Tested negative for covid! Mostly on the upswing today. I did briefly have a fever of 100, so maybe it was a mild flu rather than a serious cold?
Booster scheduled for mid-December. I looked for info on whether Moderna or Pfizer might be better after Pfizer, and most of what I found suggested no discernable difference, so I went with Moderna on the principle of hybrid vigor.
I was zooming with my mom. I usually wrestle with the camera because I'm backlit, but it finally dawned on me that my office window has blinds, so I lowered them and it helped a lot.
When we're zooming, I'm sharing my screen so that we can go over family items and I can collect the stories. Apparently when I shut the blinds, the screenshare was much easier for her to see, too.
Why would screenshare involve the camera at all?! Can't they just grab the pixels from the inside?
3: I was on a Zoom this morning where people were sharing their screens, and there was always someone inset; I was using my phone, so the inset had to take up a significant chunk of the screen. Maybe that was affecting her ability to see the non-inset majority of the screen.
2: Same, though Tim is sticking with Moderna, since we're going at the same time. I was fully vaccinated 2 weeks before him April 10 vs April 25, but that's still a 7 month gap to 12/3, so I figure it's good enough.
3.last: No because of the Heisenburg uncertainty principle.
4: She's definitely sitting at a full size computer.
She was very clear that the photos themselves were easier to make out.
2: Here. Differences may not be meaningful real-world but were statistically significant. Not somewhere I can read through, but there's a table that has the relative response. Table 2, maybe?
https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2021.10.10.21264827v2.full.pdf+html
More complete studies coming soon.
9: Interesting, thanks. So that just measured increase in antibodies vs. pre-booster, so not e.g. hospitalization, but taking that as our metric, it does suggest Moderna is slightly better to boost after Pfizer, and vice versa.
After Pfizer: antibodies with Moderna booster x31.7, vs. with Pfizer x20
After Moderna: antibodies with Pfizer booster x11.5, Moderna x10.2
(each combination's N being around 50 in this study)
Boostered. Hybrid like Minivet but the reciprocal cross.
November is the month when good weather comes back to South Cackistan and I am very much appreciating it.
Mr. 9 got a headache on Monday night and a runny nose shortly thereafter. He's tested negative twice on our not-quite-PCR home testing rig, but the school would like a negative on a real PCR platform (that someone else administers) before he goes back, so off to the testing center we went this morning.
The weird part is that as far as I can tell I could just decide on my own that it's "just a cold" and send him back - nobody's checking or taking note of the fact that we called him in sick or is asking us to follow any specific process to let him back in. This is driving my rules-following spouse crazy; she wants to know what hoops we should jump through, and reading some very stern-looking rules from the district while hearing "eh, we'd rather you tested, thanks for caring" from the school nurse is stressing her out, out of fear that we'll be Doing It Wrong.
Meanwhile, I'm scheduled for a booster after Thanksgiving, and at the rate things seem to be going, I will be in the silly situation of having scheduled when it was technically not approved for me but receiving it when it is (I also booked Moderna on top of Pfizer, seems like it'll be at least as good and might be better).
Nervously watching MA's numbers spike in the weeks after Halloween (WTF, people?).
10: You've got it. I think the Moderna vs Pfizer boost for folks who got Moderna first was not statistically significant, but the opposite was. Need more time to asses whether these differences translate to statistical significance at avoiding infection or serious illness yet - it's so rare among vaccinated folks in the first place and going to be even more rare after a booster. That said, the differences are enough that I'd cross if I got a Pfizer the first round, since there's no downside and potential upside.
N hasn't made much difference to outcomes for studies like this. I think their statistical power looked fine for what they're studying.
I have wondered if I should try to get Tim a Pfizer booster. I suppose her could ask for it. The clinic appeared to have both.
WTF, people?
Probably just waning vaccine effectiveness at this point. Once again, the FDA and CDC will be just a bit too slow.
14: I don't *think* there was a statistical difference in antibody response, and real differences should be even smaller, so that's not something I'd bother with. The other way, I probably would. Moderna and Pfizer's long-term protection seems to somewhat favor Moderna (likely due to higher dose in the vax rather than an intrinsic property.) We did Moderna/Moderna.
Fourth day of a non-covid viral infection. (Doctor's comment, "Yep, those still exist.") Blergh.
I got boosted on Sunday (Moderna on Moderna; figured if it didn't kill the first time, no reason to switch). It did kick my ass harder than the first time around. Had a fever from the moment I woke up Monday until the moment I went to bed. Fine on Tuesday. Totally normal today.
One piece that doesn't get talked about much is that N95s are waaaay more effective than other masks, and the majority of folks I see out and about aren't wearing them. I realize they're not as comfortable, but at some point you'd think we would have manufactured a bunch and asked people to wear them. Nope.
This reminds me, my wife has a friend who is a native San Franciscan, now an academic in a red state, which she abhors. She was so pissed at people going around maskless that she started wearing a scuba helmet to the grocery store. A beautiful fuck you.
Yes, despite my joking in the other thread, I'm increasingly convinced this suffering is booster-related. The second Pfizer shot also beat me up. It's a good point that wearing an N95 exclusively after this would make the pain seem more worthwhile.
18: https://envomask.com/. These look hardcore.
Have I shared my (mostly facetious) theory that Iran was hard hit because masks don't fit our noses? The mask in 20 made me think of it.
I was making my son wear an N95 mask to school but it became clear that the other kids were wearing the thinner paper masks so I let him switch.
I wear N95, but I'm never wearing one for 8 hours unless I fly.
18: Yeah, I'm squishy about masks and mask requirements (I'm not exactly against them, and I follow them, but at this point I'm not quite sure what the point is), but it's just weird to me that so few of the super pro-mask people want to require more serious masks. How can it be so important to wear marginally effective masks and not at all important to wear good ones?
Germany was requiring "medical masks" in most public places, but that doesn't require N95 just the regular surgical ones. I'm not sure whether that's better that is from home masks, at various times they've tried to put in N95 requirements but I think they mostly haven't stuck. N95 just suck and regular cloth masks are no big deal.
There was a big controlled study in India that convinced me that regular surgical masks were meaningfully a lot better than cloth. I'd been wearing cloth to minimize trash and then switched. https://med.stanford.edu/news/all-news/2021/09/surgical-masks-covid-19.html
N95s, if worn properly, are uncomfortable enough that I'm not going to unless someone convinces me that it's necessary.
*just* freshly boostered, pfizer/moderna cross bc of the reasons above. also recently had a cold, confirmed not covid via pcr test, & bounced back remarkably fast. i'm pretty sure i got it at the hairdresser rather than the swim club & also suspect got a light dose of virus bc everyone was masked.
most people at the club wear at least a surgical mask if not better, masks required except in the shower. tbh most people don't wear them when going from locker room down to beach bc can't use ear strings when you have a thermal cap on & somewhat ridiculously for a group of people about to immerse in mid- to high-50s water folks are reluctant to stand on cold concrete in the wind & dark to put on caps-goggles. & we are using the sauna, with masks. vaccine required. we all use our key cards to allow contract tracing, & vaxx plus masks seems to work pretty dang well.
i continue to be flummoxed by the prevalence mask resistance in the uk.
I like the N95 masks because you can pocket them and resuse for weeks.
When I say "N95" I should have said "KN95".
25: I went with a kn95 from mask lab, because masknerd, a guy named Aaron Collins who tests stuff at home recommended them, because, you know, we don't have good standards for that class.
Anyway, I sometimes cover it with a cloth mask when it's at the end of its life, but it sits off of your face which makes it so much more comfortable than a surgical mask. Plus cool patterns. https://masklab.us/
Reviews available on YouTube. Twitter handle is @masklab
Also - does anybody have contact info for JRoth? Heebie?
Mask resistance in the UK is partly driven by the telegraph/spectator axis; partly by sheer fucking loutishness. And certainly in London in my experience there is s typing point where people think "no one else is doing this. Why should I?"
Still around. Just scheduled a booster shot for the day after Thanksgiving. It might seem like bad timing but we'll be home, so why not. I had a headache most of this morning. I'm thinking I shouldn't have had the second alcoholic drink last night. I'm getting old.
24: "Germany was requiring 'medical masks' in most public places, but that doesn't require N95 just the regular surgical ones."
Berlin public transport requires FFP2 or N95. I don't have strong views, or indeed informed views at all, on the difference. Probably N95 is more effective because FFP2s are widely available and reasonably priced, what can ya do?
Compliance on transport is well over 90%. Now if only we could get the Polizei to hassle the people who insist on smoking on platforms.
I couple months ago I ordered N95 masks from here: https://www.esafetysupplies.com/collections/respiratory-dust-mask-usa/products/3m-standard-n95-disposable-particulate-respirator-20-particulate-respirators-pack
It looked slightly dodgy, but was way cheaper than the other places I found (~$1.50/mask) and they've been great. That model is slightly more comfortable than a standard n95 mask (and do a pretty good job of preventing glasses fog). As far as I can tell they're genuine 3M masks and they hold up well for multiple wearings.
They are fine to wear up to 60-90 minutes at a time, but they would definitely get old fast if I had to wear them for 8hrs at a time.
31: I'm pretty sure at least one is fictional.
Had Moderna booster yesterday after two original Modernas. Am feeling a bit under the weather since despite having almost no reaction to the original shots.
I don't know if I have your email, but I have his if you email me.
Serious question: Governmental regulations aside, if you're fully vaccinated and have a healthy immune system, why is it important to wear a n95 or kn95? I wear a cloth mask in almost all situations, because it meets state and local rules, signals that I'm not a sociopath, and minimizes my landfill contributions. For a fully vaccinated person who mostly interacts with other vaccinated people, isn't covid basically like the seasonal flu? In Before Times, I wouldn't have deposited several ounces of plastic into the trash every day just to avoid a common illness with a relatively low risk of serious complications.
signals that I'm not a sociopath
My "I am not a sociopath" mask is getting lots of questions that are already answered by the mask.
I used to wear a "I am a sociopath" mask, but people complained that I was sending mixed messages.
But, I hear you. I wear a mask because if I didn't, everyone would think I was a Republican.
32: that all sounds spot on. alas.
39: serious answer - my understanding is that 1- Delta is highly transmissible, 2 - and with a v short incubation period, so that 3 - even fully vaccinated people can develop enough of a viral load, quickly, to transmit even if they, themselves, never become ill bc their immunity kicks in. so wearing an appropriate, well fitted, mask is about weakening transmission chains.
if you're fully vaccinated and have a healthy immune system, why is it important to wear a n95 or kn95?
I was motivated to do so after spending some time on the microcovid site. Your personal risk tolerance might be higher than mine, but I remain concerned about the "long covid" possibilities.
From what I've seen the chance of experiencing "Long Covid" is lower than some of the numbers reported (I think it's closer to 8-10% than 30%) but vaccination doesn't seem to offer notable additional protection (other than the protection against catching Covid in the first place):
It is established that vaccination protects against hospitalisation, ICU admission, and death from COVID-192 but little was known about other outcomes of breakthrough SARS-CoV-2 infections. The data presented in this study, from a large-scale electronic health records network, confirm that vaccination protects against death and ICU admission following breakthrough SARS-CoV-2 infection and provide estimates of HR for these outcomes in a general population. Our study also shows that vaccination against COVID-19 is associated with lower risk of additional outcomes that had not been assessed in previous studies, namely respiratory failure, hypoxaemia, oxygen requirement, hypercoagulopathy or venous thromboembolism, seizures, psychotic disorder, and hair loss.
On the other hand, previous vaccination does not appear to be protective against several previously documented outcomes of COVID-19 such as long-COVID features, arrhythmia, joint pain, type 2 diabetes, liver disease, sleep disorders, and mood and anxiety disorders. The narrow confidence intervals (related to the high incidence of these outcomes post-COVID) rules out the possibility that these negative findings are merely a result of lack of statistical power. The inclusion of death in a composite endpoint with these outcomes rules out survivorship bias as an explanation. Instead, these negative findings might indicate that these outcomes arise through different pathophysiological mechanisms than outcomes which are affected by prior vaccination. For example, for anxiety and depression, it might be that antagonistic forces are at play with the protective effect of the vaccine being counteracted by the additional stressor of being infected despite being vaccinated.
Also, I just got a booster -- Moderna after Pfizer originally.
My son's school and associated parents and family members are going through a mass Covid wave at the moment. Lots of people I know have kids with COVID or have it themselves. I think about 1/4 of xelA's class mates are out sick right now and some years it's 1/2.
The rules here around isolating are not what you might necessarily expect, either. So kids with siblings or parents with COVID still come to school as normal, which, as you'd expect, means that the number of kids with COVID keeps ticking up. There's a lot of dark joking at the school gate:
"How many people in your house have COVID?"
But, often, the answer is not "None".
xelA had a negative PCR, so hasn't picked it up yet, but I'd imagine it's a matter of time. He was playing football with his friend W today and W's Dad and both of his brothers have it.
Because of something Republicans did (I forget what), the mask mandate in school will end on December 4. So kids will have two weeks to really spread it before going home to their families.
The state mandate is ending. I assume local districts can, and urban ones will, still have their own requirement.
39: It's very roughly twice as bad as the seasonal flu. 2 is close enough to 1 that it's fair to say it's basically like the seasonal flu, while also being enough bigger than 1 to argue it's not just like the seasonal flu. Maybe a bit worse than a factor of 2 because it spreads faster, but maybe not because the vaccine is more effective than the flu vaccine. But yeah, not a big enough risk for me to change my behavior in any important ways or for me to care too much about mask policy. The main risk is that all the unvaccinated assholes will full up the hospitals and then like I'll die from getting hit by a car when they could have saved me.
That said, there do seem to be lots of other people who care a lot about masks (I'm not sure why) and what I don't understand is why they care so much about masks but also don't care at all about what kind of mask. That's weird.
It's very roughly twice as bad as the seasonal flu.
Can you explain this calculation a little bit? I had thought that, post-vaccination, covid was actually a little less bad than the seasonal flu, in the sense that the vaccine was more effective against infection, and also against serious illness, than the seasonal flu vaccine.
Re: flu comparisons, the flu also sucks way more than most people seem to think? I think people are so used to calling random minor illnesses the flu that they forget what actual influenza is like. I had it in January 2020 and felt like I'd been hit by a truck; I could barely summon the energy to move between my bed and sofa for nearly a week.
Anyway, the daily plastic waste is too emotionally hard for me to bear. If it turns out that vaccination+cloth mask isn't sufficiently protective, I'd rather just avoid going out in public or talking to people in person. Tbh, the second clause of my previous sentence is true irrespective of the first clause.
50: The simplest calculation is to take the number of people who died last winter and multiply by the vaccine's effectiveness at preventing death and compare that to the number of people who die of flu in an average year. I think I've also done the calculation in other ways and also gotten numbers around a factor of 2 (I think looking at case fatality rates and again dividing by vaccine effectivness?). Of course it depends on other factors, the flu is much worse for kids, and covid is much worse for 70+. I'm not really sure on how the risks shake out in between.
51 is how I was hit by the flu too. That was in about 1998 and is why I started getting the flu shots more deliberately. We didn't even have wireless internet back then. It was rough.
No, I know how bad the flu is. M got the flu so bad in spring 2020 that he had a lingering cough for nearly a year. A close friend of mine (very healthy, 40, no known serious risk factors) died of the flu a few years ago. So I get a flu shot ever year. But I've always known about N95 masks and I never would have considered wearing one every day to avoid the flu.
I woke up on morning and felt awful. I thought I'd take a shower and see if I didn't feel better. I could barely stand for long enough to dry off. Worst I ever felt.
Anyway, the daily plastic waste is too emotionally hard for me to bear.
If I'm just wearing it for 20-30 minutes at a time (putting the mask on when I'm in stores and taking it off otherwise) I'm perfectly comfortable re-using one of the N95 masks for several weeks.
In my experience with both cloth and disposable masks they get gross much faster if you're wearing them long enough (at a stretch) that they absorb significant moisture from your breath. If they have ample time to dry out . . . I think the filter can work for 20+ hours.
51: Yes, the flu sucks, agreed. I went to the emergency room for flu in 2018. Though we mostly notice flu is flu when it's particularly bad, it is possible to have a more mild case of flu just like a lot of covid cases are mild.
On the good side, it seems like one of the four main strains of flu may have gone extinct last year, so we can hope that getting the flu becomes less likely. (I have to find the paper, it was data from Japan over like two decades, but it's amazing how much it matters how many strains of flu there are. Each strain basically takes a year off every two or three years. So every decade or so you just get a winter with very very few flu deaths.)
I will say I did just wear a mask to lecture (here we have a mask mandate but it doesn't apply to public lecturers if the audience is 6 feet away, so I usually lecture maskless) because I'm recovering from a respiratory illness. I wouldn't have done that pre-covid, but probably should have, and probably will do so in the future.
But I've always known about N95 masks and I never would have considered wearing one every day to avoid the flu.
Understood. My personal feeling is that I don't hope to keep wearing them forever, but the current local infection rates are high enough that it still seems like a good idea. But, I agree with 48, that it does ultimately come down to risk tolerance; you can make the argument either way, "the risk is more than I'm comfortable with" or, "the risk isn't large enough to justify significant life changes."
55: sorry, didn't mean to pick on you in particular. I've just been hearing a lot of talk about the flu lately in different settings and getting the sense that people aren't always distinguishing it from a bad cold.
I'm going to keep my new habit of coughing into my elbow.
I'm pretty comfortable with wearing masks on public transit or in grocery stores--it even helps with staying warm in cold weather--but I have to wear my mask while lecturing, and I don't like it. Will be glad when that restriction can be relaxed.
I wish I could find a good estimate of the number of people who have flu at a given time in the winter. I don't have a great sense of whether covid rates right now are really high relative to seasonal flu or not.
Ah right, I don't need the number, just percent is fine. So the CDC says 5%-20% of people get flu each year. The winter peak is something like 30% higher than the average. So we should expect something like 20-70 per 100K new flu infections at the peak of flu season, if I did the calculation right. So I'm not sure that covid rates are crazy high relative to flu.
This thread is giving me a sore throat because psychology.
Sorry the number in 65 was the number of *daily* new infections per 100K at the peak.
44: I'm also terrified of losing my taste and smell for months. That's described as a minor symptom, but if it lasts a long time, that's not minor.
48: NH hospitals are starting to fill up, and their vaccination rates aren't the worst.
39: I wear a KN95 while teaching as it is actually slightly more comfortable than the surgical masks, and I cannot trust that students are vaccinated. The kids wear surgical masks because the Calabat managed to destroy all of his masks last year with dry erase marker (they use it at school and he somehow gets it on the mask, and then it looks like mold) and Pebbles needs a toddler-sized mask and the surgical ones fit her face best. I might switch back to cloth after the kiddos are vaxxed and I get my booster. I don't like the waste. I'm not sure whether I'll continue wearing masks next semester. We're not required to. It's very rough on my voice. Utah's vaxx rates are bad but once we're vaxxed and boostered I'm fast running out of sympathy.
Lots of people (men mostly) wear cloth masks that are just filthy. Like hiker bandana filthy.
70: The under 5s are not yet vaccinated and have no choice to be. Also, at least in MA with high levels of transmission we are seeing hospitalizations of elderly vaxxed.
72: I get it. But also I'm restricting my life and kids so these morons can give COVID to their grandparents. At what point do have to care more than they do?
hmmm. i don't have to do any masked public speaking, and that sounds like it is a real drag for you cala. i don't personally find indoor masking in public places to be particularly problematic.
san francisco (the whole inner bay area) is very well vaccinated, and based on the lines at the kaiser on geary where i was boostered earlier today, we are enthusiastically boostering ourselves. we are also still masking indoors pretty consistently. there are exceptions - indoor dining, including bars, is open, although i believe restricted to those vaccinated. gyms and other locations with a stable and limited number of vaccinated people inside are not requiring masks (i.e., members only gyms, offices or churches with known, recurring attendees who can be contacted if there is a positive case). my swim club is still masking bc we have to allow casual day users under the terms of our lease, so we aren't taking off our masks indoors any time soon. the schools are masked. and with all of that - we've had cases head north over the last couple of weeks. north from a low base, yes, but still ...
i'm waiting to see if hospitalizations, icu and death numbers also tick up over the next couple of weeks. if they do, then it sure looks to me like the foreseeable future is recurring (yearly? twice yearly?) boosters and masks in most public, indoor settings.
I've been using the same (style) mask that NickS linked to (it's also the style they gave my wife at work). I'm using the 1870+ variant. Fits my nose. Also fits the boys very well, so I'll have them wear those when we fly.
I don't go too many places besides work (sad!) and mask pretty much everywhere -- and it's really bothers me only when I'm teaching -- but that's likely to be one of the scenarios for which masks are justified for a while yet.
the foreseeable future is recurring (yearly? twice yearly?) boosters and masks in most public, indoor settings.
I have a lot of really dark thoughts about what this is likely to do to the social fabric in California (and elsewhere). As we have all learned, some minority of people reacts really badly to being told to wear masks for any reason at all, possibly overlapping with people who won't wear protective equipment at work or anywhere. I have no idea how mask jadedness is likely to spread over time, especially if it starts to look like there will be no end to it. I imagine the end will have to come by fiat one way or another.
Also, how avid are you about wearing masks outside? I just do it more or less neurotically to avoid people ever seeing my face at all dirty looks. During that bike ride from hell with the car battery on my back I admit I was unmasked, but I saw almost no one.
I take my mask off as soon as I step outside, unless the cashier is still looking at me.
I don't wear one outside, unless I'm interacting with a group who are all wearing them. I'm pretty risk averse, but the chances of vaxxed people transmitting or catching it outdoors seem to be very, very low.
79: Almost never. I would if I were in a big crowd, maybe, but there just isn't much risk to the outdoors.
I wore masks outside when I went to watch the big tennis tournament in Cincinnati, and I think that's about it. This is probably a significant difference between big cities and other places, but here the protocol is to just maintain distance from strangers outside. Some people did mask outside last winter, but after the mandate went away for vaccinated people and then came back, outdoor masking hasn't returned at all.
Yes. I use to pull on my mask in the business district or other peopled sidewalks, but that was a while ago.
For example, for anxiety and depression, it might be that antagonistic forces are at play with the protective effect of the vaccine being counteracted by the additional stressor of being infected despite being vaccinated.
This doesn't imply that COVID actually alters brain chemistry to make a person depressed, it's simply saying that if you're prone to depression, experiencing something kind of shitty might aggravate it. It feels squirrely to lump it in as a symptom of long COVID as though somehow the disease is actually the causal mechanism.
The worst long COVID symptom is making coffee taste like rotten meat.
You really have to clean the pot sometimes.
I wear a cloth mask (a nicer one, but still) outdoors, which these days is mostly while walking my kid to school. He's in a KF94 all day that he puts on before leaving the house; I have been unable to rationalize not wearing one while he does. And now that it's getting cold outside, I'm enjoying the warmth.
only outdoors at the market, when it is crowded, and mostly to be polite. i'm not convinced it is needed, but see no harm or annoyance when the majority of people prefer to be masked.
i really really do not miss the masked bike riding, particularly uphill, of last winter.
i would love to be able to rely on vaccines (including boosters) alone, and maybe in a few more months hospitalizations and deaths will have clearly decoupled from cases and we can drop the masks in the bay area. we just don't know yet - maybe portugal will show us the way???
also - the kid just put his first straight up genoise in the oven and it smells fantastic, i so hope i turns out! i weighed things out but did not touch a thing when he folded in the butter. fingers crossed!!!
I had gotten complacent, thinking I'd gotten to a point where I didn't stand out as obviously trans if I kept a mask on, and had that misconception corrected in a nasty and scary way on the train Monday night. It was bound to happen some time, and really it's more surprising that I'd been out and about for 6+ months without something like this happening. Anyway, it's rattled me and I feel reminded to stay careful.
oh lk sending lots of love and support 💓💓💓. what a wretched yuck mess i wish this wasn't a thing in your or anyone's life, what a pointless waste.
I'm getting my booster on December 8th, I don't know if it will be Pfizer or Moderna (I had Pfizer before)
Wedding is on Saturday! Exciting! My mom got in today and we had dinner at the VRBO where she and most of her side of the family are staying. It was nice.
89: I'm sorry to hear that. Hope you can feel unrattled again soon.
The secret to winning marriage is to be the one that has totaled the fewest cars owned by the other.
87: I don't generally wear a mask outside. After church at probably wear it until I get to the car. But I'm thinking about getting a wool mask for winter.
I have a mask from inexgear that's very comfortable.
https://www.inexgear.com/?gclid=EAIaIQobChMIhPvksISi9AIVxZyGCh1sKwuREAAYASAAEgJt5PD_BwE
I wear one in the halls of my building on the way out. When They first dropped the outdoor mask mandate, I went out on a chilly evening and found that I preferred the mask. I would have been fine with an extra vest or jacket, but without that I felt cold without the mask.
Thinking of you, lk.
Teo -That's great.
SP's recommendation for these: https://www.respilon.uk/products was some of the best advice anyone has offered throughout the whole pandemic experience.
doing box jumps in a goddamn mask, though, can fuck off. dancing isn't so bad but interval training is torture.
I think I was just passing on someone else's recommendation of those since they're not what we use these days. We have air queen KF94s for the kids to use at school or when we are in other public places.
Don't let the assholes make you feel bad lk.
As for my day so far, I had a flat on the way to work, my third in as many months. Does anyone have experience with this shield system? It's pretty expensive so unless it mostly eliminates flats it might not be worth it. I also need to start carrying a hand pump.
Then I got the USPS daily digest email with images of today's mail and it appears we're being audited. Our taxes are not that complex so I'm not sure what I might have messed up- the only thing I can think of is we started doing backdoor IRAs a couple years ago and I had to move an IRA into a company 401k. I assume audits are like court cases in that you'd be a fool to represent yourself?
Maybe you got identity thieved? I had someone file for a return in my name when I owed taxes.
No. That's why the IRS started mailing me.
oh god, lk, that's awful.
Also it doesn't invalidate your experience that a vast majority truly didn't notice and accepted you at face value. A person who treats you like shit over this had their antennae out and is fighting their internal demons on gender, at your expense.
I also have an IRS problem!!
I got a form which is basically, "We need to verify your identity. Please call us within 60 days."
Every time I call, I get a message that says, "The wait time is too long, please call back tomorrow." I can't get through. I've been trying for two weeks now.
What the hell? It doesn't appear that I can verify my identity over the website.
You can usually just send $500 in iTunes gift cards.
Did you ever get eFile PINs? Usually you can get those sent to the address on your return and use that to verify online. They pick the PIN for you, a random 5 digit number for each filer on the return.
Mine was 12345, so I keep filing on paper.
Is that also the combination on your luggage?
That's just four digits, like the airlock.
Luggage locks always seemed like a 70s thing to me.
So sorry, lourdes. Illegitimi, etc.
Thanks, all. The person on the train certainly had internal demons, arguably external ones too. I tried to unpack it some on the other other place, or whatever we call that one; it was kind of a remarkable 90-second fable about race, class and gender in 2021 America, at least the Bay Area, and led lurid to conclude that it's all structural hostility here.
Congratulations teo!!!
re: 113
Commiserations on having to deal with arseholes.
re: 100
Tubeless tyres with sealant. It's life-changing. I've had basically zero punctures in a year, riding multiple hours a week in London, and I ride off-road on gravel and stones quite a lot, too.
Then you can add something like: https://www.vittoria.com/ww/en/bike-accessories/tire-inserts/air-liner-road
Do tubeless tires really not have tubes or it is like clipless pedals that have clips?
My only concern with tubeless is it sounds like they have to be handled by a professional if anything does go wrong. Last summer appointment waits at bike stores were running 3-4 weeks. Also my local shop were assholes about my particular bike because they seem to know it's a DTC sales company and they didn't want to service it at all when I had some broken spokes.
I set up and deal with my own tubeless tyres. The only hard part is getting them initially seated, where something like an Airshot helps. If they get a puncture that won't seal you can patch it, or just stick a tube in.
Re: 116
They are really tubeless. It's exactly like car tyres. The tyres go on the wheels and a white latex based sealant keeps them air tight and seals any puncture you get (up to a few mm in size).
Or use some Slime tubes. Which is easier.
Thanks. Tubeless except when they use tubes.
Slime tubes as an alternative to tubeless. But yeah. You can always stick tubes in a tubeless tyre and it will work fine.
I should buy a nice bike but I'm going to redo the bathroom first. I'm tired a traveling back in time to 1986 when I take a shower.
117: I paid the shop to set up my mtb tubeless and it took only a day (and only because they were out of valve stems.) We could have done it but I didn't feel like dealing with it. It seemed to be in a different queue than ordinary repairs fwiw. Refreshing the sealant is easy. But you could stick in a tube in case of a flat - they work just like normal tires.
I'm tired a traveling back in time to 1986 when I take a shower.
I wish I had a hot shower time machine.
The trick is never removing pink cultured "marble" or soap scum.
lourdes, I'm so sorry. Stay safe and well.
I love pink cultured marble in bathrooms. I hope by "redo the bathroom" you mean replacing your hardware with gold-tone fixtures, if you don't have them already.
Redo the whole thing in white subway tile and a tub without rust.
And a modern poopinator. The 80s low-flow toilets aren't great.
We are looking at houses, and I am trying to figure out how much fixing up I would be willing to do. I hate the gray wall, dark wood aesthetic of the people flipping houses, but I'm not really interested in buying a house where a I need to renovate the kitchen right away.
We moved in and painted all the walls off-white. And the ceiling and baseboards too, because we realized we wouldn't finish if we stopped to do things like trim. Now we're slowly repainting the right way.
133: My father-in- law found painting walls therapeutic and was meticulous. One of the sadnesses of his dying was that he never got to see us move into our first house. I hoped he would help with stuff like that.
There is a house I kind of like which has been on the market too long, because si thin' the owners have unrealistic ideas about what it's worth. It doesn't have a garage but has space for one. I keep wondering if it would be crazy to buy it if we got a deep discount. I kind of wonder if there's something dreadfully wrong, because the price was dropped in July, there was a contingent offer and then it went back on the market. They keep putting it in and taking it off.
We have a meeting with a realtor who was recommended to us, and she's been in that area for more than 40 years, so I bet she'll know the scoop. There are 0% loans you can get to make stuff more fuel efficient, so if we could get a huge break in the price it might be ok.
But there are probably structural issues.
My father-in-law hated painting, but he still was there for the whole thing.
But there are probably structural issues.
Economic inequality and zoning that prohibits more dense construction in the areas where good jobs are concentrated.
137: I meant with the foundation of the house. That's why I wanted to e-mail JRoth - so he will talk me out of thinking about buying it
Moby misses obvious things like that sometimes.
Today's lesson is that I shouldn't try to figure out the contents of an official government letter by trying to decipher the partial bleed through on the USPS scans. It turns out it's a bill for some social security tax that TurboTax set everyone to defer automatically under the CARES act- there are dozens of sites with people wondering why they're getting a bill and basically TurboTax did it automatically. So I owe the IRS $42.
141: Are you supposed to pay now or can you wait until you file?
Have to pay by Dec 15 since it would have been due April 15 if not for the deferral.
The conversation has moved on, but I just wanted to mention that I've been wearing a portable voice amplifier so that I don't lose my voice teaching while masked, and it helps a lot.
I didn't know that was even a thing.
I mean, I knew about megaphones. But there's probably a pedagogical rule against using those.
It still feels weird to see saiselgy pilloried as a major media figure, but here we are. I guess I'm going to have to update my priors about teo, too. Though in a different way.
Just because I have a compulsion to reveal to you all how silly I am -- it occurred to me that if Unfogged was a TV series, teo's wedding would make a good final episode.
Which raises the question of on what date did it jump the shark. Sometime in 2008?
I'll volunteer to script the lesser-quality spin-off.
You can be a lifeguard by day and a detective at night.
155: Heebie, you are scripting Unfogged: The Next Generation, the successor that surpasses the beloved original.
We just have to make ogged be French and less if a loose cannon.
Good call -- I'll toss something up.
96 -- Are you winning, losing, or tied, Moby, and is everyone okay?
I'm losing but the loss isn't recent and no one was hurt.
I am not going to liveblog teo's wedding, but just listening to the pre-livestream music at home I'm already tearing up.
Tell them we said congratulations.
Congrats!
Wikipedia says otherwise, but I always thought it meant "Why did you break that glass?"
What peep said! Did your face cramp from smiling?
I attended in person. I threatened to liveblog the wedding, but it was an empty threat. However, after two days of being asked how I know teofilo and tersely replying, "The internet," I was wondering whether to just start providing his friends and family with the Unfogged URL. I can say that teo's sister is pretty grear.
In short, it was lovely. Mazel tov, teo.
177: Was it in Alaska? Long trip.
Aw, thanks, everyone. It was perfect in every way, as good as we could have possibly expected.
I can't. This is important. I'm thanking people on the internet.
Alright, that's a wrap. It's been a great run. Goodbye, everyone.
Congratulations, Teo! And good luck, Bride of Teo!
Yay Teo and everyone who was representing unfogged.
Remember that as soon as you get married, all your previous sex becomes premarital sex.
Congrats!
Don't we need closure on all of our plotlines? Like, in an ironic twist of fate, Stormcrow becomes editor of the New York Times. Ogged posting more recently smacks of Diane coming back for the finale of Cheers, but what's the equivalent of the climactic scene between Sam and Diane on the plane?
Ogged, Heebie, and Lizardbreath walk into a bar. Bartender looks up and asks 'Is this some kind of joke?' Heebie responds, 'no we're inventing Web 4.0' to which the bartender responds, 'that's the 3rd time I've heard that this week.'
And this is the way the blog ends
Not with a bang but a "Fuck you clown"!
teo! so happy for you & your better half!!! 🎉🎉🎉
It could be like the end of the Truman Show, where the rest of us are moved in a catharsis of emotion by teo's wedding. And then as soon as it's over, we all ask "What else is on?" and immediately turn to Twitter.
I usually just grab as many Jordan Almonds as I can and sneak out.
At the risk of violating the sanctity of off-blog ceremonies, I really liked how the Zoom Rabbi translated the prayers into English every few sentences. I've never been to (or watched from home, I guess) a Jewish service that did that.
I like it when they explain that marriage is important because there is no "i" in "happyness."
200: It was a very thoughtful move and clearly appreciated by the vast majority of attendees. AJ was tickled to be recruited to hoist a chair at the reception.
I put up a picture at the Other Place for anyone who's connected.
There is "meat" in "team".
"There's no I in team, but there's an ME in that motherfucker."
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kr_qIbESyj4
Because this is episode Kobe four.
We had several people tell us they'd never been to a Jewish wedding before but that they found it deeply moving and meaningful. The rabbi did a great job at making it accessible to an overwhelmingly non-Jewish crowd, and it didn't take many tweaks to her standard script to make it particularly appropriate for our specific circumstances.
To illustrate how goyishe the crowd was, we had to scramble to find two witnesses to sign the ketubah. Traditionally witnesses should be Jews who are not related to the couple, and there were not very many people like that in attendance! We did find two local friends to do it. Both are active in progressive politics, perhaps unsurprisingly.
Judaism really does life-cycle stuff very well. It's one of the best aspects of the tradition.
Congratulations!
but you still do want to sex Mutombo, right?
210: That's always an awkward conversation an Unfogger has to have with their partner, once the relationship is serious enough.