Quarantine Suggestions

We’ve all been dealing with safer at home mandates – of one sort or another – since approximately the middle of March – some states started mandates a little later than that, of course. Regardless of when your state’s mandate began, we have all been doing our best to find ways to fill all that extra time while sitting at home doing all we can to be safe.

Late last week, I happened to stumble upon an interesting video that reunited some of the cast members of Glee (thank you TV Line for pointing me in the right direction!).

After watching that hour-long video and enjoying watching every minute of it, I learned about Stars in the House, the daily live streamed series created by SiriusXM host Seth Rudetsky, and his husband, producer James Wesley, that was put together to support The Actors Fund and its services.

Stars in the House is a “combination of music, community, and education located on the Actors Fund YouTube Channel. With musical performances by stars remotely from their home and conversations with Seth and James between each tune, viewers can also donate to the charity and interact with the guests in real time.”

The series raised, according to their official site, over $50,000 in the first four days of airing, and they plan to stream daily until Broadway re-opens with new shows airing at 2 PM (Eastern) and 8 PM (Eastern) DAILY. Yep, daily!

You can check out their episode archives directly at their website or you can visit them at YouTube here.

If you’re up for an adventure with your kids (or grand kids) from home, you can check out Ada and the Lost Horizon from young adult author Leila Sales (http://leilasales.com/). This is a choose-your-own-adventure game designed specifically for the lockdown that actually got started back on April 9.

It’s a scavenger hunt within the confines of your own home. A real-world Ready Player One experience; and a community-oriented coronavirus quarantine activity that takes you on an imaginary journey to another world — while taking you on a physical journey away from your computer screen. While many in-real-life experiences like museums, theaters, and schools have moved their content online, Leila saw a chance to create something we could all do together offline.

The story of Ada and the Lost Horizon is about a young woman named Ada, who wakes to find herself alone. She was supposed to be here with her younger brother, Teddy. She was supposed to be watching out for him. But Teddy has disappeared in the night. Ada must find him, but her only clue is a ransom note. What the ransom note says, where it leads her, and if and how she ever manages to see her brother again… that’s completely up to the player. Leila received dozens of entries from players creating their own ransom notes – here’s the winner.

Here is how you can play:

1. Catch up on each scene that was released on Leila’s Instagram and Twitter.

2. Each scene is accompanied by instructions for a task that can be completed in the safety of your own house. You have 24 hours to complete the task and share it to social media using the hashtag #AdaAndTheLostHorizon. One player’s completion of each task will be selected to determine the course of the rest of the story.

3. Enjoy other players’ completions, invite your friends to play, and find out where Ada’s journey takes her next.

You can read all the details about Ada and the Lost Horizon, especially how to complete the tasks, here.

If you have or know about an interesting idea on how to pass the time while under quarantine, please share them with us. We’d love to hear from you!