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

Grocery Outlet had more people in there today than i have ever seen there at any one time - but they were still well stocked on everything except tp.

I saw a young couple with no kids take *two* 12 packs of toilet paper *each* & take separate checkout lines, i wanted to call them out but i was too chicken :/

meanwhile the woman in front of me stood in line for a good 20 minutes to buy one (1) jar of pickles for $1.

i mean, we have always bulk-bought tp at costco since we were first married but a supply like that lasts us like 6 months or more easy.

i think the publicity of it being stockpiled is just making ppl have toilet paper FOMO

My mom told me that she wore big gauntlet-like dish-washing gloves to the store and then washed them at home before she touched anything. Bless her. Whatever it takes.

atta girl

heres hoping surgeons have a better fallback but otherwise 👍

My husband has been trying to figure if he should skip the gym for awhile, but it’s a small local place and they sent out a great plan for dealing with the situation so he’s still going.

Today he comes home from the gym and says “oh I’m meeting up a bar with a few ppl from the gym later”.

(Don’t worry, I reminded him that’s not how social distancing works)

Apparently my brother, who works for a major healthcare concern, called home yesterday and gave our parents an earful. He works in tech/communications and has been setting up videoconfs for very high-level discussions between hospital & research staff. I don't know verbatim what he said but he's been aware of these discussions for a couple of weeks and it made him start a text thread for the family to check in on. It's nice not to be the only one considering how bad it could be.

met two of the achill boys for a virtual pint tonight using zoom

not too bad tho they made me take down the fb post showing one of them in a tinfoil hat and a superman onesie

My parents cohort in the UK mostly think this is a lot of fuss about nothing, but they've stopped any external contact and aren't going to anything.

In Lisbon everyone just opened all the windows everywhere and started applauding and cheering the medical staff. I saw on twitter same happened in Spain.

i checked out the neighborhood grocery store and it was calm if a little bare. i got a bag of bread flour in honor of brownie. i might make a pizza later this week.

My father was in Madeira two days ago; other travelers around him bugged out via London (so as not to be coming from the EU), but he held firm to his plan to go via Lisbon to Newark.

Yesterday he arrived in NJ, apparently smoothly. From this I gather that (as of yesterday) US citizens returning from Europe are ok if they go to the right airports.

They used to say to actors who couldn't relate to playing a killer, "Have you ever stepped on an ant?" Now they can change it to "Did you hoard like a maniacal asshole during C virus?"

“No, I hoard like this all the time”

Which is to say there’s everyday hoarding and there’s hoarding during a global emergency

I currently have 1.5 Sams Club packs of TP in the house but it's not my personal record.

I really deeply hate the overwhelming majority of New Yorkers, but this entire global shitshow confirms my suspicion that humans were a mistake.

my bf thinks it's a fuss about not much and doesn't see the point in stockpiling or social distancing - I thought the latter would be fine seeing as we barely go out and do anything anyway, but he announced that the weekend would be wasted if we didn't go out and that I was a miseryguts for not being enthusiastic, so I'm not looking forward to repeating that argument many times over the next however many weeks/months

on our way back we went to the big Asda on the other side of town, and we did not gather any lockdown essentials or even much food (just a few things for the weekend), and various people seemed quite keen to be standing what I would regard as way too fucking close even in normal circumstances, and then he told me off for being a miseryguts again when I got anxious

e.g. on the way in there was an old (80+?) and slightly frail-looking couple near the door, and I very deliberately gave them an extra wide berth, and then seconds later the woman was practically crawling over me to get to some groceries. *shrug*

Sorry to hear that...I guess it’s possible that by next weekend he might be on the same page?

Mine too, aps. He's humoring me for now but I'm bumping up against his need to keep working and making $ or it all falls apart. I asked if he'd rather be dead. Answer inconclusive. I'm trying to decide whether to self-iso here in the city where I can control my environment or up w him where it's nicer to be there but not if he keeps going out.

I called him an hour ago. He was wandering around Lowe's Home Improvement just for fun.

I guess we've expanded our quarantine bubble to include our next-door neighbor (in the same building) AKA my gf's friend, which is probably good inasmuch as it means she can go visit and not have to deal with my ass 24/7/???. I think she's increasingly accepting that we really shouldn't be going anywhere for a while unless absolutely necessary. I'm checking in with myself to see how I feel about voting on Tuesday (it's a block away, and I figure I can cart gloves and wipes and sanitizer and perhaps manage not touching anything directly, but I'm still feeling real iffy about jumping back into that level of exposure).

Karl, maybe so but perhaps only if it gets closer to home in a way I don't really want to wish for! some of his coworkers are smart people who work on bio-adjacent stuff so I'm hoping they'll have thoughts on the matter

I would like to both thank and curse this thread, the latter for encouraging worry spirals, but it's also nice to be around fellow worriers online since the 1 person I ever talk about personal stuff with irl thinks I'm a lunatic & actively ruining his life by voicing any worries at all

(felt quite anxious about things earlier and also cursed the interview with a survivor saying she'd mainly just felt run down, so those of us who feel run down just from worrying about it can now also have an exciting vicious spiral of worrying more that that means they already have it and are infecting their loved ones, etc)

in orbit: *solidarity elbow bump or maybe only a mimed elbow bump from 3m away*

Update: I predicted that his clients would stop asking him to come to their homes to do his restoration work but one of his clients just asked him to come fix something. He said, "My girlfriend won't let me out of the house for two weeks but I'm not taking this thing too seriously" and she said, "Oh no, my daughter is a doctor. You should absolutely take it seriously, but I've already been self-isolating and it's very safe" but she STILL WANTS HIM TO FIX SOME BROKEN FURNITURE DURING A PANDEMIC. People really are amazing.

io, I believe I'm in the same county, and I'm not going anywhere! Well, except work.

Work finally made the call to send us home for two weeks. Of course I’m a bit nervous as I now have a sore throat and my wife’s temperature is elevated

wow, io! people are amazing, indeed.

I'm also not feeling like my work is taking it that seriously yet either: lots of talk by management about us working extra hard to get contingency measures in place for next term's teaching but all staff still supposed to come into the office, still got a big meeting booked on Tuesday

the latest email about it said that the latest govt advice was that potential cases would not be treated any differently depending on whether the person had recently been to a(nother) affected country, which makes sense as we have several student cases here already and I hope will mean there'll be more widespread testing (although the email said something confusing about "no testing for suspected cases in the community" which I hope I'm just misunderstanding?)

but my work's spin on this was that, ahem, "Please note that this also means that anyone who has been self-isolating without symptoms because of their return from overseas or because of contact with a confirmed case can now immediately return to their normal activities", which, really, do we really want to tell people who've been in active contact with a confirmed case of something apparently infectious before symptoms show up, "hey, get yr ass back in work, the boss says no more excuses!"?

It’s challenging for us to stock up on food all that effectively so it’s likely someone will have to go to the grocery store every day or two for the duration, as usual, but we’ll see.

this is maybe a weird thing to think but i'm glad that i know how to make bread, that i have a live starter in my fridge, and a fuck of a lot of flour in the pantry. what a weird time. i even picked up some branches today on the way home from the park. i have a barbecue in the back, who knows, that wood might come in handy (??)

best wishes to everybody and their loved ones.

so both our theme park chains are showing their asses rn.

So Universal Studios, where my brother works, originally made it sound like they were closed for two weeks and they'd pay their employees. then later on they sotto voce revealed that "essential" employees still needed to come in. which include people like my brother, who is an actor on contract and will have nobody to act for. supposedly they're all going to be asked to do cleaning duties, but I suspect the real motive is knowing not everybody is willing to come in and then they won't have to pay. the local paper ran an article on it and I'm hoping it explodes.

they went on with their Mardi Gras concert tonight. the main band cancelled. they replaced them with FLO RIDA. seriously what fucking year is it? who the fuck is going to show up to that shit where it'll actually generate income for you? and my brother had to come in to MC the show. he wasn't happy.

Disney, on the other hand? read this: https://insidethemagic.net/2020/03/disney-world-cast-members-walk-out-of-epcot-mid-shift-ba1/

If you ever visit my fine city/state, please boycott these parks.

an ACTOR is essential? ok.

i was ranty about my public sector employer- the one that shut down the schools- telling us "come in unless you cant" on thursday

im coldly furious about not seeing that revised as of tonight.

we were informed we will receive comp time for performing "mission critical" duties. which to me signals working from home it's ok to not really work. i have to do about 12 hours of mission critical duties in a jail next week and will probably do about an additional 10 at home.

an ACTOR is essential? ok.

― forensic plumber (harbl), Saturday, March 14, 2020 9:40 PM bookmarkflaglink

that's the part that infuriated me most. but it most likely has to do with his salary, which is higher than what the hourly non-contracted employees get, so they would enjoy not having to pay it.

this is a weird thought but I am mostly glad I am only responsible for feeding myself and not anybody else, since my go-to stuck at home cooking does not necessarily intersect with things anyone but me wants to eat

(no, I didn't hoard anything, I bought a normal week's worth of groceries, maybe more beans than usual but the store was nowhere near close to being short on those)

otm

btw people trying to conserve toilet paper should probably not be stocking up on beans tbqh

Wow, my town here in New Jersey has now gone on total lockdown: public schools, playgrounds, gyms, health clubs, movie theaters were closed yesterday, and today they announced bars will close, restaurants can only open for takeout/delivery and there is a 10pm curfew. So far one confirmed case in the town.

Oh, uh, hey neighbor

Hey! I was out walking around yesterday evening, and there were lots of people out in bars and restaurants. Guess we won't be seeing that for a while.

The company I 'contract' for is stoopid about everything -- especially for a massively successful publisher -- so I know this working from home crap is going to be a major shitshow. Hence I am going into the office for as long as it's feasible.

People out today too having drinks and nachos etc at all the sports bars... not sure most places here are going to survive on takeout only.

Also saw they literally wrapped the playgrounds with tape

Now would be a great time for ppl to foster cats and dogs - if you’re stuck at home anyway, can’t keep a pet long term, you could take some of the burden off local shelters AND have an adorable temporary animal companion to keep you busy.

Pets are great for reducing anxiety too

i have literally never listened to a podcast but i feel like the only way we can get through this is with an achill boys podcast

achill boys won't blow you away
but you know that they'll craic

I suspect I might have this. Started with a mild fever, sore throat and chest pain on Thursday and got a bit worse on Friday. Felt better yesterday though, and today I'm almost back to normal. Haven't been going out obviously and don't plan to do so for the next days. I live in Berlin where public life has basically been put on hold, which makes it a bit easier to deal with the isolation since it's the same for everyone. Still sucks though.

Hold tight groovemaaan!

Took me three supermarkets yesterday to get bread, milk and eggs. No TP to be found.

My brother is a manager in Lidl - I'm going to look for insider information on supply drops.

No grocery store trouble at our supermarket this morning, but the cashiers are worried for their health.

I expect the army to be sent in soon.