What up, mom? Put down that coffee and grab a wine. Get ready for another episode of Nursing and Cursing, a parenting podcast that covers more shit than your baby's full diaper. I'm Kate. I'm a stay-at-home mom of three in Brooklyn, New York. I'm trying to figure out whether I should go back to work, have another baby, or spend the rest of my life waiting for my fresh direct order. Hey, I'm Christine, a video editor and a mom of two living in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. Allie here, podcasting up in the mountains in South Kona, Hawaii. I work as a real estate agent and a mom of two boys. Hey, I'm Molly. I'm a teacher raising two kids in St. Augustine, Florida. And I'm Sarah, a new mom to one sweet babe living in Brooklyn, New York. Between five busy households, it's a miracle we make it on the mic.
at all. But trust me, we need this as much as you do. Hello, everybody. Welcome to a special episode of Nursing and Cursing. How are you guys? Hello. Hi. Hi. You guys, we are joined today with a special guest who was a listener named Bonnie Cooper. Hi, Bonnie. Hi, ladies. How are you, Bonnie? Thank you for joining us. You know, this has been like the one bright spot in this whole situation. So I'm really, really pleased to be here.
Thank you for being here. So you guys, Bonnie sent nursing and cursing an email that was called greetings from lockdown in Spain. In the email, she just kind of reached out and said she lives in Spain. They're on the coronavirus lockdown. No school, no work. Supposed to be over at the end of March, but she has no idea. And she just kind of gave us awesome details about going to the grocery store and what that was like and kind of how falling into a routine is going. And so we invited Bonnie to join us and thought it'd be cool to hear all about what it's looking like in Spain and what maybe we're looking.
to have happened to us too. So Bonnie, tell us what is life like right now on official lockdown? Well, we found out on Thursday, the 12th of March, so it's been 10 days now that we were going to be in quarantine lockdown starting the next Monday. Come on. The 16th, I think. Starting the 16th for two weeks, it was going to be lockdown. So that would mean no essential travel. They were giving people the weekend to get back to their main residences. You can go to the grocery store. You can go to the pharmacy. You can walk your dog. End of list. Wow. I've never heard for having a dog. You mentioned in your email going to the grocery store and having to wait for 45 minutes. Tell us what that's like.
Okay, so there's a bunch of grocery stores. There's also things called fruterias, which is where you can go and get produce and the odd eggs or sausage or whatever. But I wanted to go, I went on Saturday to the grocery store up the street from me that I don't normally go to. And I just walked in and walked out, but it's almost like the zombie apocalypse. People don't even want to meet you. If you see someone in an aisle, you like dodge, you get out of that aisle. But there were things to eat. Like I could see there wasn't everything, but there were things to eat. And then I thought, okay, well, I was kind of coming out of...
really hard mental collapse obviously and I was like the mental shift was writing itself I was like okay I get tomorrow morning I'm gonna get dressed before 5 p.m and I'm gonna go to the grocery store made my list packed my my backpack um just to haul everything back because we have a pedestrian town like I don't even use a car so just walk to the grocery store and there was a big queue outside a line a big line outside but the reason it was so large is because you're keeping all this distance between people so two or three meters between everybody and I recognized somebody just walking down the road. So I waved to her and she's like, no, no, no, we're not talking. You have to be quiet. I'm like, oh my God, we can't even say hello. Are there like cones set up or everybody's just intentionally keeping a gap between one another? I think probably the security guard at the door had told people and then everybody was just following suit.
Actually, this is so funny. I was listening to your guys episode while I was in the queue. That's so funny. Waiting, waiting, waiting to get into the void, listening to you guys. Now I'm telling you about it. So I get into the grocery store. You put on gloves. The cashier's required. Sorry, I'm just stopping you there. Are you required to put on gloves or it's everybody is. So you should too. It's like just the social pressure. The security guard was like, here you are, have some gloves, but they weren't like proper latex. They were like the gloves they give you around here. They were like a produce shopping bag type of material, you know, that sort of thing.
If you were tie-dying a t-shirt or something. Oh my god, Hawaii. It all comes back to tie-dye. Yeah, it's like, yeah. So I had a list. I worked my list. They have, it's a supermarket that has a second floor which has like non-food items like, you know, plates or kid stuff for crafts or whatever. So I thought, oh, maybe I can go up and get something.
for my son but that was all shut down it was just that first floor and um it was okay like there was stuff on the shelves um there was produce um i couldn't find any any ground meat that i wanted i didn't okay important question that is on every single american listener's mind was their toilet paper you know this is the thing i don't think there was a problem with it i didn't need any so i didn't get any so it's an american phenomenon i knew yeah of course it is it's just us uh bonnie tell us about Let's get to what we really want to know. Also, what is the routine? You're over a weekend with two small kids. Tell us about your kids ages and how many you have. Okay. I got, I got one kid. He's two and a half. Okay. Oh, I think, I think the, the, the one kid thing is really a salvation because you can manage with one. It's not such a big deal. He started going to daycare in the mornings. Of course he's not going now, but well before, like before he went to daycare, they call it.
It's baby school. It's not take care. It's not take care. Very important. Okay, right. Well, here's a uniform. In that sense, that's the only thing I can see. Oh my God, that's adorable. I want uniforms, even though I know it would just mean I wouldn't be able to find a piece of it every morning, but it sounds so great.
And he went through a whole thing, no buttons, no snaps. I'm like, I know, hon, but this is your school uniform. So when you come home, you don't have to wear any buttons or snaps. But in the meantime, yeah, exactly. So before baby school started, my husband would do the mornings and I would do the afternoons. So we tend not to do a lot of tandem parenting. We both are musicians. We both have flexible work to a certain extent. So we just switch off. Actually, I think that might be the secret because.
I don't know about you guys. Sometimes it's difficult to parent with your spouse. Absolutely. That's a spinoff podcast. We're with you all day. So in the mornings I teach and in the afternoons I'm with my kid for the most part. The hardest thing about this transition was just getting through the mental situation. Thursday, March 12th, it was 9 a.m. I was close to taking Oscar to go to school. I was like drafting a concert program and a workshop proposal. And within five hours.
There was no school. There's no work. There were no concerts. There was no rehearsals. The opera was canceled. The concert next week was canceled. Like everything was over. Wow. And it was really hard. Wow. So sudden. Yeah. So it was unbelievable. Like you're just trying to trying to get mentally like your world's changing so fast. So you recalibrate. But then it's changed again. Yeah. It's been very challenging. Can I ask? First of all, when you mentioned that line outside the grocery store and everybody is, you know, six feet apart or I don't know actually how to do meters to feet. So pardon me. I'm American. But.
Also, people are like, no, we're not talking. It just puts such an image of Handmaid's Tale going to the grocery, you guys. It's really grim. They're lying, and they're not talking, and they're not looking at each other. My question is, where are you right now as a nation? What's happening in Spain? What are your numbers? Because we are, I guess, how many days are they saying that we are behind Spain? Does anybody know, you guys? No idea. I don't know about America. America's a week behind Italy, the last I heard.
We're behind Italy, I think, because Italy's supposed to peak this week, and I think we'll peak next week. And originally, they had said, the government had said, listen, I don't watch a ton of the news for the reasons, when I got here, I couldn't speak any Spanish. So it just sounded like la-la-la-la-la-la. So even now, if I really want to figure out what's going on, I have to just sit down and only focus on what is happening on the television. So how often do you get to do that with small children? I'm not in touch, okay? Partly because, also, after I had Oscar, my heart just, like, I don't know, everything's too raw. Like, it broke open and it came back together. Like, I can't just hear about...
the horrible things that go on to children and mothers in the world. And, oh, another, another woman was killed by her husband. Like, I can't, I can't deal. So I don't watch the news. But I did pay attention to what the, we don't have a prime minister, sorry, of Canadian, the president said. And he was like, okay, it was state of emergency starting on Monday, which to me was like the dumbest sentence ever uttered. We have a state of emergency, but it's after the weekend. Okay, guys. Everything starts, everything has to start on a Monday, even a pandemic.
No, I really love, I'm like, I'm loving that approach though. Cause for me, the permanent procrastinator, like just knowing that hashtag tomorrow still exists in this world. Okay. We're going to start, we're going to start washing our hands tomorrow. Not right now, but just all going to happen tomorrow. You guys. Well, I think it was, I kind of understood where he was coming from. Like, okay, people who have second residences get back home. But I kind of feel like if you don't have, if there's the whole point about not getting out of the house is to keep the illness from traveling. So if you don't have to travel.
don't go anywhere and i think that was really hard to impress upon people and i know that because this weekend on the news um they had footage of like the police stopping people leaving valencia to go to their vacation homes at the beach like people are not getting it like this is not that's what i was gonna act like there's people like in the streets implementing the quarantine Yeah, it's getting more and more enforced by the day. I have heard that in France you need government paperwork to go to the grocery store. Wow. Procure that. It's so interesting because that would never, it's really interesting because those, like, European countries just have such a different history of, like, authoritarian styles of government that people here would just, like, if you told people here, like, you need a note to go to the grocery store, people would just be like, it would just be such, it would be so scary. People would be out in the street with guns rioting. People would not accept that.
There's no there'd be no compliance and I mean and I guess some people would argue like that's why That's one of the drawbacks at a time like this like people here do not want their personal freedom stepped upon whatsoever Well, there are people out here There's a like a saying of the culture of Spain which is picaresca, which is like to translate this it means trying to get away with something So there have been people arrested for walking like stuffed toys like it's not a dog I heard somebody was trying to walk a bird in a cage like they had their bird cage out.
Somebody watching around downtown. Oh, where was it? Valencia, maybe in like one of those blow up Tyrannosaurus dinosaur outfits and the police pulling them over. So there are, I think people will always do up to the point where a law can be enforced. It's all very well to say you can't leave your house if there are not people, if there isn't an enforcement element. I don't think you can leave up to the honor system. I don't think it will be as effective, shall we say. But I will say that it is impressive and effective in a lot of ways. I just want to shout out everybody who is doing it for the right reasons, because.
it's the right thing to do and because you may know somebody who would really be in jeopardy and just as a nation and as a world, there's so many of us that are doing the right thing and it's amazing to see. I just, you know, I want to shout everybody else out who is really doing it and working hard to do it because those of us with small kids, like, fuck, it is not easy, right? Yeah. It's getting really hard for parents. I mean, I mean, there are definitely parents or not. I mean, we obviously as people home with our kids, like so many people have it so, so much harder, but there are so, I mean, there are so many times that I'm just thinking about the childless couples we know. And I'm like, you, you, there's nothing to complain about. Like your biggest threat is boredom. That's your biggest threat is boredom. Exactly. And you could FaceTime one of your friends. You could get drunk all day. You could just jerk off and take a nap. Right. And then wake up in a beer. Like, stop. I don't want to hear a fucking thing about how hard your day was. Make an ice cream sundae, you know.
When I'm with Oscar, my son, we're never at home. We're never at home. We're always out. Our town is pedestrian-focused. There are no cars in the city, in the main part of the old part of town. Sounds great.
We just walk everywhere. We go everywhere. If I go to the dry cleaners, his little friend Nancy gives him cookies. He's all ready to go to the dry cleaners. We're always out doing stuff. The first two days of quarantine, he kept coming up to me and saying, let's go to the concert. And I just keep saying, no, not today, babe. There's no concert today. I don't think he's really wised up. I don't know how much he knows, but I don't ever, I haven't.
Firstly, I think I would probably wait till they were like, he was 18 to tell him what's really going on. Like I would just push it. Like, yeah, there's no school tomorrow either. I don't know. I don't know. No school tomorrow either. And the next day too. Yeah, I don't know. Like every night just, oh yeah, there's no school tomorrow. Like for as long as I possibly could. As a parent of a small, as a parent of like a very small kid, I mean like one thing that I feel like some interest and also regret and like some fascination for is the fact that all of my kids will remember this to some degree. Like they're all old enough to retain this memory of this time. And sometimes I think like I wish.
there's so many drawbacks to having a young young kid at this time like they can't just watch tv or draw or go do something out of your hair but one plus i feel like is they won't remember this like they won't remember how stressed out you felt they won't remember that everything in their life got canceled do you is that something that you think about or that's just me spinning out at night you know i don't know if he's gonna he's not gonna remember this because i'm not telling him there's that right genius no you're doing everything right Even for school, he hasn't, like, I think one time he was like, Bicos, like, that's the name of his baby school. Not a daycare. It's not daycare guys. Baby school. Let's go to Bicos. And I was like, oh, babe, there's no Bicos today. And he was like, okay. And we have a very, very, very, very, very short bedtime routine.
You get your pajamas on. We have a cup of yogurt. You brush your teeth. You're in the bed. So at that point, I'm like, let's do a wrap up. What did we do today? What did we do today? And like for a week, oh, for a week, he kept saying he went to like the kid cafe, like a soft play place, which is impossible. Oh, precious. Okay. Oscar's living his best life in his mind. He's like going to dry cleaner, getting his cookies, going to the baby cafe and seeing all his friends. Oh my God. That's so fresh. So, so when is it over Bonnie for you guys? Okay. So.
I've heard through my news source, aka my husband, that... The president just came on television and said that it will be extended from the 30th of March for another two weeks. So we are looking at 30 full days. So the one thing I really thought about is, okay, so two weeks is one thing. A month is quite another. Is there going to be food? Is there going to be stuff? Like, that starts to make me get nervous. And also, like, on the 12th of March, when I was in the middle of my mental breakdown, I was like, oh, God, I don't know how I'm going to go on. My whole life's been canceled. All my gigs are canceled. I had two orchestral concerts booked in June. That is over.
Well, quick, we've got to get to the craft supply store and buy stuff so that we have things to do. So that's the next thing. Like we're making, we're compiling the list of what we can order. Like, okay, we need googly eyes. No, me and my, honestly, me and my six-year-old, when I was like feeling the vibe that school was about to be canceled, we went, we also did that. We went to the big arts and crafts store in Brooklyn yesterday. And she, she could not understand why I was saying yes to the gallon of glue, the vat of glitter. I was like, just get it all. I was like, just put it all on the conveyor belt. She was looking at me like, wow. Christmas has come early. So like, I mean, we were talking like, okay, what do we, what do we get? Because there is.
There is a moral dimension to ordering. I mean, always, but particularly now because you're asking someone to put it in a box and then you're asking another person to go on the road and deliver it to you. Right. So up until this point, we haven't made any online purchases because I just was like, I don't want someone to have to be delivering it or going to work or whatever, but they're going to, who knows what's going to be possible in the next two weeks. So we're just going to put in an order now for like craft supplies, supplies, and maybe some morale boosting gardening seedling starters or, you know, whatever, just like, because a month is two weeks.
So plant some new plants. Absolutely. Get on it. Something grows out of this. That's right. I like that idea. You know, Pete's like, all right, let's bust this whole garden out. He's just outside. The whole deal right now. Anyway. Listen, in any situation, there are unintended positives, right? So like my son has finally stopped that kennel cough he kept having for like, I don't even know, over a year. Every time he comes home from daycare. School, you mean school, girl, school.
No, I didn't care, okay? You're going to get kicked out if anybody at your school listens to this. It's okay, girl. I don't speak English. Perfect. I'm incognito right now. So the baby cough is gone. And the environment's coming back. We are just taking over the empty flat that is above us. We live in a family building. But the first two floors are us. The last floor belongs to an aunt who doesn't live there and won't rent it and won't sell it and won't rent it or sell it to us. But desperate times call for desperate measures, people. We're on that terrace. Yes.
So yeah, we've got the baby's kennel cough is gone. We're on the terrace and I got to be on nursing and cursing. So, you know, you made our day. No, you made my day. Thank you so much for this money. Well, I'm very happy to be an ongoing foreign correspondent reporting to you from two weeks in the future. I actually feel like, I don't know. I feel like New York is catching up to you faster. I don't know if Sarah agrees, but.
I feel like we're about to go into like tanks on the street style. Yeah. I don't know about that, but maybe, but as far as like where she, where they are with the curve, right? It's about two weeks behind. Well, Cuomo was just saying today that like this could go on for about nine months. That was his. No, Sarah, no. The worst baby ever born. That was worst case scenario. Nine months.
Oh, you guys, Cuomo, our governor, was on today saying things like, I want the army here. I want to turn the Javits Center into a hospital for one million people. I want tanks on the street. I was like, cool, okay, that sounds really good. Let me just figure out Google Classroom and I can handle it.
Things that are happening are really scary. So birthing women at this time are not allowed to have a single support person come to the hospital with them, not even their partners. I thought it was one person, Sarah. They changed it today. Oh, my God. That is so scary. If you're in labor, you have to wear a mask. Can you have your husband, Sarah? No. No, you can't. Solo. Okay. Wow. Okay. Okay. I'm just, wow. And guess what? Women can do it. Think about it. All you really have in that moment is your own self. But damn it.
damn it just to not have that mental support that is or like an advocate like if like whatever oh my husband was that like it was all very nice when the state of emergency they said uh two weeks it'll be two weeks but i mean come on like even if that were true like you don't just push a button and life resumes just the way it was that unreasonable to expect uh there's gonna be fallout but when my husband uh was hearing was the lockout is like the lockdown is for now but what will happen is like now we've got another two weeks so let's say we're mid-april and depending on how the curve is going then the lockdown is lifted but we do social distancing and all that but this isn't over because they'll keep an eye on the numbers and when we have enough firm cases it'll be locked down again so this is going to be like a revolving situation until until it's resolved in one way or another you know this is not just two weeks or four weeks it's like the foreseeable future which is hard the kids are going to get really hard it's really hard and we were thinking like jeremy and i were talking we're thinking like wow this
for big cities like this could be a strange as they get denser and denser and just as more and more people are on this planet like this could be a strange weird new way of life where like every two years everybody goes into lockdown for six months because there's a bug that we don't have the answer for yet like I was listening to something on the radio today that was like this isn't like coronavirus sucks yeah a lot of people will die and it's changing a lot of lives but guess what it's not the big one it's something to consider It's coming back in 10 years. Big time. The big one. Allison McCann, you are fired from the news. I missed that episode of Geraldo, Allie. You did? I'll give you more information on the next Nursing Inclusion. Allie will tell you about it.
Geraldo's not on anymore, right? Is he still alive? Is he still with us? I don't know. He's married to, um, he's got, like, an impressive wife. Oh, he's married to Connie Chung. Connie Chung. Oh, wow. Did you say he has an impressive wife? Lori Povich is married to Connie Chung, guys. Gritty! Gritty! Oh, shit. Oh, my God. Gritty, did you say that he has an impressive wife? I did. That is the best thing ever. Because, yes, Connie Chung is the shit. Yeah, I know. That's not his wife, though. Yes, it is. Yes, it is. Lori Povich is married to Connie Chung.
Wait. Oh, you're right. It's my body. I feel like Maury and Geraldo are one of the same. Oh my God. Oh my God.
Bonnie, I'm really glad that you took the time to talk to us today. That's Bonnie Chung reporting live. That's me, girl. That's me. All right. Bonnie, thank you so much for joining us on this special episode of Nursing and Cursing. Also, Bonnie has sent pictures of her town in just the vacant streets. I will post them on Nursing and Cursing. They're very surreal. Eerie.
Listen, are we going to do nursing cursing? I was told at the top that I would be able to... Nail fail. You mean nail fail. I got you. I got you. Hold on. I got you. I'm going to do the whole thing. Was that Allie? That was Bonnie. You're hired. You're hired. Sarah, you're fired. That's my job. That's my J-O-B. Nail fail, girl. Okay. Wow. Okay, so what's your nail fail, girl?
Oh, my God. Okay, this is Bonnie. Bonnie Chung reporting live from Ponte Veja Spain. And my fail is that I'm on lockdown. You know, sucks. My nail, I don't know. My kid doesn't like to have his hair washed. Okay, fine. But you don't have to like it. You got to do it. And we used to do bath time. And he would be like, no, I'm going to wash my hair. So then he hated the bath. Okay, fine. I'll put you in the shower. Shower, sometimes yes, sometimes no. We don't know if we like it. Lately, he's decided he likes it. So that's great. So I thought, great, I'll do both of us at once. So we're in the shower. And my son, he's two and a half, turns to me and says, nice legs.
Oh, my God. I love that. Oh, that's awesome. I don't know. Still got it, Bonnie. You still got it, Bonnie. Plus, from his perspective, they're, like, six feet tall. That's the funniest part. Oh, yeah. Exactly. Leggy blonde. Leggy blonde right here. All right. Anybody else got a nail? Fail? I'm actually fresh out of nails this week. I'm sorry. I got so many fucking fails, though. I got fails of Make Your Hair Stand on End from this week.
Oh, come on. Do one, do one. Make it, you know, make the best. Well, my nail is since we ran out of food and I have so much free time on my hands. I just cleaned my fridge for the first time in 18 months. I don't think I cleaned it. Making lemonade out of lemons. Sure am.
I want to thank God I have so many fails. I just feel like every day something else. Well, Frances is talking to me and asking me to build a Play-Doh snake right now while we're trying to record, even though she's supposed to be outside. That could be considered a fail. My nail is that I installed a bidet and put up a bookshelf.
This week. Sarah, did you see the headline I sent you that said bidets are sweeping the fucking nation because nobody can find it. It's your moment. Sarah, it's your moment. This is our moment. This is ours. That's right. This is our time. Sarah, we also hooked up our bidet. You know, it's a shock to the system. So I'm hoping to lean into it. But I've only used it once. And I was like, oh, hey, I have a question, Sarah. So it comes with those towels.
Will you just do a little dab-dab and then to the laundry it goes? You can do that or you can just use some toilet paper to dry yourself. In a time like now, you're going to want to use the towel. And then fold it and keep folding it until you have no choice. For nails and fails for me, I'm just going to leave you with a statement that just my daughter won't speak words. She will only meow. She just meows and we've been stuck inside for days now. I wanted to be quarantined with a toddler cat. And she licks, licks your feet, licks your face, licks your neck all day long. So you're welcome.
I have experienced it on FaceTime. It is not fun. It's not fun. Sarah goes, that's annoying. Oh, wow. Well, my kids are like on shows or battling each other. Yeah.
And we were doing plenty of outside time, but it rained all day yesterday, so that sucked. I was like, what the, what's the point of this? The rain is so hard. I know we can just put a snowsuit and get over it, but the rain just puts a lid on everything. It does. And I was like, let's just go play in the rain, but I don't like that. I'm not into it. Right. We really, we really, really need like a, um.
We really need an episode just like marriage in lockdown. I'd love to explore that topic. Let's explore that topic and let's wrap this up, you guys. Bonnie, you have been amazing. Thank you. Thank you, Bonnie, and we wish you the best. Well, I'm going to make sure to send them at the grocery store. I'll take pictures of the toilet paper to demonstrate as far as I'm feeling. Please follow up. All right, ladies. Bye-bye. Bye, guys. Good luck, Bonnie Chung. Thank you so much. Okay, that's it for now. We'll see you next week for another No Same Cursing, where sleep is more valuable than fast, hard cash.