bravo1102 wrote:
Downplaying a tragedy like this is part of coping. You think of the worst that has happened in the past, compare this to that and realize it's not that bad and you can deal with it.

It's how I've come to deal with my lifelong tendency of catastrophizing and being completely overwhelmed.

I take it apart and deal with it. What do I have to do, what can I do and I do it.

Even with modern sanitation and medicine if pneumonic plague got going you'd still see a high death toll. Septicemic plague moves so fast that treatments have to begin within hours. And even with modern everything bubonic plague still will kill 15-20% of all infected.

And if the anti-vaxers have their way we'll be back to the bad old days of epidemics that make this look like a holiday jaunt to Canterbury. That's what Chaucer was writing about. A trip through the clean countryside to social distance from the black death in the city.

What about this guy? He kinda sounds more like a CON-MAN saying that he can cure the virus. What do you think lol?

If this deity created all life, she must love beetles, arceara and bacteria most of all. So many species of them and they multiply and evolve such diversity.

We mere humans are at the mercy of so many things even the not quite alive viruses. So if this deity exists, I truly think she's on the side of the disease and not the hairless apes who claim she created them in her image. Judging by life on this planet, if any one organism was created in god's image it probably was the beetle. But man created god in his own image.

From a social management point of view I can see the value of a religious showman like that, keeping vulnerable people calm and content (the sort of thing Bravo mentions). That has value to the community.

Where it's bad is when it doe the opposite and contributes to worry, makes people complacent or makes people think they're cured.
In any of those cases the person should be taken off the air. Speech that endangers people is an exception under the free speech amendment to the US constitution. You can be prosecuted for that.

ozoneocean wrote:
From a social management point of view I can see the value of a religious showman like that, keeping vulnerable people calm and content (the sort of thing Bravo mentions). That has value to the community.

Hmmm… maybe for some ‘mainstream’ religious leaders - the Dalai Lama was saying the other day how we need to turn to science to answer this problem - a LOT different to these greedy seppo televangelists..THIS ^ guy was saying everyone must keep paying their tithes, never mind their job woes, so he's just another money-grabbing charlatan who deserves to be one the C-19 casualties. along with Jim Bakker, Paula White and others, particularly the already loooong-overdue to “meet his maker” Pat Robertson ! B-)

I would recommend maintaining a safe distance from that man. You can literally see the virus colonising his thumb.

Asking for tithes is evil, the guy should be jailed.

I have been given a crappy duty during all of this. My boss, bless her, has a heart of gold. She has even told me that it the companies revenue dries up during all this, she will use her own personal savings to fund payroll. I like my job and think she is a good person.

She also is former Navy and runs a tight ship. She has sent many of us, myself included, to work from home. Though she has had some employees work from home before, it is something she wouldn't have anything but her most trusted employees do, and she trusts no one. She has a computer monitoring program to track what employees do on their computers and predicts productivity. It rarely is needed, but there just in case and disclosed in the handbook. She believes anyone she sends home will be distracted by kids, housework, etc, so she wants to knuckle down on the monitoring.

So guess who has to be “big brother?” Worst part is that she reminded employees of the software in a meeting that I wasn't at because I'm at home. And then she told them that I'd be working with the HR manager to keep tabs on them. Yay!

ozoneocean wrote:
Asking for tithes is evil, the guy should be jailed.

Can I reccomend the Supermax Prison

Listen up people! Pull yourself away from the gaming console and post! ;)

They did have gaming consoles when I was growing up. It was called Pong and consisted of a white dot going from one side of the screen to the other. On one side it went Bip and on the other it went Bop. I thought, there's no way this stuff is ever going to catch on and learned to play guitar instead. Now Pong's children have taken over the planet.

—

I'm trying to remain calm. The UK has gone into total lockdown and I only have one lime.

Ironscarf wrote:
I thought, there's no way this stuff is ever going to catch on and learned to play guitar instead. Now Pong's children have taken over the planet.

I'm trying to remain calm. The UK has gone into total lockdown and I only have one lime.

One lime ! My God, the deprivation ! My lemon and lime trees have had a lean year, plus I haven't been out to collect them anyway (it's too awkward with a walker ! B-) )

I was saying to a mate, via email, in this modern world there are many of us pre-adapted for ‘lock-down’ : ME - with a transplant and compromised immune system, not seeing anyone, nor going out for days on end (although that went up a fair bit when I got a scooter) ; His son, James - a recluse, due to ‘body dysmorphia’, in the attic, who works online for some ‘big’ people (like the head of Vogue - God knows how he gets his clients) ; Japan's ‘hikikomori’ - already withdrawn and not getting out much….

SO many young people, who sit in groups around a cafe table and ignore one another, while texting other people, should be able to adapt to doing this alone at their own kitchen tables, surely…?

All those annoyingly fit crack-of-dawn joggers, walkers and cyclists are still allowed out to do so, as long as it is solitary (like it probably was anyway) B-)

….but there are SOooo many people who will suffer psychologically, with anxiety, cabin fever, etc. Maybe this is just more “Darwinism in action” though. If it goes on for a while, we might emerge a very different world

Hang in there, everyone !

-Ursine

People seem to think self isolation means sitting inside 24/7. It doesn't. Go out for a walk, work on the garden. Use your iPhone or laptop outside.

No crowds keep six feet away from everyone. It doesn't mean sitting on the couch eating your snack of choice. Go for a walk, just distance yourself. Outside is as big as all outdoors you know.

I cope with it pretty ok… But I have to go out for some things, on public transport 😷
I just HATE anyone who gets close to me.
“Stay the F*** away from me you bloody morons!” Is all that's going through my head on the train and bus.

My neighborhood has been hosting themed walks almost everyday to keep the kids entertained. On St Patrick's day it was a shamrock scavenger hunt where people would tape a coloring page of a shamrock to their window and the kids were supposed to count how much they could find. Last weekend was chalk walk. Everyone was supposed to draw inspirational messages/pictures for their walking neighbors. Yesterday they had specific dog walking routes and times to make “a parade.” Next couple of days is “Bear Hunt.” I hid some teddies in my window and if none one spots those, they will definitely see the big wooden bear on our porch.

We also invented a new mythical figure. He is dubbed “TP Santa” and delivers rolls by drone. Cabin fever isn't an issue here.

Crisis averted. Mrs Scarf was able to procure a bag of limes on her daily exercise walk this morning. Thank Allah for the Afghan grocery, I was afraid they'd be closed. Quinces are going out of season but it's a relief to know I can still get 6, 8, 10, 12 or 14 limes for a pound (offer changes daily).

Ironscarf wrote:
Crisis averted. Mrs Scarf was able to procure a bag of limes on her daily exercise walk this morning. Thank Allah for the Afghan grocery, I was afraid they'd be closed. Quinces are going out of season but it's a relief to know I can still get 6, 8, 10, 12 or 14 limes for a pound (offer changes daily).

Kudos to you Ironscarf for nearly single handedly keeping the “lime” in limey. :D

If having trouble figuring out your 6 foot social distance, sidewalk slabs are typically 3 feet across. The average person's pace is 28-30 inches. So just over two paces. Or if you both put up your arms and you can touch fingertips? Sidestep once and that's about right. Bricks are typically 5-6 inches long. Count six bricks lengthwise and you're the right distance away.

How do I know all this? Drill and ceremony manual in the Army and Medieval history. Wow, some useless information coming in handy!

Simple really.

Thanks Bravo, one tries in trying times! And with a good splash of tonic of course, to keep the malaria at bay.

—

Totally flummoxed on my exercise walk today. I made my way to a local cemetery thinking it would be nice and quiet there and so it was. I walked up to the highest point but no sooner had I plonked myself down on my favourite bench than a car pulled up beside me and a middle aged couple got out. They then proceeded to light incense burners and started swinging them around all over the place, so that before I could take in the view I was enveloped in a perfumed fog. I gave up and went home.

Probably just as well. Our local hospital Northwick Park is now completely overwhelmed with cases. We live at the ground zero of UK coronavirus deaths and there's much worse to come, yet there were still people playing football in the park today.

Ironscarf wrote:
yet there were still people playing football in the park today.

There will NEVER be a shortage of fuckwits on this planet. I worked that out decades ago…

Hahah, the idiots with the incense… Jeez… XD

At least we know you're unlikely to catch it from random people in the street. That's very low risk exposure really. The biggest issue is inside enclosed spaces, that's where the stuff on surfaces and floating in the air, and distancing is a real issue.

I still don't like being near to people outside but there's less risk there.

—————

That said, I was getting off the train today and there was a whole bunch of private school kids clustered around the door of the train. UGH
DAMN kids! They're the worst…
For one thing they're dumb.
For two these idiots are the ones with money and so are their parents, so they're very likely to have had a recent trip (frequent) overseas or know people who have.
Three- they cluster in groups.

They should all be tazed and dumped on an island :P

They do NOT practice distancing or anything safe, I genuinely hope they die from the virus.

ozoneocean wrote:

I still don't like being near to people outside but there's less risk there.


They should all be tazed and dumped on an island :P

They do NOT practice distancing or anything safe, I genuinely hope they die from the virus.

Being tazed and dumped on an island should happen to private school kids and their pain-in-the-arse parents anyway, regardless of pandemics …and, yeah, they crowd around - my daughter teaches years 10-12, was moaning about that on faceache earlier - and how they just laugh off being told about ‘social distancing’ She's asthmatic like I am (great genes!), so she doesn't want to get it from the stupid little bastards !

I don't want to be around people in/out or wherever. I hate humanity - like the squirrel, it's just vermin with good P.R. B-)

BearinOz wrote:
I hate humanity - like the squirrel, it's just vermin with good P.R. B-)

At least squirrels don't complain about slow updates lol!

@BearinOz- I hope your daughter will be ok!

________

Still with the GF. Reconciled a while ago. She's even started psych appointments and improved a bit. But the drinking still happens… That will have to be dealt with -_-
It's sad to see someone change like that.

I initially thought this lock in would make some extra drawing time, but being shut in with the family makes it even harder to do anything. I didn't realise how much I relied on grabbing fifteen minutes here or there and those moments have vanished for the foreseeable. This is probably a good time to catch up on some reading.

Today I built a chicken coop out of an old dog pen. I never built anything before. I even drew the blueprints myself. The only tool I used was a pair of tin snips. Proud but tired.

I'm also covered in band-aids – don't even know why. I just kept finding blood dripping on the supplies while I worked. I couldn't even find the cuts, just rinsed and bandaged bloody fingers as I went along. :P

@usedbooks- are you going to start raising chickens for eggs?

kawaiidaigakusei wrote:
@usedbooks- are you going to start raising chickens for eggs?

Yep! My four chicks are coming in the mail next week! :) I bought a house last year in a city with a really reasonable chicken ordinance.

My daughter's on acreage - half a hillside, basically - and it's like “Old MacDonald's” up there : 60 mango trees, chickens, lambs, some cattle bought for $1 a kilo, from one of our many drought-stricken farmers (that are fattening up nicely, I'm told). Both high school teachers (He: manual arts, She: Art and English) and now home with the grand-daughters, during COVID-19. He has a shotgun too, so I guess they're O.K. for the apocalypse B-)

My sister in law raises chickens in an otherwise quiet suburban home. Lots of chicken raisers in suburbia. The quail didn't work out as the eggs are too small and fragile.

I've discovered the official Carol Burnett show channel on YouTube. In times of distress comedy comes to the rescue.

Social distancing is not easy, even for an introvert. I had just gotten used to being close to people and now I'm back to distancing.

However, my procrastination is live and well. All weekend to work on my comic and I did only a couple of hours and a lot of that was wardrobe and props.

I'm still working performing my essential service in an essential industry. So I still have my forty hours. :D:D

I'm currently working from home in the midst of this pandemic. So technically, let's bring the call-center to the house lol. So now my parents can experience my anger LOL.

Not that I mind, taking 2 hour trips just to get to and fro is a break, plus an Uber there will take $22 out from my bank account. I think its one of them underlining perks of working at a call-center…you can take YOUR ENTIRE WORKSTATION home.

Anyone in my same boat?

I'm doing home office too, Sometimes I need to go to the office but saving 2-3 hours just for the trip home-office-home every day is a plus. Just my laptop, a few documents and that's all.