COVID can't kick Aspen athleticism (and hubris)

It is weird everywhere.  That much goes without saying (and yet I said it---duh ouch).

Aspen is home of many amazing athletes, and many of those folks also are as my wife used to say about new sales people (young dumb and full of come)----hey that is come like tree sap, if it was the other kind of cum I would have spelled it correctly.

Anyhow we had a pretty solid dump Thursday and by 11 am Friday there wasn't a clean line to be had on Ajax, Buttermilk or Highlands.  I can't speak to Snowmass because .......well it' Snowmass.

So next thing ya know peeps are heading into the backcountry --check out these sweet lines (bonus points if you know the zone) BUT then I saw them all hanging out together eating food and yucking it up much closer than 6 feet away.  Bad dirtbags. Bad.

Anyhow the day before the wife was x-country skiing in northstar and low and behold a number of Aspenites were out on their SUPs.  I always have a bit of cognitive dissonance when I am on skis and someone 100 yards away is on their SUP.  

Goodnews Aspen is staying active and strong.  Bad news--sometimes folks are just a wee bit too close to each other (which is kinda ironic because we have sooooooo much space to play in).

Stay safe---thinking about going sledding with daughter around lift 1a (not A1 as some of our visitors called it.  That side of town is not named after a steak sauce.  

Tomorrow I plan to get her on a balance ball stick handling and see how much she has really recovered (if she fights me a lot I'll know she is 100% healthy).

COVID-19 death

It is just a matter of time before we all know someone who has died of COVID-19.  That happened for me yesterday.  Not a close friend;  he was an older gentleman (in his 80s) who felt sick went to the ER and didn't even make it to intubation. 

Sadly in a month or so everyone will know someone who died from COVID-19.  One of the things that is so weird is how fast this is all going to hit.  In the World Wars or Vietnam the deaths were spread out over a long time--I fear we will have 100ks of deaths in the next month or so. 

Shit as I type this my wife just told me of another friend who died.  That makes two (one in NYC one in STL) dead in the past 48 hours.  Old white guys seem to be particularly susceptible (maybe the Dems should nominate a younger woman whose selling point might be "I will Survive".)

i will survive ---excellent cover

Also an up close portrait of courage---an elementary school friend who is (was) a retired ICU nurse leaving two sets of twins at home to return to the ICU.  The hospital is putting her up in an extended stay apartment so that she doesn't have to decontaminate daily, but she is still putting herself at risk every day to save lives and putting herself in harm's way to do it.  A portrait of courage and selflessness.  I pray to God she stays safe.


on a super duper light note ----if a symphony can jam with sir mix a lot then anything is possible

best vid you will watch today

COVID--OMG we are all going to die

first things first--my daughter is feeling much much better. 

So much so that she doesn't want to isolate.  She doesn't want to have me bring her food.  She wants to head to the kitchen and cook.  She is going to kill the rest of us.  (and to those who propose putting everyone who might be positive in their own hotel room to isolate---how much psychological damage do you think you are going to do to kids age 0-14)?????

Being a guy who stays on top of the news, I was aware that the Trump Administration is going to recommend wearing some kind of mask to reduce the spread of COVID-19.  These are the same team who said do not wear a mask, only people who are symptomatic can infect others, provided a CDC test kit that didn't work, thought it would go away when it's warm (Donald J being a biggly believer of that forget that its summer in Australia and COVID is doing just fine in warmer weather thank you) and went from no social distancing to wanting to lock down the whole country after COVID-19 community spread is everywhere.

this is me standing in line for the grocery in my new TRUMP approved  COVID prevention outfit

Please note the AVSC buff and the Make America Deep (POW) cap, supporting our local causes.  The woman in line behind me asks me to move closer to the person in front of me, I said no I am standing 6 feet back.  I then look over my shoulder and find her standing about 1 foot behind me.  I told her to get the hell back 6 feet.  The EXCELLENT thing about wearing a buff is I can be even more of an asshole and maybe not be recognized.  Thank you President Trump.

So now we get to the OMG we are all going to die.  I get back in the car post shop and turn on CNN and Dr. Brix (one of the so called adults in the room) who is answering a question concerning false negatives being possibly as high as 33% (and still talking like anyone can get a test not just actors and prices and senators).  She said well that can't be the case because in NY and NJ the tests are coming back 35% positive so if the false negative rate was 33% then it would be 100% positive.  She then kinda, but not completely corrected herself to say the positive rate would then be 66%.

Dear readers are you smarter than Dr. Brix?

If 35% of people tested are positive and the test has a false negative rate (i.e. it says your negative when you are positive) of 33% then what percent of people are positive:

• A   100%
• B   66%  (per Dr Brix basically adding 33% plus 35%)
• C   0% if you are a Trump supporter and 100% if your a democrat
• D  33% (there are so many 3s the answer must have lots of 3s in it)
• E   12% (35% X 33% right?)
• F   none of the above

If you went with none of the above you are right and Dr. Brix is wrong.  The answer is 56% (or 56.45 if you want to be exact).  Assume a sample of 100 people---35 test positive---put those folks in lock down for the second step of the problem.  That leaves you with 65 negatives, of those 65 negatives 1/3 are actually positive (that is the false negative rate of 33%) --that is 21.45 people.  Grab the other 35 positive folks and add em up and you get 56.45%.  How big of a difference is 56% vs 66%.  Well its about 32 million people if you want to look at the US population as a whole.  Also if you take that kind of a screw up and shove it into exponential growth you have widely different outcomes.

Might I make a suggestion---all online school should be basic math ( in particular statistics).  Forget geometry, if I run into one more person who tells me if the stock market goes down 50% and then up 50% they are back to even on their investment (you are 75% of the way to where you started) or to put it in current terms the S&P high to recent low was a drop of 36%, but to regain the highs the S&P must go up 55% from its recent low.

Of course maybe the kids should skip the math, and just get drunk and have sex cause with the jokers in Washington in charge we are all gonna die.

COVID and uncertainty and unknowns

First and most importantly---I assume my daughter is sleeping---I guess she could be dead but I am going to assume sleeping.

Which is a very unsettling unknown.

My wife's keen replacement surgery is still on for a week from today---the are working under the guidelines that even if my daughter has COVID (and quite frankly who the heck knows) it will be 14 days from when she got sick to when my wife goes under the knife so as long as the wife feels ok, then she doesn't have it because it would have presented in my wife. 

which brings us to my wheelhouse---there is much I am not good at but analyzing risks and questioning unquestioned assumptions in models is as natural for me as breathing is for most.

Vis a vie Steadman Clinic and my wife's knee replacement:

1. they are assuming a 2-14 day incubation period
2. they are assuming that even with a 14 day incubation period my wife would have caught in on day 1
3. they are assuming my wife isn't asymptomatic 
4. they are assuming if my wife has systemptons they present as more than allergies
5. they are assuming no one else at Steadman has COVID (are they being tested? no)

That is a lot of assumptions and as we know many of those assumptions are increasingly looking suspect (for example a lot of people are asymptomatic or have very minor symptoms).

It is impossible to find any kind of normalcy in your life when you can't plan.  How do you not worry any time you sneeze or feel out of breath?  Is it old age going up stairs at 8k feet or should you start praying that some doctor-ethicist decides you are worthy of the last ventilator in the state?  

Will you have enough money to pay the bills?  Will you have a job when the world returns to 'normal'?  When will the world return to normal?  Will normal last when it returns?  Will my daughter go to summer school?  Will my son sail?  Will school resume?  When?  For how long?  Will we become immune to COVID once we catch it?  How long will immunity last?  Will I get to see my parents again?  When?  

If you don't have a bunch of questions that unsettle you there is something wrong with you.  If you are scared, worried, stressed, freaked out etc then you are healthy.  You should be, because being locked up in your house with no idea when you can go to White House for an overpriced but delicious french dip or go to work or see a doctor for that weird lump is impossible for the human brain to digest without some major mental indigestion.

Please know that everything you are feeling is normal, and it will pass, but only GOD knows when.

If you have extra time on your hands I've been enjoying some excellent old rock vids

Check out the hair on the guitarist on this one (who says white boys can't have a 'fro)

white boy fro (rock candy)

And the best AV for a Nirvana show ever

who says rockers can't rock the v-neck

laugh or cry COVID makes you wonder why

maybe the best worst COVID quote goes to..........Wilbur Ross

towards the end of January Wilbur Ross said 'I think it will help to accelerate the return of jobs to North America'.  yep that is the US Commerce Secretary saying out loud how many in the GOP see the world--a zero sum game and if China is losing the US must be winning. 

If this is winning can we please stop.

Larry Kudlow ( Trump top Econ advisor) said on Feb 25 that "the Trump administration has kept the US pretty close to airtight".  Which I guess you could tell because the S&P 500 was pretty close to it's all time highs and the market must know everything (how many times does the efficient market hypothesis have to be proven really fucking wrong).

VP Mike Pence (in charge of Covid-19 response March 12 " I don't actually know how many tests have been done" referring to the botched roll out of millions and millions of beautiful tests that everyone can have

Which brings us to our fearless leader:

Jan 22 ' we have it totally under control it's just one person coming in from China' (whooops)

Feb 26 'We're going to be pretty soon at only 5 people and we could be at just one or two over the next short period of time' (which I guess if you don't test anyone is possible)

Feb 27 'It's going to disappear.  One day it's like a miracle it will disappear'  (other miracles include Trump testing negative)

March 7 'No I am not concerned at all no I am not, we have done a great job'  he did a great job with Trump University and casinos in AC)

March 7  'anyone that needs a test can get a test and the test are all perfect like the letter was perfect the transcription was perfect (well I will say this for COVID, it moved everyone but Trump off the impeachment story)

March 7 also at the CDC  'people are surprised that I understand it.  Everyone one of these doctors say 'how do you know so much about this' Maybe I have a natural ability.  Maybe I should've done that instead of running for the president'.  (Dear God yes can we get a do-over where Trump is a lacky at the CDC PLEASE).

March 16  So it could be right in that period of time where it, I say wash--it washes through"  (an example of his mad CDC skills )

And on and on it goes. 

On a lighter note before school shut the choir teacher asked my boy if he could play the instrumental part of bohemian rhapsody for the choir for a competition. 

Check this out (people got too much time on their hands)

COVID Rhapsody

COVID daughter update

no puke for 48 hours--yea---and no poop for 6 days ---humm probably the result of puke+ zofran but I took her for a walk to hopefully get things moving.  She seems pretty good but the 16 hours of sleeping gives me a little bit of concern.

I watched Top Gun with the boy--I think he watched it about 5 years ago but now that he is a pilot and spent two years sailing out of Annapolis and couch surfing with Navy guys I wind up hearing lots of informed criticism (like there is no way flying through the jet wash would put you in a flat spin, when you lose one engine just put the nose down and accelerate etc).  My God know it all children are...... fun?  Well at least he was talking to me which is also both a blessing and a curse. 

Two local liquor companies (Marble and Woody Creek) have converted their plants to make sanitizer which is pretty awesome.  Also I understand North Sails is making masks, I am betting my son only uses North Sails from now on, although he does love Zim.

Rumor has it that things shouldn't get really bad in CO for another week or two, so its not yet time to go to the party I mentioned a couple of posts ago, even if it feels all clear right now.

A morbid public service announcement, we are updating our will.  Last done about 10 years ago and obviously some things have changed.  For those of you out there with spare time on your hands and kids, it might be worth looking at who you got as guardians and trustees and make sure you still want them and their contact info is still accurate.

Lastly my wife's knee replacement surgery is still on, scheduled for a week from Monday.  That just seems wrong on so many levels.

No one voted off island yet which might be because my daughter has been asleep for the past 6 days and my son has been playing his acoustic guitar exclusively.  If he goes electric and she stops sleeping for 18 hours things might get spicy in a hurry.

Be safe and try to laugh.

COVIDlisish

I've got a local doc friend who keeps telling me not to worry about my daughter and the Covid ain't so bad.

So I tried to tempt him to come have a meal at our house:

First I offered up Chicken Tikki Corona




While tempted he took a pass

Then I tried  doner corona kabab

Which almost got him through the front door but he still didn't feel quite that lucky, so I tried 

corona cherry pie 

clearly today's post has a heavy visual component to it

this picture is called corona optimism (we brought the lawn furniture up yesterday--note storm coming down the pass).  I doubt my daughter will be eating corona pie under the umbrella anytime soon.

Speaking of optimism, my daughter didn't puke last night!!!!!!!! Yea!  We got food into her and it stayed in her.  It's only 2 pm as I write this so I guess it's not surprising that we haven't seen her yet (her earliest wake up during COVID fun has been 4 pm).  I will admit I did go into her room to check and make sure she was breathing.  She is.  I also laid my hand on her head, and she doesn't have a fever and her breathing is normal.  So all that is good, but holy smokes it is a little worrying to even wonder if you kid is alive.  (back of brain is saying......." I mean she has got to be ok?  If she was really having trouble breathing she would wake up and let us know."  Right?  Right?  Right!)  Shut up back of brain she is fine--the local docs all say she is fine although they won't eat any of our corona foods.

Also as a positive I can smell the pie, kabab and curry so I guess I don't got it cause well, at least some people lose their sense of smell when they get the COVID.  I learned that on tictoc so it must be true.

Lastly, I admit I have a couple of smart geeky friends.  One of the geekiest is a Stanford, MIT physics prof who loves to talk about quantum wavelets with compressed sensing.  Well kind of, but you should be impressed.  He is smarter than 99.9999% of the word.  

We were chatting yesterday and he mentioned that it was one thing to study exponential numbers, and play with them on a whiteboard, it's a whole different matter to actually live through it.

Please put your math caps on boys and girls---if one person has COVID in the US and every two days the number of infections doubles how many days does it take to infect the entire United States?

A.  1 week

B.  1 month

C   3 months

D.  6 months

E.  Never 

F.  Who cares I am healthy and have a fast internet connection

Answer is C --well actually a bit less than 3 months but you get the point.

Next up----if we have 200k ventilators in the US (we don't have that many FYI) and only 5% of the population symptomatic at any one time and only 2% of the population that is symptomatic needs a ventilator do we have enough venalitors?

Answer---NO.  we would need 300k sitting around unused to meet that need.

Scared.  Don't be---this vid is a really lovely example of everyone listening to their better angels.