Please explain this to me

[bae]

If you were talking Ebola ... Covid is not that bad...

So, for years now I've been on the region's infectious disease team, which was formed specifically to deal with the Ebola threat. Mostly in the role of hot-zone safety officer. And I've during the Covid event been working with the local emergency management agencies formulating the response, and making sure our hot-zone protocols were appropriate for covid.

Frankly, I'm a bit more concerned in general about Covid than Ebola, once I weigh all the factors.

Then again, my opinion is informed by actual experience, training, expertise, and science.

[Teacher Terry]

When I remember people that I have seen die I think about the healthy, happy times. I would prefer not to die alone but wouldn’t want to risk my family or health care workers health. It’s a tough time for most people. I wish Y had been home for 2 months to see how fun it isn’t.

[iris lilies]

When I remember people that I have seen die I think about the healthy, happy times. I would prefer not to die alone but wouldn’t want to risk my family or health care workers health. It’s a tough time for most people. I wish Y had been home for 2 months to see how fun it isn’t.

I really cannot picture not going out at all. I go out every day. I go out often two and three times a day.

For one thing I go out in my yard and work. For second thing I go out for a mile walk every day. For third I go to the community garden a block away and work. And then, every 3-4 days (only ‘cause the weather is cold and rainy too often) I take a spin in my red convertible.

then, I drive to Hermann periodically and repeat some of the above activity.

i get a fair amount of scenic change, important for me. I get little human interaction, but we have distanced conversations with neighbors almost daily.

Are you truly staying in the house day after day?

[bae]

I really cannot picture not going out at all. I go out every day. I go out often two and three times a day.

I'm an introvert. I *can* survive for days at a time without going out.

However, over the past few years I had cultivated the habit of bicycling down to the village once a day, and spending at least a couple of minutes talking face-to-face with an actual human being, with my goal being to learn one new thing about them. I find in the New Era I really miss this simple practice.

I still go out to walk the dog, hike, and bicycle, but it's not really the same.

[Teacher Terry]

I walk the dogs a mile and sit in the backyard. I have been in 3 stores in 8 weeks. All were super quick. We did eat out Saturday at one of the few restaurants that reopened. I miss having parties, traveling, festivals, movies and eating out once or twice a week. It royally sucks. Also in the past we would interact with people when we go out instead of avoiding them.

[Yppej]

We did eat out Saturday at one of the few restaurants that reopened.

That is not something I would have done, but I do not condemn you. I think everyone should be free to use their best judgment in this crisis. What I am doing is avoiding close proximity to elderly people including my own family members although it is difficult. To me distancing is key, masks not so much, I think they are feel good measures.

[Yppej]

I really cannot picture not going out at all. I go out every day. I go out often two and three times a day.

For one thing I go out in my yard and work. For second thing I go out for a mile walk every day. For third I go to the community garden a block away and work. And then, every 3-4 days (only ‘cause the weather is cold and rainy too often) I take a spin in my red convertible.

then, I drive to Hermann periodically and repeat some of the above activity.

i get a fair amount of scenic change, important for me. I get little human interaction, but we have distanced conversations with neighbors almost daily.

Are you truly staying in the house day after day?

This is what I meant by staying home - not locked in your house, but strong distancing.

[JaneV2.0]

I have masks that I wear if there may be a chance that I'll interact with people; I wear them very seldom, but I'm convinced that they're another layer of protection, with hand-washing, social distancing, more handwashing, disinfectant, etc.

I'm an introvert who can happily go days (weeks? months?) without in-person contact. If I want to feel the wind in my face, I can go stand in my yard.

In at least two of my loved ones' deaths, they were greeted by others who had predeceased them, come from the afterlife to escort them forward. Those of us who were left behind did the figurative hand-off. I wouldn't want people standing around wringing their hands over my deathbed either, but there's not much likelihood of that.

[bae]

To me distancing is key, masks not so much, I think they are placebos.

A simple cloth mask is in essence creating "virtual distance". The point isn't that it is a Level A Hazmat suit.

A simple cloth mask adds several feet to the effective distance between you and another. Which is huge if you do the math, given the cubic nature of 3 dimensional space. (There are some other useful considerations involving air exchange rates in enclosed spaces).

Wearing a mask in circumstances where you can't maintain 6+ feet of distance is A Good Thing generally.

[SteveinMN]

Thank you Steve. At some point we are going to be paying for the internet or do ads cover the expense?

Almost everyone pays for access to the Internet now, whether it's through their cable or telephone company, their mobile carrier, etc. There have been repeated attempts to offer Internet access "for free" if a customer listens to ads or participates in surveys or otherwise provides data about themselves which can be marketed to others for $$, but my experience is that almost all of them die eventually. Only Google has made serious money with this model. Some folks are fine with that approach; others are not.

Ads can cover the costs of some services. Some sites (like SLF) don't run ads; Alan occasionally lets us know how much it costs to keep the party going here and people contribute. I participate in a car-owner's forum in which a national tire chain does some low-key advertising and covers the costs of running that site. Many on-line news services have found that ads don't cover all of their costs, so they either limit the number of articles readers can see or require signing in and providing marketing data, removing ad-blocking software, or actually subscribing with money. Other sites are in-between.

I have 5G cloud storage and have been advised to pay a monthly fee ($1.29f mth) for more so tryng to figure out options for storage. Memory sticks are a possibility for my photos.

Three different things being discussed here:

- physical media (memory sticks, external hard drives, etc.): to oversimplify a little, these are used to make copies of the files you use on your primary device (computer, phone, etc.). They can expand storage to some degree, but also to can let you put copies of your data someplace safer than the original location of the data (for example, your house, which could be broken into or flood or start on fire). It's not wise to make a copy of your data and put it right next to the original. Physical media also can wear out or fail and, over the years, the hardware and file format needed to read these files may no longer be available.

- cloud storage for backup: there are services which let you back up parts of your computer/phone data to their service. You pay for this service. Most Internet access providers have very slow upload speeds, so getting your data up there and keeping it updated can chew up a lot of time. Services vary, too, on the quality of service they provide when you need your data back.

- cloud storage to synchronize files: some services allow you to maintain the same set of information across various devices. When I delete an appointment on my iPhone, iCloud synchronizes that entry on my Mac's calendar app and removes it there, too. Ditto for contacts, notes, etc. Apple also will let you store pictures and music in your cloud so you don't have to have full copies of those images and tunes taking up space on your device. That can save money on buying the device, but typically you'll pay for more than just a little of this service, too, and then you're at the mercy of having Internet access wherever you want to look at that picture or listen to that music.

There are some overlapping areas among all three of these and each has pluses and minuses. You have to decide which features are most compelling to you -- or which downside you want to avoid most. But -- again, oversimplifying a little -- they are different things for essentially different purposes.