Friday, Feb. 28 

Day 35. I wake up and kiss my wife. She kisses me back, all traces of anger absent. Every fire runs out of fuel. 

My electric toothbrush finally died. It was a gift from my step-mom, in a care package from Costco as we prepared to return to China. It had been a wonderful, long summer. I have a new toothbrush. Life is like that. 

I'm loathed to mention it, but HK's got an infected dog. There's no evidence it will be sick or can pass this back to humans, but fear spreads faster than COVID, so keep your dogs inside. 

My boss has promised me a nice reference letter for six great years of work, and today I'll write one for the most promising student I had in all those years. I hope she will have a wonderful life in college and beyond. 

I go to pick up packages, and my winter coat isn't going to cut it any longer. In moments, I'm so sweaty and hot I breathe and start panicking. A guard at the gate passes his temperature gun into a parked car, to a passenger who's rubbing her unmasked nose. She hands it to the driver, who shoots himself in the head, and they pass it back to the guard. That's how easy you can get COVID-19.

I'm frantic, scavenging for our packages in a sea of boxes, and Xiaolin tells me to be calm, but I can't get a grip. I find them, eventually, and now we have apples.

It's avocado toast for brunch again, but I don't stop to take a picture.

The sunbeams dance into our window, teasing us, so we suit up for fresh air. 

We go and sit out on the garage on some chairs and just breathe. It's Xiaolin's first time outside the apartment in a few weeks. I take off my jacket, gloves, and mask and put on some ray bans and soak up the vitamin D in a Tshirt. My skin tingles. 

Today, Chongqing is 18 degrees and sunny with a chance of pneumonia. The sky is baby blue, and the clouds are fluffy. It feels like spring. 

Over the past month, I've researched and learned, fanned the signal fires, and prepared. I've gone through at least five stages, and now I'm ready to get on with it. We will move forward, one foot in front of the other, and it will be hard. As Donald Trump said in his second White House briefing in 3 years as president, "you probably won't die," which is probably the most honest thing I've ever heard him say. We won't all make it, but most of us will. I really believe that.

Today I say goodbye to CTV, who's been following my journey and wish them luck as they cover other angles and the emerging crisis on their shores. Thank you for all the encouragement and support; some of these days, my blog is all that got me out of bed. I hope their readers will share their stories with me too.

You know, I used to be the kind of guy that would crack a pop without washing the top, but now there are things I know that can't be unknown. All the world's a stage, full of cosmic horror.

I feel good. I've had an incredible life thus far, and I, for one, didn't survive the '90s rave scene and two decades as a touring performer only to be taken out by a virus named after a light beer. I've got a fire in my belly.

Jorah Kai Wood 

Editor, iChongqing 

Twitter: @therealjorahkai 

Blog: www.jorahkai.com 

iChongqing's COVID-19 special: https://www.ichongqing.info/special/fighting-against-2019-ncov/