I have a Coronavirus beard now. It has more grey than the last beard. https://homelandsecurity.ideascale.com/a/ideas/top/campaigns/61165 Another resource for sharing.
Another idiot. Pennsylvania supermarket says coughing 'prank' prompts trashing of $35G in produce, other items If they'd take a couple of these morons out and publicly shoot them I have a feeling other morons would get the hint that this is a horrible idea.
At this point, while our governor intends to let the chain stores sell flowers we've been instructed that there is no way we're allowed to open unless everything does. Which, I don't see happening in time for the season with every projection saying we're a long ways away from this getting any better. Every day at this point is a debate between turning off the heat and letting the last of the crew go so that the 13M in inventory can die now rather than investing in taking care of it longer and then letting the same happen. If we shut it down now I think we could find funding to try again next year. If we wait, we may get good news and salvage the year, but if we don't it puts us closer to tits up. As for personal life changes, it's odd not being able to get off the couch and go get something I want late at night but otherwise not much has changed. I typically do my grocery shopping late night so that I don't have to deal with people in the way but all of our 24-hour stores have drastically reduced hours to improve cleaning and restocking times.
Given how much landscaping I've been doing to pass the time, caved and got myself a pair of timberland steel toe boots. Moving up in the world. Had a nice "oh shit" moment while mowing the grass. I'm extremely allergic to red wasps. They sting me, I have trouble breathing. And they are EVERYWHERE currently. I have an epi-pen in the event I get stung, but I'm extra fucked if I call EMS right now. I was a prepper before it was cool with insect spray spray so there's always a can of bug killer within arm's reach when we're outside. In the past, when I've gotten stung by those satan bugs I've chewed benadryl like skittles and it's gone down, so now I'll be carrying some in a baggie while doing yard work today. The number of people who die from COVID is obviously gonna be super high, but what'll probably go overlooked are the deaths from people doing stupid shit like still mowing the yard when they're allergies to the bugs contained therein and not being able to get to a hospital on time.
Update: I couldn't take it anymore and shaved this morning. I'll never have a beard, it's just not meant to be. Meanwhile in the toilet paper/ paper towel aisle at the grocery store this morning: I can't believe people are still hoarding this shit.
I still don't get the TP hoarding but at least it doesn't go bad. We had to go to three stores last night to get hamburger buns and the pack we did get was the specialty gourmet $hit. Who the fuck is cooking that many hamburgers?!
Take comfort we live in a world of online shaming, and these people will live a life of hell for quite a while. Ironic, that a lot of these assholes pull stunts to try and have their little YouTube moment, and end up cutting their own legs off in the process like the Walmart Licker schmuck.
There are no cheap options left at our stores. I really didn’t want to pay $9 for 3 cups of fancy egg noodles so I made my stroganoff with rice last night. If this continues I’ll just buy the giant cases at restaurant depot and split goods with the neighbors and family.
Apparently the new hoarding item is webcams? I have a desktop that I use for extended work from home times and I wanted to find a cheap-ish webcam to use for teleconferencing and they're all sold out within a 250 mile radius.
Just a hunch, but maybe that's one of those items shipped from China that the stores aren't getting stock replenished?
This isn't hoarding, this is just a huge increase in unexpected demand. Just about every business that can is sending their workforce home to work, and videoconferencing is a huge new thing. They don't have cams normally, as most of them work from a desktop (even my sister's IT department packaged up and dropped off her workstation to the house a few days ago), with a brand new web cam for it. So you now have how many(?) companies all trying to outfit their staff with WFH gear, and web cams are on that list. Even online services are having a hard time to keep up. We've been using Zoom for months/years, and it's great, and no issues... except for the past week where shit's been rough, due to the new demand on their system. I'm amazed they've managed to stay afloat, and overall have been handling it well. So yeah... webcams make sense to me... TP, doesn't.
As a company who now has 240 WFH employees, we are taking specific measures to keep everyone socialized. Most people don't do well working on their own from their house, while some of us prefer it. We are doing what we can do "force" social engagement... "wfh selfie" thread in Slack where everyone shares pics of a daily themed item; your workstation, your pets/coworkers, your plants, your coffee mug, your breakfast, your biggest distraction, etc. We've also tried to ensure that our team leads have daily 20 minute bullshit sessions where people just talk with others at work, without being focused on work related stuff... basically allowing for "water cooler" time. It's really helped a lot with people's initial fears, stress, and overall comfort with WFH.
One thing that we've been very lucky about is that we subscribed to a "everyone has a laptop" policy from the start... so WFH was pretty easy. Kind of melted our VPN for a few days, but other than people grabbing their 2nd monitor and chair from the office, it's been very seamless... no webcam issues (all built in).
There was the kind of funny "please wear clothes" email that went out from HR though... apparently it wasn't a joke. I asked for clarification, and yes, it was only required for what is in frame of the web cam... so no standing up.
Yeah, I guess hoarding isn't the word here; just a huge shortage like you said. I have been using Zoom on my phone in the interim, just would like to get something a bit more permanent sooner or later. I'll be interested to see how some of these larger companies (mine included) view WFH as a potential more "standard" operating mode when it's becoming more and more apparent that in certain industries where it's possible, there's really no need to have everyone in an actual co-located office. Even before this whole situation, outside of my teammates, everyone I have to work with on a day-to-day basis is all over not just the US, but in other countries as well.
My office has a daily "check-in" video teleconference. The first couple minutes consists of passing pertinent information; the remaining 20-30 minutes is essentially just a chance to bs. There's talk of having a virtual happy hour tomorrow. I may have technical difficulties at that time We've also had the "meet my new coworkers" email with everyone's pets.