Yes, that sounds insane ...

Steve, how is the situation in FL ?

Thank you Rikki, after all the negatives and fears that have been posted comes a positive post by Rikki, not surprised.

John C.

I've gotten email notices from three different service companies that their offices/service centers will be closed to walk-in customer service (paying bills, etc.) and that all such customer services will now have to be done online. This doesn't really affect me personally or the more tech-savvy seniors that populate this particular forum, but many elderly customers are not so tech-savvy (some don't even own computers) and still pay their bills, voice their complaints or requests for service, in person. Grandkids to the rescue, I suppose . Of course this will also affect the people who work in these service centers as well.

I stopped by the local Walmart early this morning hoping to beat the store traffic. No luck. The parking lot was filled to overflow at 8:30am. Shelves half bare, some totally bare. No toilet paper but plenty of ExLax (apparently nobody needs that ). Boy, sure hope this passes quickly (the virus, I mean - poor choice of words ). Stay safe everyone, wash your hands often and don't touch your ugly mug .

chas

Tony, Everything here is a mirror of what’s happening around the country. There are a couple of venues that have well known musicians coming to play. The Platters show on March 20th that we have tickets for has been canceled. Trish Yearwood, David Foster and Paul Anka shows for next week are off too. There’s usually music and dancing outdoors at 3 town squares every night, originally they were going to be held then this afternoon they canceled them until further notice.

I’m waiting to hear from the coordinator whether my weekly piano solo gig in the lobby of the cancer center will be called off. I probably won’t hear anything until late Sunday or early Monday.

DonM.... What's happening at Ernest's?

I took off the month of March for vacation. Just got back from visiting relatives in Oklahoma, and I'm playing golf and fishing. First time off other that hospitals in MANY years.
I am supposed to go back first of April.
Haven't talked to Ernest, but I suppose I should.

Today I got all the rest of my March gigs cancelled. I played my last March gig today and had to sign a form about travel -possible illnesses -etc and had my temp taken. I was the last entertainer they will have until May 1st.

Deane

+1 Tony - I went to Walmart yesterday looking for anything resembling hand sanitizer.... ha ha… fat chance of that. It was like a war zone in there. Bare shelves everywhere and 8-10 people lined up to ask the pharmacist questions.

I was going to try to make my own homebrew sanitizer - 2 parts Alcohol, 1 part Aloe Gel... but neither item to be found at Walmart for my experiment! Fortunately, on the way home, I took a chance and stopped at a Dollar Tree store... and it was my lucky day - they had just put out a case of 2-packs of the 2 oz hand sanitizer bottles... $1 a piece for 2 bottles! Bonus! I got several of them at a great price. One of the clerks said they had stocked 22 cases yesterday and I got the last few packages.

What is really scary is the self-proclaimed "entrepreneurs" who are cleaning the shelves as quick as items are stocked - and then listing $3 bottles of Purell for $149 a pop on Ebay. Very very sad indeed.

Scary times these are. Be safe out there y'all!

Our Walmart had sanitizer - one 16 oz bottle per customer ...
A super market had a limit of 3 cases of water per customer ...

Don't know if they had a limit on paper goods before they sold out ...

I had a nightmare the other night. Big business will use this happening to eliminate music in nursing homes.

When it's all over, it wouldn't surprise me. It's all about money these days. If this goes any length of time, the nursing homes will be acclimated to "no music." Once the corporations who are buying up the senior facilities like chain restaurants realize they can save big bucks by running their operations without entertainment, that will become the status quo. Live music will take another hit and fade further into the background.

I hope I'm wrong!