- Quarantine Day 87
- Livermore cases: 57
- Alameda County cases: 4,007; deaths: 107
- U.S. cases: 1,994,000+; deaths: 112,000+
I guess maybe I should stop titling these posts as "Part X." This is just life and is going to be life for some untold amount of time.
Exactly as the entire medical community predicted and warned, now that states are opening back up the number of daily infections is starting to tick back up in those areas. Modeling is predicting record-setting case loads in a bunch of states sometime between August and October (assuming they continue with their current actions).
And states that were hit hardest in the first wave are still recovering. Connecticut, Maryland, New Jersey, and Rhode Island are still listed as over capacity for ICU beds.
On news of a budding second wave, and a statement from the Federal Reserve that the economic recovery was going to be slow, the stock market did an about face from the fairly steady climbing it's been doing for the past month and dropped 6.9% today (1,861 points).
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Alameda County updated the shelter-at-home orders starting this week. We now must wear a mask when in public within 30 feet of others with significantly fewer exceptions. However, they slightly loosened the isolation requirements. We can now meet, outdoors only (while maintaining masks/distance), with a defined "social bubble" of up to 12 people. You may not participate in more than one "social bubble" within any 3-week period. [I'm under no delusion that the bulk of the population is going to pay any attention to the details of this plan; but we will.]
So on Monday Jess had a friend & kids come over to hang out and let the kids play together for a couple of hours for the first time in 3 months. The girls really needed some playmates. It will probably be a weekly thing.
Other restrictions were also loosened slightly. More low-risk businesses have been allowed to begin operating. Libraries are allowed to do curbside pickup. Some youth-group activities are allowed to start if they follow the social-bubble rules and appropriate sanitation policies.
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Meanwhile, civil unrest has continued on a daily basis across the country. For reasons I could only imagine, multiple senior officials in the Trump administration (and Trump himself) made a point to make statements claiming there is no systemic racism in the country. Given that piles and piles and piles of academic research show quite the opposite I really don't understand what they hoped to achieve with such statements. Obviously it didn't calm the situation any.
At this point there have probably been dozens of statues and monuments all around the country that have been torn down. NASCAR even announced this week that they were banning the Confederate flag from their races and properties which made a bunch of their audience angry.
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Last Thursday I hosted another video-based episode of Dragon Strike for my friends. They finished up the Battle for Bree.
On Saturday, Ivy and Beryl escorted the penitent Dark Mage, Tramii, up Mount Atheros to seek out the Mountain Spirit. Heather Leeroy-Jenkins-ed a group of Orcs and Goblins forcing Jess to clean up the mess. In the cave at the summit of the mountain they fought a Yeti and then Tramii faced a series of trials from the Mountain Spirit. She learned about facing her past and changing her future. She left the mountain as Tramii the White Mage with knowledge of magic designed to help and heal rather than injure and destroy.