You never realize how anti-social you are until there's a pandemic...

[Brother Buzz]

and your life doesn't really change that much.

[Yonnie3]

1. Indeed!

[WhiskeyWulf]

2. Yeah, not much has changed for me, haha. nt

[lunatica]

3. My life hasn't changed at all

But I already knew how anti social I am.

[HipChick]

4. Me too..

[misanthrope]

25. Mostly the same

The only differences are not being able to go out and eat a couple of times a week or run errands to retail outlets/grocery stores/drug store. I am working as much as ever and could actually use a few more hours each day to get done what's required.

[Butterflylady]

37. And here I thought I was the only one.

[Pacifist Patriot]

5. As a highly expressed introvert, I connect with this.

While I love to travel, experience new things, try new foods, meet new people...I'm also quite the homebody on a day to day basis. (I'm the type that could bop around Europe on my own for a few weeks and never get bored with myself.)

I have never been more productive in my work as I have been for the last six weeks of working from my bedroom office.

I really love the lack of guilt for not turning down invitations I'm not receiving.

And honestly cannot give a shit what my hair looks like!

[smirkymonkey]

44. I'm pretty much exactly like you.

I love to explore, especially trips to Europe. I am open and friendly, but I also love my alone time and this social isolation is a doddle for me. I feel like I was born for this.

I am also working from home and I love not having to deal with putting on makeup or deciding what to wear every day. I usually pull my hair back anyway since it takes so long to blow-dry and I am not a morning person, so it's nice to be able to shower later in the day if I want. And being able to sleep longer is the best!

[Totally Tunsie]

51. "I really love the lack of guilt for not turning down invitations I'm not receiving."

Isn't that just the truth? I love this aspect of sheltering in. No excuses; no guilt!

[tblue37]

6. I realized that about myself a long time ago. I didn't need a pandemic. nt

[Rebl2]

33. Same here

[Leith]

7. No, I knew it already

nt

[snowybirdie]

8. You are So right

Quote content here at home. Miss the married kids though.

[demigoddess]

9. everything but the beer and the sunshine.

[stillcool]

10. makes me feel almost 'normal'

[Midnightwalk]

11. This is one time

I studied for the test.

[Skittles]

12. heh, I hear that!

it occurs to me that those of us who live alone seem to be much better at handling "isolation"

[Wounded Bear]

13. I'm basically a hermit myself so I know what you mean.

Yeah, some things have changed, and I wear a mask when I go out. I'm running out of gloves. Have some on order, but who knows when that happens? I have a few left that I wear when I go to the grocery store, but like I said, running low. I don't want to run out because I like to use them when I need some Ben-Gay on sore muscles.

Missing my weekly breakfast rounds with my bro and nephew. We did one take out in the parking lot version, but haven't repeated. Our standard restaurant we go to is probably one of those that won't survive. It's an old school diner, and mostly only us old folks go there.

So, yeah, no huge changes so far, and I'm as healthy as can be expected for a 67 year old with a weight problem and Type 2 Diabetes.

[safeinOhio]

14. Being on a fixed income is now a positive.

Seem to be spending less with more in my pocket by the end of the month.

[3Hotdogs]

22. I actually have money left over from the last 2 months.

[aggiesal]

23. Know how you feel, ...

I had to take a 25% pay cut, to keep my job,
so I have to live on a really tight budget.
Somehow, I ended up with little more money than I planned.
Budget might be too tight.

[misanthrope]

47. Yes and no

While we're not spending money eating out, shopping by home delivery is costlier than doing it in person. You can find better deals in the store and you don't feel obliged to tip the drivers who are risking their health by doing these jobs.

[Victor_c3]

15. Yup, very true for me

Part of PTSD for me is the fact that I isolate much of the time anyways. It takes a lot for me to go out to the store to go shopping for groceries and even more for me to go to any sort of social function beyond that.

As it stands right now, I couldn’t be happier.

[BamaRefugee]

16. For us loners, it just a very very very long weekend! ;-)

[Baclava]

17. I knew the zombie apocalypse plague was coming, for a long time, I feel strangely calm

[CentralMass]

18. Yup.

[klook]

19. Most of us haven't started talking to empty chairs yet.

[Midnight Writer]

20. The best thing is no one is bothering me. No one shows up at the door, no obligatory social function

I am free to do what comes naturally to me: Cocoon.

[IronLionZion]

21. Introverts will survive this

I was only flipping out during the initial week or so but have been fairly calm and well adjusted since then.

[3Hotdogs]

24. I got the dvd from Netflix.

I am planning to watch it tonite.

I would be the "get off my lawn" guy 'cept parents with kids knew enough not to even move on my block.

[LeftInTX]

26. Shower?? Who needs them??

[smirkymonkey]

45. I hate to admit it, but I have kind of been slacking off on the personal hygeine lately.

I do little birdbaths at the sink, but I have kind of gotten lazy about the full routine. I still shower, just not as often as when I have to go to the office on a regular basis.

[Pepsidog]

27. My kids already said this about me.

[Cha]

28. lol.. same here.. only I knew it before. My family

is mostly on the Mainland and we've been observing and laughing a bit how my life hasn't changed that much.. "we're all hermits now".

I still get to run and go out and forage for FOOD!

[leftyladyfrommo]

29. I have lived alone for years and I'm not not very social

But this going on 3 months abd it's starting to bother me

I try to get out every day. Walk at the park or get ice tea and drive around. But I miss being able to go eat out and I really miss the library.

[phandancer917]

30. YUP!

I work from home (IT) and live in the woods of Central Kentucky

Not much has changed for me - except my weekly line dancing is on hold....and that does make me sad.

[TrishaJ]

31. Me, too.

Knew right from the start I was okay with staying in. Peaceful and content. Go out once or twice a week for groceries.

[tanyev]

32. Yep. Blessed are the introverts, for they shall inherit the earth.

[NRaleighLiberal]

34. same here

[SheltieLover]

35. Not much different here

Violent crime is so high in the Memphis region that I mostly only went to grocery & hardware store pre-Covid.

[bucolic_frolic]

36. Hermits have problems

Finding someone to help you do something. A home or car project, a repair, an extra pair of hands.
Inspecting your car. A backup driver.
Planning. Bogged down in details it's hard to move to bigger decisions. Someone to bounce ideas off.
Scheduling home repairs.
Heaven help you for medical procedures or hospitalization.

[Hermit-The-Prog]

41. Bah, humbug.

"Finding someone to help you do something. A home or car project, a repair, an extra pair of hands."

Levers, pulleys, come-alongs, vise grips, clamps, a few extra 2x4s nailed just so.

"Inspecting your car. A backup driver."

Drive? Like on a highway? I did that last year. Might not need to again until next year.

"Planning. Bogged down in details it's hard to move to bigger decisions. Someone to bounce ideas off."

That's what dogs and oak trees are for. They don't argue with you.

"Scheduling home repairs."

I built the damn thing; reckon I can repair it if it needs it.

"Heaven help you for medical procedures or hospitalization."

Well, you got me there. Tried to wait out some gallbladder problems over a year ago but they turned out to be a heart attack. Got my son to haul me to a doc, then they decided to send me by ambulance to a hospital. Would've been cheaper to just put me in a hole and wait a while to see whether I'd climb out on my own or should be covered up. He didn't think much of that idea.

[meadowlander]

53. That's what money is for.

You can hire people to fix things for you. You can take a taxi to the car inspection or to your medical appointments.

Big decisions are easier because you don't have to factor in anyone else's opinion and there's no guilt if you made a bad decision because it didn't impact anyone except for you.

It's not like people with lots of friends and family get different doctors to people who don't. It's the same procedure. And you can hire people to assist you while you recover. Grocery stores and restaurants deliver, you can get a cleaning person, a home nursing aide, etc.

Saying you shouldn't be a hermit if that's your inclination because a few weeks out of the sixty years you live alone you might find it hard to get to the toilet by yourself is like saying no one should ever be in a relationship because 20% of long term relationships involve some level emotional, physical or sexual abuse. It's not true for everyone and you shouldn't be planning your life assuming that a relatively unlikely or short term problem will outweigh the benefits of living your life the way you want to live it the rest of the time.

[bucolic_frolic]

57. Every intrusion

into your life, is an insecure link in the chain. It opens you up to pilfering, embezzlement, incompetence, aggravation, and more. "Never bring in a housekeeper," my mom would say. "Your possessions will find legs they didn't know they had."

[meadowlander]

58. And that's not true for having a spouse or kids?

It's a lot easier and less expensive to fire a bad housekeeper than it is to get a divorce when your spouse hides part of their income from you or drives you up the wall. And good luck cutting off your kids permanently because they crashed your car or ran up a huge balance on a card you co-signed for them so they could "learn to be responsible with money". What are you supposed to do when your senile parents who are addicted to credit card loyalty schemes use your social security number to sign you up for a bunch of cards and then they give away the details to online scammers?

As you say, every link is insecure. But the stronger links are the hardest ones to cut and open you up to the most potential loss.

[Talitha]

38. Except when out picking up a few things, I'm alone 99% of the time.

I'm not anti-social or anything, you understand. It's just that my personality type is more suited to being solitary. When I was young, my family used to laughingly/lovingly call me a lone wolf and I guess that's always been true.

[shanti]

50. Mine would say

'when is she coming out of her shell?'

[warmfeet]

39. Introvert here.

Yeah.

[Duppers]

40. 😂 No, I know hubby & I are.

But if I'd stop reading all the time, perhaps I'd have the energy to clean house make it presentable enough to invite PunkinPi & greyl over. 😁
Hi, guys, if you're reading this.

[LeftInTX]

46. I am still struggling with my house and zoom meetings LOL

[dhol82]

42. Yeah, people keep asking me if I'm going crazy from the lockdown.

Ummmmm, nope. Just living my life, like usual.

[Six117]

43. Word

[ahoysrcsm]

48. Asocial, the MEME should have read Asocial.

Anti-Social is a whole nother ball of wax.

[Brother Buzz]

54. One could make the argument asociality is distinct from but not mutually exclusive to anti-social

A lot depends on who is labeling whom; just ask all my asshole neighbors.

[shanti]

49. Nope

Nothing's really changed. I have a longtime bff that would come over and hang with me a few times a month before this. That was mostly all the ftf social interaction that I would have besides shopping. My own sons aren't even worried about me because they know me so well, 'you got this'. And I do.

I've been binge watching the series Outlander on Netflix. Thoroughly entertaining, but not for kids!

[Totally Tunsie]

52. OMG - I relate to EVERY answer above!

The more I read, the more I thought I was in the Loners thread! https://upload.democraticunderground.com/?com=forum&id=1237

Had no idea there were so many of us.

[Jamastiene]

55. The absolute only difference for me is that the grocery stores

have less stuff I usually use and things I used to be able to order online now are listed as "pickup only" or "In Store Purchase Only." That leaves me doing without some things right now.

I hardly ever left the house before. Now, it is not much different. It's just me and the cats at home and I could care less about leaving the house until the trash starts stinking too much or I run out of food again, which I am hoping doesn't happen again.

Damn Duke Energy has costed me two refrigerators full of food this spring, because they keep taking so long to get the power back on after storms.

This last time, it wasn't even a storm. It was a 20mph wind gust that even I was not afraid of. If it was THAT mild, it should not have "damaged" their "equipment" like they claimed. Unless they are using Scotch tape to hold those lines on the poles, I can't see how a simple 20mph gust (or less, that was just the highest wind gust that hour that day, it could have been one that wasn't even that high) can damage their equipment so bad that it took them almost 5 hours to get the power back on.

I resent paying for Duke Energy's coal ash spill because they are a monopoly at my address and I have no other choice if I want electricity. Less than 1/8th of a mile down the road, I could be using a different power company, but at my address, Duke is the ONLY choice. I checked around when I moved here.

I wish I could get someone to help me come up with a solar/wind/battery system for my house that would be affordable. I'd cut them out and make them pay for their own environmental violations.

I didn't mean for this to turn into a Duke Energy rant, but they keep making me have to leave the house and put up with Walmart, another damn near monopoly, at least right now.

[littlemissmartypants]

56. Extroverted, introvert. I'm good. ❤ nt