Was fortunate to have another 3 day weekend this week, to take an extra day for the birthday of Erika Paradise’s brother. Their sister Alina made an a-ma-zing oreo ice cream cake for the birthday. At one point during the day, abortion became the main topic of conversation. Fun times.

Opening schools during a global pandemic continues to dominate conversations of San Antonians. Texas Governor Abbott continues to “…[overrule] orders from local health authorities to keep schools closed,” but at least the state is providing personal protective equipment for schools.

• Meanwhile, this week a school superintendent in Corpus Christi died due to COVID-19. Unfortunately, a San Antonio kindergarten teacher also died of COVID-19 this week.

  • San Antonio Express News Columnist Gilbert Garcia summed up the disconnect best in his recent podcast, explaining that a new nonbiding legal opinion signed off by Gov. Abbott states that local health officials cannot take the preventative measure of shutting down schools to prevent an outbreak, instead saying that “you can only quarantine schools after an infection occurs.”

• Health and Education Officials held a virtual town hall this week to discuss plans to reopen schools.

  • The reopening process has been broken down into three simple color coordinated zones. Some other, much more progressive ideas are also being considered to help San Antonio schools once they reopen.

  • SPOILER ALERT: COVID-19 outbreaks will occur in schools. And teachers are prepared to die. Happy first day of school everyone!

If the past two weeks of numbers confusion is any indication, el problema sigue presente. Texas health experts say it’s important for the public to understand the limitations of gathering and sharing data about a virus most people only knew existed since January or whatever.

• However, a major problem that is occurring is that Texas state officials may not be counting coronavirus deaths correctly, according to several officials from a few different Texas counties. To make matters worse, what is known is that Texas (like 23 other states) is for sure not counting rapid result COVID-19 tests as part of the state’s overall numbers. All of this, in turn is hindering the overall COVID-19 response effort in Texas.

Spoke to several friend this week that haven’t connected with in a long while.

Grocery shopping pickup order have been slightly nerve-wracking the last few weeks due to occasional indicators showing that sometimes we may need to order a few days more in advance. #firstworldproblems

• Despite this, our grocery shopping took a positive turn this week, going to Sprouts for the first time in months. This is a positive because, despite the lines wrapping around the inside of the store, Erika Paradise and myself managed to find and buy the fabled, long lost potstickers it appeared (we thought) were discontinued. #smallmiracles

My mom texted me a meme that essentially says how “sheeple” agreeing to go along with vaccinations is akin to the “sheeple” who allowed Nazi Germany to rise up. Oh boy…

This week saw a first in the relationship for Erika Paradise and myself in that she actually suggested a WTF podcast episode for me to listen to instead of the other way around. The episode in this event was the Cate Blanchett episode on WTF.

Erika Paradise and myself are both excited that Harley Quinn is now available to watch on HBO Max. We’ve already watched 5 episodes or the entire first season episodes already, depending on when you’re reading this.

This week Erika Paradise and I have discovered that Fifi the cat is not a fan of doors being closed, save for the front door. Not only that, but she doesn’t like it when doors in general open or close, save for the refrigerator door.

• Fifi the cat has also been trying out a few new resting areas this week, potentially a sign that she is becoming more comfortable living in our smaller space. Or it could also be her passive aggressive way of saying “I going to sleep anywhere I please.”

One of the main topics that dominated the headlines this week was the ongoing saga of our first world government not being able to agree on providing aid to millions of people during a global pandemic.

• One of the other main topics this week was President Donald Trump’s BONKERS interview on Axios. Like… holy shit. How is this guy in charge of a company let alone an entire country? WTF??

To make up for this, in addition to giving more interviews, late on Saturday President Trump signed several executive orders in regards to student loan deferment, eviction moratoriums and payroll tax cuts that may or may not even happen due to legal challenges that, well… challenge whether or not a President can even do that.

If the numbers are to be believed, I appears as though cases could in fact be slowing down in San Antonio. However, in the continued tradition of good news bad news glass half full or empty, the state of Texas this week reported it’s highest ever positivity rate,. This week also saw Texas named one of the TOP 5 states that make up 40% of the United States total tally of COVID-19 cases. Awesome…

• Granted, it's totally crazy and definitely not good that the US, a first world country with allegedly some of the best doctors on the planet has just surpassed 5 million cases of Coronavirus. Europe is looking at us like…