Covid-19 — the arrogance is pissing me off

I just dropped off something at UPS and on the way home drove by the local vaping store. There were at least 6 cars parked in its lot and people were going in and out. Because, when facing a virus that attacks the lungs, now is the best time to vape.

OMG!!! I love the girl at the end of the clip.  "We just can't fully isolate ourselves."  

Yes. you can. Someone's life may depend if you do or not.  

If this had happened before the Internet people would truly be isolated and out of touch. With all of the social media, emails, facetime etc there is just no excuse for whining about being isolated. People today don't know what isolated is and this quarantine is NOT isolating.  

The ones who are complaining about being cooped up with people who are driving them crazy should maybe choose better spouses and raise children who are pleasant to be around. And before anyone hand slaps I am not talking about spouses or children with problems beyond your control.

I called someone out on that bullshit post. He said it was meant to be funny. Just like those hysterical posts from the media. Today he posted about triggering your snowflake friends and posting a Trump 2020 photo. I responded, there's no way in hell I'm voting for Trump. I should unfollow or delete these people but there is some very bad misinformation out there. I'm going to do a lot of reporting of fake news.

Our company made the decision that we all had to work from home a week ago. Luckily most of my team was already set up to work from home. I've had a laptop the whole 21 years I've worked here, but the rest of my team only got laptops 3 years ago when we moved offices and into a hot desk scenario. Our colleagues in the NZ office do not have laptops, so they still have to go into the office, and spread out so they are 2m away from the nearest person. I hope they end up buying them laptops so they can wfh too. 

If I get one more video sent to me, comparing CV-19 to the flu I am going to scream. I am horrible for thinking this, but I am at the point if you think this is the same as the flu, then you should volunteer to get it and get deathly sick so the ones who are taking this seriously can stay healthy.

Be prepared. When your work isn’t done by July 17 and the sh*t hits the fan, he will blame staff.

So could you do a social media campaign, praising your employees for stepping up to help meet the need? Most people want to hear about companies who are stepping up and helping out..but especially when local companies are helping. 

Well, hopefully it will drown out any gossip. Beat them to it & don't make it look like you are trying to bury the bad gossip. I hope it works out for you. 

You just can't win it seems.  People always want to assume the worst before getting the details.

One of my husband's coworkers is taking advantage of super cheap airfares to fly his family across the country to visit relatives. Because hey, why not?

Houston area count as of 7pm CDT today: 148. Yesterday it was 117 (or 119, I'm not going back to look over that small difference). Two more Harris County Sherriff's Office employees (one deputy, one clerk). Granted, we started drive-through testing Thursday, first responders were prioritized yesterday, elderly added into the target audience today, so we SHOULD expect a marked jump in confirmed cases as a result.
Breakdown:
Houston: 22
Harris County: 46 (including 1 death, 3 recovered)
Galveston County: 8
Montgomery County: 13
Brazoria County: 14
Fort Bend County: 29 (4 recovered)
Matagorda County: 4 (1 death)
Grimes County: 1
Wharton County: 1
Brazos County: 10 (this is where Texas A&M is)

Someone posted this the other day!

Her Facebook Friends Asked if Anyone Was Actually Sick. She Had an Answer.
Heaven Frilot is normally a private person. But this is not a normal time. So she and her husband are now the face of the coronavirus for their conservative Louisiana community.
**
Ms. Frilot had an answer to that.

“I have been seeing a lot of posts about people taking this virus lightly and joking about it,” she began in a Facebook post. “Mark has tested positive for the coronavirus.”
**
At first, Ms. Frilot limited who could see her Facebook post about her husband’s condition. “I am telling you this very private information because I care about my friends,” she said. “Please be extremely cautious and smart during this time. This virus has been in our community a while now without us knowing.” She shared that her husband had been misdiagnosed with the flu, and that this would be “a long recovery.” She said that because he was in quarantine, “I cannot even be there for him to help him get through this.”
**
It was a revelation for the conservative suburbs of New Orleans, where many had written off the pandemic as liberal fear-mongering. Mr. Frilot, a registered Republican, and his family are generally apolitical, and were not thinking much about the virus — whether as a fiction or anything else — before he got sick. But many in their community had opinions on it from the start.
**
Ms. Pitfield lives in Metairie, about 10 minutes from Kenner. Like many in the area, which is represented in Congress by House Minority Whip Steve Scalise, she is a supporter of President Trump. She, and many of her friends, she said, believed that the coronavirus was a political stunt and media-induced hysteria.
**
Reading about Mr. Frilot, she added, put it into perspective for her.

On Facebook, Kathy Perilloux shared a similar conversion. Before March 16, Ms. Perilloux’s page was almost solely posts questioning the severity of the virus. March 10: “Hurricane Corona …. HYPE …. sigh,” she wrote. (“I stole that from Rush, but I was thinking the same before he said it!!!!!” she added in a comment.)

Then Ms. Perilloux commented on Ms. Frilot’s post: “Your story puts a real face on a real danger, that’s what had been missing.” She hasn’t posted anything else about the pandemic.
**
Ms. DeLaup had “mixed emotions” at first about the virus. On the one hand, her fellow Trump supporters were insistent that it was being blown out of proportion, that the flu was far deadlier, that everyone was being ridiculous. On the other hand, she thought, “It’s not just us: Everyone around the world is reacting like this. Would everyone be throwing things out of proportion? Just to try and hurt the president?”

Ms. DeLaup found Ms. Frilot’s post on Facebook after mutual friends had shared it. “It wasn’t until I read her story that I thought, ‘You know, people are wrong.’”
**
Friends and strangers have sent Ethan toy after toy. “But his response is, ‘I don’t want any toys,’” Ms. Frilot said. “‘I want my dad.’”
**
There is more in the article 
www.nytimes.com/2020/03/19/us/politics/coronavirus-heaven-frilot-mark-frilot.html

mom - Here's one of my college buddies posting on Tuesday (he's IT at Texas A&M and he and his wife are in the middle of a proactive quarantine because they just got back from a cruise to Santo Domingo):

And, Bryan/College Station has declared an emergency, city offices and libraries closed, and A&M has cancelled Spring Graduation. Graduates will get diplomas mailed, and they may do a ceremony later. I suspect if it's blown over in time, the summer graduation in August will turn into the big one. Until then, lots of businesses are really going to be hurting. I'm afraid we may be loosing some local restaurants before this is over.

Here's his post from Thursday:

The first person in town to get the virus from within town has happened. Campus is pretty much closed next week except for a skeleton staff. A few dining halls will be open for students (takeout only), as well as a few study locations. Library is closed, most Liberal Arts buildings are closed. We'll have a skeleton IT staff on campus with the rest telecommuting. Buses are restricting ridership to 30 people and must enter from the rear entrance. I have another week of quarantine to go, then the following week I'll be going in one day a week to support my 4 buildings plus 2 others. Remote classes begin next week. I know the first couple of days will be rough because faculty NEVER listen.