Us, May 10, 2020: Roy, John, Leo, Shadow, Ondine
Us, May 10, 2020: Roy, John, Leo, Shadow, Ondine
Funny calendar note: on our kitchen calendar, last Saturday is marked "Roy home," indicating when his school year would have ended and he'd be flying home. Ha! He's been home from UCCS for a couple months now. And, the calendar shows that this evening we were going to see a play (Golden Boy) at the Stagehouse Theatre in Grossmont College. Yeah. Nope!
Another pandemic cancellation: we're not going to Boston this summer. We're now low-key casting about for some other getaway for just the two of us. A lot depends on what we get back from the payments already made for airfare and lodging.
Patrick Henry Class of 2020 is planning a drive-by graduation parade in which Leo will be able to don his cap and gown, hop out of the car for a photo by the PHAME building, then hop back in again. Our payment for Grad Night is being refunded, since that's been canceled.
Coronavirus update: The Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Tracker shows that COVID-19 has been confirmed in over 5.2 million people worldwide, and has claimed over 339,900 lives. That's over 400,000 more cases and over 18,400 more deaths since Tuesday. The U.S. now has over 1,611,000 confirmed cases and over 96,400 deaths, up over 91,600 cases and another 4,900 deaths since Tuesday. In San Diego, our local toll rose to 6,434 cases with 242 deaths.
More and more restaurants and stores are cautiously opening up, with various sanitation and social distancing rules in place to protect patrons and employees. Face masks are required at most places, including restaurants except when actually eating. Many of the smaller retailers in Grossmont Center are opening too. Although science backs staying home as much as possible, for many that's not an option they can afford.
On the economic front, 2.4 million Americans filed for unemployment benefits last week, bringing total national unemployment claims to 38.6 million over the past two months. That figure doesn't include (yet) all the college graduates getting turfed out into this pandemic economy; many have had job offers rescinded. It appears that after a decade of a booming economy and record profit-taking, neither huge corporate employers nor ordinary citizens can financially weather one lost quarter; everybody needs bailouts (and just about the only people not eligible for a penny are sole proprieterships like John). A second economic stimulus package appears to be in the works in Congress, although partisan politics from both sides as we near elections may well doom it.
In an unrelated note, but relevant because we have two college-age kints, the University of California regents voted to make permanent its suspension of SAT and ACT testing requirements for California students.
Leo decided to postpone his entry to Point Blank Music School until the term starting in January, which means he won't be moving to Los Angeles until around December. He made that choice because he wants to get the full one-year program in in-person, on-campus instruction, not via distance learning. In the meantime, he's considering online summer courses in Digital Audio and MIDI at Mesa College and some sort of Masterclass taught by a well-known music producer.
Roy went out to dinner with Danielle Friday evening. And he bought a box of used Legos.
Ondine has been walking the dog with Leo at night lately.
John shredded 11 years of old invoices! It completely stuffed one of those huge black trash bags. He also cleared out a big box of odds and ends, mostly related to plantar fasciitis, from the bedroom. In that box, though, he discovered treasures: a Keroppi sticker, a vintage cardboard gas mileage calculator from an auto repair shop in Phoenix (no ZIP code so possibly pre-1963), a slick watchband repair tool, a thoroughly decent Ruper 10x doublet loupe, and, best find of all, a working Gage Elementary running club pedometer! He's enrolled in an online summer class in Physical Anthropology through City College. And, he continues to learn Latin with Duolingo.
We got a new unique visitor counter host, because the old one (digits.net) suddenly went dark this week. The new one is hosted by HitWebCounter.com.
Neighborhood gas prices are about $3.09 per gallon. The stock market closed Friday at 24,465.16.
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