Corona virus

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I'm still smart and need to be right but I have children and loved ones and I'm scared too because I know my country's not ready for this but can't quite admit it yet

It's okay, Scrotie. We know. Take care of yourself. Oh, and don't assume I'm talking to you again, because I'm not.

I noticed. Please tell your strawman of me that his creator should be ashamed of himself.

Molasses edit: Also, you should know me well enough by now to know that I don't scare easily. I sometimes wonder if that's a disability of some sort, similar to analgesia. But like it or not, I know that when death comes knocking I'll be trying some shit like trying to distract it with nonchalant requests for Cool Ranch Doritos. That's just how I empirically am. Like some kind of fat middle-aged Matt Murdock. With functional eyes.

Now am I confused because I don't know whether or not my country is ready for this? Yeah, that's fair. But with age I've given up on the premise that I need to know everything. For now I just go to work each day, make crazy commissions, then drive home. I recently decided to put my bullshitting skills to good use with a career pivot from IT to sales, and this past week has been abnormally good for my bottom line — best week ever, in fact, by a lot. I've been too busy taking in money to give a topic as massive and new as COVID-19 the full Scrotie treatment.

But I don't need to worry about Trump's response. I'm not saying that because I trust Trump on pandemic management — I don't. I think someone has to worry. But I do trust his haters to go over every detail of Trump's response with a fine-toothed comb. It's as Strawman Charan is telling me "don't worry bruh, we got this." To which I respond: thank you kindly; now, if you don't mind, I'll be going back to winning the breads.

https://twitter.com/MaddowBlog/status/1238279302468288512

This is an enlightening look at how Wuhan locked it down so quickly, and why Italy is now being forced to choose who lives and who dies based on things like age. It probably won't make a difference, but everyone should watch it. Everyone.

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MaddowBlog

Hard pass. If I want to guilty-pleasure the beliefs of a prominent conspiracy theorist, there are more entertaining options. Alex Jones, for example.

Hell, just saying that makes me wonder what the absolute madman is saying about the coronavirus. Probably hilariously absurd.

Weird how a "succesfull lockdown in wuhan" leads to the globa being infected with a virus.

And calling it quick when they imprisoned somebody for warning about the virus three weeks before it became apparent because he talked poorly about the party also seems grin worthy.

Your far too melodramatic Charan and grasping at anything that suits your agenda, which is fair given your position but the other side of that coin is that i get to point out the obvious.

Peace,

-Boem-

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/06/health/self-quarantine-coronavirus.html?fbclid=IwAR152_75mGv6N4OMpkRysJmzDXBUAJi9FctuCfaTZS5NlVfbc9eaS5Dieso

This is an interesting account of what self-quarantine really means. We're not at this point yet but the GF is separating our bathrooms right now.

I was already working from home before the pandemic so jokes on everybody else.

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Boem wrote:

And calling it quick when they imprisoned somebody for warning about the virus three weeks before it became apparent because he talked poorly about the party also seems grin worthy.

Peace,

-Boem-

Wuhan's dealing with it is going to seem very quick in a year, Boem. It should already do so. I agree that it was far from flawless: the complete denial of the issue and the martyrdom of the very person who tried to warn them was absolutely reprehensible. If you check my older posts, which you no doubt won't, you'll see I was clearly condemning China's political handling of it. I still think they lied about the numbers. They were all terrified of pissing off Xi who could, if given the bad news, just take it out on them. That's the culture they have over there.

BUT when Wuhan mobilised, it did so with extreme alacrity. They were building hospitals purely for Covid-19 patients in a matter of days. That's what happens when a communist regime decides to do something and tells its people 'DO IT' because they have no choice. And that's the flipside of this fear-driven culture that caused China to react so late: the people are so afraid of the authorities they do what they're told. I can't say if the latter evens out the former. I just know that when China took Covid-19 seriously, they took measures to contain it that other countries can now only envy.

It was never going to be fully contained and you know it. That's not the world we live in. The moment it was identified in Wuhan we all knew it was going to be global. We didn't expect it to be bad because we fooled ourselves and said, well, that's China. Poor health standards, communist society, very packed living. Of course it ripped through them. Us? We'll get a handful of cases probably.

How fucking naive we were.

And yeah, I'm dramatic. I admit it seems like I'm overreacting. But ask yourself: what is the cost of overreacting vs the cost of underreacting?

If the current trajectory persists, experts forecast that about one million will die in North America.

We all have to get serious and err on the side of extreme caution in order to change the trajectory.

These numbers stretch for an year or so. Its doubtful it will keep going at this rate for this long. Plus other countries already showed that they can stall it. Not only China and South Korea, Singapore too.

Thank you for making my overreaction look like a conservative approach, Impeacher. You're always so good at that. :)

I honestly don't think the mortality rate is the issue we should be talking about. But I already said that, so I won't go on about it. I guess if the grim figures are what get people serious, then okay. Otherwise, this should be less about numbers and more about the day-to-day reality of living through a pandemic.

Seeing some truly ugly photos from supermarkets in the US this weekend. Ugh. I feel terrible for all of them. The early adopters who were mocked, those who hesitated, and soon those who naysayed or were just ignorant. I even feel bad for those who still think it's just panic and hype, because they're no less a part of this than anyone else.

As with so many of my arguments, both about PoE and not, I want to be wrong. I very rarely feel the need to argue for something when I want to be right, because losing those arguments suck. Losing an argument you *want* to lose? Much easier to take. Admittedly my approach is often couched in looking at what I think is wrong and what can be done better, but it always starts from a hope that what I think is wrong might be, in itself, wrong.

But this time I don't think so. And that mounting certainty that I might not be wrong makes arguing it all the less attractive. When did I give up arguing about what I saw as PoE's shortcomings? When I became convinced there was no point arguing the fact.

Not the best comparison, because I had no real personal stake in PoE's shortcomings or failings. Covid-19, well...yeah.

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Pretty much every delivery service now does contactless delivery. I will probably take advantage of this now and then, if only to support some local restaurants that no doubt will be suffering as well. Also because I'm not sure how much longer they'll be able to operate as normal, as more and more supply chains get disrupted.

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I live near a railway. One of the first things I did when buying this place was double-glaze the windows in the bedrooms (what a luxury!). Hearing the trains hiss by every so often is kind of eerie. I wonder how long they'll keep going as more and more people make avoiding public transport their number one priority. Probably a while. Still, it's something to consider.