We are a commune of inquiring, skeptical, politically centrist, capitalist, anglophile, traditionalist New England Yankee humans, humanoids, and animals with many interests beyond and above politics. Each of us has had a high-school education (or GED), but all had ADD so didn't pay attention very well, especially the dogs. Each one of us does "try my best to be just like I am," and none of us enjoys working for others, including for Maggie, from whom we receive neither a nickel nor a dime. Freedom from nags, cranks, government, do-gooders, control-freaks and idiots is all that we ask for.
I have not the faintest idea what the ordinary Chinese person on the street would say, if speaking truthfully. I know it is a different culture with different rules, and certainly without Western values and morals. As I may misunderstand it, a culture without the Western ideal of the individual except for those in power.
I am in favor of decoupling from the China behemoth. That means you too, Wallmart, and you too, Apple. And all of the pharma companies that manufacture there.
One question on which I have changed my mind is that of dress. In my youth I thought that it mattered not at all, and that to be concerned with it was a sign of egotism and triviality of mind. I cannot point to any conversion experience after which I came to believe the opposite, but I now see my former opinion as shallow in the way that so many youthful opinions are shallow.
This program is designed to minmize loss of fitness while your usual routine is not available. Daily or every other day - but if every other day, walk or jog 3+ miles on the off days
Warm-up: 1 min jumping jacks + 1 min jogging in place
120-sec rest after completing each full 3X circuit -
Circuit #1 (3 times through):
90 Mountain Climbers Pushups to failure 1 min jumping jacks
Circuit #2 (3X):
Jumping squats, 1 min. Curls to failure, any weight but not too heavy 1 min. elbow plank
Circuit #3 (3X):
1 min. lunges (body weight or dumbells in hands) 1 min burpees (or to failure) 1 min bicyles (on floor)
Circuit #4 (3X):
Floor chest presses to failure (dumbells) 1 min leg raises 1 min wall sit 1 min squat with overhead press (dumbell)
Circuit #5 (3X):
Dumbell (or kettlebell) swings, 1 min Floor skull crushers (dumbell) almost to failure 30-sec. shoulder-slap plank dumbell deadlifts (1 min)
If this routine is too easy, let me know in comments.
After viewing this, a reader commented "This makes me see how much my life sucks." The old guy is full of vitality and good cheer. Readers know how much I admire his life planning.
Does he or she need to "get a life"? I have to admit that this mess seriously disrupts my well-planned life routines - work, exercise, play, and social life. Not to mention my local 24-hr Dunkin now opening at 5 am. That's too late for me.
Senator Kelly Loeffler dumped $3.1m in stock and Senate Intel chairman Richard Burr sold $1.5m while getting classified briefings on coronavirus before market plunged—then she invested in firm that...
They recommend 5 sets of 90 for beginners. (I assume that is counting 1,1, 2,2,...) Never underestimate challenging calisthenics. The US Army transforms bodies with daily calisthenics.
" The establishment’s pundits and politicians who cheer for higher death tolls from the virus and for more straitened circumstances must imagine that enough people in their audience are fearful enough to have abandoned all critical faculties—fearful enough to follow the fear-mongers."
Yesterday (3/18) I was watching CBS Morning News. I do tend to watch in the morning before I catch my train, usually not more then 20 minutes to see headlines. Now, working from home, I have tended to watch the entire 3 hours (I watch the local morning portion from 6-7 as I work). I'm no longer surprised at the hyperbole and panic in their reports. Normally it shouldn't matter, but in these unusual times with people watching TV constantly, it's very concerning.
Yes, they do pepper in 'feel good' stories of people giving away products, time, and effort (this morning, a distillery that has shifted to making and giving away sanitizer) in order to limit the panic reporting. These are of a particular type, though. All are about people voluntarily giving of themselves. Key word "voluntarily", something which is rarely mentioned in reporting. I often wonder why.
I found out yesterday when one of the CBS anchors, Jeff Glor, exposed his massive ignorance with this statement (may not be exact, but close enough). "It's nice to see people putting capitalism aside and focusing on cooperation." Wait - WHAT?
Capitalism requires cooperation. Yes, competition is often pointed to as the hallmark of capital. Competition keeps prices down, competition produces innovation, competition leads to forward thinking and proactive behaviors. Competition is critical to capitalism. However, every company would fail if its workers didn't cooperate. Every exchange would fail if the two parties involved did not cooperate because every exchange has to be based on mutual benefit. Every deal between businesses would fail if there wasn't cooperation. Cooperation is essential to every facet of capitalism. I'll compare it to any team sport. The competition between the teams yields high levels of performance from the teams themselves (front office down to the field), but requires the cooperation between teams to set rules, engage in trades, and agree on method of determining winners. It also requires cooperation on the field between team members to make the competition itself intriguing and interesting to watch (or engage in).
This failure on the part of journalists is increasing daily, and it was happening before the panic of the pandemic. It's becoming more common. After all, they are playing to the fears every day. We were told that, at this stage, the number of deaths would double every day. Yesterday, 104 people in the US had died. Today, it's 155. That's close to a 50% increase, which is the highest it's been, and while the number of dead is likely to increase, we shall see if the rate increases. However, the 'model' is still what we're comparing to, and even in regions hardest hit the 'model' hasn't played out. Total worldwide deaths still haven't doubled every day, even with the worst hit places being accounted for. We haven't even topped 10,000. So panic is the only way to describe coverage. We do not know real mortality rates, mainly because we do not know real rates of infection. For what it's worth, I am still convinced I had a very mild form of it already, and several other friends believe they did, as well. None of us have been tested, and I see no reason to be tested.
Jeff Glor's statement, in my opinion, is starting to look more and more like the reason behind the panic. There is an agenda being pushed and it's incumbent upon us to be aware of - and push back against - that agenda with every opportunity we have. Keep informing people that journalists are just tools and these tools are often poorly employed and poorly informed.
Marat's eulogy was given by the Marquis de Sade, a rather fitting person given the ideologies he promoted, which led to the Reign of Terror.
As I spoke with a friend this morning, we discussed the 'freak-out' and I immediately flashed to one of my favorite movies, so I thought I'd share. Wonka loved a good freak-out, and used it to his benefit to get to what he wanted. I don't think it's far-fetched to believe something too dissimilar is going on now. The boat ride was frightening, most of the participants were disturbed, uncomfortable and angry. It seemed the world was ending. Then...destination arrived, all was well and life went on, though not quite as before.
An interesting side note: none of the actors were told what would occur during this scene as it was filmed, many of the reactions are real. The children, unaware that Wilder was going to sing, thought he was going crazy.
Some things to consider in the Covid-19 panic. I've always known Covid is real, and that it's slightly more dangerous than the flu. I'm quite aware of how the mortality rate is considerably higher than some other viral outbreaks, especially with the elderly and those suffering health conditions. I've been less than convinced there is anything we could have done to stop it, short of shutting the nation down completely in January and keeping it shut down for about 2 months....which seems to be where we've gone anyway. That said, even extreme measures are unlikely to stop the spread. I've always supported an abundance of caution. But now that we're here with extreme measures, let's think calmly about HOW we got here.
Fear. Just fear. Yes, many of us would've gotten sick. Yes, some people would die. We can talk all we want about flattening the curve to keep hospital facilities from being overrun...while ignoring how herd immunity is being compromised. Furthermore, in shutting down in the manner we did, we basically sent people on 5 days of panic shopping whereby anyone infected and shopping was busy spreading the virus. It seems to me, the 'cure' is just as bad as letting it run its course. By increasing fear and panic, and even potentially the spread.
What's really concerning to me, however, is less the health issue and more the socio-political issue. This is the largest non-partisan event of our lifetime, and it's been heavily politicized. To that point, consider this - Democrats, who only a week ago complained that President Trump was abusing power, now are complaining that he isn't using enough power to 'fix' this.
While the world fights the coronavirus pandemic, China is fighting a propaganda war. Beijing’s war aim is simple: shift away from China all blame for the outbreak, the botched initial response, and its early spread into the broader world. At stake is China’s global reputation, as well as the potential of a fundamental shift away from China for trade and manufacturing. Also at risk is the personal legacy of General Secretary Xi Jinping, who has staked his legitimacy on his technocratic competence. After dealing with the first great global crisis of the 21st century, the world must fundamentally rethink its dependence on China.
With all of the restaurants and pubs in NYC closed except for take-out, there is just no fun lunch pizza/beer break and after-hike cocktail reward. Nowhere to sit, drink, rest legs, and tell lies.
By fall things should be fine, so we'll aim for Sept/Oct.
In the meantime, everybody should be taking all the long outdoor hikes they can. It's healthy and wholesome even if it doesn't count as "exercise". Learn all the trees, shrubs, birds, rocks, and clouds. Good stuff to know. God's world.
As we posted yesterday, they are probably all wrong. A very few people fall seriously ill (mainly but not entirely the frail elderly). The US has been fortunate, thus far. Hospitals are not overtaxed at all. Things could change, but the virus has been here for months.
Europe seems to have a special problem with this. I do not know why. Blame their government public health and government medical care, or just bad luck? I go for the latter. Disease humbles humanity and always has.
Some large gyms and yoga studios are closing for the duration, but that's no excuse not to continue a daily workout program. There are tons of yoga workouts online too. Home workouts won't be as good, probably, but at best it might help to minimize backsliding.
Most people do not have home gyms full of barbells, dumbells, kettlebells, treadmills and stair machines. I feel home gyms are silly anyway because they lack the spirit that comes from being surrounded by hard-working people who are often in much better shape than onself.
Remember, 5-7 days without your exercise routine can set you back quite a bit. Sad, isn't it?
Some simple ideas for home fitness maintenance, just an hour/day, plus small meals for your immunity (heavy eating is a health stressor):
Cardio
- Do your cardio outdoors on a track (not a road, please). 30-60-second sprints, and jog recoveries. - Find some outdoor stairs and go up and down at your best speeds, or HIIT - Jump rope is great cardio
Strength
- Sets of pushups and pullups - High reps with hand weights (curls, lunges, bent-over rows, floor chest press, had-weight pushbacks, etc etc) - High-rep squats with or without hand weights - Squats + overhead presses with hand weights
What’s the Point of Panic Shopping? With growing coronavirus fears, grocery-store dry goods and bottled water are being bought out — but it’s not really necessary
Do you know how many people were hospitalized in 2009-2010 with the swine flu? Three hundred thousand were hospitalized. So 60 million people infected, 300,000 hospitalized. And nobody even remembers it. And why? Well, because we had a different president. We had a Democrat president by the name of Barack Obama, and the news then was how wonderfully well Obama was handling it, how expertly well Obama was dealing with it.
Unfortunately, there is no scientific formula in existence that answers the question: When is precisely the exact right time to take massive economically and socially disruptive action in dealing with a pandemic?
Whatever you do is wrong. When Trump blocked travel from China, he was zenophobic. When he blocked Europe travel, he was plain stupid. Now the complaint is that he should have done them sooner.
Dalrymple 
Poll: Americans View Wuhan Virus As 
Yesterday (3/18) I was watching CBS Morning News. I do tend to watch in the morning before I catch my train, usually not more then 20 minutes to see headlines. Now, working from home, I have tended to watch the entire 3 hours (I watch the local morning portion from 6-7 as I work). I'm no longer surprised at the hyperbole and panic in their reports. Normally it shouldn't matter, but in these unusual times with people watching TV constantly, it's very concerning. 
Opening the books on running a restaurant: 