An Unscientific Timeline of the Plague

Arjun Basu
3 min readSep 23, 2020

Work.

Write.

Puzzles. Buy puzzles. Trade puzzles. Talk about puzzles.

Birds.

Local masks? We’ll take 6 please.

It’s Friday?

Hoard stuff that will be available again in a few weeks.

Exercise.

Fuck work.

Tiger King

Admittedly, it made me feel dirty

Bidet.

I love my Pax.

Cakes and muffins.

Read.

White Claw. Oh no.

Write.

Fuck puzzles.

It’s Monday?

Purchase squirrel-proof bird feeder.

Think about a new patio in the backyard.

Fuck exercise.

Learn about local businesses going online.

Get organic vegetables delivered.

Write.

Get seafood delivered.

Fuck the news.

“I’m going for a walk.”

I love my Pax.

Extoll the virtues of your bidet. Like really extoll.

It’s Wednesday?

New patio in the backyard.

Finished deck. A day old (or so). Before landscaping. If you squint you can see the birdfeeder back-left

Herbs.

“Shit, I forgot my mask.”

(half way through movie on Netflix/Prime/etc) “I’m pretty sure we saw this, like, last week.”

Lots of local gin. And more White Claw.

Find new app for local stuff.

We went to the museum! We’re adults. (It felt crowded, didn’t it?)

Fuck the birdfeeder because fuck squirrels.

Drive to country and jump in water for two weeks.

(I’m never going to bake. Luckily, my wife bakes and didn’t need a plague to start.)

I make a galette and that’s a start.

Fuck baking.

It’s August?

Why are there so many assholes?

Fuck social media.

I love my Pax.

RIP all the TV series that I had to stop streaming because they sucked just a bit too much.

Did I read that book already? I’m pretty sure I read that book.

More bourbon. Less gin. Almost zero White Claw (almost).

Idles are the best band in the world.

Q: “What kind of beer have you been drinking during Covid?”
A: “I ordered more White Claw.”

My Evernote Food Notebook has over 1,400 recipes.

Raised by Wolves

Want to be truly popular? Perform Mother’s scream. More than once.

Fuck this shit.

OK, this made me giggle.

Actress Colby Minifie followed this up with “I fucked a guy with elephantitis.” Apparently she ad-libbed the lines. Genius.

Checks calendar. Fuck.

Oh, look, that tree is turning.

Just outside my house. This tree is the first to turn every year.

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Arjun Basu

Writer. Complainer. I drink bourbon. I work in content, branding and strategy. Next novel, The Reeds, out in 2024. @arjunbasu in many places.