The CDC is now saying with negative tests, we can probably cut quarantine times down from two weeks to seven to ten days. Not that it changes anything for me now. I have completed two full weeks since my close exposure, and a week and a half since I took my test that detected no trace of virus. So we are free to perform our basic tasks again, although I'm a little twitchy in stores when people talk to me, which they did a lot tonight.
I took Saoirse with me to Petsmart, to get crickets and another bag of the dehydrated raw food (that smells exactly like those Styrofoam cup o' noodles--no idea whether it tastes like them too). She appears to be completely over her car terror. She jumps up in the seat and waits prettily for me to buckle her seat belt. She was calm the whole way there and back, although she did slip a little in the seat, because her usual blanket wasn't under her. When we got there, the dog trainer was getting an angel fish for a customer, and thus standing right next to the cricket bin. We got to say hello, which made both of us happy. Saoirse met several dogs as we walked around, and only one was allowed to greet her on a loose leash. The others got tugged away so hard, which just made them more frantic to meet her. I wanted to tell the dog parents to relax and let them sniff, but I bit my tongue each time. Puppy, however, was a champ. She said hi to people who didn't have their dogs too, sometimes taking me too close. I had to say, "humans have to stay apart, kid," but she didn't seem to take that to heart.
I left her inside alone after I fed the lizards and turned around to go out to the grocery store. This was the first time I've done that, and I was a little nervous about it. I needn't have worried. She was a good girl. No trouble at all.
At the dairy section, there was a guy needing to be pointed toward the cottage cheese, and he had no idea what kind to buy for the person who wrote his list. I showed him which one I buy, and assured him it's hard to go wrong with it. There isn't a whole lot of difference, in my opinion, in the different kinds. In other times of my life, I probably would have helped him like I would have when I was a librarian. I would have stood shoulder to shoulder with him, picked up the kind I buy, and put it in his hands. Tonight I stood six feet from him and pointed, and hoped that he could get to the right one with me tripping nervously over my words, because I was afraid to get too close. I wonder how long it will take to get my old habits back, if they ever come. Those behaviors died hard. I hope they aren't gone forever.
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