- jgrist
Quarantine? Notes from Zone XII
Updated: Apr 8, 2020

Our Zone XII Chairman Liza Lilley has shared a great list of things to do during this time of isolation:
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Armchair Travel
Never been to Amsterdam or Seoul? Now’s the time to Armchair Travel. A virtual tour of many museums around the world is just a click away. Want to visit Paris? Log into the Musee d’Orsay’s website. In Florence, the Uffizi Gallery is closed, but open on-line. Also, many gardens such as Royal Botanic Gardens at Kew offer virtual tours.
Here’s an incomplete list:
Amsterdam: Rijksmuseum; Van Gogh Museum
Berlin: Pergamon—The Ishtar Gate of Babylon is not to be missed!
Seoul: National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art
Los Angeles: J. Paul Getty Museum.
Gardens
Monty Don O.B.E. is the UK’s leading garden writer and broadcaster. He has been making television programmes for over twenty years on a range of topics,
spanning travel, craft, outdoor living and, principally, gardening. He has been lead presenter of the BBC’s Gardener’s World since 2003 and since 2011 the program has come from his own garden, Longmeadow, in Herefordshire. Monty has also made acclaimed prime time series such as Around the World in 80 Gardens, Monty Don’s Italian Gardens, Monty Don’s French Gardens, The Secret History of the British Garden, Monty Don’s Paradise Gardens , Monty Don’s Japanese Gardens & three series of Big Dreams, Small Spaces.
Enjoy Nature
Bike
Hike
Forest Bathe
Go in one's own yard, or neighborhood, or park, and take a photo of an interesting, stunning, beautiful flower, tree, or shrub which exemplifies Nature in Spring
Binge-watch
Rosemary and Thyme series
Greenfingers—movie
Anything Jane Austin-except perhaps “Sanditon”
Haven’t watched The Crown? A must!
The Durrells of Corfu
Hallmark Channel, ALWAYS A HAPPY ENDING--lol
Watch "The Story of Stuff" or "The Story of Plastic" from inbox@thestoryofstuff.org. This was a suggestion from Robin Schachat.
Books—now’s the time to catch up on all the books you’ve meant to read.
Classics: Any Jane Austin book
Middlemarch by George Eliot
The Three Musketeers by Alexander Dumas
The Custom of the Country by Edith Wharton
Slug Tossing by Meg Des Camp (humor)
A Bite-Sized History of France: Gastronomic Tales of Revolution, War, and Enlightenment, by Jeni Mitchell and Stephane Henaut
The Overstory by Richard Powers
Braiding Sweetgrass by Robin Wall Kimmerer
The Invention of Nature by Andrea Wulf
The Signature of All Things by Elizabeth Gilbert. Love, travel and mosses.
Mistress of Spices by Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni
Last Child in the Woods by Richard Louv and then go on a hike
Escape into detective mystery series featuring Maisie Dobbs; Maggie Hope; Judge Dee; Bruno, Chief of Police; Cormoran Strike (by Robert Galbraith, aka JK Rowling)
Pandemic classics: Decameron by Boccaccio; a series of stories told during the Plague
Love in the Time of Cholera by Gabriel Garcia Marquez
Late Migrations by Margaret Renkl
Garden!
Share photos of your plants with club members as Spring unfolds.
Start a dialogue about gardening success and failures with your club members
Download the app Plant Snap to find out the names of your plants that you are going to enter in your next flower show.
Follow Laura LeBoutillier’s blog on the Garden Answer https://www.gardenanswer.com/about with many how-to videos and solid advice.
Check out the American Public Gardens Association https://www.publicgardens.org for ideas.
Plant!
Propagate from cuttings
Plant seeds for pollinators—try milkweed and sunflowers for starters
Join the Great Sunflower project! Greatsunflower.org Watch them grow, share photos and document visiting pollinators!
Plant seeds to start your vegetable garden
Schedule a club horticulture challenge class to be “judged” or shared at the club’s opening meeting in September. Or, how about a Photography “contest” or challenge? Makeup FUN awards!
Share outdoor activities in GCA’s Club Member Showcase!
Plan Ahead and Finish GCA Chores
Surf the GCA website and see all the wonderful projects, conferences and read all about the many accomplishments of members of this AMAZING organization!!!!
While you're at it, check out the Programs site on the GCA website to plan next year’s programs.
Get all caught up on GCA Awards with the Members Years of Service Certificate
Have your members update their personal pages on the GCA website, this is SO important for the Nominating Committee in selecting future positions!!
Make sure they add their photos too!
Community
Reach out to those in retirement communities/nursing homes, they are prisoners in their rooms. A Zone Chairman just finished doing a crossword puzzle, over the phone, with a dear friend of her late mother’s. IT WAS SUCH A REWARDING EXPERIENCE. They now have a standing appointment!
Stay safe and laugh
My sister repeated—during a 1 1/2 hour chat (what else could we do)-- Peggy Noonan’s advice to wash your hands like you’re Lady Macbeth with OCD!
Bad joke: There’s a new drink called a “Quarantini”-- It’s a Martini that you drink alone!
Another bad joke from a Zone Chair’s spouse: World Health Organization has exempted dogs from the quarantine protocol. Therefore, WHO let the dogs out?
Remember:
Getting Outdoors NOT CANCELLED
Music NOT CANCELLED
Family NOT CANCELLED
Reading NOT CANCELLED
Singing NOT CANCELLED
Laughing NOT CANCELLED
Hope NOT CANCELLED
Wishing you a healthy spring!
Cheers,
Liza
Zone XII Chairman
