wild_turkey

Here’s a COVID trend for your state: Just out of curiosity, what day did you have your family holiday party and how were the infection rates that day? I honestly don’t care what you do and it actually sounds like you’ve been doing a fair job limiting COVID spread, but you did ride into this thread on your moral high horse to admonish other people for travel when your own actions close to home are clearly imperfect by your own admission. You just seem to pick and choose which activities are acceptable to you and which activities you deem irresponsible. We are all making countless sacrifices to get through this pandemic. Maybe you don’t agree with travel of any kind but there also is a good chance that some people who travel would not agree with everything you do. Travel can be done in a reasonably safe manner and if anyone is completely opposed to that, then I would expect that same person to be shaming everyone who shops for groceries in person, gets a haircut, lets their kids have play dates, or hosts holiday dinners with people outside their immediate family.

Why do you go to grocery stores? Seems like an unnecessary risk when you could simply use online shopping. Why do you let your kids have play dates? Unnecessary risk IMO. Wait, the kids go to school to? In person? Are you insane? There’s a pandemic going on. You had a holiday dinner with your in-laws? One of those people had a positive test and you simply “punted for a few days”. Unnecessary risk. The CDC clearly told people to spend holidays with their immediate household only. Have you or your wife had your hair cut? Been to the doctor or dentist? Ever been into Target or Lowe’s or Home Depot? How do you get parts for your Bronco, online or in person? In case you haven’t noticed, COVID is going on and it’s really not a good idea to ever leave your home or have face-to-face contact with anyone you don’t live with. Your holiday dinner could’ve been a superspreader event and you could’ve easily taken a year off and wait until next year or 70-80% vaccination.

We went to Purgatory this past weekend. The snow wasn’t great but most of the groomed runs were open. They did get 7” of snow right after we left with more on the way this week, so maybe it would be a little better if anyone else is going soon. Most of Colorado is low on snow. Wolf Creek has pretty good snow right now so that might be a safe bet. From a Covid safety standpoint, skiing felt very safe. The lift lines were spread out, everyone wore masks, never really got close to a stranger for any reason. On mountain dining was outdoors only and very limited.

As someone who has been to St. Barth twice during COVID, I would agree that it feels very safe due to the entry requirements but it is certainly not a COVID-free zone and you still have to follow basic precautions and use good judgement once you are there. That should be true of anywhere though.

I find her scenes damn near unwatchable. Every scene is an emotional breakdown over how much she loves Filip and regrets abandoning him, ending with her crying. I wonder if Dominique Tipper gets annoyed when she reads a script and realizes she has to cry 4 times in an episode. Also, it seems to me that the protomolecule still exists because Naomi gave it to Fred Johnson, and her current season 5 struggles occurred because she chased Filip and got herself captured. Her emotions dictate her actions which causes problems for everyone. The best episodes have lots of Amos and less of Naomi.

How does it take over a month to determine the cause of death and rule it a homicide?

FWIW, the TMA made a chart back in the summer that listed travel by plane as moderate-high risk. It's level 7 on a scale of 1-9, along with activities like getting your hair cut or eating indoors at a restaurant. This is based on TMA physicians expert opinion. They then released an updated holiday version of activities by risk level, which had travel by plane as level 5 on a scale of 1-10, which falls under moderate risk. It seems like they have downgraded the risk of plane travel, but the holiday chart also lists a lot of holiday themed activities, which I'm not sure how many people are doing those anyways. Furthermore, JAMA published this information in October that says "the risk of contracting COVID-19 during air travel is low". https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/fullarticle/2771435 Obviously, travel increases risk of contracting or transmitting COVID because you are inevitably exposed to other people. At the same time, there many activities that are higher risk, some of which people are doing routinely without a second thought. Perhaps shopping in a grocery store, sending your kids to school, or visiting family during the holidays are all equal or higher risk. Everyone's threshold for the level of risk they are willing to accept is different. I personally feel that travel can be done in a relatively safe manner if you plan carefully and take steps to mitigate your risk. The airports are half empty and the planes are clean with everyone wearing masks. If someone wants to shame me and others for feeling that way, I can sort of understand that position but I would also be curious what activities that person had been engaged in during the past 10 months. I would suspect that 80% of people are in some way engaging in activities with equal or higher risk at times.

It’s the travel board. Lots of people travel, even during COVID, and manage to do so in a reasonably safe way.

We’re all terminally ill.

No symptoms at any point but tested ~5 times due to travel requirements and a couple other random things, all negative. I was also curious if I had an asymptomatic infection, given that I’m a physician and see a lot of patients, so I took antibody tests in April and November, both also negative.

Also just finished Second Suns by David Oliver Relin. It’s about a Nepalese ophthalmologist and an American ophthalmologist who team up to provide cataract surgery for poor people in Nepal and Africa. I really enjoyed it because it’s in my line of work, but others may enjoy it from a humanitarian standpoint. Regardless, the main reason I’m sharing is because of this excerpt towards the end of the book: These are ophthalmologists hiking in the Himalayas in the mid-2000s when they encountered this guy. I’d be really curious to find someone who knows the Longhorn who got mauled by a bull and had his intestines sewn back in by an ophthalmologist in the Himalayas.

Just read Night by Elie Wiesel. It’s well written and a quick read, a reminder of how horrific the Holocaust was. I’m not really sure what else can be said.

Headed up to Purgatory for the weekend. Snow looks rather shit but oh well, I’m happy to ski a little.

Yes, it is extremely frustrating. If they are going to make this stupid rule at this point in the game, at least use it to incentivize people to get vaccinated. If we assume vaccines are 90% effective, I would imagine that’s comparable to the trustworthiness of a person getting a negative test while on vacation, then running around for up to 3 more days and possibly contracting COVID before actually flying home. If you gave me the choice between which person to sit next to on the plane, I’d take the vaccinated person over the person with the negative test.

That sucks that you still have to get tested even if you are vaccinated. Seems like that should be an acceptable exemption just like actual COVID infection is acceptable.

I tried to put this on in the background yesterday. Made it about 10 minutes and realized it wasn’t worthy of being on in the background. That’s pretty damn bad. Not that I had high expectations or anything, but the first one was alright and there haven’t been any good new movies lately, so I was hoping it would at least be a decent popcorn flick. That was clearly too much to ask.

It seems like they messed up the clock there. The play before the timeout Rivers threw to Pittman on the left and Pittman went out of bounds with 19-20 seconds left. Clock should’ve stopped. The clock started running again when the ball was set (although it should’ve remained stopped?), down to 14 seconds when Rivers snapped the ball for the play that was negated by the Buffalo timeout. After the timeout, Indy had 14 seconds on the clock. Seems like it should’ve been 19 seconds unless I’m missing something.

I’m very sorry for your loss. I can’t imagine what you are feeling and I don’t know what else can possibly be said. I hope your family finds comfort and strength in each other.

The problem I see with that is that there is a huge amount of variation between the types of facilities that can administer it and the regions in which they are located. A uniform process might introduce standards and protocols that make logistical sense for a hospital but not a private clinic or CVS. Or perhaps it works at an HEB in Austin but not an HEBin Big Spring. That could potentially deter facilities that are otherwise interested in providing it due to administrative or logistical barriers. I lean more in the direction of giving the facilities more autonomy to determine how they feel they can be most effective. They know their own capabilities, strengths, and weaknesses more than a government committee in another city or state. Maybe it will look sluggish and inefficient in places, but hopefully the lower degree of oversight will make it extremely easy to become a vaccine provider and reach a broader degree of the population faster.

I can’t remember if it’s been discussed here, but Maple Branch Brewery is a nice little spot. Lots of beers on tap and they have a big indoor and outdoor space. People stay pretty spread out and it feels reasonably safe from a Covid standpoint. They are located in the Foundry District, a few blocks behind the W 7th Target.

Got the Moderna vaccine first shot this morning. That felt pretty damn good.

I went over to Placerville once to ride horses with Roudy after he moved out there. Good guy, hope he’s still getting around ok. I’ll be back in Telluride in 5 weeks for skiing. Looks like the snow is finally starting to fall and I’ll be fully vaccinated by then so things are hopefully looking up. (fingers crossed) I’ve been there in all 4 seasons and it’s a fantastic little corner of the world. Almost took a job in Montrose a few years back just to have Telluride in my backyard. I still kick myself sometimes over that one, especially when I’m up there and see how gorgeous it is. Sitting at the top of lift 9 and marveling at the beauty of the canyon is a religious experience for me. Maybe I’ll retire there one day.

What about the NM mandatory 14 day quarantine order? Seems like that eliminates NM as a ski destination for anyone except NM residents.

We’re going to Purgatory in January and Telluride in February, staying in an Airbnb both times with more than one household. Neither place has ever mentioned a one household restriction and I don’t see anything online so hopefully that doesn’t become an issue.

I don’t see anything online that skiing is shut down in Breck. Details here?