50% off cotton Graf Lantz masks until July 31st, so they’re only $11 each! I have a couple of these masks in linen and they are great, especially if you add a removable lanyard for like $2. The Petite fits my small face well.
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Just got an email from the school board about a survey for a masked classroom proposal. Hell yeah! Let’s do it! Well wait a second, let’s read their actual plan …
It will only be at one location in town, away from the population center and on the “poor” side of town, so a lot of families won’t feel comfortable sending their kids there plus it’s quite the commute from the newer developments on the other sides of town. It will be a computer lab so the kids will just stare at screens all day, the adults will be supervising rather than teaching. Children are expected to work independently (mind you this is targeted at 5-11 year olds) and the parents are still the “learning coaches”. Transportation is not provided. After care is not provided, so good luck if you aren’t able to leave work to pick up your child around 2pm, or more like 12:30 on Wednesdays since it sounds like they’re sticking to something approximately like the existing elementary school schedule.
I am incensed. They couldn’t do mask-only classrooms within the existing schools? They couldn’t have foreseen the need for that, oh, I don’t know, any time in the last sixteen fucking months and allowed themselves enough time to plan for that.
I’m going to stop now because anything else will just be a bitter rant. Fucking Florida. Thank dog we’re in a financial position to have options, so many local families don’t and they basically just got served a shit sandwich.
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If you want to upgrade further: I don’t think there’s a medical-worker shortage of KN95s anymore. Even N95s have been showing up in Home Depot again. Prices are higher than pre pandemic but no longer stratospheric.
(In my area at least, ymmv)
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Yeah, it’s pretty easy to get KN95s online now, and the prices have come down even for the legit ones. I just got a bunch more.
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Lots of implications for this, but on a personal note, I’m glad we’re not throwing a 150-person wedding next weekend. My best case scenario was that we’d have been able to host it and regret canceling (because it would have been so safe) but that looks like it’s not the case:
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Here’s the leaked CDC presentation itself-WaPo has taken down its paywall for this.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/context/cdc-breakthrough-infections/94390e3a-5e45-44a5-ac40-2744e4e25f2e/
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Chicago and Cook County now added to indoor mask “advisory” due to our “substantial” spread.
Meanwhile, Lollapalooza is in progress as we speak. I’m really nervous that we’re headed for a spike.
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Yup. I picked up a 3 pack of n95s for $6 at Walmart before my flight and just had a 20 pack of Kn95s delivered.
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So… Is it wrong to go and “manufacture” your own vaccination booster shot in an area where vaccine acceptance is incredibly low and surplus shots are all over the damn place? Is it OK to do that if you’re going back to full face-to-face teaching in two weeks with no masks and no vaccine requirements and it’s been almost six months since your vaccination, has been six months since your first shot? Asking for a friend…
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I personally don’t think there’s anything morally wrong with that on your friend’s 
part.
I do think it’s mightily messed up on a larger vaccine distribution scale, but that is nothing that your friend has direct influence over and getting another vaccine will not impact that in any meaningful way, and might even prevent some people besides your friend from getting exposed to enough virus load to become ill.
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This article caught my eye earlier today:
One of the things it mentions is that the Delta infections peaked and started falling for no apparent reason in both India and the UK.
“But much of the ebb and flow of a pandemic cannot be explained by changes in human behavior. That was true with influenza a century ago, and it is true with Covid now. An outbreak often fizzles mysteriously, like a forest fire that fails to jump from one patch of trees to another.”
“A more plausible explanation appears to be that Delta spreads very quickly at first and, for some unknown set of reasons, peters out long before a society has reached herd immunity. As Andy Slavitt, a former Covid adviser to President Biden, told me, “It seems to rip through really fast and infect the people it’s going to infect.” The most counterintuitive idea here is that an outbreak can fade even though many people remain vulnerable to Covid.”
I’m intrigued. While I’ve not heard it suggested, I wonder if any given variant has a certain “half-life.” Could the virus mutate and at some point a particular variant will just cease to exist because it’s not stable enough to consistently replicate? I had assumed a very competitive variant would just continue to exist due to natural selection, but maybe not? I’m very curious to see what happens.
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It isn’t morally wrong from a vaccine availability standpoint.
Where I’m hesitant to do this or recommend doing this is: what will “your friend” do in 6 months if boosters become recommended? Get a 4th shot or admit to your doctor that you already got one? What will you do if you get people chasing you down to get your “2nd” aka 4th shot? Personally I hate lying to people, so I wouldn’t want to finagle something illicit unless I had either a doctor I trusted or a big health risk (which I know might play a role in this assessment).
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I do have the health risk, and Covid vaccines aren’t available through regular physicians here, just the health department and some drug stores (no more mass vaccine sites for some months now).
And if boosters are recommended six months from now, I’ll get one.
Confession
Drove across the nearby state line. Went to a drug store.
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A coworker told me that when she was a little girl in Mexico, you could get theme park tickets with a polio vaccine. So the kids would get a few each until they had enough tickets for the whole family.
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Yeah, I read that too and found it super fascinating. I didn’t know that about India, though, anecdotally, all of our Indian vendors seem to be more or less up and running and fully staffed without many people out any more. (I hope that is truly the case and that they’re not just being forced to come to work sick.)
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Ugh, Boyfriend’s friend and his husband both have covid - both fully vaccinated. They are in Texas and they think they got it from another fully vaxxed friend they invited over.
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And, just read that New Orleans is now fuct and has a mask mandate. Which, well, OUR mayor still won’t do that so it appears they’re taking it more seriously than us now?
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I’m stressing after the recent CDC news…
Tonight we’re supposed to host another (fully vaccinated) couple for dinner outside on our patio. The baby will be inside in bed. Two weeks ago when this was planned, it felt more than safe. Now…I kind of want to cancel even though I’ve been desperately looking forward to it. Blah. can’t decide.
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Morbidity and mortality for vaccinated individuals is still exceptionally low. Viral load still appears to be very low. Severity in children without underlying health conditions is still very mild. Definitely your call, but the “type” of COVID course that vaxxed people are getting is a world away from the experience of an unvaccinated older adult.
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What are you seeing about long-term effects I’m vaccinated individuals? That’s my concern.
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