My main issue with this is still as follows: 1) we don't know the long term impacts, and the preliminary understanding of long-term impacts is horrific. 2) the bad information still by far outnumbers the good (or at least current) information. I had fellow responders say shit like "the flu kills 300k people a year", and "well, most people have already been exposed to it if you do the math". Bitch that's a Google and a napkin away from being disproven, what the fuck are you thinking? 3) It's impossible for an individual to accept the risk for an entire network of people, but that seems to be exactly what's happening. Ie, "If I get it, I get it" is fine if it's a tumor, but if you get it, you are going to spread it to potentially thousands of people, none of whom agreed to your assessment of risk. From a leadership (or lack thereof) perspective, that's the worst part: the assumption or diversion of risk of exposure is flat out disgusting. For me, I'll skip Thanksgiving in the hopes Christmas can be had with some degree of normalcy. My niece is still in school, my mom is in a nursing home every other day visiting my grandmother and my dad and sister are still working, so the risk potential is high. I think we're heading for worse territory than we were before in terms of spread, hospitalizations and fatigue.
This is too nihilistic for me. I shouldn’t have to want to wear my mask until 2025 because some dickheads want to roll the dice with their health and the health of people they come into contact with. Fuck them. Their decisions do not have consequences that exist in a vacuum. They have a real impact on countless people that didn’t ask to be victimized by their selfishness and stupidity.
Im fairly nihilist on the prospect and idea death. Having a parent get shotgun blasted by cancer and dying when youre a teen teaches you a lot about how life and death work. That is no one escapes it and any amount of wailing and gnashing isn't going to stop it. Getting caught in the cycle of not accepting it as inevitable doesnt do anything but make the situation worse. Dont take this to mean I dont condone people who dont have empathy towards their fellow man but controlling human behavior is tilting at windmills. Working yourself up over other peoples actions isnt solving the problem and is ultimately only harms you psychologically. The only person you can really trust about your well being is, in the end, only yourself. Fittingly enough I felt like shit this weekend. Chest congestion, fatigue, massive headache. Woke up still feeling out of it so I called off work and got myself tested. Looks like it'll be 3-5 days before I get my results. Doctor figured it was a sinus infection and gave me a z pack. Given my history it is almost certainly the case but Ill be taking off and rescheduling a long awaited shoulder apt this week. There was a person who tested positive in the office but due to I guess HIPPA, and the fact that I work mainly in our warehouse, I have no clue if I was really exposed.
Probably just eat with the mother-in-law, go cut firewood with my mom and stepdad. We cancelled the 1,200 mile round trip to rural Alabama to see the wife's 80 something grandfather for Thanksgiving. He thought that was safest. I hope the other people, local family, are being cautious around him, but we don't really know. I'm pretty sure, from the way he talks, that we are probably the majority beneficiaries when it comes to his will. I hope this holiday season doesn't take him out, but if it does we'll probably be shopping for a huge sailboat next year or whenever his estate gets settled. I hate to think of it like that, but I know he'd want to see us sailing again if it does happen, he always thought it was cool and asked about our travels.
What's missing from your nihilism is the quality of life and death. Yes, death comes for us all....we can't stop that, but we can affect the expression on his face. Dying of COVID at 75? Meh, probably a good run, cut mildly short. Getting COVID at 35, and then being functionally disabled compared to my "normal" baseline for health for 40 fucking years, because Doug the Douche couldn't be bothered to wear a mask or get tested? Fuck that, thus fuck him and his attitudes towards this entire situation. Also, death is at some level statistics: it's hundreds of thousands of decisions I make to improve (or worsen) my odds. I take a huge issue with the notion that someone makes a different choice that affects MY odds, especially when it's as simple as "you cover your balls, asshole, mostly your nipples and now your big dumb face when you go outside." I'm inevitably going to be wrong eventually, but I take comfort in the "yes, I'll die, but I'd rather not die of lung cancer or a horrific accident that a seatbelt could prevent". I'm fine if someone else views the risk/quality of life calculus differently, right until their lax view of risk crashes mine. It's literally the tragedy of the commons as it pertains to health, or it only takes one person shitting in the fountain to ruin it for everyone. Let's not pretend that society functions so absolutely that shitting in the fountain is an inalienable right. I can't recommend Atul Gawande's "Being Mortal" enough for folks who've never considered quality of death.
Well we'll just have to agree to disagree here good sir. Maybe if we had more exposure to each others anuses we'd be doing better. Like India. Dont you ride Ducati super bikes? Talk about putting your life and limbs in other people's poor decision making hands.
This is a bunch of malarkey. There's a world of difference between accepting that life one day must end, and allowing Karen to contract and spread a contagion that can endanger and kill those around her. In fact we have a direct mechanism for controlling human behavior. They're called laws, and they're generally pretty effective. Self-reliance and reducing the anger you feel at things outside of your control are great. That's not the same as saying that it's fine for everyone to do whatever they want because we're all going to die anyway.
We started self quarantine last week in order to travel to visit family for Thanksgiving. Even with that we may call off depending how some at risk family are doing. For Christmas, my SIL and her family are supposed to come to our house, but again, depending how cases are trending it may be a last moment cancel. Specifically because I don't trust SIL's husband will self quarantine beforehand or while here. He's not a "COVID is a hoax" guy, but he runs in the "Fauci should be fired" crowd
Next to possibly spreading it to my parents or my in laws, this is the thing that worries me the most about this virus. Not the week or whatever of feeling like shit with flu like symptoms, but, what is that shit doing to my brain? Or my heart tissue? It's something I've tried time and again to explain to people, there's no definitive meaning to "asymptomatic". And they won't listen. The willful ignorance is staggering.
Normally Thanksgiving is my busiest, favorite holiday. We've hosted my wife's whole family (usually a total of 20-25 people) for the past few years and I love making the whole day out of it by doing all the cooking for them and then we usually have friends that stop over in the evening for their round two. This year it's looking like it's just going to be the wife and kids, which while disappointing, we both completely understand. That being said, since it seems like a lot of people are finding themselves in the same situation where they are stuck at home trying to figure out dinner for themselves for the first time, I've been getting a lot more requests to make smoked turkeys this year, so I will be spending this weekend making 12 turkeys for people.
Late last week, Jungle Julia got sore tonsils and body aches, so she got a Covid test Saturday - Negative. I'm kinda disappointed; as I've said before, I just want to get it and get those sweet antibodies. At least she's feeling better now.
Did the governor of PA really make it mandatory that if someone is visiting you everyone must wear a mask in your own home? That sounds you heard today was millions of middle fingers going up in the air. For fucks sake, it’s hard enough to get people to wear the damn things outside their homes. All shit like this does is reinforce their belief that this is all so the government can take control of our lives.
Yeah, but they don't last long... like a couple months or so. Sweden is really sorry they went the route they did with COVID protection (herd immunity), as it's not working, because no long-lasting antibodies. https://nationalpost.com/news/world...-19-cases-soar-and-herd-immunity-hopes-falter
Do we know if the vaccine is expected to produce longer lasting antibodies, or are we just planning that everyone re-up every few months until we smallpox this shit?
You know how many morons think this vaccine will contain a microchip? Combine that with the anti vaccine crowd and there is no way we smallpox this thing.