Re: Check Ins, Reassurances, and Concerns, 3/17

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Well, as if things weren't already complicated enough, I just hurt my knee. It's happened before but not in many years; it just suddenly goes out if I put the wrong kind of pressure on it, then it snaps back but remains painful and takes a while to recover. I should be fine within a few days, but we're going to get a brace just to make sure.

In happier news, I have an interview next Friday (3/26) for a job that would be a big change and step up from my current one. So that's nice.


Posted by: teofilo | Link to this comment | 03-17-21 2:21 PM
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I've gotta say, getting out of the house for a few days and camping with friends was unexpectedly restorative. I guess I haven't slept outside of my bed since last August? Which isn't that crazy. Maybe it was the zero cell reception? It was just very deeply relaxing.


Posted by: heebie | Link to this comment | 03-17-21 2:35 PM
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1: Good luck with the interview!

On my front, my wife managed to score a vaccine appointment for Friday, so that's a big source of stress dissolving. I've been a bit dismayed about the number of friends who share nuggets like, "CVS isn't checking employers", etc. for gaming the system to get their shots early. I do feel very stick-in-the-mud waiting until I'm officially able to get the shot, instead of cheating like so many of my peers and friends. (It turns out that my boss and a co-worker similarly... stretched the definition of essential = construction to include work from home plan reviewers, so even that front is dismaying.)

I suspect that I'll really be kicking myself when the official relaxation of rules for the vaccinated goes out -- I already envy the vaccinated friends who are scheduling quiet gaming evenings with other vaccinated peers. Hopefully the next couple of months will fly by and the temporary "I can meet, can you?" will be a forgotten blip.


Posted by: Mooseking | Link to this comment | 03-17-21 2:40 PM
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Sorry teo. My experience has been that dealing with minor physical ailments has been much harder during the pandemic. Because I'm already spending a lot of mental energy/attention on managing pandemic life it's just harder to be attentive to anything else that crops up, and I've definitely felt that with a couple of issues in the last year.

Congratulations on the job interview.

Heebie -- I mowed the lawn two weeks ago it was surprisingly nice; I realized afterwards that it just felt _normal_. Again, while I was mowing the lawn I wasn't thinking about COVID, and there aren't many activities for which that is true.


Posted by: NickS | Link to this comment | 03-17-21 2:40 PM
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2: Ah, so it was sere and cleansing.


Posted by: JP Stormcrow | Link to this comment | 03-17-21 2:42 PM
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oh man. I didn't get the joke in the other thread so I assumed you were aiming at someone else. Is this a typo I made? Am I a dumb thread?


Posted by: heebie | Link to this comment | 03-17-21 4:08 PM
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No it was just too stupid of a joke to "get" (and I did forget to reference your comment in disaccordance with house style). Based on your description of the place, I just came up with "sere and cleansing" as a description of the place and its probable restorative nature. You know like usually happens when you drag 4 kids with you to the middle of nowhere.

What is it, Major Lawrence that attracts you personally to the desert? T.E. Lawrence: It's clean


Posted by: JP Stormcrow | Link to this comment | 03-17-21 6:10 PM
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aaaaargh. wife's employer told her last week that she qualified for the vaccine based on the industry they're in and the state's rules. she registered for the system the state has and put that down. today they said "oh, yeah, if you work from home you don't count".

she's pissed, but also giving herself a lot of shit for ever having believed them.


Posted by: Nathan Williams | Link to this comment | 03-17-21 6:59 PM
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7: but what does sere mean??


Posted by: heebie | Link to this comment | 03-17-21 7:19 PM
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9: Survival, Evasion, Resistance and Escape


Posted by: gswift | Link to this comment | 03-17-21 7:37 PM
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SERE training used to teach how to withstand torture. Now it only teaches how to withstand enhanced interrogation.


Posted by: politicalfootball | Link to this comment | 03-17-21 8:14 PM
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I'm not saying that the contrast between the dismissive way Cumberbatch recalls his SERE training in The Mauritanian, and what we see of Tahar Rahim's torture is worth the price of admission -- at least not while the movie still costs 19.95 to stream -- but that's one bad faith argument no one has been fucked up enough even to attempt for more than 15 years now. Progress!


Posted by: CharleyCarp | Link to this comment | 03-17-21 8:57 PM
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As far as I know you have to go back to the nineteenth century before you run across "sere" meaning "dry and withered." I don't think even T.E. Lawrence uses it. I guess it might be a useful Scrabble play if someone's already made "ere."


Posted by: lourdes kayak | Link to this comment | 03-17-21 10:03 PM
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I miss my Aunt Nicki, who died of COVID a few weeks ago, and I'm just feeling a little bit sad and blue. That is all.


Posted by: Just Plain Jane | Link to this comment | 03-17-21 11:08 PM
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My sympathies, JPJ.


Posted by: Barry Freed | Link to this comment | 03-18-21 1:42 AM
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Good luck, teo!

In other news I'm taking myself out for lunch (outdoors) and it's already 100 F outside at noon.


Posted by: Barry Freed | Link to this comment | 03-18-21 1:42 AM
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13: Ah, I thought it the more precise term than "sear" and there are more recent examples in literature. But I guess more in my head than reality. Ngram shows them as somewhat rare and steadily declining since mid 19th but with quite similar frequency (and of course does not capture meaning or context of use). Interestingly "sear" has abig bubble of use during 18th century that declines preciptously in early 19th.

All of that to say, yes I am familiar with the word via online Boggle.


Posted by: JP Stormcrow | Link to this comment | 03-18-21 1:47 AM
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Did I say 100? It's 102 now


Posted by: Barry Freed | Link to this comment | 03-18-21 2:00 AM
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And looking at the actual book searches 9as well as searer/sere and searest/serest both consist of a lot of names a (and "SERE") and the like.

Also this one: "through the valley of the shadow of death , we will sear no evil ."


Posted by: JP Stormcrow | Link to this comment | 03-18-21 2:06 AM
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You lose the juices.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 03-18-21 5:30 AM
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8: That's super weird, because remote healthcare workers were in phase 1 for a while. Tim does as of 3/22 because he is in the pharmaceutical supply chain. He registered got the mass vaccination sites, but I'm going to be checking CVS and Walgreens furiously.

Walgreens actually has open appointments tomorrow, but they are all in Chelsea, Revere, and Roxbury. He's not eligible yet, but I would also feel bad taking a slot from someone who lived in one of those areas and had no access to a car.


Posted by: Bostoniangirl | Link to this comment | 03-18-21 5:55 AM
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About to to go with my wife to get her vaccine. This one was twitter for the win. Yesterday she saw a tweet from the Allegheny County Health Department seconds after it came out that there were appointments (from a different health organization) for patients 60 and over (has been 65 here) a few miles away. Got an appointment. Hope it works, as nowhere else has moved to 60. ACHD itself is going to 50-64 but with specific underlying health conditions only.

Complicating factor was that she was not feeling at all well yesterday (not Covid symptoms) and the doctor advised not to get the vaccine unless she was feeling much better, which sh is today. I guess that is a general vaccine precaution; mainly to not confound preexisting illness with potential vaccine reaction?


Posted by: JP Stormcrow | Link to this comment | 03-18-21 6:21 AM
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21: Yeah, it is weird, though one of the compounding weirdnesses of the whole situation is that it's not clear who has the authority to make that call. The state says "transit/transportation workers", and explicitly includes "administrators", which seems like it ought to cover back-office types. But her management chain has said "no, you don't qualify for this phase, if you WFH you aren't a transportation worker". And yet all of the actual sign-ups and the like are pure self-certification, so I don't think anybody in the actual process of getting vaccinated is going to check what her management thinks.

But out of an abundance of wanting to never be accused of violating rules (trying to defend herself against the just-world judgement of others) she's probably going to skip this phase and wait until the next one she qualifies for.


Posted by: Nathan Williams | Link to this comment | 03-18-21 6:35 AM
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warmest sympathy, jpj. what a brutal, brutal year (plus, at this point).


Posted by: dairy queen | Link to this comment | 03-18-21 6:36 AM
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the only part of my brother's spy survival training i remember, and i can't imagine i'll ever forget it, is the tip that if you need to eat slugs look for some dry dust to roll 'em in, much easier to get down that way. this could be complete made up hogwash and is very suspicious bc he was always and has continued extremely monumentally tightlipped about that entire decades long period of his life, i mean zip, nadda, no information strictly whatsoever, so this is probably made up. but it's good! v good imagination, bro!


Posted by: dairy queen | Link to this comment | 03-18-21 6:40 AM
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If you work from home, you aren't a transported worker.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 03-18-21 6:40 AM
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I, a fat person, got my first shot on Tuesday. (Minnesota is using a lower BMI cutoff than some states so more fat people qualify here.) Actually I feel pretty good that I weigh basically the same, maybe a couple of pounds less, than at the start of the pandemic. Normally I tend to snack and stress-eat and I've been surprised that I've kept things sort of under control this year.

Anyway, I used a Minnesota facebook vaccine finder page and got very, very lucky to see some appointments at a pharmacy in an outstate town right when they went up. So I was able to arrange a car and went out there. I brought what my doctor happily describes as my "problem list" but they didn't check anything.

Now, of course, because I am a chronically anxious person I can't stop worrying that maybe they mixed the vaccine wrong - there was an issue in a nearby town where they accidentally gave people saline shots. What if they messed up the vaccine but just decided to lie about it to save their jobs? I think this is probably a stupid worry but it's par for the course for me - I just bounce from anxiety to anxiety.

But I have my second appointment in three weeks and presumably at least one of the shots won't be, eg, saline.

If a friend lied to get the vaccine, I would feel pretty angry if they were affluent, working at home and basically healthy, especially since it seems like there will be enough vaccine for all within the next couple of months. If they had high exposure through work or had a serious illness that wasn't on the CDC list or were a carer for someone in fragile health, etc, well, obviously the system isn't set up for lying but honestly I would find it hard to be mad.


Posted by: Frowner | Link to this comment | 03-18-21 6:46 AM
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My brother is at least twenty pounds lighter than I am and the same height. He's getting the vaccine with weight as a risk factor and I can't.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 03-18-21 6:50 AM
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But, he can't work from home and I am.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 03-18-21 6:51 AM
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13: It's possible that "sere" is a D&D or D&D-adjacent word, because it was familiar to me and felt like it had been in my noggin a good long time.


Posted by: Doug | Link to this comment | 03-18-21 7:06 AM
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It's a class, dehydrated wizard.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 03-18-21 7:08 AM
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the only part of my brother's spy survival training i remember, and i can't imagine i'll ever forget it, is the tip that if you need to eat slugs look for some dry dust to roll 'em in

dq absolutely crushes the recipe thread!


Posted by: Alex | Link to this comment | 03-18-21 7:09 AM
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Roll 'em in pumpkin spice, open a shop.
Good luck teo and pharma foragers.
Brits, any hot takes on the BJ nuke announcement?


Posted by: MC | Link to this comment | 03-18-21 7:18 AM
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27: Congratulations, Frowner! Little discussed benefit of the 2-shot vaccine protocol -- they probably won't mess up and give you a saline shot twice.

My vaccine appointment is this evening.


Posted by: peep | Link to this comment | 03-18-21 7:18 AM
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Also, do vermin develop bait avoidance like they do pesticide resistance?


Posted by: MC | Link to this comment | 03-18-21 7:21 AM
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I'm going to sneak into Ohio next week. I still have my Buckeye hoodie and I can speak like the locals.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 03-18-21 7:22 AM
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35: Rodents do.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 03-18-21 7:30 AM
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37: Cockroaches presumably likewise. Are there counter(-counter^n)measures?


Posted by: MC | Link to this comment | 03-18-21 7:36 AM
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Changing the bait.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 03-18-21 7:37 AM
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Well, yes. I mean, systemic, eternal-war-with-nature measures. There are only so many baits (especially if chemicals?); are there enough for a rotation long enough that first bait regains efficacy before the last loses it?


Posted by: | Link to this comment | 03-18-21 7:42 AM
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You need to master the bait.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 03-18-21 7:47 AM
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41: In order to facilitate the little death (of an insect).


Posted by: JP Stormcrow | Link to this comment | 03-18-21 9:08 AM
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I just saw from twitter that the Blackfeet Nation is at 95% vaccinated. That is a tremendous achievement.


Posted by: CharleyCarp | Link to this comment | 03-18-21 9:11 AM
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36: Yes, there seem to be a number available there. For both my wife* and I getting appointments in Ohio led the Gods to almost immediately open up opportunities near Pittsburgh so we did not need to go there.

Assume you haver already made an appointment, but the closest place we found with readily available appointments is a Rite-Aide in Wellsville, Ohio (near East Liverpool). You can usually find a Giant Eagle one as well, although generally more work and not found any as close.

*She did get her 1st Moderna shot this AM.


Posted by: JP Stormcrow | Link to this comment | 03-18-21 9:13 AM
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25. One shouldn't have a problem with eating slugs. They're just snails without shells. You eat land snails with garlic sauce in Spain and France, although admittedly it's more about the sauce than the snails. You eat sea snails (cockles and whelks) with vinegar and pepper at the seaside. A friend once had a job going round pubs selling little pots of cockles and whelks out of a basket. So why not slugs? And yet...


Posted by: chris y | Link to this comment | 03-18-21 9:23 AM
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I never knew what cockles and whelks were. Thanks.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 03-18-21 9:30 AM
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36:. Shameless! After all your Buckeye-bashing!


Posted by: peep | Link to this comment | 03-18-21 9:32 AM
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It will be fine. I'll buy something, like when I use the restroom in a gas station.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 03-18-21 9:38 AM
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Plus, like half of Steubenville comes here to work anyway.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 03-18-21 9:39 AM
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Still OK here. Yesterday was my sister's birthday. Since she has 2 kids under 4, and of course there's still the pandemic, she did not celebrate it and St. Patrick's Day with as much wild partying as she used to. It was also the birthday of one of Atossa's podmates, so Atossa got to stay an hour later than usual for a sort of party, so we got an extra hour of kidless time, which was nice. Behavior later in the day was less nice. Too bad the pandemic didn't strike when she was a teenager, or in college in another state...


Posted by: Cyrus | Link to this comment | 03-18-21 9:53 AM
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45: as reported, by likely unreliable in this instance narrator, consumption was raw without benefit of fire, utensils, clean water, etc., in midst of travel from point a (tossed out of helicopter in back o beyond) & point b (rendez vous location to be arrived at by wits & cunning, evading capture). i can't remember the max travel time, was s week or two.


Posted by: dairy queen | Link to this comment | 03-18-21 10:05 AM
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I must admit that if I'm looking at a week or two in here be dragons the absence of clean water would worry me a lot more than the absence of food. Two weeks not eating would make me very ill. Two weeks not drinking, or vomiting when I tried to would make me very dead.


Posted by: chris y | Link to this comment | 03-18-21 12:25 PM
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A slightly famous high school friend just died -- not Covid, some other illness -- and I'm surprisingly sad. Sad that she died, and sad that the last time I saw her was when we were in college, I'd never have known if she hadn't been mildly famous, and sad that I'm out of touch with everyone from high school. I wish I was better at maintaining social ties -- I'm absolutely the worst at it.


Posted by: LizardBreath | Link to this comment | 03-18-21 12:43 PM
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When I inquired about whether my sister could get vaccinated yet (multiple high risk categories), she replied succinctly:

So, the issue with the next round of vaccines was including anyone with a BMI of 25 or higher, which is about 80% of WI, so EVERYONE is scheduling their vaccines now. I haven't seen any open appointments for vaccines yet...

Man, they couldn't add a single additional priority tier of "BMI 25+ AND one other serious medical condition"? Maybe that would still be over half the state. What a shitshow.


Posted by: lurid keyaki | Link to this comment | 03-18-21 12:59 PM
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Ducks will eat an enormous number of slugs, very useful in a garden, but you have to put out lots of bowls of fresh water because they can gum their beaks shut and need to splash themselves clean promptly.

Obvs a human would want beer for the same purpose. You can also put beer out to trap slugs (they crawl in and usually drown) but I've never observed ducks in the beer.

My one attempt at a French literature class in college ran aground when we had gotten through a poem about two snails going to a wedding, who are unhappy because they are slow and all the beer will be gone before they get there, and I managed to say This is death-wish imagery? and it turned out only one of the other people in class knew about slugs and beer and I don't think the prof absolutely believed me and I will never know what the poet thought.


Posted by: clew | Link to this comment | 03-18-21 1:03 PM
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Got the Pfizer vaccine. No reaction so far.


Posted by: peep | Link to this comment | 03-18-21 4:39 PM
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Congrats!


Posted by: teofilo | Link to this comment | 03-18-21 5:48 PM
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And mainland Europe has restarted the AZ vaccine, which is good news because they've got a shed load of the stuff and the pause was based on a misunderstanding to begin


Posted by: chris y | Link to this comment | 03-19-21 3:17 AM
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58: It is weird to me that mainland Euripe did much better on testing initially, but now the UK and the US are doing a better job.


Posted by: Bostoniangirl | Link to this comment | 03-19-21 4:51 AM
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with vaccinations.


Posted by: Bostoniangirl | Link to this comment | 03-19-21 4:51 AM
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And I reconnected with some high school friends because I was sad about J.'s death, and then Ile, here happened to be FB friends with one of my classmates and saw a picture he posted with me in it, so I showed up to say hi.

It's funny what people remember about you -- I just had someone remind me about getting busted by a teacher for, as she thought, doing homework for another class in her class. In fact, as I was able to prove, I was instead copying out Robert Frost's Desert Places from memory, which baffled her enough that she dropped it. I've forgotten that specific incident, but I certainly avoided paying attention in class by writing out poetry I was trying to memorize, and while I don't think I've thought about Desert Places in decades -- I'd never have come up with it trying to list poems I know -- on rummaging around my brain for it, it is still in there.


Posted by: LizardBreath | Link to this comment | 03-19-21 5:58 AM
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Writing in class was suspicious?


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 03-19-21 6:22 AM
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In a way that indicated that you were ignoring what was going on in class, yes. I was a horrible student.


Posted by: LizardBreath | Link to this comment | 03-19-21 6:26 AM
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I guess it is hard to look like you are taking notes if you aren't.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 03-19-21 6:30 AM
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PUBLIC SERVICE ANNOUNCEMENT:

Some slugs (banana slugs) are protected by a toxin in lieu of shells. Other slugs have parasites and a milder toxin in their slime. Here in OR a frat boy chugged a slug on a dare and died. Not recommended.



Posted by: John Emerson | Link to this comment | 03-19-21 6:30 AM
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Very few recommend death, but everyone seems to try it.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 03-19-21 6:34 AM
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53. I've reached the age where I often scan the obituaries. I don't read obsessively through the listings, but every now and see that someone I knew but haven't remained close to has died. Most recently it was someone I worked with when I was an undergrad. I think I noticed the picture first, but then saw the name and sure enough, it was him. It's a weird feeling, because I really don't scan the whole list, so I wonder if my pattern recognition is better than I thought it was. He was minorly famous, but not to the extent the Boston Globe gave him a full article. About four years older than me. That is something I look at in obits and the "born today" thing the Globe also does. ("Outlasted him/her!" or "Aha, he's/she's older than me and not dead yet!", respectively.)


Posted by: DaveLMA | Link to this comment | 03-19-21 6:59 AM
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That reminds me, a guy I went to high school with died last month. He left the school in our junior year and I had not seen him since.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 03-19-21 7:02 AM
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There was no cause of death given, so I'm going to assume banana slug ingestion.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 03-19-21 7:08 AM
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As Bayes would guide you.


Posted by: JP Stormcrow | Link to this comment | 03-19-21 7:33 AM
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Anyway, for the last several years I've been slightly proud of myself for managing to stay busy under the weight that would make me legally obese. But that's why I can't get vaccinated.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 03-19-21 7:55 AM
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Without going to Ohio.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 03-19-21 8:12 AM
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Regarding dead people: Some recent discussion here triggered a recollection of a kid who was horribly bullied in the dismal Catholic school I attended for eight years. For example, Sister Collette, our third grade teacher, used to call him a "pansy" for reasons that are inexplicable to me even today.

It's weird the things you can find out on the Internet about somebody with a reasonably unusual name. He died nearly 20 years ago at age 41. There was an autopsy performed. He graduated from a public high school and served in the military. Not much else, though.


Posted by: politicalfootball | Link to this comment | 03-19-21 8:19 AM
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Well, 73 is depressing.


Posted by: ogged | Link to this comment | 03-19-21 9:10 AM
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Yeah. I didn't post it the other day for that reason. It seemed even more on-topic today, though, what with the dead high school classmates.


Posted by: politicalfootball | Link to this comment | 03-19-21 9:28 AM
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shiv and I both were vaccinated yesterday. Utah's been moving along at a fast clip, presumably because as a young state we don't have as many old people.* shiv qualified based on BMI, and I snagged a leftover dose from the health department because the vaccination clinic is on campus. Leftover doses (usually 2-3 per day) go to faculty and staff who live close enough to make it to campus in 15 minutes and yesterday they reached my age band. Monday I'd be eligible anyway as Utah is opening up vaccination to all adults.

*good news, but it also means we can't reach herd immunity realistically without vaccinating kids.


Posted by: Cala | Link to this comment | 03-19-21 9:39 AM
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65: thank you for your slug safety service!

meanwhile I am hoping powerlifting will have put me at the top of the 40something vaccine list but also grimly aware if I'm called early it's probably a brutal judgment on my enormous backside. however, very wisely, the official letter doesn't make any mention of why you, particularly, have been called. deep down in its 1948-vintage soul, the NHS cares only for the masses, not individuals, and sometimes that's exactly what you need.


Posted by: Alex | Link to this comment | 03-19-21 11:56 AM
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but it also means we can't reach herd immunity realistically without vaccinating kids.

I've had this thought about us, too.

While I was camping, someone was saying how Fauci is predicting another wave this coming fall. I did the thing where I started to grill them like I'd grill someone here, and then they started to wither and I realized I needed to let it go. I was going to post about it here and ask for someone to help me out on the mechanism of why there would be another wave in the fall. But then I couldn't find any news story about it, and decided my friend must have been mistaken? Are there any rumors about a fall 2021 wave, and if so, what would be the mechanism?


Posted by: heebie-geebie | Link to this comment | 03-19-21 12:14 PM
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Aerial droplets.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 03-19-21 12:32 PM
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Chemtrails.


Posted by: heebie-geebie | Link to this comment | 03-19-21 12:53 PM
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Are there any rumors about a fall 2021 wave, and if so, what would be the mechanism?

My theory

1) COVID won't be gone by fall 2021.
2) Transmission & Case counts depend on both the baseline of currently infected and R(t); how many people are infected by one person who's sick.
3) Widespread vaccination pushes down R(t) (fewer vulnerable people) as does summer weather. We expect that to push R(t) below 1, meaning a declining case count.
4) Fall weather and indoor activities (and people finally giving up their pandemic habits) will increase R(t). If it goes above 1 we'll see raising case counts and possibly another wave


Posted by: NickS | Link to this comment | 03-19-21 12:55 PM
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If the vaccine means near-total protection against serious illness, any new wave will be much less of a problem.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 03-19-21 1:06 PM
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I don't think Covid will be gone, but I also don't understand how the vulnerable population will be larger than:
1. people with health conditions that prevent them from being vaccinated
2. people who are determined to remain unvaccinated
3. kids under 16

Can they really constitute a wave? Or is it just that people with health conditions that prevent them from getting vaccine won't be able to safely re-enter public activities yet?

It's either that, or the fear of a new covid strain that vaccinations aren't protecting against. But I haven't heard anything about that, either.


Posted by: heebie-geebie | Link to this comment | 03-19-21 1:09 PM
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I think the fear is that those three groups will form a big enough pool that vaccinated people start to get covid because the protection isn't prefect.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 03-19-21 1:19 PM
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I think 82 is right, that a new wave will be concerning, but not anywhere close to as bad.

Let's say the populations mentioned in 83 are 25% of the population. Is that enough for a wave? Probably, but I don't have a good intuition about that.

I've definitely read people freaking out about the possibility of new variants. For example: https://www.economist.com/the-economist-explains/2021/02/27/is-sars-cov-2-evolving-to-become-more-lethal


Posted by: NickS | Link to this comment | 03-19-21 1:21 PM
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Does anybody understand the alphanumeric codes which seem to be assigned to all the variants? It would make it a lot easier to follow what was going on if the terminology made any sense.


Posted by: chris y | Link to this comment | 03-19-21 1:58 PM
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85: The problem with trying to do that calculation back-of-the envelope is that I don't understand how long immunity from getting COVID lasts (especially with the variants), and I don't know how much the unvaccinated population overlaps with people who got COVID. But if you just look at vaccination as the only protection it's pretty straightforward. Suppose that with no countermeasures R=5 (this is a little pessimistic), that 75% of people are vaccinated, and that the vaccines are 80% effective on average in practice. Then you get that .25 + .75*.2 = 40% of the population is vulnerable to COVID. So if it would usually spread to 5 people, then 3 of those people will be immune and 2 will get it. So you get an effective R of 2, which is worse than the seasonal flu, and even if people are taking some mild control efforts you'd still easily get a spike. Of course, we should also somehow be factoring in people who are immune due to having had COVID and I'm not sure how to factor that in.


Posted by: Unfoggetarian: "Pause endlessly, then go in" (9) | Link to this comment | 03-19-21 2:48 PM
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I thought the science-types here said that, all sciencey-caution aside, one year is reasonable protection from the vaccine, and after that it's declining but not gone.


Posted by: heebie-geebie | Link to this comment | 03-19-21 3:11 PM
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Also R=5 may be correct in New York or Italy last March, but with 75% of the population largely unavailable for contagion, I don't understand how R could possibly be anywhere close to that.


Posted by: heebie-geebie | Link to this comment | 03-19-21 3:12 PM
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So if it would usually spread to 5 people, then 3 of those people will be immune and 2 will get it.

I didn't read far enough. I don't think R is considered fixed like this.


Posted by: heebie-geebie | Link to this comment | 03-19-21 3:13 PM
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After the vaccinated people stop washing their hands, everybody will stop and R could go up.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 03-19-21 3:30 PM
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56; My arm did get sore eventually, and I've been kind of sleepy all day.


Posted by: peep | Link to this comment | 03-19-21 4:38 PM
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Tell me about it.


Posted by: Opinionated Sloth | Link to this comment | 03-19-21 4:40 PM
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The worst thing about being a sloth is they save up all their poop for a whole week and then, when it is time, they climb down from the tree to poop and realize they don't have a phone.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 03-19-21 4:46 PM
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88: Yes, but this fall is more than a year from initial infection for a lot of the infected people, and close to a year from the big surge. So certainly immunity from exposure should factor into the calculation, but exactly how is complicated because it depends on the timing of the initial surge, the unknowns about how long protection is likely to last, and that this protection is likely to be partial. Plus there's a big wildcard about whether people who got COVID are more likely or less likely to get vaccinated (more likely because they know it's scary, or less likely because they're not worried about getting it again, or less likely because Republicans are both more likely to have gotten it and less likely to get vaccinated). At this point one needs more expertise than me, and more space than the back of the envelope.


Posted by: Unfoggetarian: "Pause endlessly, then go in" (9) | Link to this comment | 03-19-21 5:17 PM
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90: I'm not sure if I used the right lingo, there's R_0, R_t, etc. I tried to make clear that the R that I meant is the one in the absence of any interventions (I think this is the one that's usually R_0?) but I may have used the wrong notation.


Posted by: Unfoggetarian: "Pause endlessly, then go in" (9) | Link to this comment | 03-19-21 5:18 PM
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The most basic models don't involve interventions other than natural immunity. In those models R_0 is both the effective R at time 0, and also the value of R in the absence of any immunity and any interventions, and R_t is the effective R at time t and depends on how many people are immune. But once interventions get involved the model becomes more complicated than the one on wikipedia and I'm not sure if the notation is still standardized.


Posted by: Unfoggetarian: "Pause endlessly, then go in" (9) | Link to this comment | 03-19-21 5:20 PM
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Since it's the check in thread: I applied for a job today for the first time in almost 12 years. Feels pretty weird!


Posted by: MattD | Link to this comment | 03-19-21 5:21 PM
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But at any rate, the key herd immunity calculation, where the herd immunity threshold is 1-1/R, uses the basic R with no immunity and no interventions. And the calculation goes exactly the way I outlined, namely if x portion of the population is immune then instead of spreading it to R people you'll instead spread it to R(1-x) people (i.e. the effective R is R(1-x)). So for R(1-x) 1-1/R.

The classic example here is measles which has a crazy high R of like 15. So to get herd immunity you need 1-1/15 = 93% of the population to be immune. Since the vaccine is 97% effective, you need something like 96% vaccinated. This is why measles anti-vaxxers are so dangerous. The old 60% herd immunity numbers for COVID were based on the old estimates of R=2.5, but nowadays most estimates are higher due to asymptomatic spread.


Posted by: Unfoggetarian: "Pause endlessly, then go in" (9) | Link to this comment | 03-19-21 5:27 PM
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98: Good luck. Or break a leg, if it is an acting job.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 03-19-21 7:09 PM
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Speaking of how awful the EU has been with vaccination, I got an email from the Vienna vaccination service saying that the over-90 population was now 55% vaccinated. It's so fucking ridiculous how bad they fucked this up.


Posted by: x. trapnel | Link to this comment | 03-19-21 11:20 PM
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I have an appointment in Ohio for next Saturday. I'm practicing my accent so I can blend in.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 03-21-21 4:59 PM
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I have an appointment Wednesday for J&J but it's an hour away in the middle of the day so I'm still looking for something closer on or before Wed. I can hand the J&J appointment off to someone else if I get one that's more convenient (that's how I got it.)


Posted by: SP | Link to this comment | 03-21-21 5:44 PM
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I was awake at 3am and saw a bunch of appointments on CVS. I wanted to schedule Tim, but he isn't eligible until tomorrow, and they asked yi7 to check off why you qualified.

Can you e-mail me where your current appt is?


Posted by: Bostoniangirl | Link to this comment | 03-21-21 6:36 PM
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Looks like the new age eligibility doesn't happen at midnight. Sad trombone.


Posted by: Unfoggetarian: "Pause endlessly, then go in" (9) | Link to this comment | 03-21-21 9:03 PM
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It did on Walgreens but they were gone before I could fill out my contact info. CVS hasn't updated theirs yet.


Posted by: SP | Link to this comment | 03-21-21 9:22 PM
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106: CVS has not updated their criteria as of 6:45 am, I wonder if they are following the state guidelines precisely since they get their vaccine from the Federal government. They were offering it to k-12 teachers before the state, because they were directed to by Biden's team.

It's an additional 850k people who are eligible today in Massachusetts. First world problem here, but I booked few days at an inn in Vermont in mid June, so we need to get appointments by early May in order to be sure that we will pass the 2 weeks after final shot requirement for avoiding quarantine. I can schedule myself pretty easily at work, but access to appointments for non- employees is pretty limited and somewhat random. It's also only minimally set up to recognize occupations, and that's Tim's ba2is for getting it now. 3:00 am on a Sunday morning (if you have insomnia, like I did) may be the best time to look.


Posted by: Bostoniangirl | Link to this comment | 03-22-21 3:58 AM
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107: Different state, obviously, but we (finally!) for our first appointment for tomorrow after three weeks of eligibility. The rules seem to direct facilities to continue to dedicate the majority of doses to previous priorities, so a lot of places were either exclusively 65+ or doing something like 25% of appointments for newly eligible groups. Also, the county where we lived required employers to do eligibility paperwork rather than employees so I couldn't register there. What worked eventually is that there's a small, non-chain pharmacy near my workplace doing drives one or two days a week, announced on Facebook as far in advance as they were notified about doses. I was lucky enough to get us both signed up there. You might end up struggling a bit.


Posted by: ydnew | Link to this comment | 03-22-21 4:54 AM
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He's registered with the State with one of the mass vaccination sites. They send you a text with a date, and you have 24 hours to accept the offered time and location. I don't know what their backlog is or how long it will take to get through all of the people who are registered.

I got an appointment for myself at work, but even among older people, the hospitals are only inviting people randomly - with some effort to reach out to people living in certain zip codes. The one real exception to that is transplant patients, and they were vaccinating out of state transplant patients. CVS and Walgreens seem to be the ones where I can be active about looking.


Posted by: Bostoniangirl | Link to this comment | 03-22-21 5:08 AM
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CVS just added "certain workers" as a category. I'm just going to keep my J&J on Wednesday even if it's contributing to global warming.


Posted by: SP | Link to this comment | 03-22-21 5:14 AM
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110: I did see that. Harvard Vanguard in Needham did too, but they have no appointments. How do you know you are getting J and J?


Posted by: Bostoniangirl | Link to this comment | 03-22-21 5:19 AM
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Just made our appointments! Friday! Due to various website bugs our appointments are an hour apart, but hopefully they'll let us both go at the same time.


Posted by: Unfoggetarian: "Pause endlessly, then go in" (9) | Link to this comment | 03-22-21 5:26 AM
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I looked up the place I'm getting it and it says they only use J&J. Also wasn't asked to schedule a second appointment.


Posted by: SP | Link to this comment | 03-22-21 6:05 AM
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The email I got mentions the second dose scheduling process.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 03-22-21 6:31 AM
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102: Per above my wife had a boyfriend in Canada appointment in Ohio before one serendipitously opened up several miles away that took people over 60. She got it, but we were a bit confused because PA has not opened down to 60 in general (down to 50 but with "Phase 1a" medical conditions). Turns out the organization opened those slots (and several other subsequent clinics) in error; they were supposed to be for the 60+ with the medical conditions and they have now changed to that.


Posted by: JP Stormcrow | Link to this comment | 03-22-21 7:20 AM
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113: Got it. My hospital system books 2nd dose appt, if needed, on the day you go for the shot. They don't know whether it will be a Moderna day or a Pfizer day until the day before, although it mostly looks like Pfizer right now.

CVS says what they are offering. I looked at the states allocation for the week or something like that, and it was a 3:2 ratio of Pfizer to Moderna. There's not a lot of J and J yet.


Posted by: Bostoniangirl | Link to this comment | 03-22-21 7:31 AM
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I keep expecting an email saying, "Outlander, get away from our vaccine." So far nothing.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 03-22-21 9:07 AM
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My second shot appointment is tomorrow, but I'm not sure where I'm supposed to go for it and I haven't received any follow-up communication since I made the appointment when I got the first shot. I emailed the city health department to try to figure it out, but I'm sure they're swamped. My first dose was at a pop-up clinic at a church, so if I don't hear anything different I guess I'll just go back to the church and see if they're giving out shots.


Posted by: teofilo | Link to this comment | 03-22-21 11:14 AM
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117: Aren't they going to ask for an Ohio drivers license?


Posted by: peep | Link to this comment | 03-22-21 12:23 PM
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Can it be expired?


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 03-22-21 12:24 PM
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I could carry my Ohio Department of Mental Health umbrella.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 03-22-21 12:26 PM
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121: If you're carrying an umbrella on a sunny day, they will suspect you are the Penguin and arrest you.


Posted by: peep | Link to this comment | 03-22-21 12:29 PM
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And if two people do it, they'll think they're gay and they won't accept either one of you. And if three people do it? Can you imagine three people carrying an umbrella on a sunny day?


Posted by: heebie-geebie | Link to this comment | 03-22-21 12:36 PM
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Can you imagine three people carrying an umbrella on a sunny day?

You may say I'm a dreamer, but I'm not the only one.
I hope some day you will join us
Under the umbrella in the sun.



Posted by: peep | Link to this comment | 03-22-21 12:42 PM
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I just got an abelist playground design sent back with a request for more inclusive play elements. I've been sitting through park advisory board meetings for months to get the chance to do that.


Posted by: Spike | Link to this comment | 03-22-21 12:48 PM
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123: Have you even MET any little old Japanese ladies?


Posted by: DaveLHI | Link to this comment | 03-22-21 12:49 PM
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I've seen younger women do it here, but not often and not with "Ohio Department of Mental Health ' written on it.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 03-22-21 12:53 PM
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It's not an umbrella, it's a parasol.


Posted by: chris y | Link to this comment | 03-22-21 1:00 PM
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119: I know a number of people for PA who have gotten in Ohio with no hint of rudeness and with no deception needed. Know a few people who got canceled right after they made Giant Eagle appointments there. Apparently Giant Eagle left that up to the individual pharmacies to decide; the general purpose appointment scheduler lets you in, but they contact you and cancel the appointment. The vast majority of GEs seems to be accepting PA residents as are Rite-Aids.


Posted by: JP Stormcrow | Link to this comment | 03-22-21 2:59 PM
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My in Rite-Aid.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 03-22-21 3:21 PM
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Kroger and CVS are saying, "fuck off, outlander."


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 03-22-21 3:21 PM
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Try that again. My appointment is at Rite-Aid.


Posted by: Moby Hick | Link to this comment | 03-22-21 4:01 PM
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