COVID-19: Part 39

July 17, 2020 3:12 pm
  • Quarantine Day 123
  • Livermore cases: 349
  • Alameda County cases: 8,556; deaths: 160
  • U.S. cases: 3,555,000+; deaths: 137,000+

A triple quarantine. Ugh.

The school system sent out a notice that school will be either fully remote or as a hybrid model with limited on-campus time each week in smaller groups with the option to dynamically switch between modes depending on conditions. Given the data trends, I'm expecting things will start fully remote at this point, unless things really turn around in the next four weeks.

So Jess ordered a desk and chair we can put in Heather's room under her loft-bed so she has a dedicated school-work station. I'm setting up deal alerts on Chromebooks so we have a dedicated computer available for her (the school system has Chromebooks available, but I'm guessing we can get something better and also ease the demand on their supply for others who can't afford to just go buy one right now). I'm expecting we'll see a run on Chromebooks as the school year approaches (since many district use them) so I'm hoping to grab one before that happens.

How remote Kindergarten will work for Corinne is a mystery. She really needs the hands-on, in-person experience. So it's sad she won't get to have that. But we are fully in support of following the best available medical advice on how to do schooling safely.

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I interviewed for a "Group Leader" position at the Lab today. It's basically the bottom rung of the management ladder. It's only funded at 5% so you still do a regular technical job 95% of the time. Mostly it's handling performance appraisals and career development type activities for a group of 10-20 people.

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Last night my friends played the Gambler's Pass adventure in our campaign. One of them used a flying spell to fly across the Red River and avoid falling in when the bridge was destroyed. So that was unexpected. I'll have to do a little re-writing for the next adventure to account for that.

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More and more states are enacting mandatory mask regulations. But then you have Georgia whose governor passed an executive order banning mask mandates in the state that had been enacted at the city level.

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I finally got my hands on "Ring Fit Adventure" a fitness game for the Nintendo Switch. They've been completely sold out since March and any time they are in stock they sell out again within minutes.

We've all been playing that this week (except Corinne who isn't strong enough to squeeze or stretch the resistance band). It's pretty fun.

It's a great evolution on the Wii Fit concept. In Wii Fit they created a bunch of minigames where you exercise to play the games. But they had no overarching narrative so it was interesting but you still had to have the base motivation to do exercise since the minigames lost their novelty fairly quickly.

In Ring Fit Adventure they built the overarching narrative and exercise is the medium of fighting enemies and advancing the story. So while the actual exercise is still repetitive (repetition is rather the point) there is a developing story line and your character's strength and abilities level up so it's much more engaging.

Consequently we've all had sore muscles all week.

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