Mostly Apolitical Thread for Discussing/Venting our Rational/Irrational COVID-19 Fears and Experiences in 2020

you need to play the long game with online dating now. Many months of online conversation with no pressure so when you finally meet up it'll be like a nora ephron movie.

i am sure there have to be camgirls covering themselves in hand sanitizer and then diligently cleaning doorknobs.

Link?

still kicking myself that I left a small box of Kleenex and my WFMU water bottle in the office two Friday ago, sure i'd at least be back once more. possibly going to be cut loose next week.

for the moment, I care about seeing as many films as possible b4 I die; sad but true.

otoh, my only family is about 90 miles away; uncertain if i'll ever see them again. Just too dangerous for me to travel.

https://i.ibb.co/ynGCCn4/69f6b95e-91f3-469b-84b0-fe49773eeec9-5b6c6e867bf801a93d059d689a658871c9528a47.jpg

xpost :( sorry to hear all that Morbs.

Yeah likewise Morbs, that sounds rough. I hope you get to see a lot more movies.

alas I am Irish-American and may not get my dick sucked again either xp

It does sound like you are being as cautious as can be now. I hope CT isn't completely of the question yet?

Anyway hang in, we got another b'day a month from today and I expect to e-toast you

thanks bud <3

not out of the question, but I don't see it as an improvement... today

Morbs, you sow, you'll outlive me long enough to berate me for not watching enough Ford silents.

Or he could do it now and beat the rush. ;-)

morbs you are facing so much and I wish you all the best, take care

Morbs, try your best to find something to stay positive about. You've made it this far, and I know you've got a lot more grumbling left to give.

Just received word that someone at my job who had been out for on quarantine for a week tested positive. They said they notified people the person may have been in contact with but I have no idea if I ever came into contact with those people over the past week plus.

fwiw I don't know anybody with it yet, but I know someone who knows more or less a whole family (husband, wife, one of their moms) that tested positive. They've basically felt terrible for two weeks but hanging in there.

I'm really surprised I don't know anybody yet who's tested positive. And bracing for that.

my bestie didn't get tested cos nowhere in Virginia will test her (wtf) but she got official quarantine orders from the CDC hotline she called for work. so I'm 99% sure she has it.

she's in good spirits though, young (24), not in much pain, and just got Animal Crossing. and Virginia is allowing for unemployment for quarantines.

her boyfriend probably has it too, but much the same.

don't know anybody my age or older who has it...yet.

one of my friends is pretty sure the illness she's had for the past 2 weeks or so was coronavirus -- the symptoms match exactly

with me it'll be tough to tell because in years past, I've had quite a few bacterial illnesses that resembled CV. low grade fevers with mild other symptoms. in 2012 I got like 5 of them. obviously CV is viral but had it existed back then I'd have thought I had it.

My sister (43) and her partner (50) are pretty sure they both have it, they've put in applications to be tested, but it'll be 4 more days before they get a booking for the testing, and possibly another few weeks after that, and they're getting better rather than worse (tho worse for my sister was coughing up some blood!) so they're wondering if by the time they get tested it'll have cleared out.

A friend over here in the UK is pretty sure she's got it too, but again she's not high risk or has been in contact with anyone who's been to the Bad Parts Of The World (ffs) so she can't get tested.

with me it'll be tough to tell because in years past, I've had quite a few bacterial illnesses that resembled CV. low grade fevers with mild other symptoms. in 2012 I got like 5 of them. obviously CV is viral but had it existed back then I'd have thought I had it.

I keep thinking about that. A year ago I had a horrible bout of bronchitis that lasted for months, I pulled muscle after muscle from coughing, went to the ER with shortness of breath at one point. My doctor thought it was probably whooping cough. If I got that now I would be positive I had COVID and I would be wrong.

starting to feel weird abt "nudging" online Scrabble opponent when they haven't played their turn in 24 hrs

"force forfeit" is gonna be rough

people are still screaming about afks on Twitch as if it's a war crime if it makes u feel better

My wife just asked me if i had washed the book I’m reading

i always put Chaucer in the washing machine to be safe

I think bake in the oven at 60C for 90 minutes.

No, Chaucer is the name of my dog, I said as I was bundled into the back of a police car.

banterbury

Folks who are pretty sure they have or had it it, or know people that are pretty sure they have or had it, just wondering, why would anyone be pretty sure? The symptoms ultimately seem pretty generic. Fever, cough, fatigue, etc. Even the duration is not out of the norm for the flu. Not saying it's not covid, but barring the worst I'm not sure why I would suspect I had it unless I maybe interacted with someone I knew tested positive.

I know I keep mentioning how there are suspicions (or maybe actually proof, at this point?) that this started circulating as early as December, maybe November. Interestingly, I seem to recall people saying this was a particularly bad flu season, so ... maybe some of those were covid, too? Just like that Italian doctor who had heard colleagues say, in retrospect, they had seen a bunch of strange pneumonias back in December, I can only imagine people have been dealing with this for a lot longer than maybe known, just approaching it as a flu, or pneumonia, because the symptoms are so similar.

my friend was sure because the low grade fever was persistent and lingered longer than it normally does with her, and the shortness of breath is uncommon for her.

but she wasn't entirely sure but Virginia won't test her unfortunately.

xp This was predicted to be a particularly bad flu season as far back as early fall though, iirc. Not a surprise.

With so little testing being done we're all just milling around in the dark. This should be the first project funded during Infrastructure Week.

At this point testing doesnt matter anymore

What I had = yeah it coulda just been a cold or something. I just erred on the side of caution.

Interesting thing about testing right now: it benefits public health and safety of healthcare providers, but has little effect on how a viral pneumonia is treated. Given providers are charging the insured up to $600 and the uninsured more than $1000 (for a test whose material costs are a small fraction of that and free in many OECD countries) for a test that doesn't personally benefit them, I'm not sure I'd care about it. I get bilateral interstitial pneumonia, please treat that, but tests that only benefit others should be paid for by the public.

any version of Slob On My Knob >>>>> any version of Imagine

That so?

Wow this is beautiful pic.twitter.com/uzjkkLHFVd

— James Urbaniak (@JamesUrbaniak) March 19, 2020

Wife refuses to buy Garden of Earthly Delights puzzle

I don't know if Facebook links work here--never tried it. When I was out walking today, I took a camera and photographed closure signs around town. (Small town; covered about half of it today.) I see my name's in the URL, but honestly, I don't much care. It's always been on my ILX user profile anyway.

http://www.facebook.com/phil.dellio/media_set?set=a.10156553303521534&type=3

link works, photos appear to be private

Thanks--I'll try to fix that. I'm not a photographer...it's basically a whole bunch of closed signs. But it feels important to photograph them. Businesses are going to be devastated by this everywhere; in a small town, especially, I don't know how most of these places get back on their feet. I suspect most of the people who live here (unlike me, who moved here in November) have done so for all or most of their lives.

At this point testing doesnt matter anymore

hard disagree. it may not save millions of us from infection now, but the experts say that massive testing will be critical to any chance at regaining a functioning society and economy in less than 18 months when a vaccine might be ready. but it has to be done in the tens of millions, repeatedly, so we can sort out the currently-infected, from the never-infected, from the already-recovered and therefore immune.

xp -- they interacted with someone who had it, and the timeline of the symptoms also matched

Wife refuses to buy Garden of Earthly Delights puzzle

My housemates and I went in together on a Garden of Earthly Delights puzzle. It is the one bright spot in all this dystopian misery. We haven't started it yet, but it's comforting just to know it's there.

I had shortness of breath in October. No fever. I am fairly sure it was related to a cold and wasn't cv. I'm glad I pushed ahead with getting a chest xray at the time or I'd be worried now.

testing is vital, theoretically. literally the only reason we're staying home and closing businesses en masse is because we can't tell who has it or who has had it.

australia has just ordered all restaurants, bars, casinos, cinemas to be closed for probably six months

however it appears that alcohol will continue to be available because australia

Nothing more essential than the bottl-o.

Fuck me i’m glad the states rolled Scotty form marketing tonight.

Needing to go for a walk round the park but I suspect it will be busy. How about the amount of outdoor rec time you're allowed is inversely proportional to how much space there is in your house?