Friday 12/19/2020

After a relaxing start to give the outside temp a chance to get over 45, I walked the route.

During my walk I was realizing, thing by thing, all the things I will be able to do after the second shot of vaccine. Yesterday afternoon I realized it meant I could go back to volunteering at FOPAL. (Although, today, it dawned on me, I will never be able to do some of the things I did there, because I have a lifetime ban on lifting more than 20 pounds! Which means, banker’s boxes full of books that I used to sling around all the time, are off limits to me. It would be playing Russian roulette with my aorta. This will make a significant difference to how I work at FOPAL.)

Today I began to realize all the other things that I’m not doing, just because I cannot accept the risk of bringing the virus back into Channing House. Truly, I don’t worry very much about catching the virus myself. I’m basically healthy, I take mass quantities of vitamin D, etc. Maybe I should worry about the personal effects; after all, it could kill me. But honestly, from the beginning my top concern has always been that I do not want to be the asshole that brings the virus to the 6th floor of Channing House. Not least because several of my neighbors are in just the health condition that it would snuff them like candles. So I have not been going to grocery stores, not going to plant nurseries, not getting my teeth cleaned… avoiding all the public places and unnecessary exposure. (I still regret going to that hobby shop a couple of months ago, although it worked out fine.)

Even after the full dose of the vaccine, I understand I will still be masking up and distancing. But just the same, I will be able to go into Piazza’s grocery, or Ace Hardware, or Palo Alto Dentistry any damn time and as often I please (or finally go get that goddamned colonoscopy) and not worry in the slightest about contracting the virus and bringing it back. February is going to be Freedom month.

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In Rhonda’s open meeting the subject was almost entirely the vaccine. We are still told by the CVS organization that we will have a clinic on the 28th or the 29th. Yes, they will have nurses and be ready to deal with anaphylactic shock. There were a lot of questions about the consent form which is confusing as hell. I had messed mine up and clearly others were having trouble as well.

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There is still a lot unknown about the vaccine. I am struggling with probabilities. It’s 95% effective, figured as follows: in the Phase 3 trial they gave it to half of 42,000 people. There were 170 cases of COVID in that group: 162 in the control group, 8 cases among the 21,000 people who got the real stuff (and none had serious illness). Eight is about 5% of 172, ergo, 95% effective.

But 95% isn’t 100%, so there is still some possibility of getting the disease (mind you, the annual flu vaccine is typically 70% or less), and it is not known at this point, whether, or how well, you could transmit the disease if you, after vaccination, caught it. Hence you keep masking and distancing. Life won’t really get normal until so many people have been vaccinated (or have had the disease) that transmission basically stops, and the disease becomes uncommon.

At this point, with widespread infection moving around in the general community, the vaccinated person has reduced his or her personal risk by 95%, but still has to worry about catching it and passing it on.

So around Feb. 1, when I’ve had both doses, plus two weeks after the second to develop full immunity, I can go, masked and distanced, into relatively safe places, like the grocery store, nursery, or FOPAL — places where precautions are being taken and protocols observed. Even if there was a contagious person in such a place, I’d be very unlikely to pick it up.

But I would not feel free to eat at an indoor restaurant, mask off. Or join a gathering where people are eating, drinking, chatting with masks off. Not while the community transmission rate is high. That kind of thing will have to wait for February 2022, when the majority of people have had the vaccine and transmission is rare.

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Today they released the winter edition of Scribble and Sketch, our literary magazine. I have a piece in it, one I wrote for the Writers’ group, about this blog and how it came to be. Will anybody pick up the hint and come over to take a look? If so, hi! But I bet nobody will. They’d say, well, how do I find it? But I put the domain name right in the story: how pleased I was to find that Codgerville.net was available. But people aren’t used to thinking of a domain name as a live address.

Thursday 12/17/2020

Did the aerobics class. Veronica is so cute, and she always throws in something different.

Mid-morning I went for a medium walk. After lunch, I was feeling like the Prius must be getting pretty lonely down in the garage. I thought for a while about a destination. I decided to drive over the Dumbarton bridge to Coyote Hills regional park. I knew there was a lengthy boardwalk through the tule reeds, which might be fun. It was a nice drive but when I got out of the car I discovered there was a very chill breeze blowing across them tule reeds. I walked about 500 feet out on the boardwalk and decided this was not fun, so walked back to the car and turned up the heat.

This evening came an email from CH with preliminary information on our COVID vaccine. Our first clinic day will be December 28 or 29, with the second shot in mid-January. Consent forms will be required, and they are available at the front desk now! I was up and out of my chair as soon as I read that, down to check my mail and get the form. I have not the slightest doubt that I want those shots.

Later I got an email from FOPAL outlining the new way it is organized; and realized that hey, when I have had the 2nd shot, I can go back to working at FOPAL. I’ll have no fear of bringing COVID home to Channing House, which is what keeps me away now. That will be a welcome first step on the road to “normal”.

Later still I acted on something I’ve been thinking about for weeks or longer: I revived my Netflix membership and signed up for streaming. There are just too many good shows that I read about and can’t watch. Next: to change my Xfinity sub to drop the HBO channels, from which I’ve gotten no use.

Wednesday 12/16/2020

Walked the route in the morning (just over 4 miles for the day). At my 12pm dedicated time slot I ran my two loads of laundry.

That was pretty much the day; sorry. I spoke to a couple of people, so not entirely a hermit. But pretty much.

Tuesday 12/15/2020

Did the aerobics class at 7:30. Then, after a relaxing read of the internet, I embarked on my plan, to deal with a bunch of nickerty shit that had accumulated on my desk. “Nickerty shit” was a phrase I learned many years ago from John Snow. It means just what it sounds like: annoying little tasks too small to justify an individual time slot, but too large to ignore forever.

Part of it was going through the half-dozen orders for mask accessories people had given us. Making a spread sheet of who wanted what and how much of what we needed to buy. Then emailing Marcia to see how much of what she had, etc. I dealt with the rest of it and was rewarded by a clean desk and less clutter on my coffee table.

I went for a shortish walk in the afternoon (2.5 mi. for the day). Then it was time for SWBB, playing at Stockton against UOP. Two hours before the game I discovered, oh, it’s not just being streamed, it’s on ESPN2. Well, of course, because this was the game that, if won, would make Tara the winningest coach in women’s basketball. The team started a bit sluggish, and UOP started strong, so although Stanford led from the start, UOP got within 4 points in the second quarter before Stanford pulled away again, eventually winning by 40+. There were video clips from famous people complimenting Tara and lots of general hoopla.

Monday 12/14/2020

This morning I had to participate in our mask exhibit and demo from 8:30 to 10:30. I stood near the exhibit and chatted with people along with Alice, filling in for Marcia who had a 9am meeting.

At 10:20 we gave it up. During the Resident Association meeting we were about 7th on the agenda and summarized what we’d done. Which isn’t much really, although we hear that staff liked our display and will find a place to display it for a while.

After lunch I went for a walk on the jogging route (3.7mi). And that was about all the excitement for the day. Watching another episode of His Dark Materials (that’s a really well-produced series, much better and closer to the books than the movie (The Golden Compass, 2007); and then to bed early to read.

Sunday 12/13/2020

The first real rain of the year arrived. Last winter, when rain prevented exercise, I would go and run on a treadmill in the gym in the basement. Winters before, a treadmill at the YMCA. The gym has been closed since March, as I suppose the Y is also. So when can I walk? I loaded up the live radar map from wunderground.com and watched the progress of the green pixels. Pretty clearly by lunchtime the precip. would be over, and it was. So I took a 3-mile walk then, and got misted on lightly.

I carefully touched up tiny holes in the red paint on the MG model. One panel, the left side of the bonnet, really needed to be resprayed; the sanding had exposed too many flaws. So I got out the spray gun and it barfed on me. This is something air brushes do, for reasons I don’t fully understand, but you hit the button and the air comes back through the paint reservoir and spatters your hand and anything else. The only cure is to take the brush apart and clean it (revealing nothing) and then it will be fine. Which it was, and 10 seconds of spraying recoated the one panel and that was that. All the painted parts are ready to be coated with clear. Which I am afraid to do. I will wait for a warmer day, anyway.

After supper I sat down to watch Stanford play Cal, to give Tara career win #1098, to tie Pat Summit. The game was a romp; Cal’s team is depleted and inexperienced and Stanford’s defense held them to 15 points for the first half. One highlight was a legit dunk by Fran Belibi. She had been a Youtube sensation while in high school, when she dunked several times, but this was her first in a collegiate game. I say a legit dunk because you see that her entire hand was above the rim. There have been some women who “dunked” but theirs was more like a tip-in, the fingertips only over the rim.

Saturday 12/12/2020

Saturday with no scheduled activity or duties. I went for a longish walk in the morning. Later I sanded the red parts of the MG model. I hadn’t touched them in weeks. I’ve been worrying because there was some faint orange-peel texture and other flaws. The next step is to put a clear gloss coat on them and I don’t want to find that not going down smoothly. But I took some little bits of a wonderful product, 3M Trizact 3000-grit foam, dipped them in water, and carefully went to work, and it worked very well. The texture smoothed out very nicely. Handling each of the dozen pieces of course I also spotted flaws in the red paint. I’ll have to do some very careful touching up with a tiny brush and red paint.

That was about it for the day. I’m going to bed early to read.

Friday 12/11/2020

First thing I had to do my part in preparing for Marcia’s mask demo, which was to get 150 copies made of our order form for masks. Kim of HR emailed she could handle it so I sent her the PDF and went on my walk.

Later in the day I worked some on the model MG, getting the engine finished and installed in the frame.

I have good reference photos of actual TC engines (the classic car auction houses publish really thorough galleries of cars for sale) and this is pretty close. The air cleaner really does lean over the rocker cover at a 45 degree angle.

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Later in the day Rhonda emailed me, Marcia, and everybody in her “Incident Management Group”. They’ve decided to reopen the kitchens and lounges on each floor, and to allow unsupervised use of the 11th floor. The former renders moot the day’s work Marcia put into getting input and preparing a kitchen use plan; and the latter means the Safety Sitter program is on hold. All this new looseness is true so long as we have no cases in the IL tower.

At 4pm it was time for Rhonda’s meeting. I and Marcia were first on the bill to describe the mask info program.

During the following section, Rhonda explained that there was now an additional staff person who could only work from home: her. Because her husband who works for a high-tech company had a co-worker who tested positive and might have exposed him.

She showed us some scary reports from Santa Clara County DPH. They have a weekly list of care facilities that are reporting cases in residents or staff. For the last four weeks, the list contained 12 facilities, then 15, then 17, and this week 36. Pandemic numbers.

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Patty had arranged to get Armadillo Willy’s ribs for several people including me. However, at 6pm I had to go (supperless) to the lobby to assist Marcia. Here’s her mask info display in progress.

Marcia behind the table; her husband Kent to the right demonstrating a mask that is comfortable for a bald person. Art works provided by me.

We will run the same show every Monday during the hours when testing is happening in the auditorium just to the left of the picture.

At 7:30 I ducked out and went and had my delicious ribs and cornbread muffin and pinto beans.

Thursday 12/10/2020

Did the aerobics class. Then exchanged emails with Marcia, about two different projects. One is the request from Rhonda to rethink how the 11th floor sitters program works, with emphasis on providing what licensing agencies and health departments would call a “monitored space”. The other is of course this elaborate mask project, to provide masks to those who can’t order them, and train people in better use.

I then went for a longish walk partly to think about those things. When I was back, at 11:30, Wanda came to the door. Housekeeping has a meeting today, could she do my room at 1pm? Well, shortly after, I said, as I get my lunch about five minutes to 1. The irony is that I had booked myself to be an 11th floor sitter at 4pm, figuring that would be the time she would be in my apartment. Now I went and sat on the 11th floor from 1:30 to 2:30 anyway, against the rules (there was no sitter). And went back again at 4pm for my shift. I responded to Rhonda’s email, negatively, but with an alternate suggestion.

Marcia sent out her write-up on our meeting last night with people who like to cook. She made it into a nice proposal. We exchanged more email on how to do it, and then she sent the final version to The Powers That Be.

It feels as if I spent the day doing lots of things, but now I can’t remember them. More likely I spent large parts of the day thinking about what I needed to do, or should be doing, but not actually doing.

Watched Battlebots, my current guilty pleasure (since Naked and Afraid has gone away).

Wednesday 12/09/2020

Not bond day, James. Just a joke on the 007.

Today was the day I and Marcia presented our mask proposals to the RA exec. committee. They were well-received. This is turning into a thing, a lot more on Marcia’s shoulders than mine. She intends a display space, a card table with a couple of easels, to be manned in the lobby after Rhonda’s meeting Friday, and again on every Monday when there is COVID testing in the auditorium and people are passing through between 8:30 and 10.

I’ve got to finalize the sale end of it, the order form I drafted. She points out we don’t have to panic, we can take orders for a few days and then panic, depending on how many we get.

At 7pm Marcia hosted a Zoom call with a group of five people (plus me), people who have used the kitchens in the past and would like to cook again. It was an hour of brain-storming on how to safely open the kitchens on each floor, which then turned into general discussion on restrictions, and on the 11th floor access, etc.

Lots of work and thinking to do about this. Going to bed.