Tag: Covid-19

November 17, 2020 – When will 2020 cross into 1984?

November 17, 2020 /

I have been mulling over this topic for a while now. One catch-22 is that I want to stay as apolitical as possible. But I watch some of the things and I have a hard time not screaming for people to wake up as they seem to be stuck in a logic wormhole. I am trying to evaluate fake news and propaganda versus real problems and I have a difficult time separating or seeing the truth.

One thing that is extremely apparent is that many people are scared out of their minds over Covid-19. I hear it and see it all over the place, particularly with the more aged and health susceptible people in my life. I know people that still believe hiding out or washing and sterilizing shopping bags, voting for the right person or refusing to associate with people will tip the scales on this virus and outcome.

I am one of those people that believe that collectively we have more in common than we have differences. I watch in disbelief as our governor threatens the citizens of my state. And, just as fast as the threats went up, they seem to have been whitewashed. It is difficult to find the quote in the news stories for this post.

November 11, 2020; OPB

I would like to point out (again) the extreme lunacy in the current social distancing schemes by using an example.

  1. Put on mask to leave the car and enter a restaurant
  2. Be seated, take off mask
  3. Be served with mask off
  4. Get up to go to the restroom, put on mask
  5. Return to table and remove mask

Does anyone remember the earliest debates about mask usage? They were originally not recommended, largely because they are generally not considered medically viable. Just as all things get thrown into the meat grinder and become distorted and re-propagandized, it has now become the ‘must have’ accessory to make people feel better about doing nothing. I believe that the guidance was changed for the appearance of doing something that we as humans have very little control over, the spread of a disease.

I am not saying masks are equated to freedom. What I am saying is that people are losing their ability to discriminate between fact and feel good. I have no issues with wearing a mask when required to participate in society. Any private entity has the right to make rules or conditions for entry i.e. masks. People have the right to ask people to adhere to hygiene practices or social distancing to enter a residence. I do have an issue when the government limits how society will associate together. This I find to be strictly un-American practice.

People are abdicating their responsibility to use common sense in situations and wanting the government to handle it by policy, rule and regulation. I draw that conclusion based on the overwhelming election results to double down on state policy that will never work. I read a headline this afternoon that 75% of Americans support an national mask mandate. I am wondering if this is really true or this is another propaganda push?

I will leave with the non-scientific but logical litmus test for this entire situation.

  1. Does the bubonic plague still exist? The answer is yes.
  2. Does polio still exist? The answer is yes.
  3. Does the Spanish flu still exist? The answer is yes.

Covid-19 is never going away. It is never going to be eradicated. Children still get cancer, not just smokers. Shit happens and we don’t know why. Pharmaceuticals may some day do wonders, for now have to do the best with what we have.

I feel like I am living in the transformation of the world of George Orwell’s 1984. We have the surveillance state with the Patriot Act in collusion with social media. We have perpetual war in the middle east and Afghanistan. We have xenophobic hate egged on by the partisan groups. We have a population that subsists on processed food garbage and funded by government rations. Most of all, we have a population that is numb to critical thinking and is spoon fed ‘news’ that gets rewritten .

Just wait, there is going to be some neighbors turning other neighbors in when seven people are gathered. I can sense that it will soon be time for my re-education.

May 6, 2020 – Covid-19 has turned my 5.0 GT into a commuter car

May 6, 2020 /

My son sees a medical specialist every couple of months for monitoring. That specialist works at the research hospital in Portland. For us, that is over an hours drive on a good day. Normally, I make the next appointment when we are at the doctor’s office. I try to make it where it will have the least impact on the school day or in other words ‘as late as possible’. That leaves us at the whims of rush hour traffic during most appointments.

As a life-long, small town guy I find rush hour traffic extremely frustrating. This is born largely out of my belief of the colossal waste of time commuting is. My two years living in the suburbs or Portland cemented that for me in the 1990s. I have tried very hard not to live or work where I had to deal with those frustrations.

First, I needed to get fuel before we left. The Mustang has a small tank to begin with at 16 gallons. With the low price of gasoline I filled the car up for $32. I almost always reset the trip counter when I fuel up because I monitor the fuel economy during that period. It is a habit that I have always done as a double check on the gas gauge.

During our trip, traffic was incredibly light. I would characterize it as Saturday morning. I think that we stopped at two lights in Salem on our way to the freeway and two lights once in Portland. For an appointment at three PM, we would start to encounter the afternoon rush hour at this time, however typically not terrible in the mid afternoon.

Our round trip spanned from 1:30-5 PM. I would have expected 1:30-6:30 PM so I was really happy about that. Now, the best part… the Mustang’s overall fuel economy. I averaged 29.2 MPG on that trip. I have never seen the economy that high before. I usually average about 20-22 MPG. For that trip specifically I have seen it as high as 26 MPG.

The net of this is that the Mustang can be more than double as efficient as my other two vehicles. I am typically no lead foot nor am I a hyper-miler. I enjoy the power sometimes, but it is hard to find a place where I can safely exert it because usually there are too many people about. That usually leaves me with merges or passes when I flex it the most. But, when there is little traffic, it is nice to see what can be done at a steady pace.

March 30, 2020 – Cabin fever… deep (and I mean deep) spring cleaning

March 30, 2020 /

Have you ever moved into someplace brand-new, or even had a new car? Everything is pristine. Fast forward three years and when is the last time you dusted the baseboard? You know the spot in the shower that is not easy to clean the mildew off without removing the shower door? The blinds are dirty, the light fixtures are dust collectors.

This is the one thing about being a landlord that I really don’t like. Tenants never return the place in the pristine clean condition that it was received. And there really isn’t anything you can do about it. So, it is the one chore that has to be done on each transition. It’s also the kind of clean that you really cant pay someone for.

Getting ready for the bathroom

I am suggesting that part of this quarantine time can be used for a really deep cleaning. Think about windows, cabinet fronts, light fixtures and walls as well. It takes a lot of effort and nobody really wants to spend their time doing it. But when it is done, you feel a lot better about the space that is now clean.

March 27, 2020 – Nearing the end of Spring Break

March 27, 2020 /

We took this week to have a stay-cation being that it was supposed to be Spring Break. Our plans were to meet up with another family and spend the week on the coast for some rest and relaxation. That changed first with them coming down with suspected Covid-19 and then the state lockdown.

Next week, we are instituting a much more rigid schedule that will include personal development (self paced learning, reading, art/music, etc.) time, earlier bedtimes and wakeup times. This will be in place until we get word that life will be returning to normal – hopefully April 28.

I am sure everyone that is enduring this period seriously is finding aspects of the quarantine challenging. I am a person that treasures my alone time and personal space, that has been hard to find. But I am also a person that thinks family time is valuable. Here are some of the ways that we have been enjoying the time together.

Puzzles an games for hours
  • Puzzles – This 1000 piece puzzle pictured above took us three solid days to complete. This is a staple activity for our vacation time. It allows everyone to participate and interact for long periods of time
  • Games – I went back in the waaaay back machine to dig out old role playing games (from the 1980s!), build characters and adventure. We also have played Monopoly, poker and Mind Trap.
  • Family movies at night – We have been working our way through the Twilight Series and in honor of Kenny Rogers we watched ‘The Gambler’ the other night.
  • Swap Day – The kids were the parents and the parents were the kids. They planned and executed all of the meals as well as led the entertainment decisions for the day.
  • Cooking- We have been making comfort foods. We have been doing the activity with different family members and involving them in different aspects. A lot more baking and deserts have been made recently.
  • Create parody video – We wrote, acted, filmed and edited a video that was a lot of laughs. We are still in the editing phase, but should be up on YouTube shortly.
  • Make-over time – Not really, but my wife has been bugging me to shave my head for years. So I did, to see what it would look like.

I have to say that a lot of these things I would normally not want to spend time doing. But it seems as though forcing the issue has made something like Monopoly enjoyable. As we head into next week, hopefully it will be an empowering time teaching the kids that they don’t need school to learn and find interest in pursuing their personal projects.

March 18, 2020 – Life under quarantine: Day 3

March 18, 2020 /

Life for the last couple of days has been different. I would say that it has been difficult, but that is not true… it is time for a new normal. We are fortunate in that preparedness is our lifestyle so our pantry is full. I love to cook so I frequently go the grocery store to pick-up items for more exotic/lavish meals. That doesn’t mean I don’t know how to use the basics or substitute or modify accordingly.

In our area, school has been closed until April 28. I am not the biggest fan of our education system, in fact I think that we can do a lot better. However, we have a big problem. We have hosted an exchange student from Spain since August. Now that the remainder of the school year is up in the air, his program has decided to end prematurely and they are recommending all students return home.

It is more like ‘Peace Out – good luck if you want to stay cause we are out of here’. There is a program release form that we must fill out today if our student is staying, otherwise he needs a flight back to Spain. Most exchange students are leaving and our coordinator is worried that re-entry may be months delayed if he doesn’t leave immediately. But the short of it is that they are dropping all liability after today.

The problem is that if this academic year is not considered complete by Spain, that he may have to re-take his Junior year. We don’t really want him to leave pre-maturely but I understand the geo-politics and if we are stuck at home for six weeks anyway it could be quite difficult. My initial reaction was wait and see but that is when school was only out until April 1.

We are fortunate again in that my wife already worked three days a week from home. Now that has shifted to full time at home until the end of April. But, with everyone at home unexpectedly it is a difficult environment to be focused, let alone productive. I have been intrigued by the concept of un-schooling, self directed learning and goal setting. I am looking at opportunities to incorporate this downtime into something positive for the kids and family as a whole.

Quarantine in our current practice means limiting non-essential interaction. So, no friends or social gatherings or extra cirricular activities like church, boy scouts or trap team. We also cannot take advantage of this time for travel or site-seeing. What we are doing is family games and movies after the work day. In our climate, spring can be pretty iffy. Right now it is beautiful and time to do garden prep and walks around town. I think that we will try to get out into local nature during the workday to give my wife some quiet time.

I will probably be putting some effort into project oriented learning for the kids, more on that in a later post. For now, remember that there will be life after this so take note on what works and what is lacking so that during the summertime you can make adjustments to prevent this from being a difficult time in the future.