This is really hard on my parents, who live next door to us. My mom watches my brother's 2 kids M-F and the oldest (4 yrs old) keeps seeing my girls in our backyard and wanting to play. We have been strictly complying with social distancing for the past 3 weeks so, even though we live next door, we don't. To make matters worse, one of our closest friends have 2 children and both of their jobs are considered essential so they HAVE to go to work. They didn't want to put their kids in a daycare so I've agreed to watch their kids. Their jobs aren't public facing/medical so it is a lower risk and I would much prefer for my pseudo niece and nephew to NOT be in a daycare environment, especially considering a kid at a local daycare tested positive. Only the kids come inside, and they change clothes and wash hands immediately. Then I sterilize anything they touched. When my mom saw that I had other children over when I wouldn't let my nephew come over, she got very upset. I explained the situation and she understands but it is still hard on her, and REALLY hard on these kids who don't understand why it is they aren't allowed to play with the kid they can see next door, or walking down the street. As for me, school @ home for 4 has become school @ home for 6 so...at least I'm kept busy!!

Hi everybody! When I got to the doctor, I was told I didn't "qualify" for a test because I have no fever. We can't get antibody tests here. We can't get anything if we don't have a fever or have been out of the country, or we've been previously diagnosed with COVID-19. Isn't that ridiculous? In the wealthier communities, like Naples and The Villages, they had drive-thru testing, but not here in Gainesville. I did get a chest x-ray, and my doctor said I have some congestion, but he doesn't see the typical COVID damage, so that's good. He says he'll put me on the list for antibody testing, and I can have one as soon as he gets enough. Anyway, I'm fine now. I've been taking loads of vitamins and supplements and my energy is back. I've been gardening a lot, really literally tearing things up. I'm getting rid of a lot of ornamentals in favor of trying to grow more food. I really want to see just how much food I can produce in my tiny space. Joe, here's how those free tests go: They take your temperature. If you have no temperature, they pretty much write it off as allergies and send you home. If you do have a temperature, they test you for flu. If it's not flu, they test you for something else, then if it's not that, they test you for COVID. It's insane. I went out grocery shopping for the first time in weeks today. I tend to go shopping about every 2 weeks, then self-quarantining after just in case. This was the first time I wore a mask, and it was a homemade paper towel mask I saw a doctor making on YouTube. 5 layers, so pretty safe -- for everyone else. I can't find any other kind of mask anywhere, and I'm not paying the prices they have on eBay and Amazon for a 50-cent mask. I did find latrile gloves in the cleaning department at Dollar General. I remember when they were 10 prs/$1, now it's 4 prs/$1.50. Price gouging at its finest. When my husband was doing house renovations, the n-95 masks for $20.00/100. That was a long time ago, sure, but now they're $30.00+ for 20 from Grainger, but they're perpetually out and aren't taking orders. This is a strange time we're living in. They tell us to wear masks, then the government buys them all up and we can't find them. I'm going to be forced to start cutting up old clothes soon to make my own. Worst part is, I can't get filters for my vacuum, which uses -- you guessed it -- HEPA filters. So construction people can't get masks and we can't vacuum our homes. Wonderful. I've gotta get out of this place.

As someone who deals with facts on a daily basis in addition to the skill of evaluating the validity of research data (I teach science), the idea that data and facts cannot be objectively verified I find puzzling. As I mentioned, we use facts all the time to make decisions, for example, we check the weather before going somewhere to determine how to dress. Weather predictions are made based on facts, measurements and data. But, since weather is a system that is highly variable (many data points and facts affect the system) there is always going to be some level of uncertainty in your predictions. Meteorologists factor that into their weather reports, and usually give a range of predictions, such as 20% chance of rain. That is not zero, btw, so I always carry a collapsible umbrella in my car. But we don't assume that a meteorologist has some hidden political agenda, nor do we necessarily question the need for weather forecasting, particularly those of us in outdoor professions who depend on reliable weather data to make critical decisions. I have no reason to doubt that the Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security, one of the most respected and admired research centers in the world, would not be working diligently to present the best and most valid data available. Also, since science thrives on constant questioning and examination, they would not rest until more and more "truth" could be determined. I know science constantly refines ideas, I'm comfortable with evolving advice based on the results of more and more information being investigated and newer data coming in. That's why medical advice evolves over time and what was once standard advice, (like taking vit. E protects against heart disease, for example, which has evolved to it being a minor preventative factor if at all, not trumping genetics, and having no benefit in clinical studies as a treatment, in fact in might be a detriment and is no longer supported by the American Heart Association). I not only have confidence in the public health researchers at the University of Michigan and my alma mater Michigan State, for example, I feel blessed beyond compare that I live in a state where such institutions can exist and thrive. I feel the same way about the Johns Hopkins Center, their web site is a marvel of useful and helpful information. As well as the many professional groups I belong to that share "truths" amongst members so we can develop strategies to meet all kinds of situations arising out of real data coming out of the real world. For example, the spotted lanternfly is similar to this covid-19 virus in that it has the potential to decimate dozens of economic fruit crops. No one is questioning the validity or political agendas of folks reporting on its spread, nor on ideas for mitigation and control. That's the irony to me, I live in a state known for having more colleges than just about any other state, (we are number 9 for number of colleges) and yet folks want to refuse the good advice one can find here for FREE! Folks from all over the world come here to convene with some of the best brains on the planet! When it was just "their loss" I was fine with it. Now, when it is my own close family at risk and myself, not satisfied! I have also noted, that in my rural area, there is a movement to not only flaunt social distancing recommendations and rules, but also other laws regarding social conduct. For example, two weekends ago a gang of three wheelers rode up and down the streets in my neighborhood for quite a while, knowing full well that ORVs are not allowed on public roads. It was totally annoying because we were outside trying to enjoy the beauty and peace of our yard. It's happening on a regular basis now, folks going out and engaging in socially disruptive behavior, I guess either hoping to draw folks into conflicts or hoping no one will come out to stop them from the local neighborhood. My friend's husband is a policeman, and this is totally adding to their stress unnecessarily since they are not only having to police serious crimes, but respond to the health crisis as well. So they do not need to deal with things like folks setting off firecrackers, etc.which are totally avoidable. Regarding the three wheelers, eventually they got bored and moved on, but such things are happening on a regular basis in my neighborhood, gangs of trucks and motorcyclists driving around revving their motors, etc. And I'm not talking about groups gathering for socially distancing parties, which we had up the street from us. That was very clear what was going on as the cars all had "Happy Birthday" balloons decorating them. There are several cases of church communities being ravaged by the virus here in MI and some folks have lost MULTIPLE family members. We stopped going to church before it was cancelled, and we intend to keep on participating virtually. The biggest issue for me is how to continue to support local feeding efforts which our church was heavily involved in as volunteers. I am having to remind myself to regularly donate to the food pantry now online with money instead of food, and also not forget to regularly tithe at church.

<Massachusetts has a "One day, one trial" policy. So if you don't get called the first day, you've still fulfilled your obligation. Your name is put back into the mix 3 years afterwards. You can postpone your date up to 6 months after the first one assigned, but you can only change it one time. Once you turn 65, you can request to have your jury duty at the courthouse closest to your home. Once you turn 70, you can decline to serve.> This sounds very similar to California, except that I believe that your name gets put back into the mix in two years instead of three, but I am not sure about that. I was not aware of being able to request to have the jury duty at the courthouse closest to my house after 65, but that sounds like a reasonable idea. You can certainly decline to serve after 70 in California by simply writing a reason on the form. What is odd is that I posted on this thread two days ago (on Saturday), but the it did not show up on the front page until today for me. So I tried to start my own thread on Sunday, and it disappeared within two or three minutes after I posted it, and I attempted three times. I had saved my message as a text file before attempting to post, and so I did not have to keep writing it. It was basically the same message that I wrote here two days ago. I have no idea why those thread disappeared, but I blame it on the Sunday gremlins. Our sister, who is a lawyer in Austin, Texas, told Kevin and me that we could get dragged into court for not showing up for jury duty, but if they did that for everyone in L.A. County who did not show up, the courts would be doing nothing else. I think it is slightly more difficult to get a jury when the population is very diverse - at least it seemed that way when I went for jury duty in San Francisco. A lot of people had English as their second language, and they got dismissed fairly quickly. One woman from Guatemala got dismissed because she told the judge that she could not be fair. She said, "No, I cannot be fair - I am brown," meaning that she could not have fair skin. There were a lot of characters that got called up for jury duty in San Francisco when I got called, which was around 1979, I think. We were not allowed to read books in the courtroom, but one woman had brought her knitting and got stern looks from the judge and the D.A., but it was not against the rules, and so they could not make her stop. It made me wish that I had known how to knit.