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

I have like 43 sick days, maybe I should get the vid.

I’m going to see friends at their house this weekend, which is technically allowed (it’s to do with bubbles, don’t ask) but you can’t follow the news even a little bit and justify doing something just because the official advice says it’s ok, so we’re all just on our own to decide what’s an acceptable risk. I have my own way of rationalising it: I’ve been walking the 4 miles home from work every day, halving my use of public transport, which easily offsets whatever contribution I make to the R number by visiting this one household every couple of months. But also this is a marathon not a sprint, and I live alone; having nothing but work, home and getting drunk for the next year is not something I can realistically cope with. I’d be lying if I said I didn’t have some of the giving up malaise either, that shit’s as infectious as the vid

Noted by Chris Hayes that Covid was worst in the north when it was too cold to spend much time outside, now worst in places where it's too hot to spend much time outside. hmmm ...

I enjoy the fact that work from home + no day care effectively adds 2 hours to our day, I'm finally getting to sleep a decent amount. but both of us working + having 2 small kids who constantly need attention + having to do a bunch of cooking and housework feels like I'm working 2-3 full time jobs at once, it's crazy stressful and idk how much longer I can do it

For me, lot of things are better than they have ever been. Working from home has been an enormous improvement over commuting, but a lot of work culture stuff has gotten back to being the same old same old. I've finally ordered a desk though and will soon be able to set up an office with monitors and a keyboard instead of typing on a laptop from my couch, which I'm really excited about.

Some things have gotten worse - my family are the only people I really see, and I love them all a lot but we're bumping elbows way too much.

Lurking background dread of total societal meltdown a constant hum.

The chief of my department has taken to asking us all how we're really getting along - either in group Zoom meetings or one-on-one chats. Earlier on, when she did this in a group context, I had unmuted and was about to blurt out "pure unremitting terror!" because that was honestly how I was feeling at the time. But another colleague beat me to the punch and confidently stated "I actually think I'm getting through this alright - I've just had to stop watching the news!" So now I just tell her that I "have my ups and downs like everyone".

shaved my head/beard two days ago, feels good

. But also this is a marathon not a sprint, and I live alone; having nothing but work, home and getting drunk for the next year is not something I can realistically cope with. I’d be lying if I said I didn’t have some of the giving up malaise either, that shit’s as infectious as the vid

I feel you. I am at this moment sitting in our empty, vast public hour because I couldn't face being at home until 5 p.m.

hour = library

xp to wins - I'm on that a little bit - a friend is having a picnic in the park at the back of her (very nearby) house tomorrow, with three other friends coming down, and I'm a) concerned that I'll just be miserable company, glaring at strangers who can't keep their distance and b) concerned that I'll be miserable and rude company, glaring at my friends who can't keep their distance.

I mean, I'm not not going - her dad died during the week, it'll be good to see her.

And none of these things matter in instance, they just matter in aggregate.

I thought that a month with no school (the original estimate) would be basically impossible. No way would be able to make that work - two jobs, two kids, the household, our non-work social lives, my musical projects, our aging parents, activism and community engagement...

That was three months ago.

It was, and is, impossible. But I've been kinda amazed what one can get used to.

we bought a little bouncy castle for them. bikes, Power Wheels, a ton of puzzles, etc. etc. I know we're spoiling them but they've basically lost the only real routine in their lives. plus we're saving a lot of money on day care & gasoline

We got a big kiddie pool for the backyard. For our teenagers. It's kind of ridiculous but also charming.

i bought my kids a new hot wheels set, which they loved. they played with it for a grand total of two hours.

Yeah my kids are very digital. Neither one has any interest in toys. They play outside but rarely want or need stuff. Makes birthdays challenging.

It helps that we have almost never had screen time limits (after age 2). And we mostly gave up on enforcing schoolwork weeks ago. Daughter already had As and Bs, so there was no incentive to raise them. Son is special needsy so is following his own path.

this might be useful for anyone with young kids or with kids in their bubble

https://explaincovid.org/post/open-child-care-centers-data/IBbgwzCHrA84R45AaErk

https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/Kp2Y2YEyGbKFm9sKoS1KZW3eRAzBtGLS4mCfxYAJg7EfXJi5ulubhd1Q2m7tKuXf2kUJWuAxs-_A5fvCXVKr73B7VvX9A01e4zMqmviqrrBLw7YJ09IRmzZx23MDiT2GVh3HjLTB

Seattle just went to Phase 2, where you get to hang out indoors with up to five people outside your household per week. Some of my housemates of course want to interpret this as "each person in the household gets to hang out with five people," rather than "the household as a whole gets to add five contacts." And the language is just vague enough to let them read it that way. Sigh.

on the one hand the whole idea that otherwise seemingly reasonable people are mindlessly opening up to the maximum allowable extent dicatated by all these state "phases" is hard for me to understand...

on the other it does reinforce the argument (from other thread) that people of most political persuasions would have by and large responded to responsible, consistent, science-based messaging from the WH, and we wouldn't have gotten into the mess we're in now

yeah, for me there's this incredibly weird resentment; I'm having a picnic outdoors with one person this weekend, with a mask (other than, like, the picnic part) and that already seems like an unnecessary risk, while at the same time there are probably going to be like 200 people on st. marks

los angeles is allowing bars to open tonight so that's fine

Inside?! Or just patios?

xp caek

i'm curious what conclusions you draw from that (just the figures in the image, sorry. i'm being lazy)?

to me, it suggests a couple things. first, i seems to be a good sample to compare crowded schools vs relatively empty schools. roughly half of the centers in the sample had at least 10 students, the other half less. the vast majority of the students (88%) attended the centers with cohorts of at least 10 students. the average cohort size of the centers with more than 10 students was about 38 students, and an average of 14 staff. in other words, there are quite a few centers here that had a ton of kids and staff running around in close quarters. of the other roughly half of the centers in the sample, in the schools with fewer than 10 students, the average was 5.5 students per center, with 1.8 staff.

so with all that in mind, it seems striking that the rates were the same - a 0.13% infection rate for children and 0.87% in staff - for both the crowded and sparsely attended centers.

the size of the student cohort doesn't seem to make a difference - which seems odd, and makes me think i'm missing something. is it a case of a national-level sample disguising variations in the regional data?

xp
Inside, I'm pretty sure, with masks (when not at your table) and distancing.

My wife is bugging the hell out of me by nagging incessantly about me following up with the census worker application I made in February, iirc. They finally got back to me in maybe very early April about the position, just the usual door-to-door job, but even back then I was a little wary of how fast the interview was and how they were unable to answer what few questions I had. A lot of census prep was put on hold, for clear reasons, but now things seem to be moving again, yet obviously there are still other moving parts in play as well, and I'm just not that comfortable going door-to-door in the middle of a pandemic nagging others to fill out their census forms. On one hand I'm torn, because I know the census is important. But on the other hand, it's not that hard to fill out the census form, so that leads me to my preconceived notions of the sorts of people currently blowing off the census, who in my mind are the same people that would blow off wearing a mask (for example) and therefore are not the sort of people I want to spend hours every day hounding.

So: are my concerns rational or irrational?

Uhhh Idk who lives in the place(s) you would be going but your ideas of who doesn't/hasn't filled out their census seem extremely strange to me? But like I said, idk. The area where I live has one of the lowest response rates for all of NYC but it also has a TON of barriers to the process. Like people who rent and move often don't get their mail. Or recent transplants don't think the census has to do with them because they're not from the places where they live/are basically transient. Like ppl don't have internet access/have low quality access, or a lot of people being elderly and not having/understanding the technology to reply online. Like undocumented ppl who have an enormous amt of distrust, rightly so; even though as of now the census doesn't put them at risk, would YOU want to tell this government about yourself??! And so on. But maybe the demographics are different where you are.

I really wish Andrew WK still had his advice column.

My impression has been that a lot of community organizations who got funding to promote the census process this year don't really know how to approach it, logistically. They might not know what "success" looks like (I literally interviewed for a job as an outreach organizer and I asked the hiring CBO what would constitute success and they literally said "We don't know" because the local govt who was informing them hadn't given them any way to gauge progress--it's not as simple as "number of people who have filled out their census"). And Idk about other places but in NYC even after a lot of the community orgs started the process to hire ppl with the promised funding, the money didn't actually drop for months and no one could move forward.

There are lots of reasons why people might not respond, running the gamut from it just slipping their mind to tin-hatters. You do have the option of responding by mail or phone in addition to online, which makes it pretty accessible, but you're right, there's a lot of reasons it may not be on someone's radar. I dunno. I think going door to door in the best of circumstance makes me a little uneasy (I certainly don't like people knocking on my door), and yeah, I think the elderly or people who don't know how to use the internet *do* seem the sort either more at risk for covid or not following covid precautions. For sure as we have all anecdotally described, we see questionable behavior out and about on a daily basis, so I expect people in their own homes to be even more lax. And like you said, undocumented people (for example) might rightly have an enormous amount of distrust, so ... are those the doors I want to knock on and harass, even if it's to their benefit? I guess I can always just take the gig and quit if it makes me uncomfortable. Or maybe it will be a good experience, who knows.

You can just talk to people through the window I would say? Or a screen door? I know it's extremely weird, I had to get ppl to sign a petition for something I'm doing right as the threat of spread was getting real, but I had a pre-set deadline that I couldn't fight, so I got gloves and a sealed bag of new pens, and texted ppl ahead of time to ask if it was okay for me to come to their door so they could sign. Obv the census isn't like that, you canvas everyone. Have you done public outreach before? Like tabling or flyering? Ime there's sort of a relentless optimism/positivity that it helps to have in service of your mission.

Yeah, I've done door to door political stuff before (sucked, imo) and I also do (or did, before covid) home delivery for the food pantry, which is/was a lot more rewarding. I find the political stuff super depressing, honestly. 100 million people didn't vote in the last presidential election, for all sorts of reasons, but that number is so huge that a good hunk of them totally could have but didn't, and the cynic in me feels like a knock on the door wouldn't change that. Or maybe it would, I have no idea.

Josh I applied too and was hired, was fingerprinted and jumped through all the hoops, and then when the lockdown happened I just kind of forgot about it. Then a month ago they followed up to make sure I was still interested and I said yes...which isn't entirely true. I haven't heard back since but I will probably take a pass on doing that any time in the near future for safety concerns...

i applied to census as a statistician back in may 2009, and found out i was approved for the next stage of the job interview process in summer of 2010. they are moving at light speed on your applications

I'm actually waiting to be fingerprinted right now. We'll see what comes of it.

I had blown off the follow-up phone calls as well, then they just scheduled a fingerprinting for me anyway. Honestly I blew that off yesterday, because they don't allow you to cancel, only reschedule! And I tried to reach a human being for an hour and was never able to speak to anyone. So here I am the next day, giving it a shot.

may as well keep your options open as long as possible

My wife is bugging the hell out of me by nagging incessantly

*siren* sexist language alert *siren*

My impression has been that a lot of community organizations who got funding to promote the census process this year don't really know how to approach it, logistically.

in the last class i taught f2f with my students, a guy we had hired to work with my school to boost latinx response to the census came in and told us how important it was and i was happy bc i <3 the census
i remember everything about that class because it might be my last music class ;_; we had a big initiative and now we have...nothing

The library was going huge on the census this year—it seemed like it was going to be our priority for the spring—and then Covid happened. Not sure what’s going to happen now that so much time is lost and people’s priorities are understandably not on the census.

i'm curious what conclusions you draw from that (just the figures in the image, sorry. i'm being lazy)?

i think it's kind of in the eye of the beholder, given the way in which the data was collected contains large and unknown biases. but i will say i was surprised at how small the numbers of covid cases were in an absolute sense, especially among the teachers.

apparently she collected the data in part because of this graph

https://cdn.substack.com/image/fetch/w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fbucketeer-e05bbc84-baa3-437e-9518-adb32be77984.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fdc74aef7-d8a1-4c65-aab7-f2b6c49d7187_1256x722.jpeg

she says

What these Opportunity Insights graphs tell me is that we have to find a way to improve learning outcomes and, realistically, I think this means we have to find a way to open schools. And yet we need to do it safely. I do not want to be a broken record, but it is a travesty that we are not collecting more data to understand how child care is spreading the virus. We must do this. It is simply not fair to children not to.

which i think is extremely otm (see https://emilyoster.substack.com/p/covid-19-learning-loss-and-inequality)

A darkly humorous standby of coronavirus conversations is referring to the pre-pandemic era as The Before Time. For my latest @WSJ column, I look at the history of that science-fiction trope. https://t.co/pLoBTEzfKN

— Ben Zimmer (@bgzimmer) June 19, 2020

So: are my concerns rational or irrational?

I worked for the Census for a summer in 2006 (a Census Test, but in practice the same job). If you're an enumerator you get assigned a bunch of addresses and have to make six attempts to complete their interviews. If they won't answer the door or talk to you in person, you can try and track down their phone number and call them. Or you can get the info from a proxy respondent, like a landlord, apartment manager, or even a neighbor. I conducted a lot of interviews standing at a gate or through an open window, so you could observe social distancing and still get a lot done. If someone will give you their phone number by shouting through the door, you can just call them right there from the front yard and get it done, no contagion at all. I'd imagine during quarantine that a lot of interviews will start with tracking down a phone number and attempting to complete over the phone. Or you could leave a note on their front door with your phone number so they could call you. I'd recommend joining NextDoor for your assigned area and introducing yourself as a Census Taker.

There was no "typical" non-respondent, I ended up talking to all kinds of people. Got threatened, got propositioned, got offered a lot of bong hits. Apartment managers were the worst, because for some reason they resented having to deal with us and would attempt to evade or blow us off constantly. Joke's on them, I got paid hourly and so posting up in their fancy waiting areas was just easy money. I'd be given a quota to complete each time I met with my manager, and usually I'd get admonished for finishing too quickly... the managers wanted to the work to continue since it was high-paying ($15-17 hour) so they didn't want us to rush.

Oh yeah, we had a couple 3-4 hour training classes, got shadowed by another enumerator for a day or so, then they let us out on our own. I made friends with my fellow crew members and we shared tips (and drinks). Sometimes we'd team up, although I'm not sure we were supposed to do that. Your success will depend on being creative about getting information and having good people skills. I thought it was fun and I'd absolutely do it again (even during quarantine) if I didn't have a full-time job.

I know it's long past time to whinge about masks, but was out in Cambridge just now and whatever traces of distancing and mask-wearing there were left last week are already fading away, people seem genuinely to think that the crisis is completely over and they can get back to normal.

it's all part of the cunning plan to have a second summer spike before the second winter spike, sort of like when you take your coat of death off indoors, so you'll feel the benefit when you put it back on again and brave the cold.. no that doesn't make sense, but nothing does at the moment!

In mid-March:

Sir Patrick said it is “eye-catching” to order the cancellation of mass gatherings and sporting events but that the chances of contracting the disease by attending such occasions are slim.

He told the BBC: “Mass gatherings do have some impact, it is not that they don’t do anything if you stop them.

“But they are very much more minor than the other ones.

“The most likely place you are going to get an infection from is a family member, a friend, someone very close in a small space, not in the big space.”

So what have we got?

- No sporting events
- Friends visiting in gardens
- Shops open
- Distancing soon to go down to 1m
- All schools back in September

Good luck, England...

... here, hold on, I live there.

Yeah Cambridge is bad. I had a look at market square (from a distance) and it was a fucking nightmare - it’s claustrophobic there at the best of times so it would be impossible to have all the stalls open and maintain social distancing, but nobody is bothering. We were the only ones wearing masks when we went into boots, & in the next aisle someone loudly sneezed. I mean that’s gonna happen, it’s hay fever season, but imagine if anyone was arsed to cover their mouths. The will has just completely drained away in a really short space of time. That’s a direct result of the govt’s strategy obv, but I can’t help thinking what a miserable fucking country if we can’t do this one thing to keep people safe. Never want to hear any big society in it together bromides again

xpost

Joke's on them, I got paid hourly and so posting up in their fancy waiting areas was just easy money.

Joke was actually on you, since it was your tax money paying for your time, lol. (sigh)

I'm actually still not entirely sure what the status of census field operations is right now. Most recent thing I saw (Saturday) was this:

Based on continuing assessments of guidance from federal, state and local health authorities, the U.S. Census Bureau is suspending 2020 Census field operations. The Census Bureau is taking this step to help protect the health and safety of the American public, Census Bureau employees, and everyone who will go through the hiring process for temporary census taker positions. The Census Bureau continues to evaluate all 2020 Census field operations, and will communicate any further updates as soon as possible.

In addition, we are working diligently to provide additional information on how and when you will be trained. In some cases, training will be delayed in order to maintain public safety. Training will include social distancing measures. Please be patient as the training details are finalized. We will provide more information as it becomes available.

Joke was actually on you, since it was your tax money paying for your time, lol.

I saved taxpayer money completing those interviews! If I'd given up, it would have gotten passed up to my manager to deal with, and she got paid more than I did. It was really the apartment managers that wasted your money, but billable time for dealing with recalcitrant citizens is a fixed Census expense. Consider it public education about our civic and Constitutional duty. Speaking of managers, get in early in the first wave of enumerators so you can get promoted to field manager in the next phases and supervise a team instead of just doing interviews. Pays a bit better and involves less door-to-door (but harder door-to-door, since you have to mop up the troublesome addresses).

It's a pretty inscrutable process so far, tbh. Granted, there are extenuating circumstance, but I've spoken to exactly one census person for maybe three minutes in the last five months.

I think if you pass the background check you're pretty much guaranteed to at least end up in a paid training session, and if you do well there you've got the job. They hire like half a million people. You'll get a call when they start enumerating.

Found out a bit more about the circumstances behind the COVID-19 related death of one of my work colleagues. He had gout and arthritis, so I believe that made him more vulnerable to infection. He lived on his own but spoke to his brother on the phone every day. When he hadn't phoned for 24 hours, his brother went round to his flat and found him dead.