KIP covid thread

belatedly realised that I can put in a holiday form for the whole of February and half of march because I've been on furlough since April 1st (barring working one week in November) and I have to use my holiday entitlement up by end of March ensuring that I get paid 100% of my wages for that time rather than 80%.

was thinking how i haven't been sick with a cough or cold or anything in over a year. which is nice.

didn't take all of my vacation entitlement last year so i have 6 weeks to take this year, not including statutory holidays and the week my work closes at christmas. if somehow, god-willing, i am able to make it back to scotland this year it will be for a whole month.

Our youngest was born last March and has never had a cold in his life.

Yeah ive a ton of hols to take before march 2021

xp Caek I also have a new one, born 3/5, and it's for sure been a weird change to the new baby experience that she has never gotten sick. Don't know if it's gonna come back and haunt her though when she eventually starts interacting with the big dirty germy world.

Grats to all covid parents obv

yeah i'm kind of dreading the "is it covid?" wave of monthly+ colds when they go back to/start daycare

i'll be vaccinated before that happens and my partner probably will be too, but yup

right, but the kids won't!

(in our case)

yes definitely, same here. honestly i am dreading the upcoming months of conversations around school reopenings, kid activities etc, because i can only assume it's gonna be quite awhile before the kids get vaxxed.

like those processes have been complicated and passionate enough as is, and folks pushing for things to be open (which sometimes includes me and sometimes not, depending on the particular circumstance) will be leaning in all the harder once the adults get vaxxed. But the kids still won't be. An impossibly complicated calculus when you combine the epidemiology, social psychology, etc, just gets that much moreso

I sympathise

But i will not hesitate to tap the sign

I busted my leg while out running near the tail-end of November and had to space out my runs for about a month and a half, which made a serious dent in my morale. I was worried I'd give up on regular exercise altogether since gym closures hit harder in unforgiving climes, but I decided to bite the bullet and order some proper wintertime workout equipment, which turned out to be less expensive than I expected. While the snow-covered terrain takes a toll on my ankles and the cold (-6 today) leaves me breathless more quickly, I've finally ascended to the rank of True Canuck by realizing that outdoor workouts are perfectly doable even in January. None of this would have been possible without covid, so... thank you, undead infectious agent.

Baby its cov outside

lol, resisting the urge to change my DN

More so inside iirc.

Japan saw 1K flu patients in the second week of Jan, compared to 800K a year earlier. England, which normally has several thousand flu patients in the hospital or ICU in early Jan, had zero new hospitalizations for the disease in the first week of 2021.https://t.co/IUEtCzN7cI

— Rebecca Ballhaus (@rebeccaballhaus) January 21, 2021

wow

An ill winds that blows no nose any good

i mean some of that is people avoiding healthcare settings (testing/treatment for anything other than covid) because they don't want to, you know, die, but that's still amazing!

So lockdowns do make a difference, huh. Whudda thunk.

Our daughter is now scheduled for her initial vaccine dose on Feb 1. We found out today! Woo-hoo!

otoh, she will also have to go to a DMV sometime soon afterward to obtain a photo ID for reasons too complex to share here. Here's hoping her exposure is non-existent, or at least minimal, while that happens.

congrats, KIP

great news re: vaccine dose at least!

I love every time someone uses the wrong word for "pandemic." Noted today: panorama, panna cotta. A++ work

Buscemic

my dad got his first shot today

Good good

The last lockdown here has been much more trying (nb still relatively luxurious and well aware) but at some stage over the past week im learning how to sit and relax in a way that i havent guiltlessly done since maybe my early teens.

Just long, peaceful weekend days over books and papers and surfing but without any undercurrent of "i should be doing more" or any of that shite and honestly its a healer

'Grats to all whose relatives are getting/got the jab.

Today's KIP in my household is that we successfully completed Dry January.

congrats to vaccine-getters

i remember feeling moments of just being-in-time back last may-june. it's very cleansing.

otm, its powerful and i need to hold to it after all this

My dad got his second!

my mum got her first jab yesterday. Stepdad still waiting to hear about his second, a month on.

I heard an optimistic prediction from a (the?) Covid Tracking Project guy. While he stressed that he was speaking exclusively in a personal capacity, he made a prediction that things will be on the upswing here by April and more or less back to something close to "normal" by August. He absolutely also stressed that this does *not* mean the eradication of covid, or anything close to it, just that it will be more significantly under control due to a number of different factors. He also thinks there will be another seasonal spike next fall/winter, both naturally (as coronaviruses tend to behave) and also in groups that were either reluctant to vaccinate or unable to get vaccines, but by and large he expects a big hunk of the population (here) will be either immune or express enough immunity to keep it somewhat under control. It was definitely a more optimistic view, but I appreciated the optimism all the same.

This state has not been particularly adept at rolling out vaccines (ironically, as I understand it, at least partly because they've been keeping so many on deck for more vulnerable populations, those in the first tier, etc..). But they found that so many eligible jab-getters in places like nursing homes were refusing the vaccine that they released an extra hundred thousand or so doses this past week. Maybe flexibility like that explains why the entire staff at the food pantry I volunteer at was apparently able to get vaccinated this week, or our local high school is starting to roll out vaccinations for the entire faculty and staff next week. That sort of acceleration makes me happy.

One of my kids goes back to school today (sort of; it's a complicated hybrid system) for the first time since March. This morning we learned that someone sympathetic to their ongoing ordeal anonymously donated $15 Amazon gift cards to every kid in the district. That's 6000 kids!

Wow

Discovering that lockdown is the right vibe to finally churn thru scandidramas

my parents had their first jabs yesterday

my parents this morning!

I was having a socially distanced chat with two local blokes, all of us carrying a can and with our dogs earlier and they aren't inherently bad people but I think I'd have been much happier not to bump into them. If I'm honest I don't miss the being amongst people element of pre-covid society that much at all!

As a social worker I'm getting my jab in Wembley on Friday. I need to get a better mask!

step-mom (in Knoxville TN) gets her first tomorrow afternoon, after an anxious period waiting for the threshold to drop from age 75 to 70. 65 is apparently coming soon, so her young man about town will also soon be eligible!

awesome news!

Got my first shot of vaccine yesterday. Arm hurts, was p spaced out yesterday during a v stressful parenting day, but still feel a bit more positive about everything.

Totally spaced out too, but could be due to wearing three masks in the vaccination centre

Passed my modest FEMA-adjacent Medical Reserve Corps certification (just the basic level, as required), which means I get to volunteer at points of local vaccine dispensing, as they increasingly pop up, which should in turn entitle me to my own shots. More importantly, though, is the (again, modest) qualification to volunteer and help out with future emergencies as well. There are other online emergency preparedness certifications I think I'll go for, too, like the CERT/Community Emergency Response Team. Good stuff to learn, kind of like getting an adult Eagle Scout.

awesome news stevie!

Yesterday I delivered a signed consent form for our daughter to get her second dose of Pfizer vax on Monday. She took the first dose a bit hard so we expect more reaction this time around. Still no question, doubt, or hesitation in our minds about whether this is a good thing for her. It is.

Was it the effect of the actual virus that did it, or something in the vaccine?