Month: March 2020

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So We Went to Target Today

…to do our weekly shopping.

We were fearing the worst: crowds, empty shelves, Walmart-on-Black-Friday. You know, mayhem. For that reason we opted to go back to HelloFresh weekly delivery service for some of our dinners, not knowing what we'd find when we walked in the store.

We were surprised.

As expected, yes, the paper products aisle was stripped bare.

They were out anything with the name "Lysol" on it (we use the laundry sanitizer), hydrogen peroxide, rubbing alcohol, and all varieties of hand and bar soap. The canned bean/vegetable aisle was also a little lean, but other than that it was a typical Sunday at the store. There were plenty of fresh veggies, frozen food, and dairy products. For once they even had a fully stocked egg shelf (something unusual for this particular store). People were affable and joking about the whole situation. There was no mad buying frenzy, and there weren't an inordinate number of shoppers; a little higher than normal, but not any worse than the weekend before the opening of GCU. They even had the majority of check-out lanes staffed—yet most were empty.

Not sure if this will be the case in two weeks. No one really does. This is all new for everyone, but I'm frankly more afraid of this hoarding mentality than of the virus itself. At least the store (and others, I've heard) are limiting the number of these high-demand items that can be purchased.

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As Of Right Now…

…I'm still reporting into work tomorrow. Unlike pretty much all the other departments (and in direct contradiction to what his Director has ordered) our Director has said it's "business as usual."

This is also seems to be in direct contradiction to what was going on last Friday. We were scrambling to get everyone with desk jobs set up with VPN access because my manager told us he'd heard that in all likelihood we'd all be working from home this coming week. (How, exactly, that's going to work for desktop support since a lot of what we do is hands-on, but hey…this is new to all of us, and to be honest I actually end up doing about 85% of my work remotely anyway, so maybe it will be fine?)

While I have a very nice Dell laptop at work, I had been hoping for months to get VPN configured on my Mac so I wouldn't have to drag the work machine back and forth in the event the need arose. (We don't generally provide 24/7 support, so there's been no need for me to work from home.)

I kept running into roadblocks getting it working, either with macOS itself or with the Cisco client I was provided. I finally gave up a couple months ago after  attending a meeting wherein we were informed that the organization was going to be blocking all access from personal devices in the near future anyway.

Funny how a little global pandemic can change things.

Anyhow, since we'd been getting several inquiries from users in our department on how to set up VPN on their Macs, we got I.T. Security involved and got the most recent Mac client downloaded and configured.

I'd gotten our certificate installed and working on my machine before I finally gave up those many months ago, so when I actually installed the latest client and it worked Friday afternoon, I was surprised to say the least. I installed the the Microsoft Remote Desktop client, and viola! I was connected to my work computer.

Of course, since I'm the de facto Mac expert in our group, I was now suddenly in great demand, tasked with getting every other personal Mac user working as well.

The one machine I attempted it on Friday afternoon after my own did not go well. Hopefully I can get everything worked out tomorrow, since it appears we're all going to be working a normal schedule, pending any overnight changes.

(The good news is that even if any of us fall ill and can't work and don't have the humungous amounts of sick leave accrued that seem all too common at this place (like me since I'm a new employee) they will be advancing us up to two weeks from our bank if needed. Not great, but better than being hung out to dry.)

Early last week, I saw where all this was headed, and anticipating the worst, I'd gone ahead and ordered a few upgrades (an SSD, an additional 4GB of RAM) for the old Dell we had at home in the closet so it could be my main pipeline back to the office in the event of an emergency.

Everything arrived Saturday afternoon, and while I could've returned it to Amazon for refunds, I decided to go ahead and do the upgrade, having completed an identical upgrade to Ben's aunt's computer last summer). Needless to say, once I got Windows 10 installed on the new SSD (in and of itself a trial by fire), and everything set up, connecting back to the office was a no-brainer.

Ben's path through the virus outbreak has been just as murky. With every other school district in the state shutting down from 10-14 days starting tomorrow, his particular district had made the decision to stubbornly remain open—although students were being given an additional 3 days of spring break next week so faculty would convene to work out a plan going forward. As of about a half hour ago however, that changed as well, and now his district has joined the rest of the state and will be closed for the next ten days.

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Things COVID Has Proven

•  The job you were told couldn't be done remotely can be done remotely.

•  Many disabled workers could have been working from home, but corporations just didn't want them to,

•  Internet is a utility, not a luxury.

•  Universal healthcare is necessary.

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Lockdown

Yes there is fear.

Yes there is isolation.

Yes there is panic buying.

Yes there is sickness.

Yes there is even death.

But,

They say that in Wuhan after so many years of noise

You can hear the birds again.

They say that after just a few weeks of quiet

The sky is no longer thick with fumes

But blue and grey and clear.

They say that in the streets of Assisi

People are singing to each other

across the empty squares,

keeping their windows open

so that those who are alone

may hear the sounds of family around them.

They say that a hotel in the West of Ireland

Is offering free meals and delivery to the housebound.

Today a young woman I know

is busy spreading fliers with her number

through the neighbourhood

So that the elders may have someone to call on.

Today Churches, Synagogues, Mosques and Temples

are preparing to welcome

and shelter the homeless, the sick, the weary

All over the world people are slowing down and reflecting

All over the world people are looking at their neighbours in a new way

All over the world people are waking up to a new reality

To how big we really are.

To how little control we really have.

To what really matters.

To Love.

So we pray and we remember that

Yes there is fear.

But there does not have to be hate.

Yes there is isolation.

But there does not have to be loneliness.

Yes there is panic buying.

But there does not have to be meanness.

Yes there is sickness.

But there does not have to be disease of the soul

Yes there is even death.

But there can always be a rebirth of love.

Wake to the choices you make as to how to live now.

Today, breathe.

Listen, behind the factory noises of your panic

The birds are singing again

The sky is clearing,

Spring is coming,

And we are always encompassed by Love.

Open the windows of your soul

And though you may not be able

to touch across the empty square,

Sing.

– Fr. Richard Hendrick, OFM, March 13th 2020

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Who Wants Four More Years of This?

Vai John Gruber:

Charles P. Pierce, writing for Esquire:

Is this enough? Truly, is this enough for the country that looked at itself after eight years of a competent presidency and decided to hand things over to a vulgar talking yam? Are the vacant airports and deserted subways enough? Will the empty arenas and ballparks be enough? Is the plunging stock market enough? When the ambulances start hauling away the old folks down the block, will that be enough? How in god's name can anyone vote for four more years of this, four more years of a choleric fatburg of a man who calls a press conference about a global health emergency and asks a reporter for Fox News how the ratings were for his last town hall? How does that man carry a precinct, let alone a state, let alone the country? Christ, even Ted Cruz is doing the right thing here.

What is so heartbreaking and frustrating is that this disaster of a response was entirely predictable. What other than this could we expect from an administration that gutted the CDC, is opposed to science, and is led by a president who surrounds himself with obsequious yes-people and a career con man who thinks he can bullshit is way through anything?

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The Science of Soap: How It Kills Coronavirus

Palli Thordarson, chemistry professor at the University of New South Wales, writing for The Guardian:

Viruses can be active outside the body for hours, even days. Disinfectants, liquids, wipes, gels and creams containing alcohol are all useful at getting rid of them — but they are not quite as good as normal soap.

When I [shared the information above using Twitter][t], it went viral. I think I have worked out why. Health authorities have been giving us two messages: once you have the virus there are no drugs that can kill it or help you get rid of it. But also, wash your hands to stop the virus spreading. This seems odd. You can't, even for a million dollars, get a drug for the coronavirus — but your grandmother's bar of soap kills the virus.

So why does soap work so well on the Sars-CoV-2, the coronavirus and indeed most viruses? The short story: because the virus is a self-assembled nanoparticle in which the weakest link is the lipid (fatty) bilayer. Soap dissolves the fat membrane and the virus falls apart like a house of cards and dies — or rather, we should say it becomes inactive as viruses aren't really alive.

I was not aware until this week that good old-fashioned soap is significantly more effective than alcohol-based disinfectants. Now I know why.

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The Bill is Due

From John Pavlovitz:

The bill for MAGA has come due, Trump supporters.

It's time to pay up.

The deferred invoice for you selling your souls is here.

It's time to pay for every incendiary campaign boast you cheered,
every factless diatribe you vigorously applauded,
every nonsensical middle-of-the-night tweet you boosted,
every dehumanizing stereotype and slur you shared,
every callous and cruel rally insult you passionately amen-ed.

Its time to pay for every denial of Scientific evidence,
every terminated qualified conscientious objector,
every attack on factual, responsible journalism,
every vicious assault on objective reality,
every star-spangled dog-and-pony show distraction,
every lazy xenophobic caricature,
every tired racist tirade.

This is how your beloved capitalism works isn't it: someone was always going to pay for services rendered? Nothing is free, isn't that what you've been saying—no handouts? Well, dig deep friend because you are on the hook for this.

Many people have been footing the bill for a long time: migrants and Muslims and transgender people, young black men, refugees, the sick and the poor, already vulnerable communities pushed all the way to the brink—and now past it.

You were paying too of course, you were just too willfully ignorant or intellectually negligent to realize it. Over and over we tried to tell you about the cost: the civil rights you were sacrificing too, the environmental protections you were losing as well as we were, the safety and security you were relinquishing alongside us. We tried to tell you that this hardship was not a partisan expense, that his moral bankruptcy would eventually hit you hard too.

But your Fox News bubble and your white Evangelical echo chamber and your America First, Don't Tread on Me, middle-finger affinity clubs left you certain you were insulated from it all; that the only tears that would fall would be liberal ones, that the only people suffering voted for Hillary, that all of the pain would be isolated to people who vote Blue.

You felt immune from the spreading sickness. You felt invincible, because your messiah told you that you were winning and that was enough for you.

He was lying to you as he always does, but you preferred to believe the lie because it felt warm running through your veins even as it was poisoning you—the intoxicating, cheap high of making America great while owning the Libs. That was a costly drug, that arrogance—and you were slowly going broke in your addiction.

Now, in the middle of a burgeoning pandemic and a precipitous market crash and a hopelessly fractured nation, the bill is coming due.
You can't avoid paying now.
You're here with us.
I think even you realize that now.

This President didn't create this virus,
but he ignored it,
denied it,
minimized it,
joked about it,
weaponized it,
politicized it,
exacerbated it.

He systematically removed qualified people and replaced them with genuflecting, sycophantic traitors, or with no one.

He generated a steady stream of partisan attacks and conspiracy theories and abject lies created in the moment, and the kind of "I am smarter than anyone in the room" sermonizing that cult leaders bellow all the way to the terrible and tragic end.

He is culpable for the chaos and the unnecessary illness, and yes the preventable deaths because of it—and you are too.

This is the human cost of the MAGA cult delusion, and we're all paying for it now equally, however we vote and wherever we live and whatever we value. Pandemics don't choose sides or spare voting blocks or respect affiliations.

He will pay for it in November and in the unflattering, incorruptible light of History.

I hope whatever you received was worth it.

I hope you still feel like you're winning.

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The Ninth Circle of Hell

AKA Buying a Car

"The ninth, and final, circle of Hell is reserved for sinners who committed treachery. Dante thought there was no sin worse than betrayal of trust."

Seems appropriate.

While places like AutoNation and Carmax would have you believe that they've "streamlined and perfected" the car buying experience, it's complete bullshit.

Granted, their no-haggle pricing is a thing. The number quoted online was the price I paid for the car itself, but everything else—getting financing, buying an extended warranty—was the same bartering bullshit as it's always been.

It didn't help that my salesman (let's call him Derek) didn't score points right off the bat by saying, "I'll need you to move the car; I can't drive a stick," as we were walking toward a totally different MINI than on the printout I'd given him.

"That's not the car," I said.

"My apologies." (This was to become his mantra for the rest of the afternoon.)

It also didn't help that Derek—or apparently his service team—also didn't have a clue about the workings of a MINI, which certainly did not inspire my confidence. Even losing track of all the technological changes in the MINI line in years since I bought Anderson, I still had a better understanding of the car than he did.

I knew the moment I got behind the wheel of Rabbit, that I wanted the car. But I wasn't blind. Right off I noticed that the rear passenger tire was throwing a low pressure warning, as well as some other, undefined warning symbol was appearing on the display. After inspecting the tire, we both decided the sensor just needed to be reset, but at the time I didn't have a clue how to accomplish this.

"I'll have my guys take care of it."

The test drive was uneventful. I was doing this for more than anything to see if I'd be happy going back to an automatic transmission. While I definitely prefer the control a stick provides, this tranny was responsive and something I could live with.

And then the bullshit began.

Considering the history I shared with Anderson, I knew an extended warranty on any MINI going forward was a must—especially since this might very well be the last car I can afford to buy and would realistically want to keep it running as long as I did Anderson. (I do want to retire at some point, after all.) I specifically set my upper limit on a monthly payment below what I was actually willing to spend to account for the added expense of an extended warranty, but even I was taken aback when the finance guy returned with a full warranty package that added nearly $6K to the price of the car and pushed the monthly payments well over $500 a month.

That wasn't happening.

Thankfully there were several different packages I could choose from, with each offering customizable options. I didn't need or want routine oil changes to be covered, appearance (paint) protection, or a host of other items that were available. I simply wanted the drive train and basic electrical and mechanical items covered. Back and forth we went, with a string of indomitable 20 minute periods spent sitting and waiting for that blasted finance guy to return return with a new offer. I mean seriously.

"I apologize for the wait."

They really wanted to sell me more bullshit coverage than I wanted or needed. (Must be a cash cow for the dealership.) After nearly 90 minutes of this crap I agreed to take the fucking oil change service in addition to the mechanical/electrical breakdown coverage in exchange for a much lower interest rate on the loan. Done.

And then it was another forty-five minute wait while they prepped the car.

(Note to Derek: When you have nothing else to do when they're getting the car ready to deliver or the finance guy is bullshitting backstage, do NOT come and sit at the table with us without saying a word. It is creepy as FUCK.)

When the car was finally ready, I got in and saw that now ALL FOUR tires were showing low pressure, and the undefined warning symbol was still illuminated.

"I apologize."

"They said the warnings will disappear once you drive it for a while."

From experience I knew that was also bullshit, but I also knew it was only a matter of resetting the computer to accept the new pressures (I'd done this often with Anderson). The undefined warning light was more concerning, but they had a 5-day return policy, and I figured if I couldn't discern what was happening and it didn't disappear on its own the car would go back.

Like I said, I wanted the car, but not so much that I wasn't willing to walk away from the deal.

When all was said and done, it was 4:30 pm. (We had been there since noon.) After getting the car home, I had time to look through the manual (still brand new and unopened – obviously the previous owner had never even looked at it) and found the reset procedure, which took care of the four low air pressure warnings. The undefined warning symbol was oil related, so I checked the oil level (which was fine), replaced the dipstick, and after restarting the car that warning disappeared as well. (I guess it's like the unseated gas cap warning? The stick hadn't been fully inserted.)

Since that time I noticed that one of the license plate bulbs was burnt out, the stubby antenna was missing and—probably most troubling of all—the center console that was shown in the online photos of the car—had mysteriously disappeared between the time the photos were taken and my test drive.

I've already replaced the bulb and antenna, and have emailed them regarding the console, but I seriously doubt I'll hear anything back.* (The car was sold "as-is") and frankly at this point I hope I never have to set foot in that dealership again.

*Update: I just got an email from Derek telling me he'd "find out what happened to those items." Ugh.