a dismal article

"All families retrenched their living as much as possible, as well those that fled as those that stayed; so that an innumerable multitude of footmen, serving-men, shopkeepers, journeymen, merchants' bookkeepers, and such sort of people, and especially poor maid-servants, were turned off, and left friendless and helpless, without employment and without habitation, and this was really a dismal article." daniel defoe. a journal of the plague year

with unemployment booming...

and "the market" in need of serious psychiatric help...

congress "races" to keep the wheels on the economic wagon and throw us into a much steeper deficit ( in a most un-republican disregard for "fiscal responsibility"...they and their true constituents must be in serious trouble ) and while i am likely to not turn down free money ( no loans for me though...thanks but no thanks ) i am left wondering what effect a one off relief package may offer when somewhere in here i read that the government is working out an "eighteen month plan"...this puts paid to the idea of a quick virus burnout and a sudden return to "normal"...whatever that might be..and i have some nagging doubts about the whole "two week shutdown" paradigm...i am on a two week leave today and my son texted me that his place of employment is closing down for a fortnight...there were, to the best of anyone's knowledge, no active cases of covid-19 where i work when the place was closed...one presumes that fourteen days is enough time for the virus to incubate into a full blown case and i would not dispute that...however...supposing ( oh no! a "what-if" ) that i am unknowingly exposed to the illness on the thirteenth day of the shutdown, return to work on 1 april and come down with it on 13 april having exposed many peers at the newly reopened store...if this outbreak is going to go on past the first of april ( and one presumes it is here for some time to come ) this is,at least. a possibility...the virus isn't going to respect management's two week hiatus so closing for two weeks seems pointless...either stay open or close for the duration...a two week gap is not going to stop this in every case...may work for some...not sanguine about it working everywhere every time...

the n y times virus map shows expanding cases...and the cdc reports 10442 which is 3404 more than yesterday as well as 53 more deaths ( and here i'd like to ask if anyone remembers the n1h1 pandemic of 2009 and its 18500 confirmed deaths...i don't remember this sort of panic or impact..admittedly there was a financial crisis going on then as well which may have blunted the news...that pandemic was not the cause of a financial crisis though...would it have been? don't know...all i did was go to work as much as i was allowed by financial conditions at the company i worked for )..and my state has 22 more cases...has now tested 380 people out of an almost 7 million population ( they don't know what is going on beyond a most general impression )...and has suffered no more deaths...

finally, the times has sent me a charming email telling me it is safe to handle their robotically produced paper...untouched by human hands until delivery...i do not have to sanitize the paper before reading and if i am antsy about it i can always go on line, right? so for god's sake don't cancel your subscription...line the birdcage or wrap cantaloupe rinds in it but keep the cash coming in...they are, after all, selling a product...more interesting stuf as it comes up.