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

Makes sense. In the meantime, stay safe.

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/10/05/nyregion/cuomo-shutdown-coronavirus.html

we're all gonna die because diblasio and cuomo refuse to agree as to who has the bigger dick.

It makes no sense - restaurants stay open, schools get closed? Why not just open or close both?

someone, somewhere in my building is hacking up a storm :))))))))

I had a crazy squirrel shrieking outside my window for quite a while this morning.

might be useful

https://kottke.org/20/10/how-to-protect-yourself-from-the-aerosol-spread-of-covid-19

My droplets have gone ballistic

https://www.jmdjournal.org/article/S1525-1578(17)30234-9/fulltext

Developed sinusitis. Despite knowing exactly what the symptoms meant, cos I've had them before, i still wigged out a bit til i got diagnosed and it wasn't COVID. Yay, antibiotics!

I'm not sure how much of this I can specifically pin down to just COVID, but I'm sure it's a big part of things. I've just hit an absolute wall of hopelessness, anger, stress and frustration that is turning me into a spiteful, bitter person that I really don't want to be. It's mostly down to work stuff, where, because of the pandemic, my responsibilities and workload is probably double what it was before the pandemic, with fewer resources to lean on. Three major projects that would have all normally occurred throughout the year have all been launched at the exact same time, all on accelerated schedules with the added complication of trying to coordinate with fifteen departments, all working remotely. I keep being required to drop everything and attend in-person meetings for coordination which, fine, but it means I keep leaving my wife with the short shrift of trying to do her full time job AND keeping our son focused on remote learning. Naturally, she's frustrated with this since I can very rarely plan ahead for these requests, so we're shorter with each other. I've had to cancel four straight Friday afternoons I was going to take off because of these "emergencies" (which, of course, are hardly ever actual "emergencies", but rather requests from people high enough up the chain that they believe themselves to demand immediate attention).

I mean, I get it. We're all doing more with less and trying to balance so much, no one has it easy. And I know that I am incredibly fortunate to have a job and a healthy family, I'm very aware of that, but it makes it really hard to appreciate that when I'm working constantly and getting next to no time for self care. I've just hit this wall where I feel constantly angry, constantly bitter, constantly on edge and I hate the person I'm becoming.

it sounds like work is mistreating you & that it's time to look for another job, & to let your current work know that you're looking around. if they're leaning on you this much they must know that you're important to them & won't want to lose you.

Eh, I mean, in non pandemic times I really enjoy my job. I was just wholly unprepared for how difficult and demanding it would become as the pandemic drags on.

I'm just feeling completely hopeless watching the trajectory of all of the work difficulties increasing while still knowing that any of the enjoyable things in life are completely unavailable and will continue to be so for the next several years, at least. It's despairing.

Cases have risen a lot in Ontario over the last couple weeks and I suspect won't flatten properly again for a decent spell. The volunteer group I run with has paused operations and getting ready for this new wave; hopefully they'll be up and running again shortly. I'm looking into investing in some serious winter walking gear - my delivery routine has become a necessity for keeping my spirits up since I have ruled out seeing family for Thanksgiving and likely Christmas, especially with my mémère being as fragile as she is. It sucks ass but most people have it a lot worse, and I'm now living with other people, which, while less safe (one of my roommates works in a bike shop, an "essential service" that will likely not be closed in the event of another shutdown), is heaven compared to being in a germ circle of one.

That’s not a nice thing to say about your grandma, Simon!

I'm feeling the work stuff-- since I'm one of the few people at work who can do 100% of his work from home, my workload has increased threefold--it's reached the point where my job was moved to a department full of people who had almost nothing to do, so my work could be shared with them. Unfortunately most of the people are old and unwilling to learn new stuff. Plus, my wife has had to start going back into the office 3 days a week, leaving me alone with our kindergartner who is doing mostly asynchronous virtual learning--meaning that I have to help him with nearly everything. Plus not having the autonomy to like go for a walk at lunchtime. It feels like things cannot continue like this, but it also feels like they probably will.

It feels like things cannot continue like this, but it also feels like they probably will.

Man, this. So much of this. That really nails where I am right now.

I had one manager who told me her learner was going to miss the entire first day of a 3 day course and ask me if i would be teaching anything "important".

People don't know when they sound insulting but COME ON. i was pretty sarcastic in reply

xpost Asynchronous virtual learning is a terrible thing to do to kids imo. I mean, I get that it theoretically helps with scheduling, but in reality it means kids having to manage their own time and figure out when and how to access and complete a massive list of tasks, which is something even adults struggle with. I'm teaching middle school right now; half the class time is synchronous through Teams and the other half is asynchronous, and so I'm theoretically supposed to give them 100 minutes' worth of outside work a week. That's nuts and I can't bring myself to do it, but then I feel like I'm skimping on the teaching I owe them. No way to win.

Yeah, my 9 year old has noticeably been doing better this year with really rigid Zoom schedules and class group meetings, as opposed to the asynchronous from spring. He will say it feels more overwhelming and I'm not dismissing his stress of having to "perform" on Zoom calls all day, but he's been doing much better at keeping up with his assignments with way fewer breakdowns than we had in the spring.

xpost my teacher friends have reported almost exactly the same experience. miserable but want to hang on for their kids.

so many people I know (including family) are struggling financially. one of the few things that brings me joy is finally being in a place financially where I can give back to friends and help out much more significantly - because if I saw everybody struggling and had no ability to help, I'd feel powerless.

not saying this to horn-toot - but it's nice to be able to help some friends mitigate problems since apparently the government isn't going to help.

I'm starting to get anxious about winter, both from a POV of seasonal uptick in cases and also just how the New York weather will make us so much more cooped up than we are when it's nice outside. I wonder if outdoor dining will find a way to carry on with those carbon-guzzling heaters.

Winter is coming!

If we do not get this virus under control now, we are in for a perfect and terrible storm

We are not taking the expected seasonality of this SEASONAL virus seriously!

Instead, we've assumed our efforts are responsible for decreased cases this summer...

1/x pic.twitter.com/iiP4EAoMD8

— Michael Mina (@michaelmina_lab) October 7, 2020

It seems like having widely available rapid results saliva testing would make a big difference as we head into autumn and winter. It’s frustrating that we are still so far behind and there doesn’t seem to be enough emphasis on things that could make a difference.
I haven’t really gone out anywhere since March and even though I don’t really miss it, I feel kind of depressed that it seems like I’ve missed what was probably the optimal window for going out to do just a thing or two.

I don't know how I missed this but ALBA, wtf are you doing in NY???! Are you in the city?

Are you my neighbor?

just walking around my quartier during "rush hour" & I feel like we're doomed, the streets are packed, plenty of people wearing masks wrong or not wearing them all, lotsa coughing. & my kids have to ride the métro every day to go to school where they eat in the canteen where obviously no one wears a mask. fuck.

:(

Ugh

Ugh, that sucks, I'm sorry.

my job involves a company/client, and everyone decided it would be a great idea to get together tomorrow afternoon to have food and drinks at a restaurant/bar. i lied and said i couldn't make it, first because having a "fun" client get-together sounds like a fucking nightmare and i try to avoid it as much as i can, but also because i just don't want to hang out with people i barely know in close quarters!

as the three posts above indicate, there's so much Letting Down of the Guard going on, everywhere. i just know that it would be weird (to them) for me to wear a mask as I sit there with them around a table. there would be peer pressure to take it off. but they're not in my pod! and i live with the most risky people out there, i'm like a potential vector myself!

anyway, ugh is right

I mean this is the thread for venting, I hope it's just that, but I'm worried about the way in which we're just back to doing pretty much everything normally except that we're supposed to be wearing masks. & I think most people are wearing masks! but 1) is that really enough? I want to believe but... & 2) not everyone is, or their noses are exposed, and then they're coughing ; and 3) who's gonna *enforce* the rules? at what point are people just gonna give up on masks? my quartier is poor, and masks are an expense, a small one, but maybe today you'd rather have a few cigarettes or a beer instead, I mean it's just one day, and then... ?

It seems like having widely available rapid results saliva testing would make a big difference as we head into autumn and winter. It’s frustrating that we are still so far behind and there doesn’t seem to be enough emphasis on things that could make a difference.

i think the evidence from the whitehouse is that widely available rapid results don't actually help that much because we live in a world in which a significant fraction of the population is hostile to the idea of public health.

a significant part of the population - around here at least - have spent their whole lives being proud of no-one telling THEM what to do and don't see this any differently.

not being told what to do is basically the top priority for most of white america

at my kid’s school, parents have received an untold number of comms about masks being mandatory when picking up their children. reminders are periodically sent out. i went today to pick up my son and maybe half the parents were wearing masks. and maybe half of them actually had the masks on the NOSE and MOUTH parts of their heads. tough one to figure out, i guess. i’m in london, in the borough that for awhile had the highest covid incidence in the entire country.

I mean this is the thread for venting, I hope it's just that, but I'm worried about the way in which we're just back to doing pretty much everything normally except that we're supposed to be wearing masks. & I think most people are wearing masks! but 1) is that really enough? I want to believe but... & 2) not everyone is, or their noses are exposed, and then they're coughing ; and 3) who's gonna *enforce* the rules? at what point are people just gonna give up on masks? my quartier is poor, and masks are an expense, a small one, but maybe today you'd rather have a few cigarettes or a beer instead, I mean it's just one day, and then... ?

― All cars are bad (Euler), Thursday, October 8, 2020 12:29 PM bookmarkflaglink

I mean I definitely don't think a mask means all activities are back on/ok. I'm not going to sit here judging every activity if the person is masked, though I sure af will if they're not or distanced.

depends a lot on whether the activity is indoors or outdoors, for indoors, how good the ventilation is, for outdoors, how spaced out is everybody (the lower risk goes away if you're all on top of each other).

due to the abandonment of our government, I feel like a lot of people are pushed into doing things they don't want to. My brother's been back doing his acting gigs at Universal, and while he probably doesn't think it's fully safe, otherwise, he loses his job, which he's had for almost a decade. and they just layed off a TON of supervisors yesterday, so he's freaked. he masks, he takes it seriously, but....if the government supported the businesses allowing them to close and pay their employees so they stayed home, he'd prefer that.

I almost certainly got the vaccine in my COVID trial, but without knowing how effective it is, I'm certainly not going to be reckless just in case.

i've become very shut-in....other than this message board, if i'm not meeting up with a friend for a "responsible" meetup, I ain't talking to nobody. worries me a lot because tat's how I was in my lonelier, pre-medicated 20s, and don't want to undo all of the years of progress, but....can't be having block parties either.

(note, I realize not all posters here live in the US, so I'm sharing my US perspective, for which i speak only for myself)

I don't know how I missed this but ALBA, wtf are you doing in NY???! Are you in the city?

Ha, probably easy to miss this international event. Yes, we moved here a year ago. Been a weird time to be here, all right! Will probably stay another year. Hoping things will be a little more explorable before then.

for moderate to harsh illnesses not related to COVID, too...it's frustrating when you come down with them because even if you're sure it's not COVID because maybe they're symptoms you have routinely (i.e. sinusitis), you still want to be sure it's not COVID, so you wind up waiting 2-3 days, if not more, to get a result and then you get seen for the actual symptoms, after 3+ days of more misery. Or you're confident it's not, because you "know" what it is, so you skip that test, and worry whether it actually is and whether you're being irresponsible.

or you waste your time at a hospital hoping you can get told that same day if you have it and then get treatment, and then pay out the yinyang for it. my PCP isn't even seeing patients in person, just video chat, which complicates things more.

not being told what to do is basically the top priority for most of white america

― call all destroyer

Let's not forget about telling everyone else what to do.

Are you my neighbor?

It's always possible. I live in Prospect Lefferts Gardens.

no way! i lived there for a couple years and loved it

I had to drive downtown for a walk-through today, which is an surprisingly warm and gorgeous day in Chicago. The lakefront path was packed and it seemed that maaaaaaaaaaybe 1 in 30 people had mask on.

It’s so frustrating that the test results generally take at least a few days, during which you might be doing things and being exposed to others, then when you get the results they may no longer even be accurate. Obviously most people aren’t going to get tested constantly even when there’s constant potential exposure. Some people will never care or try, but for those of us there should be a way to easily have a quick test (maybe even self-administered) before going out or seeing people.
I hardly ever go out or see anyone outside the one other person in my household (who works outside the household so I can’t completely isolate). I don’t much want to, but it would nice to be able to do just one or two things without feeling like I’m being selfish and irresponsible.

Fwiw folks I have been tested often for the last few months both 24 hr version and 15 min rapid and it doesn’t make it any less stressful

Alba, you're my neighbor; i'm in kensington.

about every other day, i am continuing to jog (mostly during off-hours [4pm], off-trail, veering away as much as possible whenever I come across people) without a mask in Prospect Park; there doesn't appear to be any evidence that I've seen that it's notably risky for other people or for me as long as i stay distanced and in motion and also because I tried jogging once or twice with a mask and almost hyperventilated after five minutes.

That said, the number of mass, unmasked gatherings on pedal-busses / picnic blankets / BBQs at any given moment out there is reaching peak, end-of-summer status. And, though I don't enjoy singling anyone out, there is an undeniable and dependable contingent of orthodox jewish multi-family hootenannies of fifteen or more unmasked people flocking across the park who are just not interested in giving you any sidewalk space.

"it is what it is."

Comparing the gov’t Covid19 maps for end of September and start of October, it looks as if things are getting better.

UNTIL you notice they’ve changed the numbers corresponding to each colour. Had they used the same ones, most of the country would be red or dark red.#BitSneaky pic.twitter.com/61u1dd4G1U

— Alex Andreou (@sturdyAlex) October 9, 2020

https://everymoviecough.com/

lotta sneezes mixed in too btw just in case you're keeping score