SL 824

~ Laura

Hi all. I’m back. I’ve been AWOL on this blog for a few days, because I’ve been way busy with paid work.

Sidenote: All those folks that talk about “fake media” can kiss my ass. Do you know how many hours of work go into every article? Holy Crap. This last article involved eight hours of interviews with hundreds of pages of transcripts from the audio. Then, turning all that information into a coherent story that fits a website’s format and expectations took days and days of work. And I’m not quite done yet.

And truthfully, I’m working out of some pandemic malaise. Keeping this family sane for an entire year has been exhausting. I’m getting back into some exercise routine, so I’m starting to feel better.

Let me just post some links this morning, as I get back into the swing of things here:

Guilty pleasures: The Meghan and Harry rumble with the Queen. The gossip blogs have so much dirt. Fun!

You might think that people stuck in the house all year would lead to babies. But no. Birth numbers have dropped. I have to think that 20- and 30-somethings have been watching parents struggle this year, and decided that babies aren’t worth the trouble. Others have lost their jobs and are struggling; also, poverty is not a conducive environment to make babies.

Cooking: I’m going to work my way through this list of recipes this month. Last week, I made GOOP’s sheet pan recipes for salmon and chicken — they were actually pretty good.

I’ve been hearing that boys are weathering the pandemic depression better than girls, because they already had a social life through video games.

How many colleges will survive this year? How many folks in the arts industry in NYC are now getting handouts of groceries from friends?

Picture: Easton and Franklin Press books are colorful leather and faux-leather books mass produced in the 70s to now. I bought a stack of them at an estate sale last weekend for resale on my Etsy shop. The house had hundreds more. Maybe I should bought more (kicking myself now), but I wanted to see how they sell first. The house –a jaw-dropping mid-century house that had been sadly neglected for decades — had been owned by a double surgeon couple and was filled with objects from their plentiful hobbies (harps! parrots!). It was a great way to spend a Saturday morning.

Published by Laura

62 thoughts on “SL 824”

  1. ” Keeping this family sane for an entire year has been exhausting.”

    I may or may not have yelled at my husband on the weekend “I never APPLIED for the job of Pandemic Cruise Director and I am tired of Making Things Fun!”

    (A nap helped followed by a workout.)

    Hang in there! For food our wave of “I should take advantage of being home and cook all the things I can’t usually manage” has worn off and so this week we had a massive pot of slow cooker chicken adobo followed by chicken/lentil slow cooker soup followed by hummus bowls featuring all kinds of chopped vegetables and pickles +, you guessed it, shredded chicken. 🙂

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    1. The would count as high cuisine in our house. We had an excellent high end take out meal last Friday (the yam soup was very yummy as were the bottled cocktails). But, I just may or may not have made a trip to Burger King for my comfort chicken sandwich recently.

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      1. Takeout is my nuclear option for Events and Horrible Days so I try to use it sparingly. But we have my daughter’s birthday/life/death day week coming up next week so I have a to-go schedule planned. Yam soup sounds awesome.

        In the Before Times I relied on slow cooker recipes *a lot* and I think everyone was glad of a break for a while.

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    2. One of our family’s big pandemic discoveries was that the rotisserie section at the grocery store sells boxed cut-up rotisserie chicken and turkey meat at a very reasonable price.

      It’s made the burden of pandemic home cooking a lot more bearable.

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    1. Steal away! I just got the idea of giving my family one of those cruise newsletters (we did a cruise with my parents a few years ago) tomorrow morning.

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  3. Laura wrote,

    “I’m getting back into some exercise routine, so I’m starting to feel better.”

    Before the pandemic started, I worked with a (fairly cheap college gym) personal trainer a couple times but after COVID hit, I had the world’s best excuse to stop that. Our family now has a cult-like attachment to our evening walk (we did SO many walks even during the big storm), but it’s not quite enough exercise for me.

    My plan is to join the trendy ladies’ gym downtown after I get my shot and it kicks in.

    “You might think that people stuck in the house all year would lead to babies. But no.”

    There’s also the medical side of it. Early during the pandemic, everybody was terrified of going to the doctor, and having a baby involves a lot of going to the doctor. I’ve read a number of stories of mothers of newborns dying of COVID or pregnant mothers with COVID dying, but the baby being saved.

    One of my email friends is pregnant right now, and she’s basically living in a bubble.

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  4. Have you seen the Buzzfeed article comparing Kate & Meghan headlines from the British tabloids? From a year ago.

    My main thought is that Meghan must have some pretty terrible things she is planning on exposing given the reaction of a royal family that tolerates Andrew and survived the Diana interviews and release of conversations between Parker-Bowles & Charles and Diana’s bother’s diatribe against the Royal Family.

    I’ve always wondered why the royal family pursued the romance of Charles & Diana rather than letting Charles just marry Parker-Bowles.

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    1. “I’ve always wondered why the royal family pursued the romance of Charles & Diana rather than letting Charles just marry Parker-Bowles.”

      You know, there’s a whole season of a tv series about that very topic (Season 4 of The Crown). 🙂 Bonus Gillian Anderson as Margaret Thatcher.

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      2. I am late to the Gillian Anderson girl crushing (all my Buffy fan friends loved her from XF back in 2000), but I am a huge fan now. Have you seen her in The Fall with Jamie Dornan? And Colin Morgan? OMG. And then of course Sex Education, which is a great show. I need to watch her in House of Mirth, but I am afraid to because that book is incredibly special to me, and I don’t know if I want to see it filmed.

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      3. I haven’t seen those movies, but I’m interested. We used to religiously watch XF, but haven’t seen anything with her since then.

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    2. Yeah, that buzzfeed article was stupid. You should see what the british tabloids have said about Camilla and Kate over the years. Worse! The British royal family has a weird relationship with the public and the press. The public funds them, but they expect a pound of flesh in return. That life isn’t for many people. I don’t think I could tolerate it. I don’t blame harry and Meghan from wanting to get away from life in the fishbowl, but I don’t like that they are branding themselves as American royals with no responsibility. It’s highly distasteful that Americans are going around calling themselves duke and duchess.

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      1. So I completely disagree about the Buzzfeed article since it shows exact parallels in some cases (Kate lauded for cradling her bump while Meghan is vilified for it). But, I would enjoy seeing the reverse in which Kate is vilified for the same actions that Meghan is lauded for. Has anyone produced such a thing?

        I did find an article titled the 10 meanest things people have said about Kate which contained gems like: “”I think she dresses quite uneventfully … I don’t think she’s become the fashion plate that [Princess] Diana was, and I think she’s probably doing that advisedly, wouldn’t you say?” (said by Margaret Attwood). I presume there are some worse ones?

        Camilla cheated with Charles when he was married to The Princess who died at 36 in a horrible car crash leaving young children, so I can imagine they said awful things about her).

        Harry really isn’t an American, though, He’s a Brit who lives in the US and is married to an American and has an American child. I do agree that Americans like Meghan shouldn’t accept title of nobility (though they are allowed to unless they are naturalized).

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      2. Anyone marrying into the British royal family has to know that the Tabloids are vicious. As a woman, your appearance and actions will be endlessly criticized – and you can never get it ‘right’ (there will always be negative press).
        And that the ‘job’ of being a working royal (i.e. one supported by the British taxpayer), requires you skate a very fine line in espousing political views; and gives you very little true privacy.

        It’s a hard life, and not one that I would ever sign up for (not that I’m likely to get the opportunity!)

        To many people, Meghan is exploiting her status-by-marriage without being prepared to carry out the duties that the role entails. The comparison with the Duke and Duchess of Windsor is, I think, very close to reality.

        I’ll be interested to see the Oprah interview – but don’t expect any bombshell revelations. More ‘the papers were mean to me’, and ‘I didn’t have any privacy’.

        The release of the allegations that Meghan bullied staff – is very interesting timing. I can’t help thinking that this has been kept on ice for the ‘correct’ moment….

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      3. I know what the buzzfeed article said. I read it. But it is stupid, because Kate has tons of similar negative press. Yes, much of Kate was positive, too. But Buzzfeed cherry picked. There have simply tons and tons of article gushing about Meghan Markle, too. Tons. That Buzzfeed article was dishonest and awful. People should be ashamed of themselves for publishing it.

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      4. Also, it’s ridiculous for her to talk about being ‘prepared to lose things’ – she’s lost nothing.
        Harry on the other hand, has lost his whole family (to whom he was very close – especially to William), and his ‘job’ (he really valued his relationship with a raft of charities and organizations)

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      5. The way to show me that the buzzfeed article is stupid is to pint me to the similarly catty press about Kate. I couldn’t find it, but am open to someone who has read it pointing me there.

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      6. Honestly if buzzfeed should be embarrassed for the article it should be easy to rebut with the reverse gushing about Meghan, dissing Kate. And I’m sincere in wanting to see the equivalent in the British press.

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      15. Yeah, I’m surprised about the royal family engagement on the Oprah interview. Anything they do just increases the publicity and, I’m guessing, the Meghan/Harry brand.

        I think their brand has economic value even if it brings the haters and in the anti racism community obsession about Meghan doesn’t look good.

        Harry clearly blames the press and the lack of royal family support for his mother’s death. And, I’m guessing that as one would imagine, it’s no fun being the second son in a royal family.

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      16. bj said, “The way to show me that the buzzfeed article is stupid is to pint me to the similarly catty press about Kate. I couldn’t find it, but am open to someone who has read it pointing me there.”

        https://www.cheatsheet.com/entertainment/icarly-jennette-mccurdys-net-worth-movie-tv-roles-after-nick-show.html/

        Kate Middleton was apparently given the tabloid nickname “Waity Katie” to make fun of the fact that she was a girlfriend for so long before becoming officially engaged. Of course, they met as college freshmen…

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      18. In addition to all those links above, there is also all the press about Prince William’s affair, which I suspect was absolutely true. The gossip blogs say that it was MM’s people who leaked that info to the press.

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      19. The topless thing was bad (the court ordered a payment, but, still bad). I wonder how topless photos compare to publishing a private letter to one’s estranged, absent father?

        The buzzfeed aticle inspired others (including marketing/analysis firms) to test their software on the Meghan/Kate coverage. The Guardian said Meghan gets 2X as many negative headlines as positive (they don’t compare to Kate) (https://www.theguardian.com/global/2020/jan/18/meghan-gets-more-than-twice-as-many-negative-headlines-as-positive). The Guardian does a timeline. Brandwatch says in 2019 Meghan got about 21K negative stories out of 29K articles (72% negative) v 4K/14K for Meghan (28% negative) (https://www.brandwatch.com/blog/react-markle-middleton-negativity/). And Relative Insight says that Meghan was portrayed as a “lone wolf” compared to Kate as a team player. Apparently “Relative Insight can analyze data from any language asset”. (https://www.greenbook.org/mr/insights/comparing-how-meghan-markle-is-discussed-in-the-press-vs-kate-middleton/).

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      21. Yes, I do thinking timing would be one of the plausible regressors. Meghan’s criticism was coming in the first few years of the relationship (which moved faster); it could be that ten years hence, everything would have settled down.

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      22. That finger thing is down right weird. And, almost certainly not true, in the sense that Kate has abnormal fingers. I can easily make my fingers look the same length, and I have really different length fingers. And, yet, I am now obsessing about it and if there was an article about my fingers, I’d want to correct them, even though that would certainly be a foolish argument to get into if I were a princess (or just me).

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      23. bj said: “Yes, I do thinking timing would be one of the plausible regressors. Meghan’s criticism was coming in the first few years of the relationship (which moved faster); it could be that ten years hence, everything would have settled down.”

        Maybe, maybe not. Sarah, Duchess of York has pretty much always had bad publicity (not that she helps herself for a lot of it). But huge amounts of criticism about her weight and fashion choices – especially compared to the beloved Diana – in the early years.

        Media do like to create a ‘good princess, bad princess’ narrative. And there is literally nothing the subject can do about it. It’s whatever makes good clickbait headlines.

        The best solution is to ignore the press (especially the gutter press), and outlive them…. Which is what Kate did – and also Princess Anne, for that matter.

        Meghan has pretty much guaranteed that she’s going to get shocking press coverage in the British tabloids forever. Trying to fight fire with fire is a guaranteed ‘lose’ situation.

        If she had been prepared to take advice (especially media advice) from her UK PR team – who knew what would work, she would have done a lot better. But, I think, Meghan thought that she ‘understood’ the media (because she knew what worked in the US and online) – and didn’t realize how totally different the media industries are. Divided by a common language….
        Also Harry is just not balanced about the media – he blames them totally for his mother’s death (there’s some psychology there – if he doesn’t blame them, then he would have to admit that she contributed to the situation, and he’s not willing to do that)

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  5. Fun fact:

    Every day, there are about 30X as many Americans getting a COVID shot every as there are Americans having a new case of COVID.

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    1. But there are still 2000 people dying each day. I will feel more positive when that number falls.

      In WA, the vaccine site reports that 50% of 65+ year olds have received a first vax dose and 25% have received both. Very exciting and hopeful, since 80% of Covid deaths are in that population.

      And the CDC was reporting 50.2/cases/7 days/100K today for my county. Almost the “yellow” zone for the CDC!

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  6. bj said, “But there are still 2000 people dying each day. I will feel more positive when that number falls.”

    It has already fallen a lot, and that 2,000 reflects what was happening a month ago.

    Still hate that little plateau, though…

    “In WA, the vaccine site reports that 50% of 65+ year olds have received a first vax dose and 25% have received both. Very exciting and hopeful, since 80% of Covid deaths are in that population.”

    Really good!

    I kind of wish that the next step in vaccine prioritization was something like 55+, rather than every human being associated with education, but you gotta do what you gotta do.

    “And the CDC was reporting 50.2/cases/7 days/100K today for my county. Almost the “yellow” zone for the CDC!”

    Not bad!

    You want to hear something really annoying–my old county in WA, which my sis says is very, very, very anti-mask has also been one of the yellow counties for a long time.

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    1. It is that those counties without much population survived the travelers while maintaining (relatively) low rates: 1K/100K (over the whole pandemic) compared to King county’s (3K/100K)

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      1. I would like to be positive, but I am worried about the variants. Virginia’s death count has suddenly jumped in the past week: https://covid.cdc.gov/covid-data-tracker/#compare-trends_newdeathsper100k (choose deaths/last 7 days/rate per 100K, and up to 6 states)

        I think death counts are the most reliable statistic. Criteria to qualify for testing is not uniform across the states. Criteria for hospitalization varies as well, by doctor and hospital capacity. One can only die once.

        I worry, because I see that news articles are reporting that the new variants are circulating in VA: https://roanoke.com/news/local/virginia-in-a-race-with-vaccines-and-variants/article_f1d2984e-7d1c-11eb-b543-f72e3f271483.html If you look at the CDC interactive graph, Virginia did not have an unusually high case rate in the weeks before the last 7 days, which could mean the new strains are more deadly.

        Virginia is vaccinating, too.

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      2. Cranberry said, “I think death counts are the most reliable statistic. Criteria to qualify for testing is not uniform across the states. Criteria for hospitalization varies as well, by doctor and hospital capacity. One can only die once.”

        Not an expert, but there’s a lot to be said for hospitalizations. Testing can be very wobbly and deaths are a significantly lagging indicator and are often recorded weirdly late. I kid you not, there’s a note today on my county’s dashboard saying that of the 18 (!) deaths they recorded today, 2 were recent and 16 were previously unreported deaths from 2020.

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      3. Yes, testing is very variable, though the positivity can be a gauge of testing. But odds are those anti-masking counties are probably not too eager about testing, either.

        Deaths aren’t a good indicator because they tell you what happen a month (and in some of those smaller counties, potentially even longer, since the chain of transmission might be slower — ie the wedding that caused the nursing home deaths occurred 6+ weeks ago).

        Hospitalization does seem pretty good (though still delayed by week+ and longer, the wedding ->nursing home scenario again).

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  7. This is interesting:

    https://mobile.twitter.com/Alicia_Smith19/status/1367853737801355268

    “Exclusive: Oxford study indicates AstraZeneca vaccine is effective against Brazil variant.”

    “In addition, scientists and epidemiologists are also skeptical of the massive Brazil variant-induced reinfection claims, and say the most likely explanation is that seroprevalence was not as high as it was first believed to be.”

    That would be nice!

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    2. We flooded half of our ground floor with (clean) water from a burst water filter some years ago.

      We got a lot of use out of a small device for checking humidity as everything dried out. I want to say hygrometer, but I’m not sure that’s the right term.

      It took a month for my husband to take apart the affected areas, dry them out, and then put them back together. We had dehumidifiers and heaters running for weeks. Super loud–drove me nuts.

      Good luck!

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      1. We loved the water filter (it gave us delicious cool water during the summer when TX water comes into the house really warm), but I’m never going to take the risk again.

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  9. About the Texas COVID relaxation:

    I keep getting notifications that various local entities are planning on carrying on much as before.

    For example, the county courthouse is going to keep requiring masks, school is continuing to require masks indoors for staff and bigger kids, and I just got a notification from our therapy center that they are continuing with their current mask and temp-check protocols. They write, “We will continue to monitor the situation over the next couple of months and will let you know of any changes.” Hometown U. is also continuing to require masks indoors, and outdoors when distancing is impossible.

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    2. The poorer people working in the grocery stores and the like are going to pay the price of higher risk, mostly not the professionals.

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      1. MH said, “The poorer people working in the grocery stores and the like are going to pay the price of higher risk, mostly not the professionals.”

        https://newsroom.heb.com/h-e-b-takes-additional-steps-to-safeguard-partners-by-providing-masks-and-gloves/

        HEB (the big Texas grocery chain) says this:

        “While statewide policy has changed, our store protocol has not. Mask use at our stores will remain. Our signs requiring mask use will remain posted at entrances and we will continue to make announcements in store.

        “We will continue to expect shoppers to wear masks while in our stores. Additionally, we will still require all our Partners and vendors to wear masks while at work.

        “H-E-B has always been a strong proponent and advocate of mask use even before mandates and orders were passed.”

        They say that they will continue their COVID rules until all Texans have a chance to be vaccinated. And yes, they did have a lot of protocols in place before it was legally required.

        bj said, “I think the data is always messy, but, I think it is a bad time to get rid of masks.”

        Dropping a legal requirement to mask is not the same as getting rid of masks, particularly since private entities are still free to require masking and (as I have described) many of them are. I will tell you all if I notice a big change in grocery store masking going forward. HEB has had around 98% properly masked right now, with most of the 2% being little kids or mask under nose. The outlaws (no mask at all) are not that frequent and really stand out. We’ve had this level of masking at the grocery since late June.

        That said, while I think that the substance of Governor Abbott’s announcement is defensible, I feel that it could have been phrased better. He initially made it sound like all restrictions were dropped, when it would have been more helpful (although less dramatic!) to explain that state restrictions were dropped, but local and private restrictions might well continue.

        My cleaning lady moonlights at Hometown U. (working in their COVID jail and possibly stationed on campus telling people to keep their masks on) and she reports a lot of recent pushback from students (“my mama says I don’t have to”). She was not thrilled by Gov. Abbott’s announcement, because it’s going to make her job harder.

        I, for one, am looking forward to the time when we can all 5 sit at the same table at the campus cafeteria without danger of getting yelled at for moving a chair over so we can sit together as a family. They’ve already brought the salad bar back (*harps*), so I have high hopes. (For the past year, any fruit or salad has been offered in pre-packaged form–a box of greens or a small cup of mixed fruit.)

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      2. The CDC data on masks was based on the mandate (and not a measure of weather people were wearing masks). I recently heard a report on the radio of a restaurant in Texas in which the owner said he would have his employees wear masks but not customers, because he thought there would be resistance and he didn’t want to enforce a mask mandate.

        I would like to see your mask compliance stat again (when you told us who was wearing masks while walking around your neck of the woods).

        Masks are nearly universal inside stores here (though I don’t go enough to be a statistical sample). I did see a few unmasked people months ago at the Target. Outside, I’d put it at about 75% unless its really not crowded. We do have a mandate, though.

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      3. Here, we’re 100% indoors since last April. Outdoors is 25%, but that’s not necessary.

        We’re driving down to Jonah’s college now to take him out to lunch. We’re eating at a pub that specializes in hotdogs. Very excited.

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      4. bj said, “I recently heard a report on the radio of a restaurant in Texas in which the owner said he would have his employees wear masks but not customers, because he thought there would be resistance and he didn’t want to enforce a mask mandate.”

        Not requiring customer to wear masks in restaurants may not make a big difference, though, because a) a lot of restaurant transmission is happening back in the kitchen and b) customers were presumably already allowed to have their masks off at tables. (I’m not sure about the TX restaurant norms right now because I haven’t dined inside at a restaurant for almost a year. I did once see a cafeteria worker telling some guys sitting at a table to put on their masks when not actively eating, but enforcing that rule looked to me like an exercise in futility.)

        Lunch time at school has been a trial for our 10th grader because it was so hard to both distance and be socially involved. Finally, we told him to eat quickly and wear his P100 afterward while socializing.

        bj said, “I would like to see your mask compliance stat again (when you told us who was wearing masks while walking around your neck of the woods).”

        I think the relaxation starts March 10.

        “I did see a few unmasked people months ago at the Target. Outside, I’d put it at about 75% unless its really not crowded. We do have a mandate, though.”

        I used to see an occasional outlaw with no mask at all at the grocery store, but I haven’t seen them for a while. I see a lot of homeless men downtown wearing masks outdoors. The college students wear masks a lot outdoors, especially when there’s a lot of pedestrian density. We ourselves typically don’t outside, unless we really can’t avoid people.

        I see that the TX governor may be planning to fight locales on their enforcement of local restrictions again, which strikes me as being a poor use of everybody’s time.

        https://www.aarp.org/health/healthy-living/info-2020/states-mask-mandates-coronavirus.html

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      5. The soup bar at our local grocer is sometimes available as well as the olive bar, but no salad bar.

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  11. I simply can’t understand why people don’t like masks. They keep my face warm. I will probably use them even after vaccinations and all that.

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    1. Plus, they keep people who don’t know me very well from recognizing me, sparing me from having to try to remember their name.

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    2. Makes my glasses fog up!
      Serious issue, I’ve done a full length purler over a curb that I didn’t see……

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  12. I thought I should mention that Hometown U. is using an occupancy tracker for public buildings:

    https://occuspace.io/

    There’s an app and there are also displays in some buildings. I’ve seen one at the college library, where the board tells you how full each floor of the library is. Husband says that the app also gives historical data, so you can more easily figure out when is a less busy time to go to the cafeteria, etc.

    It’s kind of handy.

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