Sunday, April 12, 2020

Happy Easter!

Happy Easter in this brave new world that we live in.

I still find it hard to comprehend how we got here, or that we are here at all. A few days/weeks/months ago life was chugging along normally. There was some news that China had a new(er) bad(der) disease, but the rest of the world was pretty much 'whatever'.

And here we are. This new life where we wear masks to go outside, to a store, to work (if you are lucky enough to still be doing that). This strange apocalyptic world where I can go for a road-bike-ride and there is almost no traffic. A world where we suddenly aren't traveling ANYWHERE. I walk down to our mailbox and there isn't anybody outside (our housing complex has those banks of mailboxes every block, so the mail-people stop and fill them all, then drive to the next block, and the next one, and so on). It seems like a much quieter world suddenly.

In our house life is eerily similar to the pre-apocalyptic world. Our living room is our social gathering place. Our TV is the center of that (sadly)...oh heck, I won't apologize for that...we LOVE watching movies and TV (Jeannie is totally addicted to those shows about crimes...the real crimes I mean, not TV crime series shows). And the news. We like Lester Holt. I like news where they just give the news and let ME make up my own thoughts about it...it's hard to find news not slanted one way or the other. Seems every channel has it's agenda. I'd like to think I'm agenda-free. Kind of like Tide-free (detergent)...no dyes, scents, just the soap.

Then I look at our dining room table, which is now Jeannie's office. That's different. Her entire office has been brought home...laser printer, monitor, computer, office-chair, and even her little space heater (I still chuckle at that). I pulled her nice desk-plaque she got soon after she earned her CPA (the wooden name-plate-thing with her name and "CPA" on it)...I told her to put it on her desk at work but she doesn't want to appear to be bragging (hell, I would...I saw her work SO VERY HARD for YEARS to earn that! It truly was like earning ANOTHER college degree, and she worked so very hard for that too!) Anyway, she laughed when I put it out on the table, and she even left it because I'm the only one who gets to see it.

Other than the dining room office, there is nothing out of the ordinary here at home. I still mow the yard every so often, scoopy-the-poopy in the back every day or 2 (it's amazing how much poopy two somewhat small dogs can make). The only weird thing is I just don't see my neighbors much anymore. I know Louie and Anna on the one side are very much in "safe" mode. Like Jeannie and I, they are both still working although under the new world order rules (facemasks, social distancing, etc) and they are both very worried about catching this new-to-us disease. John and his wife on the other side, well, I hear John every now and then moving his plastic dumpsters around (we have city provided plastic dumpsters for trash, recycling and yard waste). But that's about it...I haven't seen either of them for weeks.

I know that I SHOULD be more worried about catching it than I am...but I'm just not. I don't know why...denial maybe? I'm still finding it so hard to believe what the world is going thru right now. Maybe if I was in a big city where the effects were real and nearby....Santa Maria is a somewhat small city (I think around 90,000 or so). We aren't a suburb of any larger city, and it's a fairly sprawled out agriculture type town (year-round strawberries are a huge part of our local crop, as well as a TON of wineries just outside of town....I go on a road bike ride from my house and there are vineyards pretty much everywhere). I just have this "what's all the fuss about" attitude, and I can't say exactly why. I mean, if either of us came down with it and got really sick I'd sure change my attitude. I can't even fathom how the families of those who have died from this disease must feel...one day they get sick and are whisked away to somewhere that you can't even visit, and they just don't come home. How horrible would THAT be? They DIE and you may not even know about it....I hear (see) on the news the refrigerator trucks they are using for temporary morgues in NYC...that is just beyond my comprehension that they NEED to do that!

One of the guys I work with went to our local Hospital about 2 weeks ago as he thought had some symptoms and had been sick for over a week... and after walking thru hallways lined with plastic sheeting and sitting in a plastic room all by himself, he finally saw a Dr. who said his symptoms were not of the disease and sent him home (without being tested) and told him NOT to come back unless he was dying. And we are like WHAT?? It's not like we are in NYC and our hospital has been over-run...we have locally just a very few cases (so far). I guess THAT is part of our new reality...don't go to the hospital unless you have IT...they don't want to see you otherwise.

Oh...and the news last night was talking about THE checks from the Fed. Gov. are hitting the accounts now. Yeah. Both of you (Susie and Rae) have talked about this...believe me, Jeannie and I feel the same way. So you are looking to the Gov to give you money. Expecting it. Deserving it. Uhm...where is your savings? You've got nice new car/truck, cell phone, wide screen TV and Cable service, internet service, eat out all the time, buying all kinds of crap you don't need...and yet you don't have enough money saved to get you by a few weeks without a paycheck? And that is somehow everybody else's fault? OK...I do feel bad for all of the millions who are suddenly COVID-unemployed...and IF there are to be checks going out, then THOSE should be the ones to get them. IF you are still working, no check. The farmers? SURE THING...help THEM out! They are being crushes! Suddenly there is very little demand for a lot of their crops with restaurants and cruise ships and such being closed. Crops in the fields rotting and being plowed under. I'm all for giving those people help. I'd be fine with them getting weekly checks they won't ever have to pay back. We MUST keep them afloat. Farming is a hard life! (my Moms entire family up in North Dakota are pretty much all farmers...her mom and dad, most of her siblings and their kids). I have seen first hand how hard a life that is. My Uncle Charles always said farmers are the richest poor people on the planet (referring to the fact that he has a few million dollars of necessary equipment sitting around his farm, yet he owns free and clear almost none of it).

OK...that turned into a rant of sorts. Yep...I'm fed up with the "give me give me give me" people...but they were here before this and will be here long after. And I'm all for helping those who really need it. I just don't know where / when this ends. There is no end in sight yet, no matter what we hear on the news. Sports coming back? Not any time soon if you ask me. All this "flattening of the curve" has been working pretty well in this country (if you ask me)...but the only problem with that is that very thing means you can't just go back to 'normal or everything you've done thus far is thrown out the window and BAM...the medical system is overwhelmed, the very thing we have tried not to do. We can't really go back to 'normal' until A: there is a vaccine, B: nearly everybody has already had it, or C: there is reliable and quick (and super-abundant) testing for both having the virus and having the antibodies....so we know who is actually safe from catching it. None of that will be happening soon though. But that's just my 2 cents on it...maybe there is an option "D" or "E" that I can't even think of.

Anyway...here we are. Things are surely WELL beyond our control. I'm very happy and thankful that we don't live in a big city, that we aren't surrounded by actual Covis cases, that we still have food available (and yesterday I actually picked up a 9-pack of Charmin at the base Commissary while we were doing our weekly grocery shopping...WOW!) I didn't really need it, but grabbed it anyway as I know there are people I work with who don't have Commissary access (retirees and active duty only) and who don't want to brave the 2 hour Costco line before they even open....and I'd like to just be able to hand them a few rolls and say 'here you go'. I think sharing and taking care of each other right now are the biggest things we can do. I know last weekend when we were at the Commissary Jeannie got TP for one of her co-workers who hasn't been able to find any...we drove by her place and dropped it over the fence (she wasn't home). And yesterday she came by our place and dropped off a bottle of Vitamin C that we haven't been able to find (Jeannie takes chewables every day...I don't, but I eat a grapefruit nearly every morning with breakfast). So yeah...helping each other....that's what this is all about now. Taking care of each other in whatever way we can. Small things can mean a lot right now.

So....on this Easter morning I just want to say that. Help each other any way you can. One day this will just be part of our history....and hopefully we will learn something from it, and be better prepared for the next time (for rest assured, there WILL BE a next time). Human Kindness. That's what this is all about. As Ellen (DeGeneres) says at the end of every show: "Be kind to each other".

And get out there and ride. Or jog. Or hike. Or walk. Whatever it is you like do do outside, just do it.

That is all.

10 comments:

  1. OK....so, let's do the math. As of today somewhere around 750,000 people in the US have now had IT. That's out of 330,000,000 people who live here. Now I grant that it's very likely that a lot more people have had it and didn't even know it(mild to no symptoms)...so let's just double that number to 1.5 million. Heck, lets just call it 2 million who have had IT (so far). That's just .6 percent of the country.

    And now suddenly we are ready to start opening things up? Am I not understanding something huge here? I keep hearing people from all over saying things like "we are over the hump now"...and that may be true, IF you take into consideration what we have done to flatten the curve and were to keep doing it. The moment we stop doing those things, that all goes out the window! Oh...wait, I get it...now that .6 percent of the country is theoretically safe, we are good to go, good luck to the entire rest of the 99.4% who are still at risk. Seriously...who is doing the math up there?? Am I missing something?? If we are to give up doing what we have been doing now, then we never should have begun down this course, wrecking our economy for lives. We either continue down this very difficult road or give up and millions will die. Just my 2 cents worth...I'm SICK of the news. From ALL sides...everybody seems to be STUPID! PEOPLE are stupid! I guess you can't protect them from themselves. But the moment things go back to normal and IT starts to run rampant everybody will then be crying foul and wanting to sue somebody! Gads...maybe this is one of those apocalyptic events wiping out a large portion of humanity. I hear pollution is way down world-wide right now...isn't that something.

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  2. Hey Matt, I've believed from the beginning that this is Mother Nature sending us a warning - if WE won't do something about climate change & the destruction of earth's resources, "SHE" will take it upon "herself". The upshot - millions of cars off the road, less use of electricity, trash-free beaches, wildlife getting a break from human predators. I read last week that the OZONE LAYER IS REPAIRING ITSELF! You go, girl! Too bad for us that hundreds of thousands around the world will die & even then, some will STILL not learn the damn lesson!

    I also believe at LEAST 5 million in the USA have had the virus so far & if we hadn't closed down when we did, it would have been 4,5, maybe 10 times that. As bad as things got in NYC 2 weeks ago, it would have been like that in EVERY American city & small town & it would have escalated to MASS death & no one able to deal with all the bodies. (Think of past reading about the Bubonic Plague in the 14th century). The entire society would have broken down into total chaos. And you're right - it makes NO SENSE TO "RE-OPEN" RIGHT NOW! I am filled with RAGE even thinking about those MORON "protestors" & the god damn "Governors" of GA,SC,TN,FL,NE, etc. Opening gyms, hair & nail salons, massage parlors?!!!! WTF?! Can there be ANY WORSE type of business to 're-open' in a freakin pandemic?! I think ALL travel into & out of those states must be blocked!

    And btw, those agitating for this "re-opening" are GOP NAZIS who do not give a damn WHO & how many DIE as long as it's not them. THEY.DO.NOT.CARE. They mew about the economy & why it's so critical to not let it totally go under, but the truth is - they will accept the deaths of HUNDREDS OF THOUSANDS AS WORTH THE PRICE. These people are NAZIS. It's about time the rest of the country recognizes what they are as THEY are the enemy as much as this virus.

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  3. When were down in El Segundo back in early Feb, a bunch of our crew got sick of something....not quite a cold, not the flu...it was odd, and there were lots of levels of sickness...a few were in their hotel rooms for a few days, most of us just had some sniffles like a cold trying to get a grip. I can't help but wonder if that was an early version of this thing. It will be VERY interesting when the antibody tests become widely available....I hope you are right and the number who have already had it are WAY more than we believe...that would be a great help (only if those who have the antibody's are now immune tho). Imagine how long this will take to go back to ANY sense of 'normal' at our current "flattening the curve" rate of infection (which is a good thing btw, lives are of the utmost importance!) And who knows....IF that was this virus in a less deadly form a few months ago, maybe a whole lot more than even in our wildest dreams have had it. Out of our road-crew of about 40 I'd say that over half were fairly sick for a few days in a 2 week period, and most of the rest of us had some form of sniffles in varying degrees. It did seem very odd at the time but we all dismissed it. Now we are all wondering. And even now we are working like MAD to be out the door heading to Denver on 15 June, then to Boulder, and then back to the Cape, and finally home mid to late July. I'm still skeptical that we can go...but for now we plan like we are. OH...and saw the news today that Germany officially canceled Oktoberfest. Rats and hooray at the same time on that one. Now we try to get our money back from the Munich Marriott that we had to pay in total up front (within 24 hours of making the reservation, if you didn't cancel it they charged us the entire amount). That will likely take months, but I'd assume they kind of have to give us our money back. As well as our tickets to Buckingham Palace in London...I think that's all we paid for up front. At least the uncertainty is gone...so that's good. I hated not knowing. Gotta run...time to go be "essential" (doing a 12 hour shift today....2pm to 2am...ugh!) Later gators...stay safe!

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  4. I am with you Susie, the COVIDIOTS are starting to run rampant. In the newspaper last week there were DOCTORS asking to be allowed to start doing elective surgeries again, claiming that the risk had dropped and "they had plenty of PPE"! Guess what, all of them are owners of outpatient surgery centers or very lucrative practices and whining about their loss of income! Guess they aren't really looking at the daily case reports, we are having a sudden spike in cases and deaths in my county (not related to the prison cases 2 counties away)!
    People just don't understand - or don't want to, more likely, because that doesn't fit their bias - that we haven't had the number of cases and deaths from the worst case scenarios in this state precisely BECAUSE of the shutdown, not because the estimates were wrong, overblown, media frenzy or a conspiracy! Geez Louise, I had to stop reading the paper/social media/ even a group of health care professionals on facebook for a few days because I can't take the stupidity. All a bunch of Trump sycophants, eager to follow his lead. And his #1 concern is for his own businesses, #2 is getting re-elected.
    Yes I am sure that there are large numbers who have been infected but asymptomatic. There is testing going on now in CA to try to figure that out- maybe you and your crew could find a way to be included in that?
    Good luck with the refunds - I am still waiting to hear if Alitalia will refund me for my tix - according to their website they should (if they manage to stay in business) since they cancelled 2 of the 4 legs of my round trip.

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  5. We just got word tonight at the start of our shift that so far our June mission is on...the plan is for us to fly Military transports as usual, and when we get there our hotel is supposed to be open, but no restaurants...so after work we order food to go or delivery and sit in our rooms alone with food. If this goes off it's going to set a new level of suckage for a trip. But with all the Covidiots (love that...handn't seen it before, nice Rae!) out there screaming to go out there and catch it, I can only assume in 2 months we will have a new wave of cases and shutting down all over again. Just my thoughts...I think it's inevitable. I did ask about getting the antibody tests before we fly...it would really be comforting to be tested and find out if we had been exposed or not. They sounded interested in that (but managers do that...SOUND interested but in the back of their mind they are already saying "NO...costs too much, who is going to pay for it?") so we will see. Hope you get your money back Rae...I'd think they would have to being as this is in now way your fault.

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  6. Hey all, hope everyone is still fine! We're finally seeing the sun right now after days of rain & dark skies. My current office at work is not a "window office" so one would THINK I'd have no problem sitting at my kitchen table now while working & seeing what is usually some sun from my house windows is now dark & dreary but one would be wrong! Yuck.

    I have to go into the office one day next week & at 1st, I was not happy at all but now I'm kinda looking forward to it even if I'm scared. I MISS being in my office & I'll be able to print & copy many things I need. Plus, I can gather up some more supplies! On my last day (3/23) before the "shutdown", I tried to think of what I'd need & throw it all in a box but I just didn't think of everything! Plus, I was so ignorant of the REAL FACTS at the time, that I thought we'd all be back BEFORE NOW.

    Right now, I don't think we'll all be back at our company before June & even then, only a % will be able to work onsite each day. I'm actually PETRIFIED of being out of my house, being around others & touching ANYTHING! Last Saturday, I got some of the masks I'd ordered on Amazon a month ago - they came 3 weeks early! Very relieved as the 2 scarfs I'd tried weren't great.

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  7. Matt - when you go on your work trips, even if the local restaurants are open, I think you should still get your food to go or delivered. No sense exposing yourself. Even though you are in great shape & must have great immunity as you rarely mention being sick, this thing can take down the young & healthy too! And even if you don't need hospitalization, the sickness can be awful! Especially if you're away from home & all your regular sick supplies. It would be doubly awful. And scary!

    I'm actually more worried & depressed than when the shutdown 1st started. Part of that is because of the, ahem, INANITY of several states' governors & knowing all this reopening will make hundreds of thousands of us sick & or dead & these a-holes don't give a damn.

    We're also at the point where one begins to "panic" & feel that this will "never end". Human brain. Thus, I certainly understand WHY some folks want to "get things back to normal" but as you said above, it's NOT going to be normal! Not till there's a vaccine. I am "high risk" & if EVERYONE saw themselves as such, all these demands to "reopen" would NOT be happening! They are selfish pieces of shit & I'm TRYING to not wish for them to get their just 'end'.

    Stay safe!

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  8. Hey Susie...we have some sun, but the stupid WIND is every day...it should be over by now (as a bike-rider the wind is simply soul-crushing). Usually our high daily winds begin around mid March and go for just a few weeks, sometimes till late April...this is just ridiculous! I think I whine about the winds every year tho...so nothing new there. Jeannie needs to back into her office and get a filing cabinet that she can lock (for all her paperwork)...she thought the same...that she'd be back by now. I tell her every day let's just go get it, and she can't do it for some reason. I don't see it happening anytime soon (her going back to the office). Same for my work...on the one hand I'm thankful to still have my job, but this 2nd shift is horrible. I just can't get a grip on it...I head in about 3:15pm, start work by 4, and get off at 1:30am. On normal day-shifts and even the "graveyard" 3rd shift, there are usable hours after your shift (when I worked 3rd shift up at Sunnyvale years ago I'd get off at 6am, eat some breakfast and could actually for for a several-hour bike ride, come home and eat/shower and sleep for a good 7 hours, get up and have dinner and go to work). Can't do that w/ 2nd shift. And I'm tired all the time, even if I do get 7 hours of sleep (rare). I get up at 10am or so and sit and stare at my coffee while the news is on (Jeannie has it on all day while she works...just background noise for her). Here I am grumbling again...between this dang virus and my work shift it's making me into somebody I don't want to be. Gotta break that somehow.

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  9. Oh...that last comment was supposed to be a reply to your first comment Susie...this is for the 2nd...when we do finally travel there's no way I'll eat IN a restaurant...I think this trip will be ground-breaking. Much like being in a low security prison with work-release. We will go to work every day, and come home to our hotel and lock ourselves in. Order meals for delivery OR cook them in my room (will be at a Residence Inn at both Boulder and the Cape). I plan to find a Costco and go buy (on my corporate credit card) hundreds of $ of things like steaks and king-crab...really high end expensive stuff (so-as to spend ALL of my daily per-diem money...we travel on use-it-or-lose-it...required to keep all receipts and it takes DAYS to do the travel claim at the end of the trip). I figure a bunch of frozen veggie bags (love the Steamables...throw them in the microwave for a few minutes and bam...veggies!) Don't remember if the Residence rooms have ovens or not...(the broiler for steaks)...if not maybe they will open up the gas-barbecues they have outside for us (I'd assume they are closed right now)...we will definitely need those, as long as we agree not to congregate around them. I figure steaks and king crab will keep me alive a long time, and easily spend all my daily $!

    I'm kind of worried this will be going on for YEARS...I just don't see any end-game except a vaccine, and they say IF they can even get one it will be a long time. This is definitely a crazy scary time...we've got nothing in our history to compare it to.

    And Rae, how are you doing? Are you staying busy? All this 'house time' is making everybody nuts...hope you are doing well and staying sane!

    OK...gotta finish my coffee and fix the washer (this weekend it died...figured out it's the circulation pump and I found one locally yesterday and ran out and bought it before I went to work). Just need to finish draining it and then take the front off and replace the pump. Paid 3 times what the pump actually costs, but the small family-owned appliance business really needs help too (the wife is the office manager and the husband is the drive-around fix-it-guy). When I called to see if they had the part their daughter answered the phone...she is about 10 I'd say...they were all hanging out when I arrived to get the pump. If I had ordered it online it would at best be here sometime next week (and even w/ the markup, me installing it myself saves us a BUNCH of $). OK...gotta scoot. Keep safe and keep your spirits up...this will one day be over. And Stay ALIVE!

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  10. This is an excerpt from an email my brother sent...it's really frightening.

    In a matter of days, the Fed has created more currency units out of thin air than it has for most of its existence. In the end, it’s likely to be measured in the tens of trillions of dollars, or more.
    The human mind has trouble wrapping itself around such figures. Let me try to put it into perspective.
    One million seconds ago was about 11 days ago.
    One billion seconds ago was 1988.
    One trillion seconds ago was 30,000 BC.
    One trillion dollars is almost an unfathomable amount of money.

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