Mostly Apolitical Thread for Discussing/Venting our Rational/Irrational COVID-19 Fears and Experiences in 2020

Tbf the Great Plains are always awful

love it or leave it

the badlands are extra bad right now

whoa whoa whoa whoa

You mean it isn't the Uk?

sorry to report that you must try harder

1 Belgium 1,255.74 (deaths per million)
2 Peru 1,082.02
3 Spain 866.01
4 Argentina 788.54
5 Brazil 785.59
6 Chile 781.92
7 United Kingdom 775.68
8 Mexico 772.42
9 Bolivia 768.6
10 Moldova 759.7
11 Italy 750.1
12 Ecuador 748.72
13 USA 746.9
14 Panama 676.57
15 Colombia 676.03
16 North Macedonia 626.36
17 France 625.83
18 Sweden 599.29
19 Armenia 596.07
20 Czechia 581.83
21 Bosnia and Herzegovina 572.25
22 Iran 500.43
23 Netherlands 485.38
24 Romania 461.14
25 Kosovo 458.13
26 Ireland 400.49
27 Switzerland 392.89
28 Slovenia 381.71
29 South Africa 345.66
30 Portugal 329.23
31 Hungary 316.99
32 Costa Rica 306.29
33 Bulgaria 305.34
34 Israel 301.77
35 Iraq 296.87
36 Puerto Rico 292.76
37 Canada 292.66
38 Honduras 289.65
39 Poland 272.52
40 Oman 268.95
41 Croatia 257.9
42 Guatemala 236.81
43 Russia 227.78

146 Thailand 0.86
147 Papua New Guinea 0.8
148 Vietnam 0.36
149 Tanzania 0.36
150 Burundi 0.09

Not bad though.

Tbf the Great Plains are always awful

― All cars are bad (Euler), Monday, November 16, 2020 1:41 PM (thirty-nine minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

How bout you go fuck yourself

Belgium only has 1/6 the population, they're really going for it.

Will keep this spreadsheet open for a few hours if anyone has other countries they want to ask about.

(The USA is at 245,162 total deaths on today's figures, with a 50% per-day increase: guessing that as weekend counting comes in, the president's score might cross a quarter-million. India is the only country other than Brazil with a total score over 100k, and they have 1.3billion population.)

Tbf the Great Plains are always awful

― All cars are bad (Euler), Monday, November 16, 2020 1:41 PM (thirty-nine minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

How bout you go fuck yourself

I've lived there for brief periods, spent a fair amount of time traveling in it.

It's certain some of the most beautiful country on the continent, much better than anything on the eastern fucking seaboard, that's for sure.

Euler doesn’t even live in America anymore, don’t listen to his America opinions

Admittedly, my reaction wouldn't have been so strong if I'd known you'd lived there at all, so my apologies. Thought it was typical "coastal person moved to France" type of situation.

I lived there for eight years. How about you?

― All cars are bad (Euler)

god the way Sinatra sings this line devastates me

I’ve never lived on the east coast, just Deep South, Midwest, Great Plains and the Bay Area for a couple of years.

Knew the Bay Area part from other threads.

I think that I have a tendency to defend "flyover" country, mostly because I think it's so beautiful. Like, you want to see an ugly state? Come to Pennsylvania. Total shithole.

But Western Nebraska? Wyoming? the Dakotas? Beautiful.

Now, that's not to say anything of the honkies living in those places, who are mostly terrible from my time spent with 'em, but...

Yeah I came to appreciate the beauty of the Flint Hills, my home during that time, but it was no place for culture.

I think most of the country is pretty or full of pretty stuff except for, basically, Indiana, much of Ohio, most of Illinois ... I'm not even sure Illinois has a single national park. Kansas has never impressed me, either.

PA is really pretty, I don't know what you're talking about.

god the way Sinatra sings this line devastates me

lol

Southern Indiana is very pretty. It's also mostly a place you very much don't want to visit, unfortunately.

PS is so beautiful!!! lol c'mon now

I mean PA obv. The hills all along 80 are gorgeous, so is the farm country around Lancaster, in a different way. Lancaster itself as a city is a jewel box! Admittedly I have a friend who grew up in rural NE PA and she says it killed her soul (she lives literally on the other side of the world now in Aus, I guess that's how far she had to go to get away), but it's objectively beautiful.

Tbf the Great Plains are always awful

How bout you go fuck yourself

Wasn't there a period when ILX wondered why all the valuable women posters were leaving?

rural NE PA

can confirm is beautiful, soul-killing

I grew up in SE PA and it was more gorgeous than I could ever appreciate at the time. Not soul killing, imo.

I mean, compared to Chicagoland, Pennsylvania is pretty, but that's not saying much.

And xpost to Aimless, bless your heart.

Anyway, new restrictions here in Philly mean I just requested a million library books and will have a heavy saddle-bag riding my bike home from campus later this week.

lol at all y'all yinz acting like you know every corner of every state commonwealth

bless your heart

have nice day and thank you for shopping ILX

i'll have a BLESSED day instead thank you very much

Too blessed to be stressed, right.

lol at all y'all yinz acting like you know every corner of every state commonwealth

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mNj6spCtUE0

I'm surprised, if not exactly shocked, that I know at least a couple of families doing a whole house quarantine for 14 days in advance of Thanksgiving, with whoever they plan to be with supposedly doing the same. My family has never been particularly sentimental, and Thanksgiving in particular has never been a big deal. I like the food a lot, but at the end of the day ... it's just another day. And yet even acknowledging that not everyone feels the same, given the circumstances I'm not sure why anyone would risk a bigger family gathering just for the sake of tradition. I do appreciate that they are being as safe as they can, but what does it even mean these days? You'd think that anyone aware and cautious enough to quarantine for 14 days would also be aware of the inherant risk regardless of precautions. Like, why not just plan a feast to end all feasts when this thing has run its course, rather than risk putting someone in the dinner party in danger?

My house and another are in a 14 day quarantine right now as we will be traveling to stay with in Chicago later this week. Nothing traditional about this to us as we’ve never hung out with these friends for any holidays but we trust them (more than our families) plus our sons birthdays are a day apart this coming weekend and we want to give them something at least sort of fun. Especially because our kid is an only and desperately needs to interact with others.

xp Hope they're willing to at quarantine 14 days after Thanksgiving as well

We did a similar lockdown with the same crew this summer at a beach house in Michigan and it was so absolutely worth it but it is going to be harder being totally house bound with no lake or woods access.

But Binnys delivers so there is that

If every person attending does in fact quarantine for 14 days before gathering and is symptom-free, that does seem pretty low-risk though? It's probably less risky than them all going to the grocery store themselves and having a Zoom Thanksgiving.

I mean, the 14-day quarantine thing seems like a way to mitigate risk, but as pointed out, only if everyone does it AFTER the event as well. But even if I wanted to do that, I can never guarantee even a 7-day quarantine for myself with my work responsibilities. I work from home 95% of the time, as I have since March, but at least once every two weeks I have to go into work to visit a project in progress or to address some of the COVID signage/renovations for campus.

It’s easier for us because all four adults are able to work 100% from home and have been since March. Our friends in Chicago straight up didn’t leave their house at all for three months this spring. Not trying to be hyperbolic here but we are all trusting each other with our lives.

Honestly didn't leave their house for three months? I mean, good for them if they're that strong, but that just seems so implausible to me. Not even a walk around the block? No trip to a store? Gas station? Didn't walk the dog?

No dog, no walks around the block, no gas station (cause no driving), grocery delivery only, etc. They live in a house with a backyard and one of them has really serious anxiety so staying put was preferable.

Mad respect, I wish I could pull that off.

Wow, I'm impressed!

But Western Nebraska? Wyoming? the Dakotas? Beautiful.

you start to live out here long enough though and it becomes very apparent what over a century of overgrazing has done to 90% of the land, on top of extraction and recreation and a hundred other things. the 'humans have fucked this place over' element is not as obvious to people from cities but it's just as prevalent imo.

Big work conference call today - someone in the office tested positive for covid. They were last in the office on Friday, on floors 6, 7, and 8.

Who was exposed? They can't(/won't) say.
Should we quarantine? The health department will contact people who were exposed over the next week or more. They dont know/wont say who was exposed or what 'counts' as an exposure.
Until then, so that they can deepclean floors 6, 7, and 8, everyone who works on those floors spread out to other occupied floors and find desks and cubicles to share and keep working.

Seems pretty foolproof, I think we got this!

That sounds like the answer to the Jeopardy question: How can we appear to respond vigorously to this potential health threat to our employees while in fact doing nothing that will effectively protect them or disrupt work flow beyond the minimum necessary?

I understand the privacy issues, but yeah, having been on a contact list and quarantined it's kind of maddening sometimes when they won't give you those details.

Re testing: My wife and I were able to schedule an appointment for a PCR test the same day with results expected in 2 days.

map, I've lived in the mountain west and some other places, so I know that the land has been fucked in places like Wyoming, etc.

But I mean, I live in Philadelphia. I'd rather have a disused overgrown logging road and second growth ponderosa than the bullshit I live in, but up until recently, I couldn't make a living in the former environment.

Goddammit an old friend of mine just posted on FB that his wife (also an old friend of mine) is in the hospital with COVID, which has caused pneumonia and other complications. He says she is "having a difficult time." He's tested positive too, with minor symptoms. Their 8th-grade son is fine. But I am just furious all over again at all the selfish assholes in our idiot deep-red county who have spent the last 8 months screaming and yelling about FREEDOM and have helped propel us to total out-of-control community spread. We're at our highest hospitalization rate yet, 86 people — and now I know who one of them is.

I'm sorry to hear that tipsy, sending good thoughts your way.

If it helps at all, our very blue state and area is an absolute shitshow now and the scenes from the airport are not inspiring any hope at all.