It's a scary time to be alive, when it seems
like there is a new virus outbreak every other month. We can't help but think- what if a virus got
truly out of control? And what is life like for the unfortunate
souls that get stuck in quarantine, forced to live their lives separated from their loved
ones? Well, rather than try and reach out to any
patients who have been quarantined like a true journalistic outfit, we decided instead
it'd be funni- we mean more enlightening- if we tasked everyone's favorite Infographics
lab rat with living in quarantine for a full week! Day 1: You know what? I don't even hate this challenge. In fact, I'm kind of excited. Ever since I saw that early Jake Gyllenhaal
movie, Bubble Boy, I've been wondering just what in the world it would be like to live
quarantined off from the rest of society. I mean I know it won't be any picnic, but
I guess curiosity's definitely got my cat, and I don't know, I'm just kind of excited. I had to coordinate this one with Infographics
before doing it, because I told them if I was going to live in quarantine for a week,
then I was going to do it right. And that meant one thing: plastic sheeting. Lots of it. And I mean a lot. The solution turned out to be a construction
supplier here in town, which even delivered the 200 foot rolls of plastic sheeting straight
to my doorstep. You heard that right, 200 feet of plastic
sheeting half a millimeter thick per roll, and I got three of them. Of course I immediately realized I had seriously
over estimated how much plastic I'd need, but don't you worry, I will definitely find
a use for all this plastic. I solemnly vow not to dump it in the ocean
where it'll murder sea turtles. So I got to work as soon as the girlfriend
left the house to go to a shoot she had scheduled. I knew she'd be gone for at least 14-15 hours-
yeah, people in the entertainment industry work some absolutely brutal hours. Anyways, that gave me more than enough time
to put my plan into motion. I have to live in quarantine, which means
I can't come into contact with the outside world under any circumstances- well, with
a few reasonable exceptions. I don't much feel like living in a bubble,
or being stuck in one room, so I got creative. Our new apartment we just moved to is a cute
little one bedroom place with a large living room, attached kitchen and small dining room
area. It's all kind of an open floor plan except
for the bedroom, so there's very few walls. I kind of love how open it is to be honest,
and the location is great- it's literally like two blocks from the beach. Good thing the girlfriend makes like ten times
the money I do, or the only rent we could afford in this area would be for a shoebox. What I really like about the place for this
challenge though, is how easy it is going to be to convert into a relatively comfortable
quarantine area. Along with all that plastic I had Infographics
spring for a ton of duct tape, like 15 rolls in total. The first thing I did was attach plastic sheeting
to the wall at the head of our bed, then I ran it to the doorway, snaking a bit to the
left because our bedroom door is on the left, then out to the living room beyond. In essence when I was done putting up multiple
layers of plastic, I had split the room- including the bed- completely in two. Then I had to tear half of it down when I
realized I had left her massively heavy makeup desk thingy on my side of the quarantine zone. It's where she sits and does her makeup every
morning, and so I had to shove that thing- which I’m pretty sure is made of solid granite-
to her side of the room. Then I put the sheeting back up and moved
on to the living room. From the living room I extended the sheeting
towards the kitchen- but here I hit a dilemma. I couldn't wall off the stove and the refrigerator
or she wouldn't be able to fix herself any food for a week, and I probably shouldn't
have plastic anywhere near the stove. So I aborted my plans to extend to the kitchen
and just settled on splitting off half of the living room. I ran the plastic straight through the middle
of the couch so I could have a place to sit comfortably, and then fastened it to the wall
on the right side of the tv. All in all, I had a decent living area set
up, and wouldn't be stuck in one tiny room for the entire week- which should help with
the stir-crazyness. Now I am officially sealed in to one half
of the apartment, and I guess I have nothing to do but wait the week out. See you guys at my mid-week check-in! Day 3: Ok, I didn't think some things through
completely. But first, well, let's rewind to day one real
quick. I hadn't told the girlfriend about the challenge,
it's kind of become a little game for her to guess or figure out what my new challenges
are- except well, this one was pretty obvious the moment she opened the door. She came in and was immediately greeted by
our dog, who had spent half the day whining on the other side of the plastic because he
couldn't get to me anymore. Yeah, that kind of hurt a little. Anyways, after she greeted our dog she looked
up and... well, she didn't say anything. Her jaw just kind of slowly dropped as she
took in our cute, new apartment- which was separated nearly in half with plastic sheeting. She didn't really say anything, just slowly
made her way to the bedroom door, looked inside, saw the bed was also split in half with plastic,
and just said, “...of course. I mean, makes total sense.” Then she sat down on her half of the couch
and finally looked over at the bathroom and said, “You know the bathroom's on my side
of the plastic, right?”. I told her, yeah, of course, that's why I
got- and she immediately cut me off with a very stern “No.” To make a long story short, well, this living
in quarantine is in no way going to involve me using the bathroom indoors unless it's
in our actual toilet. I mean, I'd bought plastic bags and kitty
litter and a big bucket- but oh boy, she was not having it. She made it extremely clear there was only
one way I'd be using the bathroom, so uh, Infographics is going to have to deal with
me making an exception to my quarantine challenge that I get to leave my plastic world for number
one and number two. And if they have a problem with it, well,
they can take it up with her- although I seriously don't recommend it. So, yeah, the girlfriend wasn't too pleased
with me or the show for turning her cute little brand new apartment into a quarantine zone,
to say the least. But it turns out, I kind of didn't think things
through completely. The TV for example- I left the remote outside
the plastic, because of course I wanted my dear, sweet girlfriend to be able to unwind
and watch tv. But that also means it's out of reach for
me and I can't change the channel all day long. Now luckily I managed to worm the playstation
onto my side of the plastic, so I have that- but I left every single dvd and game on the
outside. So unless I'm playing something on the hard
drive already, forget about it. Also, in what is absolutely becoming a recurring
theme- I forgot about how to deal with food delivery. Obviously I can't cook, so the girlfriend
very graciously slides me things like sandwiches through a little slit I built in the plastic,
and hot meals when she's home. I guess that's kind of cheating a little bit,
but hey, if you want the real deal go ahead and hit up Infographics to spring for a full
in-home bubble boy habitat situation. Except of course the girlfriend would probably
murder everyone involved in that little shenanigan. Thing is, I'll occasionally need to order
delivery, like today for instance when I got hungry and the girlfriend was back on set
for a billion hours. Except, I totally forgot about being able
to get to the front door. So I got creative. I ordered my delivery and then called the
drivers when they arrived and directed them to an open window on the quarantine side of
the apartment. I guess opening a window is cheating too,
but you know what else I realized I forgot? Cutting off all that airflow is a good way
to damn near asphyxiate yourself in plastic. So an open window became a necessity. Anyways, the driver was pretty cool about
it but was definitely weirded out by the whole thing. Good to know I'm already setting a bad precedent
with local delivery drivers in our new place. Day 7: I don't know why I was excited about
this challenge in the first place, because let me tell you- living like a bubble boy
absolutely sucks. The lack of proper ventilation meant that
my side of the apartment got extremely hot and humid from all my breathing, and for the
last seven days I've had to try and comfort my dog from afar because he was very upset
that I was living on the other side of several sheets of plastic from him. I have to admit, I missed him really bad. Turns out, the girlfriend missed me too. On day four as we both lay in bed separated
by plastic she just turned over towards me and looked really sad. She was kind of quiet, and said that she really
didn't like living like this- so close together but separated by all the plastic. Then she just softly said, “I really miss
you.” It felt like a punch in the gut to be honest
with you. When we moved to this new place we shuffled
our lives around so that we spend less time apart from each other. Sometime around the alone in the woods challenge
we both had a really long talk, and decided that what we really wanted in life, more than
our own careers and success, and whatever, was to be with each other. So we agreed to make it a priority, which
really just means that she agreed to stop accepting jobs that send her out of town for
days or even weeks at a time. She made a pretty big sacrifice, and this
silly challenge reminded me of why. In the end when we look back on our lives,
neither of us want to regret even the smallest amount of time we spent apart that we didn't
really have to. When she told me she missed me that night
I almost tore down the plastic just so I could hold her again. Maybe I do take these silly challenges too
seriously, but one of the reasons I do is how they broaden my horizons. I've realized over this last week how terrible
it really is for people who have to live in quarantine for real. Not just sick people, but even people who
have to live in special environments or can't spend too much time around other people- maybe
even can't rest in the arms of someone they love because of how weak their immune systems
are. I have such a new appreciation for normal
life, and deep respect for the strength it takes to live such a difficult life. How do I sum up the rest of my week? Well, uncomfortable for one. Without proper ventilation my side of the
apartment got really hot and muggy, and good thing I had two windows I could open. I found myself staring out the window at the
outside world a lot, even just listening to people walking by outside or cars going by
was sort of exciting for me- and depressing. I kept imagining all the people just walking
around going about their day, and me stuck in this plastic cocoon. I really couldn't live my entire life like
this. I learned that there was a real life bubble
boy, David Vetter, with a severe immunodeficiency disorder. He ended up dying at age 12, but until then
he lived in a completely bubble environment. NASA ended up designing a bubble habitat for
David, and he lived inside a series of connected bubble environments. It wasn't until he was six years old that
once more, thanks to NASA, he got to go outside- but he had to be inside a bubble suit of sorts. Until he was able to get into that suit and
leave his bubble habitat, his mother had never even been able to hold him in her arms. David died after contracting a virus, and
his mother only ever got to hug him without plastic between them after he was already
dead. I'm not going to pretend I didn't cry when
I read about David's story, and if there's a bright side it's that his disease has been
cured by modern therapies- largely thanks to blood that he donated. I'm done living in quarantine, and yes the
whole thing has been extremely uncomfortable and tedious. But the hardest thing about it, maybe the
hardest thing I've ever had to do, was to live my life with the person I love most in
the world always just a few inches away from me, on the other side of impenetrable plastic. Now if you'll excuse me, I think I'm done
writing, and I'm going to go hold the woman I love in my arms for a very long time. David, wherever you are now, this episode's
for you. If your eyes are dry enough to keep the watch
party going, then why not check out some of our favorite lab rat's previous challenges,
such as Chained To My Boyfriend For 72 Hours! Or maybe you want a sneak peek into our favorite
Challenge couple's perfect life with 24 Hours to create the perfect life in the sims! Go ahead, take a moment to dry your eyes and
then click on one of those vids!
