Health officials continue to urge people to stay home in self-isolation. At the same time, local movie theatres, bars, and restaurants are temporarily closed as the province is in the grip of a state of emergency.
And although COVID-19 has made it challenging for people to stay active and social, it's not impossible - as some people in Orillia are proving.
Dave Luffman is a part of the Orillia Men’s Darts League, which has been suspended for the foreseeable future.
Some of the players were suffering from withdrawal and had the itch to get some players together for a game.
“One of my friends reached out during the week and said 'Does anyone want to come over and throw darts?'” Luffman said. “Everybody responded back with 'No, we need to self isolate and keep our distance.'”
Luffman and some of the Orillia Dart League members started brainstorming on how they could play without actually being in contact with each other and to follow necessary health practices.
They soon discovered the group video chat app, Google Duo, which allowed them to set up a game this past Saturday night.
“We set up our cameras in a way where we could see the dart board, and started playing games of doubles with five people,” Luffman explained.
“The odd person out would keep score and call out whose shot it was and what they had remaining in the game. We continued playing for probably two and a half hours," said Luffman.
Luffman shared his enjoyment about the experience on his Facebook page, and since then he’s had roughly 30 people inquire about joining in for the next game which they are trying to organize for tonight, which is their regular men’s league night.
Some others are missing the atmosphere of going out to the movie theatre. So, Derick Lehmann has set up what he is calling social distance movies which will debut tonight.
He is welcoming the community to join together via the Zoom video conferencing app to watch the 2007 comedy, Superbad.
“We see these social distancing exercises and painting classes and I thought movies would be a good idea. Why don’t we all get together for a movie?” Lehmann said.
The app allows for up to a hundred people to join the conference. You can join and hold your spot starting at 6:45 p.m., then at 7 p.m. everyone in the conference will start the movie at the same time.
“Make your own popcorn, get your own drinks, do your own thing and sit down on the couch and watch the movie,” Lehmann suggested.
For those who want to join the simulated theatre experience, but don’t own a copy of Superbad, it is available for streaming on Netflix.
“If it’s successful, we will pick another movie and do it again next week,” Lehmann added.
You can use this link to enter the virtual theatre Tuesday night. https://us04web.zoom.us/j/
