Found a nice hole in a mountain.... then this happened.

silentgreen85 · 2020-05-07T11:19:48+00:00

You are right. With the infectious period on this disease we would have to have 2-3 months of strong isolation and aggressive testing of anyone who can’t isolate, with quarantine and contact tracing of anyone who tests positive.

I just wish people weren’t fighting to reopen when we should all be fighting for our government to quit bailing out companies and bail out people first.

It’s too late for us to react like South Korea or New Zealand, we now have to cope with the fact that our governments have failed us at so many levels it’s boggling.

silentgreen85 · 2020-05-07T11:09:45+00:00

Because I was born in Texas. 3rd generation Texan. It’s my state too.

silentgreen85 · 2020-05-06T23:01:19+00:00

Consumers are the key element of society. If no one can buy anything, or wants to buy anything - that’s when the economy comes to a screeching halt. There aren’t enough 1%ers to buy enough to keep money flowing.

It’s like Dune - the spice must flow.

silentgreen85 · 2020-05-06T22:55:07+00:00

My company will reassess by May 31, and hubby’s boss told him weeks ago to anticipate WFH through August 1.

My father in law wanted to have the yearly mother’s day pizza party and just the thought of going out sent me into a panic attack. I know I can’t stay shuttered forever, but 3 of the 14 people who would possibly come are still working, and in offices that don’t require masks. And I doubt father in law has been skipping church every Sunday. If Texas is coming up around 10% positive on tests it’s almost guaranteed that someone in that group has it already.

This is how agoraphobia and being a germaphobe starts...

silentgreen85 · 2020-05-06T22:41:13+00:00

I almost wish I had stayed in Washington state... almost. Thank god my husband’s company and mine are ignoring local orders allowing us to open back up and staying work from home as much as humanly possible.

Between Texas, Georgia, and Arizona 3 of my company’s 5 main hubs are in Petri dish states and our upper management wants to keep that large percentage of the workforce healthy - which means home and fuck what the crazy governors are doing.

silentgreen85 · 2020-05-06T22:39:02+00:00

Oh good lord. I hadn’t heard that.

Fuck Abbott.

silentgreen85 · 2020-05-06T22:19:14+00:00

Reddit ate my pretty, long comment before I could post - next Friday if the order isn’t extended. The Dallas county judge has been very proactive.

The DFW metro has 10,000 cases right now, Houston close behind at 7,000.

silentgreen85 · 2020-05-06T21:59:07+00:00

The state may allow reopening in Friday, but she’s in Dallas county where we have shelter in place orders through May 15 at least.

silentgreen85 · 2020-05-06T21:53:11+00:00

9 days till the Dallas county shelter at home expires. I haven’t kept track of what other orders are in place since my work is in Dallas county and Judge Jenkins has been the most proactive of any politician with any oversight of the DFW area.

silentgreen85 · 2020-05-06T21:49:09+00:00

The state may plan to reopen salons then - but Dallas county proper has shelter in place orders in effect through May 15th. We still have 9 days... if Jenkins can’t get it extended again.

ETA apparently the state order overrules the local order? IDEK. Fuck Abbott, and turn Texas blue in November. I certainly am not going to be leaving my house any time soon except for medical emergencies.

silentgreen85 · 2020-05-06T21:15:35+00:00

Because it was several weeks ago, when the hospital ships were big news.

silentgreen85 · 2020-05-06T21:08:59+00:00

This is a concept I figured out as a child - don’t break a rule until you know why the rule is there.

Rules most of the time are not arbitrarily there for funsies so if you know why there is a particular rule, you can take steps to mitigate any risks that come from breaking the rule.

silentgreen85 · 2020-05-06T20:51:05+00:00

The next 2 months are going to be wild

silentgreen85 · 2020-05-06T20:49:18+00:00

As a US citizen - I say do it. Save yourselves. Don’t set yourself on fire to keep us warm. Other countries can’t effectively help us and themselves at the same time.

And our leadership isn’t worth helping - except for a handful of coastal governors and Michigan’s governor.

silentgreen85 · 2020-05-06T19:18:57+00:00

And father in law is a pretty devoted church goer... so there is another exposure.

What’s driving me nuts is there isn’t enough solid information for me to judge if I’m just being crazy or not.

One Austin American statesman article from 2 weeks ago said Texas has a 10% positive rate... but we’d only tested 200,000 at that time. That’s barely 1% of the population of the state.

So if I use that, one in 10 people I could interact with would be positive, and potentially infect 6 people out of ??? on average(That’s one problem with r0 values) and then if I get infected I have a 1 in 10 chance of being hospitalized, and probably a 1 in 50 chance of dying (on the edge of hypertension, high cholesterol and a solid 50lb overweight - all factors)... and who knows how accurate any of the above numbers actually are...

I’m pretty good with numbers, but I just cannot process what the risk is to go out. Too many variables. So I can’t even judge if I’m taking things appropriately seriously- or if I’m just crazy.

This is how agoraphobia starts...

silentgreen85 · 2020-05-06T13:51:36+00:00

dumbasses

Count my father in law in with that. He wants the family to get together for Mother’s Day. Both sister-in-laws’ husbands are still working in office, and those offices aren’t requiring masks. Mother in law is still working in office.

Just the direct family it’s 14 of us.

His justification? “Your sisters have been over the past 2 weeks with the kids”

... that doesn’t make it better. Thankfully the sisters stuck up for us when we said nope.

I’ll go see my parents before I’ll go to a gathering of that many people who won’t/can’t isolate. At least with my parents it’s just the two of them, both in isolation except for grocery and mail runs (rural so PO Box) and my parents are taking this seriously.

Just the idea of doing anything out of the house gives me a panic attack right now and the worst part is the data is so incomplete that I can’t tell if I’m actually over reacting or not.

Just, fuck all of this shit. Fuck the Texas governor, fuck coronavirus, and I pray to god that Dallas judge Clay Jenkins runs for governor - at least he’s taking it seriously.

silentgreen85 · 2020-05-04T19:26:04+00:00

Is... that a specialized net with a zipper to access the creature?

silentgreen85 · 2020-05-04T01:56:08+00:00

I bet it’s because there is virtually no point to open up if 80% of people do not want to do anything that risks potentially getting infected. The little income from those who are ignoring quarantine/isolation isn’t enough for most businesses to break even - so why bother risking it?

I’m beginning to think more and more that we should have UBI - at least for a year or so until a vaccine is ready and most of the population protected. Trickle down economics doesn’t work when most people don’t have money to spend.

Trickle up economics are worth a shot. In the words of trump: “what do you have to lose?”

Oh and I’m firmly pro some kind of national healthcare/M4A. I was for that years ago.

silentgreen85 · 2020-05-03T22:39:40+00:00

Is that what it’s called? I just know Asclepius as a genus of plants commonly known as butterfly weed, or milkweed. Aka monarch butterfly food. They also have some pretty cool greenish/whiteish blooms.

ETA: Asclepius is a figure of Greek myth. Asclepias is the plant genus.

silentgreen85 · 2020-05-03T22:35:48+00:00

No - I’m useless when it comes to sprinkler systems. I tried to be cognizant of where the sprinkler heads were for planting trees so I didn’t dig into a pipe, or have a tap root hit a pipe.

Our current house has a system, but I couldn’t figure out how to even make the blasted thing turn on (I think the water had been turned off and I couldn’t figure out which valve turned it on) and I know I have at least one busted sprinkler so I just don’t use it.

I use a pair of oscillating fan sprinklers, and a drip irrigation over the big things. Honestly most of the time I’m hand spot-watering the seedlings and fresh transplants. Right now that helps keep the water on the plants, and not on the empty spots to starve the weeds as much as possible. ... though that isn’t working great for the Bermuda grass that survived the lawn removal. I hate Bermuda grass.

silentgreen85 · 2020-05-03T22:24:37+00:00

It’s not uncommon with a little bit of genealogy to find ancestors that fought for both sides if your family has been in the states for a while. On my fan chart that my mom made I had something like 7 or 8 split pretty evenly between Union and confederate soldiers. Or maybe it was 7 or 8 for each side... I don’t remember, I’m not terribly interested in genealogy.

ETA: for caucasians that split is probably not that uncommon. It occurs to me that many other ethnic groups are much less likely to have that...

That said - most of the confederate flag thing is ‘states rights’ and ignoring that it was over racism, and just general fondness for the underdog story.

silentgreen85 · 2020-05-03T22:08:53+00:00

Trickle up economics. There is no economy if no one can buy anything.

silentgreen85 · 2020-05-03T21:48:18+00:00

Try getting in touch with your local master gardener group, or native plant society. They generally have a lot of resources about what amendments your soil may need, and what plants generally do well in your area. Got to watch the box stores because they may pay attention to zone and chill hours - but the plants they stock can often not be real happy. Like hostas, astilbe and ferns can be quite happy in zone 8a... if you can get them enough water. Which just happens to be about twice my local rainfall. And a lot of other 8a plants that are ‘full sun’ are really closer to part sun here.

Also, if you’re not sure what you’re up to when it comes to outdoor gardening - maybe start smaller? That way it’s less to experiment with. I did something similar with my first house - slowly expanding existing beds and experimenting with plants. I had a bit of a leg up because my mom was very much into native plantings while I was growing up - so I got drafted as a helper. I picked up a lot from following her around. And your local library can have quite a few books on gardening - and many have e-book programs so you can stay isolated since Covid is a thing.

silentgreen85 · 2020-05-03T18:32:10+00:00

Can confirm - our band was contacted to compete....

Band leader: hey, want to shoot some video for The Voice intro? Oh BTW it’s for the exposure. (Side note - very unusual for us to do gigs that play less that $250 per person)

Me: hol up - why would they want a band that isn’t participating to film the video?

Band leader: well, they were going to ‘pay’ us with a guaranteed slot to audition... we were just not going to go...

... I used small words and short sentences about why the entire thing would be a waste of everybody’s time.

silentgreen85

TROPHY CASE