Fight off thread. Before you start a post quoting someone else or @ naming them, please think if you are answering a legitimate question, or requesting needed clarification…or if you are annoyed/ mad/arguing. If the latter, TAKE IT TO PM (excuse the yelling, but you all know better).
This thread is going downhill too fast and all the bickering just shows that posters cannot control themselves even under light moderation. Believe me, the rest of us are not sitting here in righteous indignation hoping that you will carry the standard of truth, justice, and the American way.
I went to one of my local beer stores today. Employees were all masked. Only 2 customers were allowed in at a time. They were doing a brisk business filling on-line orders that were available for curbside pick-up.
A favorite local deli reopened this week for take-out and curbside delivery. He had closed one week after our NY PAUSE went into effect back in March.
We walked over today to pick up an order (really want to keep this place in business) and saw that the owner had refashioned a wall in the entry foyer by cutting a hole in it, installing a wall of plexiglass with an opening at the bottom through which he could pass the food or take an in-person order. I had said I preferred curbside but when we got there I was happy to pick it up in the foyer - he was masked, as was I as was everyone I could see in the counter/kitchen area. He told me he offers curbside because there are people who don’t want to step inside at all and he’s happy to bring the orders outside.
Observed: Belmar NJ (popular beach town) jam packed with thousands of people, majority not wearing any masks.
I just don’t understand how that many people, who have been locked down for several months can be that ignorant as to crowd each other and not wear masks, etc…
This is simply not correct. As I’ve said before, I can give you tens of thousands of examples of employees who want to serve their communities and perform their jobs. They work for our company! They are proud of what they do and happy to have the job and work for a great company. Yes, some are afraid and have been given leaves. Most are taking precautions and are fine. You have NO idea how these employees feel about serving the communities (many on the rural side) in which they live and work. I’m talking to them and about them every day and have been helping them for the last several months, so I KNOW! Of course, not every company is as appreciative and giving the rewards that we are, but morale and attitude is not a problem at many customer facing companies. I’m on the phone with most major retailers several times a week.
There’s an assumption here, one that ignores the fact he may end up in an ICU because he shopped for groceries or touched a gas pump and then scratched the side of his head.
Edited out the rest, since there’s no real point to asking it.
Travel is, well, interesting. Nashville airport was sadly empty. All parking lots are closed except for the terminal garage ($$$$). I would say 90% mask compliance in the airport and closer to 100% on the plane. Southwest- limited flights now so it wasn’t empty , but it was sparkling clean and all middle seats were empty. I felt safe.
Rental car experience not so much. 30 or 40 people in line (spaced out). ONE employee handling all of Avis AND Budget. I’m FastBreak, but that is not a thing right now. Took 40 minutes. There were 2 plexiglass terminals for the rentals, and this guy was in between them with NO plexiglass and no mask. No sanitizer and a pen that everyone used. He handled your license, credit card and paperwork. No signage about any COVID precautions. It was very strange. I think they have laid off so many people that they just can’t staff, but they expected precautions were absolutely not in place.
I had on a mask and had hand sanitizer, so I felt relatively OK.
Condo is perfect and clean and hasn’t been used in weeks. Cleaning precautions posted. I’m hearing waves and smelling salt air. I needed this trip.
Thanks for the info about the flight, MOWC. I’d love for my son to fly home to California from Michigan, but those United flight photos I saw last week made me not want to fly or have anyone I know fly.
Our kid is driving from GA to CT today. She normally would travel well west of DC. Today, she drove straight through. She reported some light traffic around Richmond. She said the rest of VA, DC and MD had extremely light traffic, including the Beltway. Very strange to drive the Beltway with no traffic issues.
She called from southern NJ…no traffic really in NJ either. Since it’s getting later, I think she has seen any traffic she is going to see on this long drive.
She has made this drive several times as have we. She says very strange driving the east coast between DC and NY and seeing such very light traffic.
MomofWildChild: I am so glad to hear that you work for such a wonderful, employee focused company! Such companies do exist and I know of several. Unfortunately, I do not believe that the majority of US companies are like this.
I know there are bad companies out there, but the majority of the companies with whom I have associated over my last 8 years through industry associations and, especially, during the current crisis have the interest of their employees paramount. You only hear the bad stories, but I’ve seen many of the CEOs and other management in action during this and the general public is really not seeing what is going on behind the scenes. Many retailers have given pay raises and bonuses for the duration of this crisis, have been extremely generous with paid and unpaid leaves and have taken all possible safety precautions. Of course, it’s harder for the companies who had to shut down and who are on the brink of failing, but they are still trying hard. I heard the CEO of Gap almost in tears. She had only been in her role a couple of months when this hit. She said, “I’m responsible for 130,000 employees and suddenly we have NO sales.”
Back from a visit with D and SIL. They live in a county east of San Francisco. Ordered out for lunch and SIL did the pickup. He said the downtown area looked like ‘normal times’. People sitting on lawns having their lunches. Don’t know about masks and SD but from my previous experience in that county - folks are highly compliant.
Interesting article on why New York and California are experiencing such different effects of COVID…
'New York City is 10 times larger than San Francisco, but has seen 555 times the number of deaths. At least 20,000 people have died in New York City to this point, but that figure is widely expected to be an undercount. San Francisco has seen a total of 36 COVID-19 deaths."
This explains - at least to me - some of the discord on this thread. The east and west coast are truly living in different times.
My company and D1’s company are not allowing any travel in the near future.
I like my profession, but I don’t love my job. I certainly wouldn’t risk my health for my job. My company provides very essential services to the public, but very few workers would say they couldn’t wait to go back to the office. I guess it is because majority of us could work from home. If we didn’t get paid while out of the office we may be saying something different to the management.
Based on what I’ve read about outdoor transmission and what I see here it honestly doesn’t look super risky to me at all. People seem to be distancing from groups they are not already part of.
My friends and family in the hot zone of New Jersey agree broadly with the shutdown, and my friends and family here in the SF Bay Area also agree broadly with the shutdown.
We here in the Bay Area haven’t seen the terrible devastation the folks in the New York Metro area have seen. And we don’t want to.
Different states have different ways of paying unemployment. Some have the first week as a not eligible week, and then have a two week reporting period. You sign and certify that you didn’t work and you did look for work. If your daughter was on an ‘off’ week for reporting, her first week may have been unpaid and then her one week she was paid was for that second week. Usually that’s paid in what would be the third week.
The CARES act changes that and it did allow for people to be paid in that first week BUT not all states could get their computers adjusted on time. Same with the federal supplement.
It is not a perfect system and it is very overloaded. I hope they catch up for your daughter. She should be able to tell by the check/receipt which week she was paid for. She also may have been paid by her employer for that first week and she’d have had to report that. Since she’s receiving health insurance benefits, that may play into it too.
We’re retreating to a new strategy on covid-19. Let’s call it what it is.
‘We’re retreating to a new strategy on covid-19. Let’s call it what it is.’
‘At the beginning of the outbreak, the United States had a chance to contain the novel virus by identifying each person bringing the infection into the country and stopping it before it spread in the community. We failed, with a lack of testing largely to blame. Instead of individual-level containment, which would have had minimal effect on the economy, we had to employ societal-level lockdowns to slow the explosive spread of the virus and buy us time until we developed the capacity to rein it in. The idea was that restrictions would be lifted once we reduced the number of infections far enough and built up the public health infrastructure needed to find new positive cases, trace contacts and quarantine those exposed.’
I’m tending toward the “shelter” group on CC generally, but I would say earlier better than later at this point. My thought is that things are pretty clean and empty right now, and about to get much less so.
I’m also considering all of this in terms of my need for periodontal care (and I listened, increasingly upset, to that TWIV episode as recommended to me). I’m thinking that to go as soon as possible, as early in the day, might be the safest. Similar if my son ends up needing podiatrist care if our home efforts aren’t successful.
I was teaching a class online the other day and some of the students and I were almost in tears from wishing we could be together in person. It’s very hard. But I wouldn’t forgive myself if one of them got sick and died from that, either.