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

Just got tested for the first time. They go deep! No symptoms, but my employer offered tests on campus today, one of these mobile testing units. Waited 20 minutes, now have to wait 24 to 48 hours for results.

In a shop yesterday queuing for the cashier. They have markings on the ground and I'm keeping distance from the person ahead. A woman starts edging into the space ahead of me before I catch her eye and she deigns to ask if I'm in the que. No I just like standing around in the middle of fuxking shops for no reason you stupid xunt. Anyway, that cleared up she proceeds to stand behind me, like up my arse behind me, and the next bloke does the same behind her. We are all wearing masks and these people seem to have no idea why. Jesus fucking Christ bring on the second wave man let's end it.

That happens to me every time I'm in a store or other public space.

When you have a GP appointment here you have to wait outside and they supposedly send someone out to tell you where to go. I was the only person waiting for ages, then this older lady walks up the path behind me and stands about 4 inches from me. I try and do the polite 'lean and amble' but she kept following me!

my cousin is having a small (~20 people) wedding today but I’m kind of pissed about it because people are still flying in from all over and she said she’s going to have a bigger one with more people in June anyway (wtf).

I just spent a night in hospital sharing a room and a toilet with a bunch of older folk who didn't seem so clued in on the old hygiene measures and were mad into coughing (and in one case streaking).

14 days ahead of holing up at home and hoping none of us had the virus.

hope you're ok, onimo!

yes, nobody is distancing here, and for some reason in this country hardly anyone bothered wearing masks outside to begin with, and half the people who are wearing masks have them under their noses if not their chins, and customers are supposed to wear them in shops but staff are exempt and most of them don't bother (at least in my local shops), and it drives me mad.

I went to the GP a while ago and it wasn't clear whether I was supposed to phone reception (which was repeatedly engaged) or press the doorbell. Whichever method I finally managed to get hold of them with, the receptionist seemed quite grumpy, like I'd done it wrong. I finally got let in about 30 seconds before my appointment time, after waiting for 15 minutes getting increasingly worried that the receptionist might not answer until after my given time and then tell me to go away because I was late.

My rona test was negative. I'll probably keep on getting them every time the mobile testing caravan is on campus, which isn't gonna be very often, but I'm teaching university students in person and taking trains to/fro work one day a week, so I want to keep up with this.

Anyone else been having recurring covid dreams? I keep having dreams where I am in a public space (record store, bus, train, etc.) and not wearing a mask or those near me are not wearing a mask. There is a rush of panic in trying to then find my mask/get away from the non-mask wearers/distance myself.

I had those back in March and April, not much since.

saw a viral tweet along the lines of "new yorkers are so great, they put their mask up whenever they see a stranger!" and the one person who pointed out that they should have their mask up all the time was swarmed in the replies like "but you can stay six feet away, you must not actually live in new york." which, no, you actually can't, I can't even walk up my block without coming within like 6 *inches* of people; and also this doesn't account for the MANY people who just don't wear masks at all

also the "but I just can't wear a mask in the heat/get fresh air/talk on the phone in a mask!" excuses are all bullshit. I don't have a particularly loud speaking voice and I have never had any problems talking on the phone in a mask; I also have the worst heat tolerance of anyone I know and not once have I ever thought "man, if only my mouth and chin weren't covered, then I wouldn't pass out."

so, no, I haven't had those dreams, I just live them instead

which, no, you actually can't, I can't even walk up my block without coming within like 6 *inches* of people

This sounds right to me. I walk around outside without a mask but that's because I live in an un-dense city where if somebody is coming towards me on the sidewalk I can just step off and walk in the street, not an option for Manhattanites.

I mean, I can walk in the street, just not if there are cars coming

I do love football players who wear Michelin suits and helmets complaining about how suffocating masks are

Broadly im with you but come on theres a dif between a facehugger xenomorph and like, a squirrel

Which.... one's...which

got my second injection for Moderna's trial today. from here on out it's follow-ups. another 8 vials of blood, a nose swab that somehow managed to be the worst one yet.

i get a little annoyed about how disorganized the people running this trial seem to be (not with the handling of materials, but they all still aren't on the same page with best practices, run ridiculously behind schedule), but....it did also give me an extra $400, which is going to come in handy as I'm moving in for the next year to help my mother take care of my dad so she can work again.

yay America! (I'm actually not bothered about it - it needs to happen).

right about the time you'd expect it (12 hours or so), side effects showed up. sore arm and elevated temp (99.5).

not uncommon for any vaxx including this one, and they swabbed me beforehand, so if I have it I'd known in about 2 days anyway.

man if I can get out of work tomorrow that would be booooss

I’m super glad you’re doing this, Neanderthal. Even if it is a paid gig. I hope it works! Feel better tomorrow and save our economy with your enchanted blood!

shall! tis a small price to pay.

unless I grow a third arm, but good luck stopping me in basketball if that happens.

Had my 2nd vid test on Sunday. Went a lot easier tahn the first one. This time a female medic. She talked me through the process better.
I guess they've had like several months more experience anyway or maybe it was just her being more patient friendly. or whatever the correct word for a person having the test performed. Testee sounds genital.
Swab is still a very unpleasant experience but she talked me through how long it was going to take at the time, counted to 5 and removed but I don't think that's an orifice that should have things shoved into it. Oh & she explained why they used the same swab for back of throat and nostril and exactly where she was trying to access.

GOt results back negative yesterday morning.

but I'm still feeling pretty lousy. So I assume that means that flu season is upon us. I think this si normally the time that people are returning to Universities etc which tends to be when all the pathogens congregate and distribute.
head been feeling muzzy, limbs aching etc

rather than do my usual 7 paragraphs, let's just say my mental state is hanging on by a thread, so I suspect many of you are also with me there, so....just please be good to yourselves.

back atcha

indeed.

As if things weren't bad enough, yesterday I learned there is something called "zoom bombing," wherein anonymous strangers crash Zoom classrooms with profane or racist interruptions and post passwords and stuff. One of my kids said a teacher confessed she found even the threat of it the most stressful part of the day.

a friend of a friend attended a zoom wedding that got bombed. there was a deluge of naked people yelling racial slurs in the middle of the ceremony. password protect your meetings, everyone.

JIC, a poet friend was giving a Zoom reading at the beginning of the pandemic and it was Zoom-bombed with child pornography. I can never unsee the vileness of that image. Pw protect or use the webinar feature, otherwise it's a gamble.

Our first online trivia game (hosted by a pub) got zoom bombed that first week we all went into lockdown back in March. Thankfully none since!

we use MS Teams at work and fortunately it prohibits those outside our organization from joining - that said at this point I can't even feel confident that some of the seasonable people we hire wouldn't do it, considering the terrible screening processes of our third-party partner site

already gotten several stereo pee sessions from people pissing unmuted

FPed Neanderthal for kinkshaming

FPed table for not respecting the kinkshaming fetish

FPed an actual table.

We have been getting warnings about the Zoom bombing too (in our case, Teams bombing, from people who wait in the lobby and accidentally get admitted b/c the teacher is distracted.) It feels like presiding over a seance that's constantly at risk of being invaded by malicious spirits.

I just shared this at work cos we have a buncha learners who "never figure out" how to join MS Teams via the app and keep joining as a Guest and that requires us either setting it up so everybody bypasses the Lobby (which we definitely cannot do) or admitting them individually via Lobby (which due to this example, now we definitely don't want to).

thanks!

Not to change the subject, but man, my son is struggling with school this week. It's hard to watch and harder to help him. It's tough to parse out what is so hard for him, but from the pieces we are pulling from him, it sounds like the performative anxiety of being on Zoom calls all day is wearing on him. All week he's been great through the morning and really happy through lunch time, but by 3:00 his brain is totally wiped and he doesn't really know how to deal with it. It's so hard to help him through something I never had to even imagine when I was in school.

Just venting, really, but this damn virus is breaking us all in so many tiny, unforeseen ways on a near daily basis.

I'm not sure how old your son is, but I think that's pretty common with kids in the best of circumstances. They spend so much time at school keeping everything under control, then the second they get home they fall apart. It was certainly true for both of my kids when they were younger, and I presume the same would hold true for online learning.

Yeah, that's true, he was similar when he first started going to school full time, but this seems much more intense than I've seen it before.

Best wishes to jon and family. Hope things improve.

We just heard that my son is in a group that may be able to return to something like "school" soon (based on his IEP and support needs).

What we're hearing is that most instruction will still be remote... but that it will take place at school, with an aide helping him get from class to class and stay on track.

This would be a godsend for us, because honestly that shit is a full-time job (on top of our two existing full-time jobs, and parenting our other child, who is also going through significant struggles).

This model seems to minimize (but not eliminate) transmission danger to teachers and staff, while enabling way more effective schooling for this particular special-needs kid.

I don't know how well this would work for everyone or everywhere, but we're cautiously optimistic at present.

Thanks YMP.

While one part of me is thankful we aren't at the stage of worrying about him being back in school and risking getting sick, this shit is hard trying to balance his schoolwork while each of us are in full time jobs. And we only have one kid! I can't imagine how much harder it gets with multiple kids in various stages of life. We're lucky that my wife's job is pretty flexible, hours wise even outside of the pandemic, but mine is very much driven by the traditional 9-5 timing of the contractors and consultants I work with. It's frustrating because I can't as easily just block off an hour of my day to help him out.

this shit is hard trying to balance his schoolwork while each of us are in full time jobs

Yep

i am a person with teens who is able to do a home TA job by circumstance. but based upon the difficulty i had with last spring's 8th grade level job and what i see now, i truly don't know how many parents are coping. i am hopeful that many are compensating, but the difficulty and cost to the kids is so high. stay strong, be supportive as you are able, and keep demanding better is all i have to recommend, but i will.

My teacher friend has suspended giving his kids homework because he feels they're in front of a computer screen too long already

I think a decision is being made as to whether there will be a local lockdown tomorrow at a meeting today.
I thought it was odd that I didn't seem to be seeing the social distancing notices taht had been up around town for the last few months. Used to be some freestanding signs made of wood that had been stuck up in the corners of the field sin the park around the corner fro where I live. I'm only just seeing they aren't there any more. I thought I would have noticed them being gone before but definitely not seeing them now.
& couldn't see equivalents anywhere across town as i went in by bus for the first time in a few weeks. Been able to get by with visits to local supermarkets etc since feeling fluey a couple of weeks ago. I think it probably is a flu or similar since i tend to get them or heavy colds around this time of year anyway. Had the vid test to make sure and it came up negative.

Didn't see wind damage to signs though maybe it was that.
Seems like numbers of new cases are on he rise again anyway.

Missed seeing exhibitions etc in the recent arts festival cos i wasn't going to town. Also another exhibition i would have definitely got to in a different situation, didn't hear it was on. Exhibition of end of year for the local art school they're normally quite fun.

I know there is flou going around which is probably goingto help the spread.

People are being outraged locally because students have come in before the start of term to try to ensure tehy get accomodation i a town where there is a lot of competition for it and are congregating in large groups at night. Think its happening in a couple of places across town. Think they might normally be going to pubs but can't at the moment so are hanging out at the old hangout points, Spanish Arch which was where people always went to drink on the hot summer days for decades. I think in the woods behind me too.
People are on social media condemning them and saying that the army should be called in to stop them gathering. In fact there are other money making cincerns taht should be acting more responsibly and you wouldn't have the problem, University charging student fees and wanting students to physically be around. Landlords facilitating the competition over places. Not sure what teh story is on teh AirB'n'B problem that was heavily contributing to that too. If the same locations are now open for long term rent etc.

Oh well another month , I'm sure ther ewill be further developments. Time doesn't stand still even if it sometimes feels like it.

i got turned down from a test today because i wasn't in a car. this was at a pharmacy that is a 10 minute walk from my house

🤦

Things are going off in my school district, where classes are all-virtual until after Thanksgiving at least. My wife started a FB group for parents of incoming kindergartners at our school to meet some other parents. Of course people started arguing immediately about whether their kids Should have to stay at home, and more groups were started, both pro and anti return to in-person learning. People will join one group as a spy and send screenshots of discussions to the other group. One of anti-virtual groups organized a protest at the school board building to try to get the board to reverse their decision. My wife’s friend showed up to counter-protest. And even though she was the only counter protestor at the rally a local news crew covered the event and interviewed her. This angered the ‘return to school’ group and there are screen shots of local business owners threatening violence against my wife’s friend.

This is going to be a Lifetime movie in six months

my partner's (nyc charter) school has shut down the possibility of hybrid learning until end of January, which was a great relief for both of us but also means we're stuck together 24/7 for at least another four months.