issue #45 - the one for everyone sitting on their couch

Last Sunday night was normal, in many ways.

We ate dinner as a family. The boys were tucked into bed, my mom and husband in their own corners of our home doing their thing, and my father and I were at the kitchen table planning our own work.

After talking through some work items, he called his closest friends, urging them to stay home and call one another and promising to FaceTime them later in the week for virtual happy hours.

It was a normal moment, and it also wasn’t.

It was at that moment that I furiously started writing lists - things to pack, things to order to my parents’ house, what I needed to get done in the next couple of days - so we could safely head to Pennsylvania and wait out COVID-19 together.

I’m beyond privileged and fortunate to have my family physically close by, to have a home outside of the city to decamp, to continue paying for our home team to stay home and take cover with their families.

So many people - especially our healthcare providers and the hourly workers who literally run our communities - don’t have this privilege.

When you stay home, you’re staying home for them and for your older or immunocompromised loved ones.

And I’m lucky enough to spend lots of time with the people I love the most in this time.

If this is your first e-mail from me, welcome! In addition to writing the book How To Pack, I'm an entrepreneur and angel investor, an avid reader, and a mom of two boys (a 5 year old and a 10 month old).

Every Saturday, I share the 25 best reads from the Internet (culled from the daily shares on my Instagram), the books I've read that week, and things I'm generally loving at the moment. You can join the conversation on all these articles - and more! - in my Facebook group.

Looking for my packing list template? Here you go!

Two Smart Things

This week on the podcast...

• The science of COVID-19, explained in under 10 minutes (join the conversation)

• How I’m juggling work + kids in these socially distant times (join the conversation)

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#ThingsILove This Week

• I set up a little office in my room at my parents’ home with this desk, this chair, and a desk light that doubles as a nice ring light for video calls. I also brought my Post-Its, my favorite pens, my time cube, and my aromatherapy blends.

• While my routine is still all over the place, Rho and Rhaki’s is pretty solid. The boys are up and ready by 7, and we head out for a walk/scooter session between 8-8:30. Rhaki’s down for his nap by 9, and I set up a FaceTime with Rho’s babysitter to work on ’school’ (and I can get a little bit of work done). We take a break (snack for him, coffee for me), and Rho and Rhaki play on the living room floor while I triage my inbox. We have lunch and play for a little while, and then Rhaki’s down for his second nap. I let Rho have a lot of iPad time in the afternoon if my husband is tied up, or he plays with my parents while I get my work done. Once Rhaki is awake, the boys are back out for another walk/scoot session. Rhaki has dinner at 4:45, Rho at 5:30, and Sri and I tag team dinner and bath/bedtime while my parents make the adults' dinner. We have dinner with my parents at 7 after the boys are asleep, and I hop back on my computer around 8 and work for another hour or two. Then it’s bedtime for me, and we do it all over again.

• Things I packed - easy jersey overalls and cropped t-shirts, my favorite jumpsuit, the coziest joggers and matching sweatshirts (I own them in dark gray and red), ankle weights and a folding yoga mat, the best sweatshirts ever and my softest leggings, and these cozy slippers.

• Rhaki is perfectly content with the basket of toys we brought (and the stroller), but it takes a little more to keep Rho occupied. On the app front, we’ve downloaded Khan Academy Kids and OSMO (to work with this set). I brought one of my many blank notebooks and Rho and I have been creating our own book of monsters, and we’ve brought MagnaTiles and animals to build habitats.

What I read this week

A quick note - I hope you reserve the books I recommend from your local library, or purchase them from your favorite independent bookstore or the audiobook fromLibro.fm.

• Head Over Heels (ARC provided by NetGalley, out June 23) - this was the perfect book to get back in the swing of reading, and I tore through it in a single sitting. Give me gymnastics, ambitious women, and overcoming obstacles and I am here for it - as well as for Hannah Orenstein’s engaging writing. Head Over Heels is my favorite book of hers to date. For my fellow former gymnasts, you’ll especially love it.If you haven’t read Playing WIth Matches or Love At First Like yet, they make for the perfect ‘I’m inside for the foreseeable future and need something fun’ books.

• Cleo McDougal Regrets Nothing (ARC provided by NetGalley, out August 1) - this book gave me serious Where’d You Go, Bernadette?and Charlotte Walsh Likes To Win vibes, but was wholly original and refreshing and I couldn’t put this one down either. It's so refreshing to read books that capture women for who they are - smart, complicated, brave, loving, loyal, and always changing. There are moments where you can't stand Cleo, moments when you're rooting for her, and moments that make you cringe. I LOVED this book. In a time when politics is depressingly male, Cleo gave me someone and a vision of the future to root for.Can’t wait for this one? The author’s other book, The Theory Of Opposites, is free on Kindle Unlimited right now!

• Pelosi (ARC provided by NetGalley, out May 5) - I literally did a happy dance when I got the NetGalley approval to download this book. AND IT DID NOT DISAPPOINT. Nancy Pelosi has been a longtime hero of mine, and this exhaustively researched, impeccably written biography of Madam Speaker is worthy of her. I learned so much about Speaker Pelosi in this book - how her relationship with each of her parents helped define her own political skills, her incredible productivity as a legislator and Congressional leader, and more about her incredibly close family life. I took a number of parenting tips from her in this book as well - getting Rho to set the table for breakfast the night before, for him to help me fold his laundry, and to perfect the motherly glare that stops rebellious behavior in its tracks (I hope). I stayed up far too late for 3 nights to read this book, and I have no regrets. It’s superb.Can’t wait for this one? Grab The Nancy Pelosi Way, authored by her daughter Christina. Full review here.

Current book reviewshere, and here are all my random Amazon favorites.

Hitha’s Favorite Things

• Libro.fm is my favorite audiobook app (it credits your favorite independent bookstore with the sale). Use code HITHA to get 3 audiobooks for the price of 1 when you create a monthly membership. You can find my favorite audiobooks here.

• This is the only book club I’m a member of

• my Amazon shop

• my favorite vitamins (both their pre-natal and their essential one for women). Use code HITHA for 10% off your first 3 months.

• CBD has been a lifesaver for me. Get 20% off your first order with code HITHA.

• my favorite produce delivery company that supports small farms in the process. Use code COOKWME-NM5DMZ for 25% off.

• the app to save #5SmartReads to read later

• the notebook that has changed my life (see how I use it here and here). Get 15% off with code HITHA15.

• the marriage check-in my husband and I do every single week

• my favorite workout - and why. Use code G37YVV for $100 in accessories (spin shoes, weights, headphones - oh my!)

• Small Packages (one of my portfolio companies) is the curated gift box company I’m always talking about - get 15% off your order with the code HITHA

The Top 5

1. How to talk to your friends about social distancing when they’re going to bars (The Lily)

2. On finding the first domino: passivity, drinking and habits (Extraordinary Routines)

3. The End of the Bernie Bro (Jezebel)

4. Bodies In Seats (The Verge)

5. Big Feels (The Cut)

The Catch Up

Monday

• The problems with our coronavirus testing are worse than you think (Axios)

• South Asian Girls Are the Stars — Not the Sidekicks —in Desi Chick Lit (Zora)

• ‘Thank You, RBG’: 9 Women Who Clerked for the Supreme Court Justice on Her Enduring Example (Glamour)

• How Dictatorships Make Pandemics Worse (The Dispatch)

Tuesday

• Before Trump’s inauguration, a warning: ‘The worst influenza pandemic since 1918’ (Politico)

• Why Can't Women Win On The Internet? (Bustle)

• The Remote Working Parent’s Survival Guide (Doist)

• To stop a coronavirus quarantine recession, economists say send everyone cash—now (Fast Company)

Wednesday

• Coronavirus May Make Millions Of Americans Sick. But We Only Have About 100,000 Ventilators. (Five Thirty Eight)

• What To Do If You’re Feeling Lonely During The Coronavirus (Refinery 29)

• It isn't democracy vs. authoritarianism (Axios)

• Why I Ran for the First Time: Lulu Seikaly Wants to Prove Democrats Can Win Anywhere (Shondaland)

Thursday

• When Your Home Becomes Your Office — And Daycare (Medium)

• The Kushner Kingpin and His Corona Conflicts (Shero)

• New York City Bodegas And The Generations Who Love Them (NPR)

• What We Owe to the Black Women of This Powerful Civil Rights Group (Zora)

Friday

• Here's why Trump and Elon Musk see potential in a drug called chloroquine to treat coronavirus (CNBC)

• COVID-19: How To Help (The Stripe)

• I Am a Descendant of James Madison and His Slave (Zora)

• In one day, 1,000 NYC doctors and nurses enlist to battle coronavirus (New York Post)