The countdown has begun

I'm sheltering in the shade of the Sparklight pole, watching traffic zip by on US-191, and thinking that it can be really hard here in rural Arizona to grasp that big chunks of the rest of the country are a mess. People elsewhere are dying from a virus that not long ago only virologists knew existed, but other than stores putting up spit guards to protect the cashiers not much has changed locally. Well, Walmart did do an interesting barricade using shopping carts to channel people going into the store into a single line and get them to think about social distancing. The barricade was kind of cute. They also put trash cans next to cart returns in a no doubt vain attempt to get people to put their disposable gloves in the garbage instead of on the ground.

And it's not actually just rural Arizona. I can understand people here in Safford or Thatcher still acting like not much has changed. Graham County has had two confirmed cases of COVID-19, both of which were diagnosed over a month ago and both of which did not require hospitalization. It's hard to take a disease seriously when you see no local evidence of it. Tucson, on the other hand. . . Pima County has not been as much of a hot spot as the Phoenix area, but it has had quite a few cases and at least (as of the last time I checked) over a dozen deaths. We were in Tucson on Saturday. It was a bit odd.

Our first stop in Tucson was -- no surprise here -- at Pull-a-Part.The S.O. was looking for a part for my Focus. It being Saturday morning, it was busy. There was a line of people waiting to get into the store/junkyard. Parking was tight, and got tighter. The Kid and I were waiting in the car for the S.O. She finally got bored enough that she went for a walk to see if he'd even made it into the store yet. He had -- no sign of him in the line. When she got back to the car she said things were tense in the parking lot. When a car went to leave, there were multiple cars wanting the empty slot. Two guys got into a shouting match, both obviously totally pissed off and yelling in rapid fire Spanish. She said they were talking fast enough that she didn't understand anything except one phrase that must be universal: Fuck You! I would have sworn that Spanish contains some really colorful insults, ones that are much better than fuck you, but maybe they had exhausted all of them and the fuck you was just the final shot. Pull-a-Part. It's not just cheap car repair material. It's also entertainment.

It can also be lunch. There's a guy with a mini-van who sets up not far from the store entrance. He sells bagged snacks, cold drinks, and has food of some sort that requires condiments. Hot dogs and burros maybe? He's even got a few folding chairs so you can dine in rather than walking your snacks back to your car. We chose not to patronize him. Instead, after the S.O. emerged triumphant, we went looking for a Popeye's drive-through for lunch, and then decided to seek out a Target.

Holy wah. The parking lot was full. You would not have known there was a Stay at Home advisory in place. The store had signs up saying they were limiting the number of customers in the store at a time, but you could have fooled me. It looked like Target always does on a Saturday afternoon: crowded. If I end up dead from the world's worst chest cold, I'll have to blame the desire for cheap cat toys, because that was about all I purchased -- a scratching post for Beelzebub. Oh, and some Oregon Chai. In any case, it was pretty clear most of the people in Target were not taking social distancing seriously. They were also mostly young (as in not gray hairs), the age slice of the population most likely to walk around asymptomatic.

The Kid and I had talked about stopping at JoAnn's Fabrics but when we saw the line there changed our minds. JoAnn's was keeping in store numbers low; there was a line of probably 100 people waiting to get in, all spaced the recommended 6 feet apart. You know, I like fondling yard goods as much as the next person, but there isn't a bolt of batik on the planet that could get me to stand in line for more than 2 seconds, let alone potentially hours. The ladies in that line must have a serious addiction to sewing and crafting.

In any case, I think that was the last trip to Tucson for us. This was the third time we'd been there this spring; that's more than enough. Traffic is horrible, and there's always something kind of seedy and run-down feeling about the city even in the good neighborhoods.

As I've mentioned before, the S.O. and I are staying home, sort of, in the Guppy parked at the Stables & RV Park at the Graham County fairgrounds. It is not a bad place to be -- it comes with built-in social distancing because the RV area is only 25% occupied (total of 5 RVs in area that could accommodate 20) and those RVs are widely spaced. That's better spacing than we would have gotten had we been able to get into our first couple of choices, both of which were totally full and are set up with sites so close together people with slide-outs get to worry about hitting the neighbor's rig. There is a communal shower house but it's pretty clear I'm the only woman using the ladies' side. The S.O. tells me that for the last couple of weeks it's basically been just him on the men's, too. In short, no fears of contagion from that particular facility.

In any case, here we sit waiting for it to get far enough into May in the Upper Peninsula that we can be reasonably sure of being able to drive the Guppy on to our property without either having to bust through snowbanks or sinking in axle deep mud. Going by photos a friend who lives a mile or so away from where we do, the smart thing to do is just sit here until the next rent payment on our site is due, which is still a good 2-1/2 weeks away.

I had been worried about just where we'd stop with the Guppy en route. I was having visions of Walmart parking lots and interstate rest areas. Well, turns out KOA has opted to stay open nation-wide. They rightly view campgrounds as essential services. There are a surprisingly large number of fulltime RVers out there. Folks who do not have a bricks and sticks home to go back to; their RV is their only residence. Some of those people got left hanging when work-kamper jobs got cancelled, some were doing the ambling around the country spending the maximum allowed time in state and federal campgrounds, and some were extended stay to begin with: KOA does do monthly rates.

And then there are the snowbirds, of course. People like us who went south for the winter and would like to go home eventually. KOA campgrounds have closed communal facilities like shower houses but noted that people traveling in motorhomes or with travel trailers are self-contained. As long as there are hook-ups, they can shelter in place in their RV with minimal social contact. The KOAs are now set up so you can register and pay for a spot using a phone or the internet; no need to step into an office and talk with anyone in person.

I have to say quite honestly that KOAs would not be my first choice when ambling home. I'd much prefer a state park or federal campground. But, as the cliche goes, any port in a storm. Now all I have to is get out the KOA directory and start plotting a course north.