My thoughts unmasked!

Since in pandemic times the renovations just.don't.end.  (because seriously what else is there to occupy my time and energies?)  My wife and I need to start making ginormous screens for our front porch. They will be about 7 foot by 8 foot.  We went to the orange big box store for supplies last night.  We had a question on if a staple gun or a brad nailer  would adequately fasten the mitered edges.  We asked an employee if this would work or if there should be some other type of stabilizing agent.

The employee looked at me and said (and I quote) "you mean a paper stapler?"  I'll give you I still had my work clothes on.  Picture older woman in office wear asking this question.  Still. . .  wouldn't the fact that I even used the term "mitered corners" have indicated I had at least a rudimentary knowledge of carpentry.  (or had binge watched 50 million home improvement videos during lockdown?)  Technically both statements are true.

I looked at the fellow and said "I'm a girl, not stupid!" and thankfully he had the good grace to appear abashed.  For the record, I can you the staple gun according to this fount of information.

The incident did not really annoy me as it was such a whacked out comment that I just responded in kind.  But it points to assumptions which are never good.  And in our society at present so many assumptions are being made in so many arenas of our lives, that I am mindful of how scary that is.

There are the people who are making the assumption that being asked to mask up in public is an infringement on their rights. It isn't.  If you don't like it,  please stay home.  Have a friend shop for you if it is impossible to mask up.  Order on line.  Use one of the burgeoning delivery services.  I respect your PTSD, your belief that you are dying of carbon dioxide poisoning, your COPD.  But realistically if you have COPD you are at such high risk of complications with Covid that frankly you should be staying home anyway.  Is being asked to wear shoes in a public building infringing on our rights?  Nope. Because we are a) used to it. b) puritanical about our bodies and c) we have learned that it is no fun to catch athletes foot fungus from walking around bare foot with lots of other folks in the same space.  I have spent the last month communicating with my sister long distance as she fought Covid. She lives in AZ which is a hot spot state. She has asthma.  She appears to have made it through okay but it has been 25 days of worry and she still has pneumonia. She caught it giving a co worker a ride home from work.  They were not masked up in her car. The coworker had no symptoms and did not cough or sneeze once in the vehicle.  So, seriously,  mask up folks!