In the immortal musical words of Napoleon XIV, “they’re coming to take me away.”

OK, so it’s not that bad. After all, we’re only on day six of hunkering down. There are other things that take you away. A Calgon bath. Your mate’s breath in the morning. Kidnappers.

As I social distance in my home with my family, we’re stuck in the house as there is no place to go (who wants to go browse adult defense underwear at CVS)? I am reminded that it could be worse.

On the bright side, it’s been less than a week of being cooped up, there’s plenty of food. There are the same friendly faces, I write everyday, the bar is stocked and I have refills on my medications.

Now I think I know what Scientology is about.

A member of my family said if worse comes to worse, “We can always do yard work.”

“Stop freaking me out,” I bellowed back. “It’s not that bad yet.”

Where in the past, neighbors would say hi to each other by stopping by, now all I hear is the sound of chainsaws. Either they’re filming a horror movie down the street, or people are using power tools to communicate with one another, like some primitive Black & Decker mating ritual.

I decided to take the bicycles off the hooks where they were hanging in the garage. The weather is pleasant, why not? They looked so stymied up there. Now they’re resting comfortably on pavement.

“Wow,” I thought to myself. “I can do this.”

There are two types of bored people. Those who create short videos and post them on platforms such as Tik-Tok. And then there are those who mindlessly watch them.

I’m fascinated by some of these dance moves that I see. I’ve been thinking, now is a good chance to learn. I have some down time. But then again, what if I fall and injure myself. Going to a hospital emergency department is out of the question, they’re busy. And if I don’t go, my family will probably just string me up by my shoelaces and put leeches on my forehead to fix a simple groin injury.

I exaggerate. I’m not wearing shoes. And I have a package of a frozen vegetable mélange for my nether region. I’ll be fine.

Someone in the house said, “Hey! We can shred old documents that are just sitting in boxes.”

Yeah, like I want to live out the plot of “Argo” in my living room. If I had a big enough shredder, trust me, I’d shred the smaller shredder.

To distract me, someone said, “Let’s do a puzzle.” So, I shredded it.

I think that if Vincent Van Gogh was alive today, he would have trouble keeping on his surgical mask.

My neighbor said she was doing some light cleaning. I followed suit and changed every bulb in the house.

Another neighbor signaled me through her window using sunlight, her compact mirror and Morse code. I don’t have a compact mirror, and I’m a little rusty on my Morse code. So, I just drove my car onto her lawn and flashed my high beams a few times.

I was channel surfing and saw some actual surfing, so I wondered while they surf, are they thinking, “where is that remote control?”

I came across a YouTube channel featuring aerobics from 1982. The word, aerobics, comes from “aero,” which means space and “bics,” which means boredom.

I saw two brothers walking their bikes in the street. And they have a cat. And I thought, “could be worse. They could be walking the cat.”

People say there is a lot of needless violence and disgusting smut on TV. They may be right. but I’m not sure, I spent an hour looking for it and still came up empty.

Bored, I actually watched auto racing. Around and around and around. It was dull until I saw one car going 200 mph upside down. First, I thought, cool. Second thing I thought, he must be British. The steering wheel’s on the other side.

My friend told me he was looking for something to do, so he watched the musical, “Oliver!” and after enduring that, he said it was so boring, he could punch an orphan. I said, “Well, it’s not like he can tell his parents.”

I thought, I’ll practice one of my hobbies. And then I remembered that there’s a fine line between a simple hobby and being completely deranged.

I decided to go for a walk and saw my older neighbor. She wears a lot of make-up. I told her she was drawing her eyebrows too high. She looked surprised.

Finally, I have resorted to wearing a mask when I have to go out to the store. Not a surgical mask. It’s a Michael Meyers mask from the movie “Halloween.” Trust me, expecting others to social distance while shopping is not a problem anymore. I have the whole aisle to myself.

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