Shouting Into the Void

Up until a couple of days ago, Arizona was a mild COVID-19 risk. We had a few cases, and no deaths. Yesterday we had our first death. It wasn't anyone I know, and it wasn't anyone at all similar to me (aside from geographic location), but somehow knowing that this disease has killed someone in my state makes it real. I don't want this to be real. In many ways, I wish Trump was right when he made the inane and unsupported claim that the heat of April might make all of this blow away. Let the record show: he has done a piss poor job of handling this crisis. He has repeatedly lied about the severity of the threat we face, has bandied unscientific and unsupported claims about, and has always seemed to care more about a) the pandemic's effect on the economy, and 2) the pandemic's effect on the stock market more than he cares about Americans dying. He is a megalomaniac and an asshole, and I hope history bears those two truths out. Anyway, back to the lecture at hand. We...

So the global pandemic COVID 19 (a form of coronavirus) is sweeping the nation and everyone is panicking. People are buying up groceries and hard goods like they are prepping for the end times, and there is a generally apocalyptic feel in the air no matter where you go. The virus poses the greatest threat to infants, the elderly, and those with autoimmune diseases and deficiencies. The fun part is that this is the time of year when the state fills to the brim with old folks from cold states. So anywhere you go in Arizona right now, you can find elderly Minnesotans hording toilet paper and bread. The real fun connection is this one: severely religious people are largely responsible for electing Trump (despite his utter lack of ability to worship anything other than his own ego, and his obvious lack of moral fiber), and the Trump administration has fumbled this health emergency in big, dumb, obvious ways. Now we are facing a much larger risk than we would if we lived in a country wit...

One of the many problems I face as an adult is weekend time management. In many ways, the very sarcastic and pessimistic view I had of adulthood as a teenager is correct. You work really hard so you can have barely any time to enjoy yourself on the weekend. Then the weekend comes and there's all this pressure to have fun, accomplish a lot, and not get behind in all the behind-the-scenes teaching bullshit for which we are not compensated (grading, planning, etc.). I firmly believe there are two kinds of people: 1) those whose natural state is at work, and 2) those whose natural state is at rest. I am of the latter variety. This being the case, when I'm getting things done on the weekend, I worry that I'm not relaxing enough. When I'm relaxing, I worry that I'm not wasting time on the right things or in the right way. When I play a video game, I worry that I might be better off playing something different instead. When I watch videos, I worry that I should be watchi...