Coronavirus complaint/commiseration thread.

[jono]

LE should enforce the law, but Cuomo is right--you can't enforce a stay at home order. People have to understand the reason and voluntarily comply. I hate to go all pollyass but it's unavoidable--if the POTUS were to properly educate and lead and support the need to stay home we wouldn't be having all these people refusing to comply. It wasn't a political issue until he decided to make it one.

Here's another gripe--6 FD emts and firefighters in our house the other night, for a patient with a respiratory illness, and not one wearing a mask or using any other PPE. I was afraid for them, and afraid of them.

I hope your wife is feeling better, that sounds scary as hell.

Without pointing any fingers at any particular pollyasshats, the stress of not knowing what to do and not having clear direction is having a cascading effect. The rush to reopen is combined with lots of imprecise statements from OSHA and the CDC which try to leave others responsible for making specific choices. Maybe they want to leave specific decisions to a more local level or to business owners or managers, but instead their approach is being copied. I'm hearing business owners say they can't make their employees follow "recommendations" even though the recommendations to business owners include requiring (for instance) masks.

I don't know if everyone is missing half our sleep, but the stress-induced loss of IQ is real. As much as we don't want to lock down people's freedom to decide things for themselves, the stress of having to think about every little thing or policy or procedure makes the stress worse for most people. I wish the leadership vacuum was only political.

[whipski]

So a bunch of former friends/colleagues (I'm recently retired) are having a big outdoor barbecue tonight. Guessing dozens of people with a bunch of kids running around. Calling it a coming out party. I will not attend as I am in the demographic more/most at risk. I see both sides of why this is or is not appropriate. I believe most of these friends observe guidelines publicly. I suspect if I were 20 years younger I would be right in the mix. Just feeling like these are difficult waters to navigate right now.

[Core Shot]

A coming out party sounds super gay.

Can I come?

[jono]

A coming out party sounds super gay.

I wouldn't go either.

+1. NTTAWWT.

People are coming out of a lot of different closets nowadays.

[whipski]

well we did elect a gay governor but while this group is decidely not homophobic their politic is diverse. left right middle. pretty sure the coming out was tongue in cheek. oh did I just say that? FTR all resort town hetero-families who ski, bike and run rivers. but if you can turn your attention to navigating the waters I 'm interested in perspective

[wooley12]

Have you ever been to a backyard BBQ with your wife and you were the only straight couple? I have.

[Ottime]

Why were you hanging with Whipski's wife?

[jono]

well we did elect a gay governor but while this group is decidely not homophobic their politic is diverse. left right middle. pretty sure the coming out was tongue in cheek. oh did I just say that? FTR all resort town hetero-families who ski, bike and run rivers. but if you can turn your attention to navigating the waters I 'm interested in perspective

The social waters suck. Jokes are definitely easier. I don't know how helpful this will be, but I'll throw in some common experiences, maybe there's a nugget in here someplace.

I'm also high risk and my wife works at a high risk job so she's been living the divide that develops between those with seemingly higher or lower risk tolerance. I say seemingly because in reality her risk tolerance is higher than the people who "aren't afraid" but don't understand the situation. Since risk is cost x probability (rather than just probability alone as a lot of these people imagine) and the likely cost of her being infected is ~5-100x higher for us than for most people*, she has to accept a massively higher risk to go in at all. At which point she's wearing maximum PPE, surrounded by people without masks who "refuse"....you get the picture.

Co-workers think she's the one who's letting her emotions rule her because they see her all covered up. And she feels isolated more than just physically. Thanks to video conferencing I had the pleasure of watching her female (?¡!¿) office manager mansplain to me what it means to be a "girl" in an office and how that makes it easier to misinterpret social cues. So that was pretty surreal.

I'm really proud of how professional she's been through all this, but the emotions can only be shoved to one side for so long. We gotta find ways to be real about this. In your case, can you drive-by and wave? It would be awfully nice if we could acknowledge that the differences in our situations are not political or any other nonsense and just support good decision-making for each person.

*90% I get it if she does and a much higher chance for a bad outcome for me vs. her female co-workers with no at-risk members in their households.

[AK47bp]

Have you ever been to a backyard BBQ with your wife and you were the only straight couple? I have.

Cool story.




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[iceman]

jono, I'm curious what profession your wife is in that's high-risk but the people won't wear masks. Please share if possible.

[concretejungle]

I'm really proud of how professional she's been through all this, but the emotions can only be shoved to one side for so long. We gotta find ways to be real about this. In your case, can you drive-by and wave? It would be awfully nice if we could acknowledge that the differences in our situations are not political or any other nonsense and just support good decision-making for each person.

This is the part I struggle with though. These people could be making decisions that air on the side of caution (it's been a short amount of time in the grand scheme of things) but they aren't making empathetic choices. I'm not really scared of the the virus but with how much we don't know and the longer lasting effects that happen are what worries me. My partners daughter is high-risk so that affects my decision making but I'm not willing to throw caution to the wind and I don't think standard procedures like not having big get togethers, wearing masks or giving a correct phone number (the people outraged by this are fucking mouth breathers, that said they can also not go out to eat) are a bridge too far given what is going on.

[wooley12]

Cool story.




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Education is cool. Uncomfortable situations are educational. Like the time I was invited to bring my wife along by an outlaw biker to the club roadhouse after midnite to have a few beers. Uncomfortably educational.

[Kinnikinnick]

Its all a big experiment. Wisconsin going all ‘aint no thing, lets get together in confined spaces.’

T minus 7-14 days...


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[Deebased]

Education is cool. Uncomfortable situations are educational. Like the time I was invited to bring my wife along by an outlaw biker to the club roadhouse after midnite to have a few beers. Uncomfortably educational.

Were you the caboose on the engine on the train?

[jono]

jono, I'm curious what profession your wife is in that's high-risk but the people won't wear masks. Please share if possible.

I've been redacting a few posts lately but I'm sure you'll know what I mean if I say: this is TGR and she's female, so....apply stereotype and you won't be wrong. We're in the early stages of re-opening here so some people that gave up their PPE earlier are now working out weird ways to get back to it by applying rules that weren't intended for them and ignoring a few that were.

Thinking about solutions, it occurs to me that maybe the right answer is for me to have a video call and just thank her co-workers for their efforts and see if I can't put a face to the risk. It's only minor overstatement to say that if an infected person comes through their doors my life may be in their hands. I don't really think it's fair to leave them thinking the only logical choice is to rebel based on their own personal risk (which they may rightly perceive to be low). The whole thing is probably more palatable if they can consider it from our perspective and know their vigilance is meaningful. IDK. Hard to frame something like that, but I do feel like it makes sense for me to take some responsibility for communicating this if I can. Ignorance can be curable, right?

[riser4]

A coming out party sounds super gay.

Can I come?

That's up to you.

[wooley12]

Were you the caboose on the engine on the train?

HAha. Homophobe much. Or are you expressing your own fantasy wish? Pro tip. Never think an Iron Horseman who invites for beers is your friend.

[Danno]

I've been redacting a few posts lately but I'm sure you'll know what I mean if I say: this is TGR and she's female, so....apply stereotype and you won't be wrong.

Your wife's a husky Latin hooker?

[iceman]

I was gonna go stripper.

[I Skied Bandini Mountain]

Your wife's a husky Latin hooker?

My wife isn't Latin..

[Benny Profane]

Have you ever been to a backyard BBQ with your wife and you were the only straight couple? I have.

That must of been a fun party.

[wooley12]

It was. Food was to die for. Invited by a good HS friend of my wife and I with his new husband put it on. Boomer Gays who grew up when being gay was illegal. Very different from the picnic we were at of 30-40something gays.

[bagtagley]

My son’s bday was yesterday. Wife broadcast a drive-by party. No gifts, just honk and wave and say hi. I vocalized my concerns that we would be putting pressure on people and my doubts that anybody would even show up. I couldn’t have been more wrong. Tons of people showed up with signs, throwing small gifts and candy into the yard. Lots of kudos for the idea and thanks for an opportunity for the kids see each other and talk, even if at a distance. Sounds like we’ll be attending some of these ourselves in the near future now that the idea is out. Just a little thing, but the little things are pretty big these days.

[I Skied Bandini Mountain]

My son’s bday was yesterday. Wife broadcast a drive-by party. No gifts, just honk and wave and say hi. I vocalized my concerns that we would be putting pressure on people and my doubts that anybody would even show up. I couldn’t have been more wrong. Tons of people showed up with signs, throwing small gifts and candy into the yard. Lots of kudos for the idea and thanks for an opportunity for the kids talk to each other and talk, even if at a distance. Sounds like we’ll be attending some of these ourselves in the near future now that the idea is out. Just a little thing, but the little things a pretty big these days.

That's awesome.

[Benny Profane]

It was. Food was to die for. Invited by a good HS friend of my wife and I with his new husband put it on. Boomer Gays who grew up when being gay was illegal. Very different from the picnic we were at of 30-40something gays.

Yeah. Food was great and everyone was dressed sharp.

Dancing?