Housepets!

Just thought I’d check in with everyone and ask you all how you’re doing. Everything good? Anything to report or get off your chest?

other being bored, I'm good

We're fine, Jag. Just did a grocery raid and, while there's some rationing, there's enough of everything including the three "P's" (Pasta, Pizza, and Paper Products). Weather's kinda ishy up here anyhow, so it's keeping people home. Oh, and we're fine on the three "B's" (Bread, Beer, and Bandwidth). Be well, be safe all.

Starting to get a little nervous because in the last few days we had 4 deaths from the virus. The 3rd death was someone who was in his early-30s.

I'm 27 by the way. Send help.

Amazee Dayzee wrote:Starting to get a little nervous because in the last few days we had 4 deaths from the virus. The 3rd death was someone who was in his early-30s.

I'm 27 by the way. Send help.

Maintain social distancing, wash your hands every time you go out, don’t touch your face while you’re outside, regularly take your temperature. This thing CAN be beat, you just gotta be smart about it.

And, this is just a general pet peeve to anyone listening, but please try not to panic shop. Other people need toilet paper too, so please be considerate.

I am monitoring myself and making sure I am not getting sick or have any of the symptoms as well as slathering on hand sanitizer whenever I get my hands on it.

But my mother is a secretary at a NICU so she is an essential worker. She gets it, we ALL are gonna get it.

Honestly, the disease outbreak hasn't been affecting me that much.
There are other things that have been happening in my life though. I recently heard about Dogbomb(a furry who died almost a year ago; may he rest in peace), and he has become somewhat of an inspiration to me. When he was diagnosed with ALS, instead of crying in a corner, he continued to life his life to the fullest-even right up until the very end. The courage and positivity of that guy really touches my heart. I think we should all strive to be a little more like him.
May he rest in peace.

It's true hospitals have the most people who still need to go to work, but they're also the places most used to dealing with things like this, have the people with the best knowledge of how (and more importantly, why) to avoid it, and the best resources at their disposal for doing that.
I work in a hospital too Dayzee, and beyond just being glad I still have a source of income that's guaranteed to last however long this does, I think my risk of infection is probably lower than many of the people who are simply staying home.
The scariest thing about times like this, I think, is that we all know we're ultimately playing a game of probabilities, not one of certainties. But when it comes down to it, nothing in life is ever certain until after it's done. At least right now we have some idea of the odds.

As for me... with the zoo having been shut down to visitors for a couple of weeks already I desperately miss all my wildcats who help me de-stress... the tigress, the snow leopards, and especially that ancient ocelot. I want to spend more time with him before he's gone. I've never had a better reading companion, but right now I read alone.
Not that work is very stressful right now, at least. Most of what I do pertains to surgeries and only the most essential of those are still going forward.

Beyond that I'm making sure I keep writing and recording songs; and I'm working on another, bigger collaborative story with some of the same people I wrote with a couple weeks ago.

The weather here has been beautiful. I've been taking some long evening walks with my brother. And tonight I make my famous chili

Good attitude, Vert, I salute you. And a bowl of chili and a bottle of beer'll get you through most anything!

Do you guys think things will ever return to normal?

I'm not really scared of the virus. In fact, I'm just glad I can get things done.

FoxyBoi wrote:Do you guys think things will ever return to normal?

Countless people are working on vaccines. On top of that, it’s believed that the virus will take a ‘dip’, allowing us some leeway before it starts picking up again.

Things will go back to normal. We just have to weather the storm.

Frankly, let's hope for a better "normal." This wasn't taken seriously fast enough. And we're currently seeing a much higher cost because of that.

I have to confess right now that I started bracing myself for this being the new normal and having to deal with it since there are times I can't see a way out.

It'll be normal for a little while. Then something else will be. No good thing lasts forever, that's true, but the exact same goes for bad things. Even when no other way out exists, there's always time.
I do agree with D-Rock, I hope that we can collectively learn something from what's happening now once it's over, rather than saying "well that happened" and forgetting it actually did.

Granted I don't live in the U.S. so I don't know the full extent of how badly the epidemics were dealt with there at the beginning, but I think every place on this planet could stand to do a little better and even countries who might have dealt with their share "well" shouldn't act like there aren't any lessons they could be taking away. People die from this, and we should all be doing our part to ensure it's not for nothing.

It was downplayed by leaders well beyond the point of no return. It’s been bad. But right now, a lot of us are doing what we can to at least slow down the spread.

The worst part is the fact that there are still people who don’t understand why the measures being set in place are there.

That's bad. "Why" is the most important question. Someone could tell you how to protect yourself or how you have to do... anything, but without knowing why, you can't truly understand what you're doing, and that means you can't adapt when your situation changes even a little. Changing is the one thing all situations will do.
I'm sad to hear that there are people out there, who when the lives of others or maybe even their own are at stake, still don't care enough to ask it.

Vertigo Fox wrote:That's bad. "Why" is the most important question. Someone could tell you how to protect yourself or how you have to do... anything, but without knowing why, you can't truly understand what you're doing, and that means you can't adapt when your situation changes even a little. Changing is the one thing all situations will do.
I'm sad to hear that there are people out there, who when the lives of others or maybe even their own are at stake, still don't care enough to ask it.

Nail. On. The. Head.

Going to the store might eventually become an armed endeavor xd

Fortunately, I'm young, so I don't worry about myself. Unfortunately, I have older family members who are affected. So I'm doing alright, but I am worried that I could spread it to those in my family who may be affected. My dog included

Otherwise I'm just keepin my pace. Nothing I can do to change the whole world, so I'm just letting everything happen as it will.

As my old First Sargent used to say, "You keep telling yourself, this stuff ends!" `Course, he didn't say "stuff", used another word that began with "S".....

I'm doing fine, other then finding out my radio I worked at is shutting down at the end of the month due to the pandemic.

That really sucks but now you have more time to write then!

I would have thought radio stations would be "essential" .... like, you know .... golf courses.

heh Would've been nice! But sadly that's not the case. Plus the lack of funds coming to the station (we are an online station) also contributed to the closer. Thankfully, I can still do my game reviews on YouTube, though I need to look into a new place to air my radio show.

Things have actually been going pretty well for me, honestly. I've had so little free time that getting a little more is a good thing, not a bad thing.

I just realized after a few days of the quarantine that my cousin has to cancel her daughter's baptism. That means I won't get to be a godmother.

Can't just write that in a will?

I guess? I'm not really sure how it is supposed to work.

I'm sure a clergy could tell you.

It would have to be over the phone since all the churches up here cancelled services.

Amazee Dayzee wrote:It would have to be over the phone since all the churches up here cancelled services.

I'm sure they'd be happy for the conversation.

I'm not even sure how you would do church services over the phone though. :/

I'm doing as well as could be expected.

I keep being thankful that it doesn't seem to be as bad in my home country of Australia than it most other places.

I'm pretty bored however, thinking of starting up a vegetable garden in my backyard.

I am actually getting a bit worried about the virus since the US death toll has overtaken some other countries and that kind of makes me nervous.

I have heard (not sure how accurate this is) that there are a number of Americans who refuse to take the advice of experts and are just going about their normal lives putting themselves and others in danger.
Speaking from my nice warm hidey-hole here in Canada where people, as far as I see them, seem to be behaving sensibly... those people need to grow up. They don't have the right to be putting everyone from strangers to their neighbours in mortal danger.
There are plenty of sensible Americans out there too (I could start by naming all of them on this forum ) but a nonviolent demeanour does no one any good if some random schmuck walks up and punches you in the face just because you happened to be there.

My point is, it wouldn't surprise me if the proportion of people with that attitude is higher in the US than it is in other places, since it can be a part of the culture there for some people... if that's the case -- and again I don't know for sure that it is -- they're probably a big part of the reason that the number of cases in your country is so high, and whatever's being done to keep those people from hurting themselves and everybody else isn't enough.
Honestly, if they were only putting themselves in danger I'd say it's their business and they can go wild. But when their danger will spread to everybody unlucky enough to get within two meters of them, something needs to be done.

There are some folks in life who go through the world deliberately smacking their hands on every wall they encounter which bears the sign "Don't touch - Wet Paint."

And when they're just poisoning themselves that's only their own problem. When they start poisoning everyone around them they become everybody's problem.
Especially when there's no reasonable way for the people around them to know ahead of time that somebody's going to be dangerous, and protect themselves.
Yeah, there are people like that everywhere... but having it ingrained in your culture makes it even more dangerous in times like these. It becomes so much easier for people to mistake nonsense for sense.

The whole social distancing idea relies on having as many people as possible actually do it. If somebody at the supermarket decides they just don't feel like it, there is no way for the people who just happen to be around them when they decide that to keep themselves safe.
This is why I believe the most important thing in the world at a time like this is to find something that will make you happy. When you're happy you have something to live for, and so you keep caring even when caring's not easy.

Because when tables turn, your biggest strength can become your greatest weakness.





I just saw this tweet from one of those people who put it in what's maybe the most bizarre possible way and part of me just wants to reply "YES, DIE FOR YOUR OWN RIGHT TO STAY ALIVE!!!!!!!!!!!"
Only I don't think they'd understand the irony, or the sarcasm...
Might make a decent lyric though.

"But I don't want to go among mad people," said Alice.
"Oh, you can't help it," said the Cheshire Cat. "Everyone's mad here."

What is particularly insidious about this virus is you can have it and be spreading it for days before you know you've got it. That makes it particularly easy for people to snarf off the precautions we all owe each other.

I'm doing perfectly fine, if not a bit busy. Not gonna lie, this whole "quarantine" thing hasn't really affected me much at all, since I'm still doing the same things I always do. Except instead of walking to classes every day, I'm doing those at home and working 40+ /wk (at a grocery store) instead.

People in the US have this thing ingrained in their mind that ANY type of restriction for any reason is an infringement on their rights as a person, and they will do everything in their power to fight it.

That can be applied to a LOT of things. Like the people who want churches to be labelled an "essential business" so that they can keep running.

Churches aren't "businesses." They were never meant to be. And the people who say they belong to a certain belief seemed to have forgotten that one of the teachings is that you DON'T need a specific building to do your worship.

And SOMEHOW, they fail to see that being stupid has the very high potential to spread a disease to everyone else, not just them.

And MAYBE, the fact that things aren't getting as bad as quickly as originally projected (and mind you, it's still bad) might mean that our precautions are WORKING.