Quarantine Dreams

The stress of teaching online has manifested in my dreams. Daily (nightly) I have bizarre and complicated dreams about school and my students.

Often the classroom has been destroyed and we are trying out new settings only to have students get lost or fall into crevasses, or I spend the dream encountering small groups of my students and I can't find the rest and when I do find others I lose the students I'd found previously.

The current project my students are working on will get a ridiculous additional requirement that nobody can accomplish, and I awake multiple times thinking "That's not part of the assignment" only to fall asleep again and have another anxiety dream about it again and again.

Yesterday I dreamt that my class somehow woke five monstrous giants from the distant past. These began systematically destroying civilization with cudgels the size of train cars. I guided my students to an ancient thick-walled fortification atop a system of caverns and we all got separated in deep catacombs. At one point I thought "well at least the giants can't get us here," only to see through a hole in the wall that human soldiers and police in allegiance with the giants were forming up outside to invade our bunker. I rushed around trying to find my students to guide them out before it was too late.

Sometimes the dreams are of a sort I used to have in high school: can't find my classroom, my schedule is printed in symbols I can't read, my locker with all my work is sealed shut or the combo no longer works, etc.

Strangely, however, I'm sleeping more than I have in years--somewhere around 8 hours a night. This is unheard of. I typically get 3-4 hours. Is it healthier to sleep 3-4 hours without waking, or to sleep 8 waking 3-4 times a night in a panic at some imagined stressor?

And how many more weeks/months of this will we have?

La Ley Seca

As part of its coronavirus/COVID-19 strategy, Panama snuck a Ley Seca rule into the mix. This means no booze can be bought or sold for the duration of the crisis.

I'd heard about it happening in the provinces via the Web early this week and bought a few bottles to sock away last Monday just in case the law came to the City. But I've also been considering a dry-out myself for 2020. I haven't done one for a while, and I drink A LOT, and have been drinking A LOT for many decades. A couple months off the sauce can't hurt. (I can say that now without pain because I still have a couple bottles left, LOL).

So after I finish the current bottles of whisky and wine--likely by Sunday--I will be dry. And so will Panama. Meanwhile, I see that back home in the USA booze has been characterized as an essential business. Given what's coming down the pike based on the inaction of the Fed for 2.5 months, y'all will need a steady supply of booze just to read the news. Good luck everyone! And STAY HOME.