I had hoped to start the newest incarnation of my newsletter on a high note. I mean, I’m a soprano. High notes are what we do. However, as Covid-19 infections rage out of control, it was not to be. I’m sorry to say that this is basically a combination plea-for-sanity-slash-public-service-announcement.
Anyway, an Irrational Political Bro recently said something like, “You should have Thanksgiving with your family because it’s going to be a lot of people’s last Thanksgiving,” conveniently leaving out the part that a Thanksgiving gathering may be why those people won’t live to see another holiday season. I guess a good number of people will be thinking to themselves in late December or early January, “Gosh, I’m so glad I got to see Pop-pop one last time before the virus I unwittingly brought to Thanksgiving killed him.” But do you want to be one of those people?
Things aren’t normal, no matter how tired of the virus you may be. No amount of cranberry sauce will make things right. Hospital systems are already beginning to collapse all over the country. It’s time to cancel Thanksgiving and the entire holiday season — except for the celebrations you can have at home with your immediate household members. Yes, that’s a bummer for most of us. Accept the bummer and move forward. If we genuinely get an effective vaccine by next spring, we can all have Christmas in July. Let’s rent a beach house and go wild! But right now, we need to stay home.
Now, you may be thinking, “Nah, this bitch isn’t an epidemiologist. Who the hell is she to tell me to rearrange my entire life and destroy my family’s vibe, et cetera?” Excellent point. I’m not a scientist. But I’m able to read graphs, and boy howdy, the numbers are looking dismal. Just Google it. Look at a reputable news site. (That means something other than social media, okay? Something with legitimate fact-checkers.) The statistics are widely available. Look at your area on Covid Act Now or The Covid Tracking Project.
If you’re determined to hold or attend a holiday gathering, here are a couple of eye-opening tools you may want to consult before you commit. First, the COVID-19 Event Risk Assessment Planning Tool gives the approximate percentage of risk that you will encounter someone infected with coronavirus at an event in your area. A gathering of 10 people in my county has a 9% chance; a gathering in the rural county in Missouri where most of my family still lives has a far riskier 49% chance. This statistical wonder is admittedly a little dry but very useful.
The Covid Risk tool from the Center for Digital Health at Brown University is more versatile and far more user-friendly. This interactive app lets you choose your location, setting, activity, number of people, and level of expected mask use before giving an approximate, color-coded measurement of risk. I would encourage you to check both of these sites before meeting up for a typical holiday gathering. Even if you choose to go, you’ll have a more realistic idea of what you may be getting into.
All that being said, I know that numbers and dry risk assessment won’t convince everyone. I would suggest that if you’re one of those people, try imagining how it would feel if you learned that you brought the virus along with your signature sweet potato casserole to your own family Thanksgiving. It probably wouldn’t feel great. Ask yourself if that’s a kind of guilt you can live with, and then plan accordingly.
Current Obsessions and Compulsions: The “Thank You for Coming to My Ted Talk, Here Are My Apologies in Link Format” Edition
Lennox got the new Fuser video game, and although it is now a dance club in our living room most of the time, he has not yet sunk to the “I must obsessively put ‘All Star’ into every mix” level.
If Lennox did reach that level, I would have to insist that he only use this medieval version, which I cannot stop listening to for some reason. (Thumper sent me this video. He just gets me.)
It’s okay. You can keep reading. I don’t have any more Smash Mouth links.
“AUSTRALIA’S NEWEST ANIMAL IS A DUMB FLYING BEAR THAT SHOULDN’T EXIST,” presented without further comment.
BRB, gotta rewrite my Regency romance to make the hero look exactly like…this. (This guy’s whole Instagram account is like a historical costume thirst trap. It’s all, like, cake and waistcoats.)
I feel like you should maybe not, um, climb mysterious staircases that seem to go nowhere when you encounter them in the wilderness, but maybe that’s just me?
Important Texts: The “Petite Blonde Saves Us from an Apocalypse” Edition
What I’m Currently Writing
We’re over halfway through National Novel Writing Month, and I’m happy to report that my current count is a very respectable 31,532 words. (I even have another hour set aside for writing this evening!) I may make it to 50,000 words this year — and I’ve only managed to complete the goal once in all the previous years I’ve participated. Sure, the world is a terrifying dumpster fire, but I’m turning into a fast-drafting champion. That counts for something, right?
Until Next Time
Please stay home if you can. Please wear a mask if you can’t. Please be as careful and as safe in your behavior as you possibly can. We’re facing a long, dark winter. But we finally have reason to hope that two effective vaccines are on their way. (Two!) We can also quietly celebrate that sanity will be restored to our government's executive branch in January, even while acknowledging the amount of work still to be done.
We just have to hold on for a while longer.