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

Just found out a friend I hadn't heard from in about a month has been laid up with covid most of this time. She either got it from her girlfriend or the hotel she works at. Doesn't sound like she had severe respiratory problems, but mostly just persistently high fever and very bad aches and pains. Luckily recovered now.

glad she didn't have severe respiratory problems. my bestie thinks she may have some long term impacts, not major, but she still says she doesn't feel completely whole. and now I have another friend who likely has it.

caring for my dad with my mother has unexpectedly calmed me a bit because now I'm not alone, and this is more time than I've spent with the folks in like 13 years. he's steadily improving.

Psycho Las Vegas is officially bumped so now that this is finally official, now I don't have to worry about that anymore. I miss my friends a lot though. thinking of setting up a Zoom.

want to record some more music, but there's no way I can do it in their place. may stop home just for purposes of recording a tune.

i kept thinking that the new normal of distancing and masks and all that would be hellish for me to accept, but on rethinking it, when things actually get to where we can relax distancing (i.e. NOT right now, even though we're doing it anyway), I'll accept socializing in any way I can get it.

I miss hugs. a lot.

<3 can’t wait to actually be able to hug someone again

at the point where I wish I'd gotten it, because the rest of life just seems like it has atrophied permanently on a global scale

I would be fine dying from it but otherwise nah

Kind of odd to see a basketball game taking place on a court in the park this morning. Mainly because unless those ~eight people all live together they must have made a collective decision to go against physical distancing mores and specifically to play basketball (?). And if they do live together what kind of household is that? Are they like a cross between the Monkees and the Harlem Globetrotters? That would be bad and annoying even as a TV show.

well i mean everything is reopening, it must be fine

Every week this just gets harder and more stressful. Some days it feels like the country is on the verge of massive nervous breakdown, I don't know anyone that is thriving right now, even without directly with friends and family being sick. Even family members and friends that are still fortunate enough to have work are stretched so thin with even longer working hours, added responsibilities and bosses being completely unforgiving about children. It's like the "novelty" has worn off and leadership and owners have collectively decided, "Okay, hope you enjoyed your slow period, back to work, here's more responsibility. What's that? Distance learning? Your kids aren't my fucking problem, BACK TO WORK".

Yeah if dads go back to work without school or childcare in place, ALL the work falls on moms (like usual) and that is a nonstarter in my view.

I mean, any partner left at home to handle all of that full-time is a non-starter, but yeah. It just feels like even the companies that started this thing out being really flexible and helpful have changed their tunes. Several friends have shared emails that are variations on the theme between the lines of, "yes we are giving more work for you to do, but be happy you even have a job".

covid is a bummer

trickle down covidnomics

With multiple disclaimers along the lines of "So glad I don't work on a ward/in a care home etc", I'm a bit sick of this idea that "We need to return to work" (I haven't stopped working, albeit from home, but in a way that is more knackering than ever) and I really just want to *touch people*.

Well, still waiting for unemployment to go through.

My friend, who is younger than me (I'm 39), has stage 4 inoperable colon cancer.

Last week, a beloved member of the theatre community, my brother's friend, died of heart issues. Mid 30s.

Another theatre acquaintance with substance abuse issues killed himself last month. Also 30s.

My friend's 19 year old son died in a one car crash two months ago.

FUCK THIS MOTHERFUCKING YEAR. people are dropping like flies. And this one is one I finally can't hide from. He's a good friend I've known about 10 years. Started crying at work.

He has days, years, months, I don't know.

In typical me fashion, trying to pretend nothing's wrong. I don't like crying in front of people.

fuck man, I'm sorry

I'm so sorry Neanderthal.

Thx :(

These are rough times for all. Stay safe and healthy please everyone.

good vibes to you mister.

So sorry to hear that, man.

My friend, who is younger than me (I'm 39), has stage 4 inoperable colon cancer.

here in this boat with you neanderthal, except my friend is my age. <3

he's taking it relatively ok, despite learning that he had an abdominal CT eight years ago at another facility featuring a spot on his liver that his current docs said should have been noticed and investigated years ago, and may have prevented this.

hoping I can zoom with or hang out with dude somehow in the next month or so. I did have another friend who was terminally ill over ten years ago and he's still around (idk if it was a misdiagnosis or remission or what). so here's hoping.

Sorry to hear that, Neanderthal.

Yeah Neanderthal, sending love.

my parents have swung back around to "the media has overhyped this, it isn't a big deal, the hospitals are empty" and it is very concerning

we were warned ahead of time that if distancing measures worked we'd be accused of overreacting but still there are over 74,000 american deaths from covid-19 last i checked so "overhyped" seems like a bizarre takeaway either way (i've seen "friends" on fb arguing the same)

yes, over 2k people dying a day doesn't seem like 'overhyped' but perhaps society has moved the goalposts now so that if we don't see bodies falling dead in the streets then we're doing ok.

most of those people vote

i'm not sure what the practical consequence is of that fact, but it would seem, in any analysis, to be a net negative for the republicans

someone said in one of these threads the other day something close to "apparently a 9/11 every day is no big deal" and I keep thinking about that and being mad about how the terrorists won

I think a lot of people either don't believe the numbers or live somewhere that hasn't yet been hit as badly so they think they are untouchable

Ah not believing the numbers of dead, I certainly have no awful associations with that phenomenon

There's no coincidence there, it's just replacing one genocide with another

I think we need an ACT UP for COVID, w/ ppl throwing blood on the White House fence

of course they would be shot on sight

https://i1.wp.com/media.boingboing.net/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/1486cbCOMIC-trump-on-protesting.jpg?fit=600%2C896&ssl=1

say what you will about 9/11 but it was no annual flu

Wrong thread for Trump shite.

I'm getting a COVID test as a precaution just cuz I'm living with my folks.

My mom's was negative.

what better way to honor plague-ridden new yorkers than with . . . low-flying commercial aircraft

Tonight, at 7 P.M. three @JetBlue aircrafts will conduct a flyover over Manhattan, Queens and the Bronx to salute frontline first responders & health care workers. The aircrafts will fly at approximately 2,000 ft. Please follow social distancing guidelines if viewing in public. pic.twitter.com/YdDdq37p4z

— NYPD NEWS (@NYPDnews) May 7, 2020

that is insane

dad went to the bathroom by himself today. wasn't intentional, we still spot him. my mother went to the store without warning me while I was working in the other room, so he got up on his own, and suddenly I saw him standing outside my door. walked behind him to make sure he got in but he barely needed me. walked, sat, pulled his pants down, peed by himself, redressed himself, got up on his own power. even asked "what's on the agenda for today?" yesterday, which is positively Shakespearean for him.

glad to see he's getting better. soon I won't be needed here anymore but I'm wondering if it might be better for me to stay here a while. my mental health has been better here than in my own place.

who the fuck would go outside to look at the jetblue 2000 feet overhead? what? what???

After the saga of the CDs I ordered turning up 3 weeks later and the postman not bothering to ring a doorbell and posting a non-delivery slip claiming I wasn't at home, forcing me to get them delivered to the horrible post office in Seven Sisters Road where I got into a stand-up argument with the guy behind the counter, all of this after I'd cancelled the order and got a refund, I ordered something online again on Wednesday. Amazingly, although I'd ordered this item at quarter to five on Wednesday, it was delivered the next morning - except it wasn't because the postman didn't bother to ring a doorbell and posted a non-delivery slip claiming I wasn't at home. So, having checked online to see if my local delivery office was open the following day - and it was, from 7am to 9am - I got up extra early to walk down there, only to find it shut, because it's a Bank Holiday Weekend, hooray! So do I risk schlepping down to the delivery office on Monday, given that the Royal Mail website doesn't tell you if there's a bank holiday on or not, or do I wait till Tuesday? Minor stuff, in the grand scheme of things, but irritating. Probably best not to order anything online for the foreseeable.

your postman is an idiot - in what world are people not at home as much as possible right now?

Go on Tuesday! You can wait an extra day for 3rd-level Krautrock or whatever it is, Monday will be dismally overcrowded everywhere. Are you sure you're doorbell's working, btw?

(xp) Yes, that's what I don't get, unless they're under instruction not to ring doorbells or deal with people face to face - which I could understand.

If there are too many packages for a postie to carry on rounds, they post a card through but they just use the standard ‘we called but you were out’ instead of making one specific to the ‘we didn’t bring them along’ situation. Enraging, I know, but because I have to attend Mount Pleasant sorting office for my parcels, I got a decent explanation.

Ah right, that could be it. Having seen a programme once on the pressure they're put on to do their rounds on time I'm generally sympathetic to posties.

Do they not have trucks??

Tricycles iirc