Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

“Joe Biden deserved better than he got from some folks in his own party.”

“The defense has a certain level of trust in defendant that the government does not.”

Let’s not be the monsters we hate.

Polls are now a reliable indicator of what corporate Republicans want us to think.

Imperialist aggressors must be defeated, or the whole world loses.

It’s easy to sit in safety and prescribe what other people should be doing.

Too often we confuse noise with substance. too often we confuse setbacks with defeat.

Nothing worth doing is easy.

“In the future, this lab will be a museum. don’t touch it.”

Second rate reporter says what?

Let us savor the impending downfall of lawless scoundrels who richly deserve the trouble barreling their way.

Dear media: perhaps we ought to let Donald Trump speak for himself!

At some point, the ability to learn is a factor of character, not IQ.

Never give a known liar the benefit of the doubt.

Since when do we limit our critiques to things we could do better ourselves?

Balloon Juice, where there is always someone who will say you’re doing it wrong.

And now I have baud making fun of me. this day can’t get worse.

This really is a full service blog.

It could be worse. Vance could have said “post-menopausal sows.” Waiting for that audiotape to surface.

Today’s gop: why go just far enough when too far is right there?

Come on, media. you have one job. start doing it.

There’s always a light at the end of the frog.

Damn right I heard that as a threat.

“Everybody’s entitled to be an idiot.”

You are here: Home / Healthcare / COVID-19 / COVID-19 Coronavirus Updates: Saturday/Sunday, Dec. 5-6

COVID-19 Coronavirus Updates: Saturday/Sunday, Dec. 5-6

by | 81 Comments

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Clarification on one of yesterday’s links. It actually makes sense to classify bank tellers as ‘essential personnel’, especially since other front-line workers (retail clerks, cleaners, etc.) are more likely to need face-to-face banking assistance more than white-collar workers with sufficient financial cushions to take full advantage of online services…

Reader Interactions

81Comments

  1. 1.

    NeenerNeener

    Monroe County NY yesterday:

    638 new cases, 480 people hospitalized and 101 are in the ICU now, 350 total dead here since March.

  2. 2.

    OzarkHillbilly

    COVID-19 may cause long-term erectile dysfunction in men.

    All of a sudden men throughout the hills and hollers are wearing masks. “I still think it’s fake, but why take a chance, ya know?

  3. 3.

    Amir Khalid

    Malaysia’s daily Covid-19 numbers. Director-General of Health Dr Noor Hisham Abdullah reports 1,335 new cases today in his media statement, for a cumulative reported total of 72,694 cases. Dr Noor Hisham also reports two new deaths today, for a total of 382 deaths — 0.53% of the cumulative reported total, 0.62% of resolved cases.

    11,039 active and contagious cases are currently in hospital; 126 are in ICU, 57 of them on respirators. Meanwhile, 1,069 patients recovered and were discharged, for a total of 61,273 patients recovered — 84.3% of the cumulative reported total.

    Three new clusters were reported today: Ceram in Negeri Sembilan, Pulau Berhala in Sabah, and Jalan Tampoi in Johor.

    1,332 new cases today are local infections. Selangor has 335 cases: 187 in existing clusters, 87 close-contact screenings, and 61 other screenings. Negeri Sembilan has 258 cases: 98 in older clusters, 155 in Ceram cluster, one close-contact screening, and four other screenings. Sabah has 250 cases: 61 in older clusters, 23 in Pulau Berhala cluster, 106 close-contact screenings, and 60 other screenings. KL has 177 cases: 44 in existing clusters, 12 close-contact screenings, and 121 other screenings. Johor has 125 cases: 93 in older clusters, nine in Jalan Tampoi cluster, 10 close-contact screenings, and 13 other screenings. Perak has 108 cases: 97 in existing clusters, seven close-contact screenings, and four other screenings.

    Penang has 31 cases: 20 in existing clusters, six close-contact screenings, and five other screenings. Labuan has 21 cases: eight in existing clusters, seven close-contact screenings, and five other screenings. Kedah has 17 cases: nine in existing clusters, seven close-contact screenings, and one other screening. Pahang has four cases, all close-contact screenings. Melaka has three cases, all close-contact screenings. Kelantan has two cases, both in existing clusters. And Terengganu has one case, found in other screening.

    Sarawak, Perlis and Putrajaya reported no new cases today.

    Three new cases are imported. Two were reported in Selangor, one in KL.

    The two  deaths today are a 65-year-old man in Perak with hypertension and chronic kidney disease; and a 72-year-old woman in Johor with hypertension, dyslipidaemia, and obesity.

  4. 4.

    YY_Sima Qian

    Yesterday, China reported 1 new domestic confirmed, reported by Tianjin Municipality. The case is the granddaughter of a family cluster at a residential compound from late Nov., when the grandparents and the father had already tested positive. The case had been in quarantine with her mother since 11/20, first developed symptoms (nasal congestion) on 11/27, IgM positive on 3rd serological Ab test on 12/2, both IgM & IgM positive on 4the serological Ab test as well as signs of ground glass opacity on chest CT. So far, she has test negative RT-PCR for oropharyngeal swab, phlegm and fecal samples.

    At Manzhouli in Inner Mongolia “Autonomous” Region, 1 suspect case has been ruled out as COVID-19 case. The city has completed the 3rd round of mass screening of all residents, with 200,745 individuals swabbed, all negative. It appears the outbreak there is under control. Currently there are 24 confirmed, 2 asymptomatic and 1 suspect case in the city.

    Yesterday, China reported 17 new imported confirmed cases and 2 imported asymptomatic cases and 2 new imported suspect case:

    * Shanghai Municipality – 6 confirmed cases, 5 Chinese nationals returning from Russia and 1 from the US; 2 suspect cases, no information released
    * Fuzhou in Fujian Province – 5 confirmed cases (all previously asymptomatic), 4 Chinese nationals returning from Indonesia and 1 from Japan
    * Xiamen in Fujian Province – 1 confirmed case, a Chinese national returning from the US
    * Guangzhou in Guangdong Province – 2 confirmed cases, both Chinese nationals returning from Saudi Arabia
    * Shenzhen in Guangdong Province – 1 asymptomatic case, a Hong Kong resident coming from Hong Kong
    * Chengdu in Sichuan Province – 1 confirmed case (previously asymptomatic), a Chinese national returning from Ethiopia
    * Kunming in Yunnan Province – 1 confirmed case, a Chinese national returning from Indonesia
    * Xi’an in Shaanxi Province – 1 confirmed case, a Chinese national returning from Pakistan

    Yesterday, Hong Kong reported 95 new cases, 8 imported (from the Russian, Pakistan, and Indonesia) and 87 local (36 of whom without clear sources of infection, and 18 related to the ballroom dancing clubs). There are additionally 60 cases who are preliminarily positive.

  5. 5.

    sab

    One of my stepsons just tested positive for Covid. He and his fiance have been very careful, but she works with autistic preschoolers. They think she caught it at work

    ETA But who knows. It’s so rampant in my county that they can’t contact trace. It’s everywhere

    They both have symptoms, so not a false positive.

  8. 8.

    yellowdog

    Our bank doesn’t  even let you in without an appointment. I don’t  think their tellers are more or even equally in danger as retail workers.

  9. 9.

    sab

    @yellowdog: Ditto my bank. My husband’s bank, on the other hand, opened back up as soon as they could legally.

    Go back to  banking through the drive-in window. I want my stepson’s fiance who is an essential retail worker at BP (gasoline and sundries) to be way up in line, right behind the EMS folks and miles ahead of the bankers.

    I am an old with health issues. I can hunker down and wait.

  10. 10.

    NotMax

    @yellowdog

    “Essential” is a sliding scale. Certainly there are some types of transactions only a teller can or is best equipped to handle.

    Also plenty of people don’t have access to online banking services, or if they do not via an optimum connection interface insofar as security is concerned.

  12. 12.

    sab

    @NotMax: Drive-through windows. Otherwise make an appointment and wear a mask.

    In before times I used to watch in horror as customers  with massive runny colds came in, coughed in line and then coughed all over the papers they were handing to the tellers. If we let those idiots in they will be back in droves.

  13. 13.

    MFA

    COVID-19 may cause long-term erectile dysfunction in men.

    Well then, I guess I won’t have to wear those fascist condoms anymore, either!

    Ha! Suck it, Libs!

    Oh, wait, no, never mind. No point.

  14. 14.

    NotMax

    @sab

    (leafs through the manual)
    Rule 34, subsection b:

    “All and any puns involving reproductive organs will elicit groans. Although intensity and/or duration of groans will vary, there are no exceptions.”

    :)

  16. 16.

    NotMax

    @sab

    Drive-thru windows may be fine and dandy for quotidian transactions, provided the physical space for them is extant and provided the customer has a vehicle.

  17. 17.

    OzarkHillbilly

    My bank has drive thru for any and all teller functions, no face to face. Anything else one might need (such as safety deposit boxes) one must make an appointment ahead of time, 5 mins is usually enough.

  18. 18.

    p.a.

    Good point in a previous cov-19 post: while elderly especially those in group living ctrs will be front-of-line, they are also the folks whose time is limited anyway.  Bad actors and idiots will use these death stats to spread fear of the vaccine when it isn’t the cause.

    Biden admin will need to be on-point to counteract the fearmongers.  Thankfully they will be in charge by then, not the Oval Office squatter.

  20. 20.

    NotMax

    @OzarkHillbilly

    Banks here open, with plastic barriers in place at all teller stations, for usual business except:

    100% masking requirement
    Maximum number of customers permitted inside at any one time strictly limited (maximum have generally seen is 5)
    .
    There may be branches someplace on the island with drive-thru but if so one could count on a single hand and have multiple fingers left over.

  22. 22.

    Barbara

    @sab: And if you live in a city where many don’t have cars and the banks aren’t drive through and you can only go during your lunch hour? Not sure that they are essential, but come on.

  24. 24.

    NotMax

    @a href=”https://balloon-juice.com/2020/12/06/covid-19-coronavirus-updates-saturday-sunday-dec-5-6/#comment-7988568″>OzarkHillbilly

    Standing around outdoors in winter, or in rain, handling cash out in view of the general public. Let the good times roll.

  25. 25.

    YY_Sima Qian

    @NotMax:

    Nate Silver is an even bigger horse’s ass than I previously pegged him as.

    While what Nate Silver said is technically true, if insensitive, it is also irrelevant. Yes, it is very likely that the actual cumulative infected cases in America is several times that of the officially reported count (therefore, on the order of 40 – 100M). However, by definition, no one knows who the unreported cases are. Not the authorities and not the cases themselves. Unless there is an effort to mass screen the entire population of the US for antibodies, there is no practical way to skip the unreported infected cases for vaccination.

    Secondly, a large percentage of the infected cases (reported or otherwise) in the US will have recovered from COVID-19 for at least 8 months by the time vaccines are available to the general population in Q1 2021. There is no guarantee that their naturally acquired immunities are still robust by that time.

  26. 26.

    YY_Sima Qian

    @p.a.:

    Good point in a previous cov-19 post: while elderly especially those in group living ctrs will be front-of-line, they are also the folks whose time is limited anyway.  Bad actors and idiots will use these death stats to spread fear of the vaccine when it isn’t the cause.
    I am more concerned with the fact that it ~ 2 weeks after the 2nd dose before robust immunity is generated by the vaccine. Given the very high prevalence of COVID-19 in the US, as well as the vulnerability of the first in line for vaccine demographics, there will be people who have taken vaccination shots (either after the 1st or 2nd dose), yet still become infected and unfortunately pass away. The anti-vaxxers will have a field day with such cases. Robust public education on how the vaccines work is is absolutely necessary.

  27. 27.

    debbie

    Ohio had 10,460 new cases yesterday. Guess the governor’s restrictions, in place for about three weeks, are a bust. ?

  28. 28.

    Amir Khalid

    @p.a.:

    Are those restrictions being observed as strictly as they need to be? I understand that Ohio is a Republican-held state.

  29. 29.

    Ken

    @p.a.: @YY_Sima Qian: Derek Lowe’s recent post on false side effects put it this way:

    Specifically, if you take 10 million people and just wave your hand back and forth over their upper arms, in the next two months you would expect to see about 4,000 heart attacks. About 4,000 strokes. Over 9,000 new diagnoses of cancer. And about 14,000 of that ten million will die, out of usual all-causes mortality.

    The point being that when we vaccinate that number, we can expect similar results, but people will tend to blame the vaccine.  He speaks of the need to educate the public, but I am skeptical the message will take.

  30. 30.

    Uncle Cosmo

    @YY_Sima Qian: …[A] large percentage of the infected cases (reported or otherwise) in the US will have recovered from COVID-19 for at least 8 months by the time vaccines are available to the general population in Q1 2021. There is no guarantee that their naturally acquired immunities are still robust by that time.

    And our experience with influenza viruses – for which even strain-specific immunization is seldom effective farther out than a calendar year – suggests that naturally acquired immunity will not remain robust. The best we could logically expect is that the naturally immunized would still need vaccination in the near future but might be put at the end of the line without harm. It seems hardly worth the effort to determine who they are.

  31. 31.

    dnfree

    @yellowdog: We had to go in person to the very large bank that holds our mortgage to get an endorsement on insurance checks. The first time, in October, was in person and went normally—we waited in our car until the signer was ready for us to come in.  The second time, in November, did not go well. They were not ready for us, we waited in the car for half an hour, and when I went in to ask when we could get this check signed, the desk worker was rude and told me to get back outside. Sounded like they had had a Covid case in that branch and an overstressed employee had walked out that morning. The bank is in the Schaumburg IL area (northwest suburban Chicago).

  34. 34.

    Scout211

    We live in one of the two regions of California in a stay-at-home order as of today. The Central Valley region and the Southern California have both been ordered into the stay-at-home order. It’s not a shut down as many news articles are writing. It’s more like a modified stay at home order. Retail is still open, with 20% capacity and all medical and dental offices are open, for example. It’s still strict, but not a shut down like last March.

    My husband and I were studying all the new rules and restrictions last night and realized that for us, it changes nothing.  It’s exactly like we have lived our lives since March.  But now everyone else is required to live under the same restrictions.

    I hope there is good compliance because my region was down to 8% ICU bed capacity. That is not good.  That is scary bad

  36. 36.

    Sloane Ranger

    @yellowdog: Here in the UK banks are open with face coverings required for staff and customers and limits on numbers allowed in at any one time. Automatic banking machines are wiped down after each use and tellers are protected by screens (although they always have been).

    If you need to talk to someone it’s done by phone and there’s even an app allowing you to deposit a cheque online, without needing to visit the bank. I haven’t been in for months.

  37. 37.

    EmbraceYourInnerCrone

    @YY_Sima Qian: true. This year when I got my flu shot the nurse was very careful to remind me that it would not reach full effectiveness for two weeks.  Not sure why people don’t understand this.

  39. 39.

    evodevo

    @sab: Same with clerking at the PO lol – people are such pigs (my apologies to pigs, who I know personally are smart and relatively clean)

  40. 40.

    sab

    @NotMax: I made an appointment when I needed help getting a card for my dad’s accounts so I could online bank, and a new PIN for me. Otherwise everything I do is drive-through with gloves.

  41. 41.

    debbie

    The tweet ninth from the bottom: Does anyone know the purpose of the nurse wearing that large photograph around her neck? Is it a photo of the person she’s treating or a photo of herself so patients have a better idea of what she looks like under all that gear?

  44. 44.

    Sloane Ranger

    @debbie: It’s a photo of her for the reasons you give. Very early in the pandemic, someone made a decision to show patients there was a person under the PPE and it took off on social media  Can’t remember where the original person came from.

  46. 46.

    sab

    @NotMax: I am making an apointment next week because I finally wrapped up all my pennies. The bank has a penny shortage. Can’t send them through the drive-through tube.

    Gloves and mask and pennies.

  47. 47.

    The Moar You Know

    I have been telling people for the last six months “COVID dick” was going to be a thing; it’s in the journals and literature, but you had to dig to find it.

    Viagra won’t help either.  That’s the next word that’ll get out about this.

    “Just a bad case of the flu” – words by which civilizations die.

  48. 48.

    sab

    Stepson’s fiance got her Covid positive results yesterday. Woke up today with no sense of smell or taste.

    Based on the timing, she probably got it from a patient/client kid who got it at their Thanksgiving. She is careful, but still gets it because somebody else’s family  took a chance.

    That’s how this stuff works.

  49. 49.

    Matt McIrvin

    @YY_Sima Qian:

    Good point in a previous cov-19 post: while elderly especially those in group living ctrs will be front-of-line, they are also the folks whose time is limited anyway.

    I think that, even if this is true by the numbers, the potential danger of adopting this type of reasoning is so high that we need to bend over backwards to reject it. The anti-maskers are using the same reasoning to argue that the value of a nursing home resident’s remaining life is so low that it’s less valuable than the freedom of young people to go out to the bars unmasked.

  50. 50.

    sab

    @Barbara: Accept your point. Masks and gloves enforced would take care of much of this.

    Our favorite paint store, with elderly owners, has a mask and glove mandate with a bucket of gloves and a box of masks at front door. They charge you for the masks/gloves when you check out.

  52. 52.

    Matt McIrvin

    @sab: I wonder about the value of gloves for everyday use, unless they’re single-use disposable gloves distributed at the door like that. A contaminated glove is pretty much the same as a contaminated hand, and they’re not blocking germy exhalations like masks do.

  53. 53.

    sab

    @Matt McIrvin: Nursing home caretakers are at high risk and out and about in the community. They need to be at the front of the line. Residents less so, but they need to be vaccinated so that family can come in and check on them. My dad has a private duty nurse in a first rate nursing home, and she says the care the other residents get is less than optimal since no one is checking up on them.

  54. 54.

    sab

    @Matt McIrvin: I got a bunch of cotton “lotion” gloves early on. I use a new pair at every stop when I am out. Wash them when I get home.

    I agree same pair all day is probably worse than bare hands with sanitizer. I like them because they remind me not to touch my face.

  55. 55.

    rikyrah

     

    So, today is the deadline for CPS parents to inform if their child will continue with remote learning.

    Peanut’s grandmother woke me up this morning, after seeing it on the news, to make sure that I contacted Peanut’s parents.
    I did. Her Father was like, I couldn’t find the form online.
    So, I spent 20minutes trying to find it my Damn self. Could not find it.

    They think that they are slick.??

    We are this close to a vaccine and you think that child is going to be sent back, during the worst possible time for the pandemic?
    Not today, Satan?

    Got the email addresses for the Principal, Vice-Principal, Teacher, and did the email blast:
    Peanut is staying REMOTE, and you put her on the REMOTE list for CPS.??

  57. 57.

    Sloane Ranger

    Yesterday in the UK. Usual health warning. These are Saturday’s figures so will probably be low due to weekend reporting/processing delays.

    There were 15,539 new cases yesterday, about 800 less than Friday. The R rate remains below 1.0, but the 7-day rolling average, while still going down is beginning to show a decline in the rate of decrease. Today it only shows a reduction of 10.9%. Cases by home nation,

    England – 12,666 (down @800)

    Northern Ireland – 451 (up 2)

    Scotland – 777 (down @200)

    Wales – 1645 (up @200).

    Deaths – There were 397 deaths within 28 days of a positive test yesterday. 344 were in England, 7 in Northern Ireland, 22 in Scotland and 24 in Wales.

    Testing – No update provided at weekends.

    Hospitalisations – 14,556 people were in hospital on Thursday, 3 December and 1274 were on ventilators on Friday, 4th. Both these and the rolling 7-day average for hospital admissions continue to show declines.

    General – Nothing of note. The news is full of last minute Brexit negotiations. Oh, I can’t remember if I already posted this, but five days ago the Welsh first Minister, Mark Drakeford has been officially barred from over 100 pubs in Wales for at least 18 months as a response to his decision to ban the sale of alcohol in pubs and to set a closure time for them of 6pm. Landlords who have taken this step have threatened they will call the police to have him removed if he tries to ignore the ban.

    It’s a mad, mad, mad world!

  58. 58.

    sab

    @rikyrah: Wow.

    Thankfully our PS said all remote, since too many families have members working multiple high risk jobs, and multigenerational living arrangements.

    Also, they have kept up the school lunch program, no questions asked about needs. So kids can pick up a lunch every day (also all last summer.)

  59. 59.

    Uncle Cosmo

    @catclub: To quote “Pastor” Copeland: Ha. Ha. Ha.

    Public Service Announcement.

    (Object lesson on why acronyms ought to be clearly defined from the gitgo – i.e., written out in full at first use:  Someone will be unable to work out which of the possibilities they’re meant to stand in for. And Murphy’s Law specifies said “someone” will be the person you least want to be confused or mistaken. Said “someone” shouldn’t need to – and wouldn’t, if the acronym is clearly defined from the gitgo. But I repeat myself…)

  60. 60.

    Uncle Cosmo

    @Matt McIrvin: When exiting your vehicle and opening your front door(s) to re-enter the house, use a tissue or paper towel between your gloved hand and the handles/knobs. Once inside, go directly to the sink & wash the gloves for 20-30 seconds with soap and water as you would your hands; strip them off & hang them up. Once dry, they’re ready for reuse.

  61. 61.

    Cermet

    My girlfriend’s relative passed due to Covid (this makes three), last night (expected for a few days now.) He did not believe in masks so I guess he won’t be infecting anyone now. Mixed feelings through this was self incurred.

  63. 63.

    Bruce K in ATH-GR

    @Uncle Cosmo: I wish that “define your acronyms the first time you use them” could get tattooed into the public consciousness. For extra laughs, when I have to translate stuff from Greek to English, Google’s no help because a Greek three-letter acronym often coughs up a fraternity or sorority.

    It’s enough to make me go “JFC(1), WTF(2) is up with all the undefined TLA(3)’s in this POS(4) document?”

    1: Jesus Fbeeping Christ; 2: What The Fbeep; 3: Three Letter Acronyms; 4: Piece Of Sbeep

  65. 65.

    Suzanne

    @rikyrah: So our school district was planning to go from all-remote to a “hybrid plan” during the first week of November, but with opt-out available. Mr. Suzanne and I elected for the OPT-OUT, no need to roll this dice. Then, the week before the hybrid plan was supposed to start, cases were creeping up and the school board voted to continue all-remote until January. Cases here are absolutely bonkers. I have a feeling we will be extending all-remote again.

    Let’s just wait for the vaccine.

  66. 66.

    debbie

    @rikyrah:

    Never ever.

    And even though I’ve got enough now, I am compelled to check stock levels every week at Target just to make sure I will never be caught short again. I will never recover from the sight of empty shelves.

  67. 67.

    germy

    I’m currently reading “The Plague” by Albert Camus (a little light bedtime reading).

    Amazing how much the novel captures what’s going on now.  Some people refusing to be careful, some authorities refusing to admit there’s a problem, a church service blaming the plague on sinners, etc.

  68. 68.

    debbie

    @germy:

    “Stupidity has a knack of getting its way, as we would see if we weren’t always so wrapped up in ourselves.”

    (paraphrase)

  69. 69.

    Gvg

    My sister is planning a birthday party for my nephew. She has come up with the idea of a drive up movie projected on the garage door, 2 other boy’s families bringing them, mostly stay in the cars with a hot cocoa and popcorn “bar” set up in the yard. Take turns getting out to serve. What a year. Luckily a lot of technology is now cheap and easy. She did go a little crazy on different kinds of marshmallows.

  70. 70.

    rikyrah

     

    @debbie:

     

    I haven’t been able to find a Chlorox Wipe since February.

    Had to try others.

    I like the alcohol based ones from CVS. I use them for the daily wipe down of my work area.

     

    I also have come to really like the Dr. Brite brand-Eucalyptus scented.

     

    a big NO for me are the “Green-friendly” ones at Target. Too Damn soapy. I gave mine away.

    thanks to my sister in  Minneapolis,  I discovered MicroBan. Love it. It is a good alternative spray to Lysol, which is overwhelming to me.

  71. 71.

    debbie

    @rikyrah:

    The Target brand wipes aren’t bad, fyi.

    ETA: The Target brand of sanitizer (Defendr) also isn’t bad. It’s 70% and it doesn’t have a weird after-smell.

  72. 72.

    Another Scott

    @Ken: Yup.

    There’s an old truism in physics: Given enough time, anything that’s possible will happen.

    It’s just math.  0.0000001% probability per year x BIGNUMBER of years means that it will happen.

    Similarly, as you mention, other causes of death will not stop as soon as someone gets a shot.  And the vaccines are not shown to be (nor expected to be) 100.0000% effective.  People (especially people in power and people in the press) need to understand this.

    Cheers,
    Scott.

  73. 73.

    gwangung

    @rikyrah: If you’re willing to deal with the great satan, Amazon, they occasionally have sales of Chlorox brand (I think they’re selling them now for delivery mid month for $11.97).

    I’ve stockpiled a few, keeping an eye out for their sales.

  76. 76.

    sdhays

    @Another Scott: My high school physics teacher liked to say that when he dropped a piece of chalk, he always looked up, just in case that was the time it fell up instead of down. He wanted to be he sure he saw it.

  77. 77.

    Uncle Cosmo

    @Bruce K in ATH-GR: Most everything I’ve ever written for pay since the mid-1970s has been a report to one or another government agency, and that admonition got tattooed onto my brain pretty early on.

    I got pretty hot about this with some of the regulars and was pied by a few for “being a dick.” Upon reflection it may be because the guessing-games reminded me of a particularly nasty evening when the only 2 people left in the office were me and the card-carrying-sociopath boss**. I was working on some analysis he was allegedly the expert in, and instead of telling me what I needed to know to finish it properly, he made me guess – every 20 minutes I’d bring him results & he’d snarl, That’s wrong, go do it again! and nothing more. An assignment that should’ve required a half hour took close to 5 hours, because that SOB got his rocks off telling me I was wrong but not what was right so he made me keep guessing.*** Not a good memory.

    ** Think Jabba the Hutt with pasty face, longish greasy black hair and glasses. The primary reason one of us is not dead and the other spending life in prison for his murder is that I was on anti-depressants at the time,

    *** Roughly a year later his assistant for personnel matters (as nice a young lady as he was nasty) said to me during a one-on-one performance review, Do you know why he treats you so horribly? He’s afraid of you. You learned most everything he knows about his field of expertise in a year. You’re more intelligent than he is & he’s terrified you’ll take his job. Not that I particularly wanted his job, but TBH ;^), those few words made my job a lot easier to bear for the year or so it took the SOB to mess with the wrong subordinate, who called HR down on him & got him transferred to an office where he had no peons to abuse.

  78. 78.

    Ruckus

    @sab:

    I deposit my paycheck online. Haven’t been to my bank in over a year. And even then it has been only once in 18 months. I need little cash, only to exchange for quarters every 6 weeks at the bank inside my grocery store for the laundry and that has inch + thick Lexan to thwart any sort of bank robbery. And COVID germs. At most places I need to shop at I use Apple Pay (one could use Android Pay) so there I’m no contact shopping. Well other than the actual products. Is it enough? I don’t know, but the reality is that we have to have some, if not contact, close interaction with other humans because we can not be totally isolated. I had to go to the dentist, I’ve been procrastinating but I had a broken crown. Now that’s pretty high wire stuff, one of us isn’t/can’t be wearing a mask.

  79. 79.

    Ruckus

    @p.a.:

    All of the info I’ve seen says that in the case of COVID, 60 and above is elderly. A lot of us here are over 60, some of us by a fair number of years. It’s not just everyone over 80-85, it’s a not insignificant percentage of the population. Hell it’s a not insignificant percentage of the BJ hordes.

  80. 80.

    karen marie

    @yellowdog:  That’s your bank, that’s not all banks or even most banks.

     

    @NotMax:  I haven’t seen a bank drive through with live tellers in years.  They’ve converted them to drive-up ATMs.

  81. 81.

    WaterGirl

    @Gvg: The operative word there is “mostly” which now makes my hair stand on end.

    Mostly works as well with COVID as “mostly” using birth control when having sex when you don’t want to get pregnant.

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