July 12, 2020

 

Goddam COVID.  I can’t get an Uber to the airport.  No cars are available.  No one is driving to the airport at 530 am on a Sunday.  I used to be able to get an Uber anytime, anywhere!  My neighbor Jim drives for them, but he is out of town at his summer home in New Mexico.  I like having him a couple of doors away.  Normally, I would call him the night before and he would be waiting for me in my driveway 10 minutes before I was ready to go.  I would open my app, search for a car, and he would suck it right up. We had a good system going on.

I gently nudge Deidre and ask her to take me to the airport.  She expected that anyway.  I have piled a load of stuff on her to do while I am gone.  Because I hate to have idle time, I try to force that on her when I am home and when I am gone.  Please mow the grass and don’t forget to weed eat.  Use the blower every other day to keep the yards clean.  Try to fill up both trash cans each week with clippings and such from the yard.  The pool needs to be cleaned and checked every Sunday.  Don’t forget the chlorine.  Start the cars once a week so the batteries don’t die.  You’ll need to bring stuff up to the pub when they are low on growlers and such.  The fountains, don’t let the fountains go dry.  Every time you fill the fountains, please water the plants on the front porch, the plant on the table in the patio, and the asparagus fern I transplanted. Oh, and can you take me to the airport?  All those chores I listed, she does them anyway.  I don’t know why I tell her about them.  My cousin Paul gets upset when he finds out Deidre mowed the yard again.  I am lucky, very lucky.

We pull up to the airport at 6am.  We brought the dogs so I could tell them goodbye.  This is going to be weird for them.  They have gotten used to me being home for 4 straight months and I have gotten used to seeing them every day.  They are great together, get along better than any other pair of dogs we have ever had.  Carson has that sad look on his face, as he knows what those suitcases mean.  Cocoa, who we have only had since January, does not know the absence that lies ahead.  I hug and kiss them both, stroke their heads, give them one last hug. 

I have become quite attached to our pups.  Our kids have grown and have their own lives, so these dogs have become our children.  Mind you, our children (the ones that are human) we are super proud of.  Clay is a second year resident at Banner hospital in Phoenix, after graduating from the University of Arizona, then Med School at the University of Miami.  He is right in the thick of COVID, and that worries Deidre every day.  He is still our “little redhead boy” and a mother will be a mother until she dies.  Kristen was married this past November to her high school sweetheart and she and her husband own a home in north Phoenix.  She took her first job at Walgreens Corporate in Chicago, but was lured to Scottsdale by Sprouts.  I am not quite sure what her job title is, but she is killing it.  I look at some of the data she works with, and I turn away afraid that she might ask me if I know what she is doing.  Please don’t ask.

Back to the dogs.  When I leave each time, I never know what may happen while I am gone.  During the NBA playoffs a couple of years ago, I got a call from Deidre who told me Shasta, an Australian Shepherd mix that we have had for 11 years, had fallen ill.  I loved that dog.  She was my shadow.  She followed me everywhere.  I’d get out of the shower, and there she was, on her back, tail wagging, begging me to rub her belly.  I’d work in the yard, she trailed.  I’d sit down to watch TV, she’d stick her nose on my leg for me to pet her.  In the mornings, she would sneak on the bed to snuggle. But Shasta was dying.

This was a Thursday, and I would be home on Sunday for a few days.  Deidre had taken Shasta to the vet.  They ran a bunch of tests and found she had cancer.  She had a rather large tumor that we never saw.  The vet said she had been sick for quite some time but she never let us on her secret.  A dog’s job is to make her family happy, and she had done her job magnificently.   Shasta couldn’t wait until I got home.  Deidre let her cross the rainbow bridge with a photo of me on the table next to her.  I was able to call and Deidre put me on speaker so I could let Shasta know how much I loved her.  I cried like a baby that night, and I can’t imagine how Deidre was able to hold herself together through that ordeal.

I have to get on the plane.  I kissed Deidre goodbye and said let’s hope this bubble bursts so I can get home earlier.  I put on my mask, checked in at the counter and deposited my two suitcases.  Going through TSA was a breeze being as there was no one in line.  I had to pull down my mask so they could see it was really me.  Boarded the plane and nestled in to my first class seat.

It was strange watching everyone on the plane board masked.  Everyone. I wish we would have done that way back in February and we may not be in the situation we are now.  But hindsight is 20/20 and I don’t like to be a Monday morning quarterback.  We do get drinks in first class, but no food.  It was an uneventful flight to Dallas, and on my second flight to Orlando.  I was able to conclude my watching of “Good Girls” during both flights, and I started the second season of “The Politician.”  I love Netflix, especially since you can download programming and watch it anywhere.

When we landed in Orlando 30 minutes ahead of schedule, I received a notification that instead of reporting to the Coronado Springs Resort for immediate quarantine, I was to check in to the Waldorf Astoria property for one night.  Seriously, they are going to tease me with one night at the Waldorf?  I made it to baggage claim and found the NBA representative that was waiting for me.  Get your bags, she said, then come back for transport to the Waldorf. Everywhere you looked, everyone had a mask on, except the NBA representative! I found that to be very strange, as the protocol for this thing to be successful was extremely stringent and my first observation of an NBA representative was quite loose.

Checking in to the Waldorf was quick and easy.  I saw several of my Turner Sports co-workers in the lobby.  There were quite a few ESPN guys that I knew as well.  Turner and ESPN are the two networks covering the games.  ESPN stays for the Finals, while Turner is tasked to leave after the Conference Finals.  Some had been there for a week, some for five days, some just arriving as I was. There are three levels of COVID clearance for the NBA restart: Green, Yellow, and Red.  Now you’d think red would be the most stringent, but it is the other way around.  Green is the highest level of clearance.  Green are the players, officials, coaches, anyone that is allowed on the court, and the camera operators that are near the court.  I am a slash camera operator, and there are two of those.  They are about 5-10 rows off the court in the corners opposite the benches. The other green cameras are the mid court handheld and the reverse camera.

The yellow clearance are those that can be in the arena but nowhere near the court.  And the red are those that are not allowed in the arena at all, like the truck technicians, tape operators, producer and director, etc.  But here is the catch. Red and yellow get to stay at the Waldorf, green must quarantine and stay at the Coronado Springs Resort.

I got my key and dropped all my luggage in my room, then was hustled onto a bus that took me to my first COVID test.  I was starving as I hadn’t eaten anything all day (my connection in Dallas was very tight).  The testing site had two trailers for testing, but only one was operating.  We waited in line for over an hour, social distancing and wearing our masks like good soldiers.  When it was my turn, the test was over before I knew it.  I was expecting the nurse to jam a huge Q Tip up each nostril and scratch the back of my throat, but this testing was super easy,  a gentle mouth swab and an easy swipe around the inside of each nostril.  I walked away quite pleased.  Heck yeah, I could deal with that every day. 

I was supposed to get right back on the bus to go back to the hotel but the bus hadn’t come back yet, so me and a couple of other buddies decided to run across the street and have dinner at a restaurant.  We weren’t sure if we were breaking protocol, but hey, we had been on 2 planes each, three airports, a shuttle, a bus, and a hotel lobby.  What’s a restaurant gonna do?  Plus, we figured this was our last meal before we get hustled off to quarantine, so let’s do it.  The meal?  It was okay. Nothing memorable, but it killed the emptiness I felt in my stomach.

After that, we needed ice cream, and Kelly needed to pick up some additional alcohol because 80 days in lockdown is a long time, and we weren’t sure if we could get any alcohol on the Disney property we were going to call home for the next 80 days.  Ted is a big fan of Freddy’s, and there was one right next to the liquor store.  Score!  Both needs were met within feet of each other.  Masks were being worn by everyone everywhere.  In the liquor store, inside Freddy’s, on the walk back to catch the bus, masks were on all. Why is Florida running rampant with COVID cases?  Everyone is masked.  At least where I have been during the few hours I have been here.  Well, except the NBA rep at the airport.

We caught the bus back to the Waldorf, said goodnight, and headed to our rooms.  Who knew what lie ahead in our first real day of the NBA Bubble?