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

I am really struggling with the not touching my face thing. A Doctor friend said one of the biggest benefits of wearing a mask is to make it much harder to touch your face, or at least the nose and mouth. (although I feel like its going to take a full face motor bike helmet to stop me from touching mine)

30 cases in Portugal, which while low is I think higher than average. No shortages of toilet paper or sanitizer or anything else. Doesn't really seem to be registering in the same way as in US/UK.

I went to a coding meetup last thursday and there were maybe fewer people than expected. It didn't occur to me turnout might have been coronavirus related until yesterday.

further cases of desperately needing to scratch an itch on my nose have resulted from not being able to touch my face

Have been wondering if any of the arts festivals this year are actually going to happen. There have been some cancellations of opening events because of the weather and now this may mean large gatherings aren't allowed later in the year.
So maybe the 2 events last weekend are going to be about it. I volunteered for the opening of Tulca which was on as part of several events over Galway 2020 when it's normally a festival in November. Then went to am opening that was part of the actual Galway 2020 set up or at least had volunteers with I'd saying Galway 2020 not the gallery name.

Just seen the headlines for an article in the irish independent repeating some of the myths including some of what Trump has been saying. Not sure how good that paper ever is as a news source since it seems to follow it's owner's agenda.

after about the 10th attempt I've finally learned how to pronounce the word "epidemiologist" properly, now got my chat authoritative sounding shit bout COVID-19 card.

hell of a time to have a really intense sinus headache

A Doctor friend said one of the biggest benefits of wearing a mask is to make it much harder to touch your face, or at least the nose and mouth.

My buddy is an ER doc and recommends against wearing a facemask. He wrote a really good article, "As an ER Doctor, I Need You to Know These Things About Coronavirus": https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/884d35/er-doctor-healthcare-workers-coronavirus

good article davey, i'm already planning on sharing it with one of my more fearmongering friends

the beginning of last week was tough, not because of the disease itself, but because of the panic. i'm a bit hypochondriac, have some fairly nasty paranoid tendencies, and have panic disorder. this has been hard for me. on the other side of it i do work for a healthcare organization, though not in direct patient care, so i do have access to reliable information. i've also shut off most forms of social and other media (years ago) and, at least when it comes to stuff relating to my profession, am decent at understanding what is reliable information and what isn't.

the panic comes in waves, and though i try not to let it affect me i feel like it's important for me to at least acknowledge what i'm feeling, acknowledge what's going on around me. the way people are talking, the nervous jokes (deflecting with humour)

i fairly quickly concluded when shit got real that i was probably going to get COVID-19, probably sooner rather than later, and i was probably not going to die from it, and while i still take safety precautions the idea that we could effectively halt the spread of this in it tracks never struck me as particularly plausible.

there's a certain balancing act going on here - on the one hand not giving in to the panic, which is for me personally probably a greater threat than COVID-19, and on the other hand not working on diminishing what is absolutely a global public health crisis. human beings aren't necessarily good at dealing with crisis, aren't necessarily good at differentiating "ok this is a serious and major thing and we have to address this seriously" from "OMG we're all gonna die".

on a personal level, i'm going to be fine, most of the people i know are going to be fine. i have one co-worker i worry about; she's young (barely sixty) but is in pretty poor health and has a lot of trouble breathing. that's part of "taking this seriously", thinking about the very real possibility that a person or people i care about will die from this. on the flip side maybe nobody i know well will die from this, it'll just be musicians i like and whatnot.

i'm weirdly enough more inclined to leave the house since it's started getting serious. i can and often do work from home, and i figure it's only a matter of time before the company i work for starts asking me to. i'm expecting cabin fever, and leaving the house while i can will hopefully minimize it.

honestly as a data analyst i'm really worried about that 3.4% number i see going around, and i'm not sure darragh does a great job on that front - he cites a number of 0.06% but then later on cites an overall mortality rate of 2.3%. this is some pretty wonky stuff, the difference between case mortality and overall mortality, and it's tempting to get into an extremely wonky argument about statistical methodology, but i don't see that argument remotely being productive. statistics, in a situation like this, seem mostly totemic in nature, either a ward or an excuse for panic. i don't cite numbers or percentages when talking to other people.

Find it very hard to avoid touching my face. Have taken to tying my hair back on the way to/from work to avoid needing to put my hands near my face, also less keen on using self-checkouts & other people seem to do the same. I don’t go to Starbucks but other people have told me they won’t accept people’s own cups anymore, so I’ve stopped bringing my folding cup with me.

Toilet roll thing is hitting here. Panic buyers clearing teh shelves. Hope it is just a temporary thing but not sure exactly where the supply levels lie wherever they're getting them from. I assume it is going to return to normal and not be blocked by international exchange somewhere down the line. people not trading the necessary commodities that go into the production etc.

I mean if society is going to collapse i would hope it would be with clean bums. Maybe we need a rise in bidet production?
THink somebody I know had a hose bidet substitute tehy got cheap in Dublin on Facebook last week. Maybe that's the future?

Luckily I’m already obsessive about not touching my face with unwashed hands / not touching other things after touching my face.

What’s with the toilet paper thing?

Panicked people incessantly shitting themselves, I assume.

As a person with a chronic lung disease I am:

- increasingly worried that this will hit me hard and at best will further damage my lungs and shorten my life
- pissed off with people growling at me because I cough a lot and they think I'm part of the plague
- a complete hypocrite who growls at everyone else with a cough as I'm scared that they have the plague
- thinking about the benefits of self-isolation in terms of reading and video games :)

xpost The best I can tell it's people worried they'll be stuck inside with ... not enough toiler paper to last two weeks?

Def. have noticed places out of hand sanitizer, and signs limiting purchases. Also other signs, like the one at the vet this morning declaring it a "no handshake zone." Proactively and helpfully, all of our doctors, dentists, etc. have sent out texts and messengers saying, please, if you're sick, stay home. (And affirming that that is always appreciated).

I'm a little annoyed because my kids were both sick last week with mundane stuff, and now, when I want to be at my sharpest and most vigilant, I have a stuffy nose.

my spouse hesitated about kissing me this morning and I was like "dude, you've stuck your dick in me, I am pretty sure you've got whatever I've got."

Yeah, but maybe not covid.

;)

we have not been touching our top faces. only our bottom faces.

now is the perfect time to invest in a bidet

have a wedding planned in june and an out-of-town bachelor party planned for april 2nd. not gonna lie, i'm slightly nervous about that second thing. hopefully, the panic will subside by the time june rolls around, and i'm going to that party unless the faa grounds flights (sorry, not sorry colorado). but covid has been a fun additional source of stress during an already-stressful time.

The Bidet: like a wet kiss for your bottom face.

cancellations are really bumming my kids out - mariachi performances, purim celebrations, soccer games, etcx.

Been thinking about life and mortality today. I’d rather die gloriously in battle than from a virus. In a way it doesn’t matter. But it kinda does. pic.twitter.com/m6vU5RTQHJ

— Paul Gosar (@DrPaulGosar) March 9, 2020

if they don't get their Disneyland trip at the end of this month the tears are gonna be epic

xp

Disney hasn't closed or anything yet, right?

So far not much here has changed, as far as I can tell.

my work is definitely going to close when the virus picks up steam here and I can't do most of my job from home as things stand (and this will not be remedied in the near future). this is going to definitely create an "interesting" time for me, probable extra paid holiday from work followed by "too much fucking work" when I get back

it's a good thing that Paul Gosar was a dentist then.

Disney hasn't closed or anything yet, right?

they closed Disneyland Tokyo (different situation, obviously)

definitely create an "interesting" time for me

Maybe you'll finally get to watch "The Irishman" in one sitting.

JUst seen it confirmed taht teh St patrick's day parades are bing cancelled. Heard Dublin, Cork, sligo so far.
BUmped into someone i know this morning who was coming from a meeting about the local one and told me taht our local community centre had definitely pulled out but the town as waiting for the decision from teh council.
I thought it was pretty likely that if there was a panic over the last week a large close crowd event like that next week may not be likely to go ahead.

Pretty sure the St. Patrick's Day response here will be to drink *more*.

They won't need to dye the river, it'll just turn that color from all the covid.

Went to Costco and the big asian grocery store in town. Costco seemed to be out of toilet paper but didn't notice anything else weird.

The asian grocery store was pretty cleaned out though - 90% of the rice was gone, all of the dried chinese noodles were gone except the very thin ones, and like 75% of the all the huge chinese preserved vegetable aisle was empty.

I'm kind of fascinated by what was gone and what was still around - I imagine some of it is supply issues for chinese products, the fact that the vast majority of customers are chinese, etc. There was still lots of thai/vietnamese rice noodles, korean sweet potato noodles, kimchee, pansit noodles, and some stray bags of basmati, sticky, sushi, and brown jasmine rice. My son and I were also the only people there not wearing masks this time.

I'm not very observant, so on Saturday I learned that brown basmati rice is a thing.

that's interesting, I shop pretty much only at Asian grocery stores (south but mostly east) here and I haven't yet seen anyone in a mask, nor any shelves unusually out of stock.

Probably also touching my face the average (160 times an hour, I've read). Yesterday I donned one of my dog's neck bandanas inside the apt, so at least I noticed each time I rested my chin on my thumb. I imagine I'd get habituated to that, too.

I've long been in the habit of touching my face with my knuckles, or the back of my hand. Like "The Thinker."

I have a work trip that I spun into a vacation for my spouse and I (me?), heading from SF to Paris then Amsterdam next week. We are both wondering aloud if this is a good idea or not.

As for the workplace itself, we are extremely deadline-driven in my dept and if we close it will have an enormous, unpredictable impact on them. it's definitely making me anxious.

I'm slightly nervous about flying this week: first to Raleigh (for a Destroyer show lol), then NYC. But other than sanitizing the airplane seat table, what can ya do?

wipe down the tv screens, arm rests, belt buckles, remotes, etc too (if they have them). suck on a zinc lozenge the entire flight?

We met another Chinese mother at the supermarket, her daughter is in my son's class and she doesnt speak English. She was complaining that people weren't taking it seriously enough and that it was still not socially acceptable to wear a face mask in public.

Last week I bought toilet paper at Trader Joe's (not hoarding; I had just put the last roll from the previous package on the spindle). The checker immediately comments on the TP, as there had been a run on that store earlier for TP and hand sanitizer.

Are people anticipating a civilization that has collapsed enough that TP is worth its weight for bartering?

People with relatives in China, including Taiwan, seem to be way more aware of the need to take this seriously. As for TP, we have one more package than usual, but we have squeeze bottles that can be filled with water and squirted directionally, if necessary. <<-- this thought is new to me and I thank ilx for its recent bidet conversation for bringing this to the fore of my mind.

i think the recent bidet conversation was the ilx highpoint of the week.

feeling good about my choice to travel by Greyhound this summer if only because I'll be locked in with 8-12 disgusting strangers as opposed to hundreds

As I understand it, traveling by plane is no worse (and in some ways better, thanks to the HEPA filters) than any other means of transportation. Assuming you are not within 3 or so feet of someone actively sneezing or coughing up a lung, the usual caveats apply: wash hands, don't touch face, and so on.

I was watching SNL last night, thinking, boy, this is so not funny. So my mind started to wander to a parody of Hitchcock's "Lifeboat" where four people are stuck on a tiny raft, and the number of TP rolls stacked in the corner keeps going down and they have to find the cheat secretly burning through all the TP.

I refuse to not touch face!!!

They’re still everywhere ime
To me the worst are the saggy faded signs about heroes outside hospitals and nursing homes

My work still has a "Guests need to have their temperature read before entering" sign on the front door.

No sticker for me and also no new entry on the vaccine card, kinda bummed.

Well, about 10 days after getting the new vaccine ... my wife has covid. Thanks a lot, Fauci.

My least favorite relics are the sneeze guards, often crudely made and intrusive. They never did anything! Why are they still around?

I do love the old signs and have been slowly building a photo collection of them.

I'm scheduled for a booster tomorrow AM and I'll probably add on a flu shot, too. I'm hoping it will be no more trouble than the previous injections, but I'm planning on taking it easy for a couple of days, just in case.

I got the new one a couple weeks ago, and the only side effect besides the sore arm was feeling a little muscle-achy the day after.

And on the relics front, many businesses when they did open kept their restrooms locked. Now that there are no restrictions on any other aspect of having a store, the restrooms are still off limits. I guess they discovered it's easier/cheaper to not have them for the public.

Starbucks still reluctant to leave cream out. They fucking pour the cream into the coffee as if they were Dunkin Donuts. Judging from those portions, I didn't realize Americans prefer a side of coffee with their cream.

i got the novavax and felt nothing.

^^ Camus novel opening

Huh, I haven't polled which version of the jab they got, but seems like most folks I know have reported being hit way harder by this one than the other rounds.

Novavax m/l universally reported as having no side effects and little to no arm pain.

Starbucks still reluctant to leave cream out. They fucking _pour_ the cream into the coffee as if they were Dunkin Donuts. Judging from those portions, I didn't realize Americans prefer a side of coffee with their cream.

We both did.

I have to wait until early November to get my next covid booster (4 months), but plan on getting the covid, flu, and RSV shots all in the same day.

The Shingrix vaccine (which I got with two other shots) made my arm hurt the most of any I can remember, but I have never had any other side effects from vaccines.

Friend of mine is traveling and just posted a picture of a portable CO2 monitor he carries with him. This is while the plane was idling on the ground:

https://scontent-dfw5-2.xx.fbcdn.net/v/t39.30808-6/395318428_10161359009294085_6501657829487761960_n.jpg?stp=cp6_dst-jpg_s1080x2048&_nc_cat=107&ccb=1-7&_nc_sid=5f2048&_nc_ohc=vLrCAi2xpxUAX-1pnXd&_nc_ht=scontent-dfw5-2.xx&oh=00_AfA9sVbd8F8zxkfiHDv7cQp6fU06zO8KhS13YuTwmU9NTw&oe=653C3705

Hence my masking on planes.

supposedly once they turn the engines (and therefore the hvac system) on, planes are one of the safer places to be. but just sitting at the gate they are bad news.

yeah, my dad, who works in AOG, says planes do an outstanding job of filtering air, but even the best systems get taxed when every seat is filled

when every seat is filled

So literally every flight I've ever been on in my life.

OSHA limit is 5,000 ppm for 8 hour periods of exposure.

I do miss the days of flying in half-empty planes.

I caught covid over the summer after flying home; my family, seated near me, did not get sick. My wife caught covid after coming home on a flight last week; I was sitting next to her, I did not get sick (yet/again). Maybe she got it on the flight. Maybe she got it in the airport. Maybe she got it at her doctor visit last Thursday, or maybe at the Taylor Swift movie Friday. By the standards of circulation, yeah, planes are supposed to be pretty safe, but at this point it's just one giant public pool of potential exposure.

It's unpredictable. I flew pretty much throughout the pandemic, hence my comment about half-empty planes. (Don't even get me started on empty LA freeways.) AFAIK, the only time I caught it was when my middle schooler brought it home.

It's weird, my flight from Dublin to Washington three weeks ago was only half-full, which I have not experienced on a plane for a long time.

My second bout, this summer, happened after international travel.

But here is the thing: there will never be a way to know if it was the hotel shuttle, the other hotel shuttle (that we had to switch to because the original shuttle broke down), the line for customs and immigration, the line for security, the VERY intimate security screening I got the gate, the plane, the other gate, the other plane, the OTHER other plane, the taxi home, or some random sneeze in the restroom or the bar the night before.

Maybe it was all of those places!

I took my youngest to a birthday party this past weekend at a video arcade/bowling alley. I could practically feel the viruses and bacteria seething around us.

something i have gotten used to in the last 3+ years:
don't touch anything
don't touch face
repeat to self as many times as needed

esp as someone who works with numerous people in a room in two public-facing jobs

two nights ago at the restaurant i served a couple that were clearly on a first date. three hours later, she went to the bathroom and he chose that opportunity to blow his nose -- twice! -- into his cloth napkin and then place it on his plate. he looked around to see if anyone was watching. i did not touch his gross snotty napkin.

Everyone in my family has had covid at least once. Two of us have now had it twice (that we know of). To date, none of us have ever had it at the same time.

just had to explain to my mom, in 20-fucking-23, that people can be totally asymptomatic and still transmit COVID. sigh.

boomers do not understand epidemiology!

This new vaccine kicked my ass. I got it at noon and had full-body chills all night starting at around 10 PM. Woke up this morning completely drained of energy. Breakfast helped, but I'm still shivering somewhat.

re: "covid detritus" upthread:

https://covid-signage.net/

OK, here's some anecdotal data. I watched the football game with friends Saturday night. There were five of us in the living room, total, including the host. He was sipping tea because we was feeling a little run down, but had tested negative for covid, and wasn't coughing or sneezing or anything. The next day, however, Sunday, he was feeling worse and *did* test positive. So far the rest of us are negative. But here's what's (perhaps) useful to know. I asked him if he had gotten the most recent vaccine, and he said no. In fact, he had only gotten the first two, apparently. He's not an anti-vax guy, just lazy, but two things. One, fwiw he and his family have had covid more than almost anyone else I know; they are all more recently vaxxed than he is, and so far no one else in his family is sick. And two, he says this most recent bout has been the worst one yet. So ... get vaxxed! You heard it here first.

Also I've been seeing an uptick of local mask wearing, too.

Sounds very similar to what I posted in one of the other covid threads:

Completely anecdotal, but I thought it was interesting nonetheless. Back in early December I went to go watch a friend's band play in a local, small bar. It was unannounced and a pretty small bar, so I went (unmasked) figuring it was relatively low key and a rare risk I was willing to take. And it mostly was, the bar stayed pretty sparse, though near the end of their set the bar was crashed by a very large group of folks on some ugly sweater bar crawl type thing. It got crowded fast and I was kind of kicking myself for not at least having a KN95 in my pocket to pull out, as I usually do.

Fast forward to a few days later and my buddy texts me to tell me that the guy who owned the bar (a friend of his) heard that the travelling ugly sweater thing was rumored to have turned into a super-spreader and that we should test. Long story short, of the group of 8 people that we were with, 4 ended up getting (fortunately mild) cases of COVID. The other four of us never fell ill and never tested positive. The interesting part though, was confirming that of the 4 who tested positive, 2 had never gotten more than the initial two vax doses and the other 2 had only gotten the first booster. The 4 of us who never tested positive had all gotten each booster as they'd come available.

Coincidence? Luck? Probably. Maybe. But still served as a good reminder to stay current. (Also learned that folks I knew who I'd assumed were vigilant about boosters were actually not - fortunately they all agreed to get back to getting boosted.)

I think I already posted the same thought in one of these threads, but my big COVID conspiracy theory is that staying up to date with the vaccine does actually help protect you from infection

I don't wanna jinx myself, but aside from an asymptomatic infection in September 2022 (not so much a sniffle, detectable only b/c my doctor gave me an antibody test a month later) I haven't gotten sick after seven jabs.

one concern w/covid is the possibility that multiple infections can fuck you up over time. anecdotally the people i know who have had it a few times have been increasingly sick w/not-covid illnesses as well, just really knocked flat by various viruses.

meanwhile on my local next door someone is claiming they'll never get a vax because they know five(!) people who died right after they got a shot. i have my doubts about that tale.

i'm really fortunate to WFH, i feel terrible that my poor kid is on the front lines, especially with the new Cali guidelines which give full permission for covid-positive but asymptomatic kids to be sent to school.

A good friend of mine's son, after catching covid some three years go, lost a lot of his sense of smell and taste, and when it came back there were certain things he mysteriously could no longer stomach, like eggs and meat. Well, three years later and his taste for eggs and meat has returned ... after he got back from a semester in China! Maybe they engineered a new counter-virus?