for this year and keep the Hydro Flask for next year....

Unless...

POSTSCRIPT 1:
I had Art give our mail carrier a homemade mask I made a couple of days ago. What a surprise to receive a gorgeous thank you card from her yesterday.

I am in awe of all the medical personnel who are in the front lines during this crisis.

However, I am also truly grateful to all the people who have to keep working during this terrible time so that we can shop for food, be protected, receive our mail, etc.

To all of them... THANK YOU!