Y2/D274...Ugga Bugga, It's been a day.
Dec. 16th, 2021 09:05 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
shadowkatWell, today's been kind of stressful.
Right now, I've put my Kindle Paperwhite in the freezer to see if that will fix the frozen touch screen problem. (This was suggested by various folks on Quora who had the same issue, and nothing worked, so they attempted this and voila it worked). If not, I may have to get a new one. I think I damaged it attempting to get on my work wifi to add books? I don't know. Or too many books? Anyhow it went kablooie on me. The good news is I have an HD Kindle Fire (it just needs more charging, and a password to get into it, annoying but it is what it is) and I've got the Kindle on my phone. But I may just do the insane thing and read a paperback book tomorrow. It's not like I don't have about a 100 to choose from. Hell, I could buy one at the airport, if I wanted to.
Most everyone reads it on their phone now - I prefer the kindle sized book, personally, less stress on eyes and neck. I also have audio books available.
Spent most of the day worrying over whether I'd have to get a PCR Test prior to boarding the flight to Hilton Head on Sunday morning. The Jetblue site is not clear on this issue. Instead of clearly stating that - "no tests are required for domestic travel in the US outside of Puerto Rico", it states, for travel within the US check these links. And the links provide no information on the matter. So I googled, which informed me that Jetblue required a PCR test 72 hours prior to travel, at least. And you could get a test through them for $116.
Annoyed, I contacted Jetblue, who after about an hour or two, finally stated via text that "Covid testing for domestic travel is not needed at this time with the exception of Puerto Rico."
Tried to find the bad sites with the misinformation on home laptop, but I've a better filter in place than my work computer does, apparently. Or Firefox has better things in place. Because it doesn't come up. Instead, an article does explaining why the domestic flight airlines in the US are dead-set against testing for domestic travel. It's just not Feasible. They are right, it's not.
And considering folks are going to restaurants, Broadway shows, concerts, traveling by subway, train, bus, cab, car service, etc without getting tested, why should you do it on planes? Planes have an air filteration system, so do trains, and buses. I'm more likely to get in the office or at my apartment complex or the grocery store.
I asked around at work - no one had needed it for domestic travel. But they didn't know about Jetblue. One co-worker said, I should get it anyhow. So did my brother. Thankfully, the damn airline doesn't require it for domestic travel.
Just so you know? Rapid tests such as the antigen are easy to come by, but the PCR's are harder, and cost money. Jetblue has put in test sites at the airport, but they aren't at all the terminals. And the test is costly, if I don't go through certain agencies. At work - if you go through Northwell Health - it's free, but that's not easy to find in the city.
Came home, with the intent to do laundry. Curses! Foiled again. In fact chose to do laundry instead of going to the pharmacy to pick up my prescription, and the grocery store. Ended up sharing an elevator with a maskless young guy (who has only deigned to wear a bandana the entire length of the pandemic, his wife wears nothing at all), and in the basement, discovered a young woman and her daughter doing laundry with no masks on. Gave up and went back upstairs. It's not a ton of laundry, and can wait until I get back. Some of it, I can take down with me and do at my Mom's.
Talked to mother, and discovered she was taking a COVID Test as we spoke.
Mother: I'm taking a COVID test.
Me: Do you want me to call back -
Mother: No, it takes 15 minutes.
Me: The over-the-counter version?
Mother: You're brother convinced me to get one just to be safe. He said that you were coming down, and I go into the Preston to see your father, etc. And I should see if this is a cold or COVID-19. It feels like a cold, I can still smell and taste things, and the cold medication is working. (The pattern with COVID is nothing works - but special COVID meds and well the vaccine. That's why Pfizer and Moderna are creating COVID pills for it. No other meds work.)
Apparently my niece takes this one each day for school. To go to London, she has to get the PCR test. So did my co-worker who was going to the Dominican Republic.
We had a stressful fifteen minutes until she could check it and discover that it was indeed, negative. After I got off the phone with her, I did the same thing, which involved opening the little packet. Taking out the little cardboard sleeve, opening it, placing six droplets in the hole. Taking out the cotton swab. Swirling about my nostrils five times, each nostril. (It made me sneeze, and I was worried I got a bit of blood in there.) Put the cotton swab all the way through both holes. Remove the seal, seal the test.
Wait 15 minutes, and do not go thirty minutes. Fifteen minutes later, it was negative, and I was relieved. Let Mother know, and she doesn't think I need to do the saliva test or PCR, in conjunction with the antigen.
We were both terrified of testing positive - because then what? Do I cancel my flight? Reschedule? What?
Meanwhile, her physical therapist who is from Peru, is traveling to Paris for Xmas with his four kids, and going to Euro Disney, then later to Vegas with his wife. He's already gone to Peru a couple of times this year. (Neither of us understood how folks did this.)
**
Funny stuff on Twitter.
So there's this site on Reddit, where people post lengthy essays asking if they are assholes. AITA or Am I The Asshole. Then folks on Twitter repost the essay and make fun of it. Because, it's Twitter. I honestly think sometimes that Twitter exists solely to rag on things.
Anyhow, HERE's the whole crazy tale.
The gist? Poster supervises a workplace that has two cats. Pam, a former volunteer turned employee, has taken a special interest in the cats. Jorts is a Orange Tabby or Ginger Cat, and Jean is a Tortoishell Cat. Jorts isn't that bright. He keeps getting trapped in closets. Their food is in the closet. Jean can open the doors by pulling down the lever or handle, Jorts pushes it up and gets trapped, so Jean has to get him out. Also Jorts apparently isn't that great at grooming himself. And likes to sleep on an old boot pan in the superviser's office. Pam has taken it upon herself to train Jorts, even though Jean does help him and helps groom him. She also has placed magarine on Jorts coat so he will figure out how to groom himself. (Yes, she buttered the cat.)
Her supervisor began to point out that this was not necessary, kind of made fun of what she was doing, and stated, look orange cats are just dumb by nature. Pam felt this was racial stereotyping and fled the office in tears. She sent an email to HR complaining about racial stereotyping of orange cats and refused to come back until it was resolved. HR told her that no, this wasn't racial stereotyping, and she was being insensitive to the actual issue, and she may want to scale back on her oversight of the cats.
It goes on.
I explained this to mother.
Mother: She buttered the cat? Eww.
Me (laughing): yup.
Meanwhile on my wacky soap - they have a scene in a sauna, with a hot guy in a towel and a woman in a blazer, shirt and skirt. And I'm distracted throughout by the fact that the woman will not take off her blazer. I mean come on, who can wear a blazer in a sauna? And who marches into one with a coat and blazer on?
Soap Twitter has forever dubbed the woman character - Blazer Lynn. The guy, though, has a remarkably attractive chest. You can sort of tell who this show is directed towards, heterosexual women and gay men.
Twitter is also upset that Time chose Elon Musk as Person of the Year, so have been supplanting it with cat pictures, specifically Jorts the Cat as Cat of the Year.
Twitter: Elon Musk as Time Person of the Year? Really? This is Unconscionable.
ME: I'm guessing someone at Time desperately wants to go to Mars?
***
Followup on Kindle. Freezing the Kindle did not work. (I'm not surprised, I didn't really expect it to.) I'm guessing I will have to buy a new one. Damn. Mother thinks we may be able to find one at Staples or order it down there. I don't feel like doing it right now. Although I might and just send it to myself down there. Of course, if I don't make it down there, she'll have to send it back, so it may make more sense to wait?
***
It's late, I need to go to bed. No photos tonight. Sorry.
Right now, I've put my Kindle Paperwhite in the freezer to see if that will fix the frozen touch screen problem. (This was suggested by various folks on Quora who had the same issue, and nothing worked, so they attempted this and voila it worked). If not, I may have to get a new one. I think I damaged it attempting to get on my work wifi to add books? I don't know. Or too many books? Anyhow it went kablooie on me. The good news is I have an HD Kindle Fire (it just needs more charging, and a password to get into it, annoying but it is what it is) and I've got the Kindle on my phone. But I may just do the insane thing and read a paperback book tomorrow. It's not like I don't have about a 100 to choose from. Hell, I could buy one at the airport, if I wanted to.
Most everyone reads it on their phone now - I prefer the kindle sized book, personally, less stress on eyes and neck. I also have audio books available.
Spent most of the day worrying over whether I'd have to get a PCR Test prior to boarding the flight to Hilton Head on Sunday morning. The Jetblue site is not clear on this issue. Instead of clearly stating that - "no tests are required for domestic travel in the US outside of Puerto Rico", it states, for travel within the US check these links. And the links provide no information on the matter. So I googled, which informed me that Jetblue required a PCR test 72 hours prior to travel, at least. And you could get a test through them for $116.
Annoyed, I contacted Jetblue, who after about an hour or two, finally stated via text that "Covid testing for domestic travel is not needed at this time with the exception of Puerto Rico."
Tried to find the bad sites with the misinformation on home laptop, but I've a better filter in place than my work computer does, apparently. Or Firefox has better things in place. Because it doesn't come up. Instead, an article does explaining why the domestic flight airlines in the US are dead-set against testing for domestic travel. It's just not Feasible. They are right, it's not.
And considering folks are going to restaurants, Broadway shows, concerts, traveling by subway, train, bus, cab, car service, etc without getting tested, why should you do it on planes? Planes have an air filteration system, so do trains, and buses. I'm more likely to get in the office or at my apartment complex or the grocery store.
I asked around at work - no one had needed it for domestic travel. But they didn't know about Jetblue. One co-worker said, I should get it anyhow. So did my brother. Thankfully, the damn airline doesn't require it for domestic travel.
Just so you know? Rapid tests such as the antigen are easy to come by, but the PCR's are harder, and cost money. Jetblue has put in test sites at the airport, but they aren't at all the terminals. And the test is costly, if I don't go through certain agencies. At work - if you go through Northwell Health - it's free, but that's not easy to find in the city.
Came home, with the intent to do laundry. Curses! Foiled again. In fact chose to do laundry instead of going to the pharmacy to pick up my prescription, and the grocery store. Ended up sharing an elevator with a maskless young guy (who has only deigned to wear a bandana the entire length of the pandemic, his wife wears nothing at all), and in the basement, discovered a young woman and her daughter doing laundry with no masks on. Gave up and went back upstairs. It's not a ton of laundry, and can wait until I get back. Some of it, I can take down with me and do at my Mom's.
Talked to mother, and discovered she was taking a COVID Test as we spoke.
Mother: I'm taking a COVID test.
Me: Do you want me to call back -
Mother: No, it takes 15 minutes.
Me: The over-the-counter version?
Mother: You're brother convinced me to get one just to be safe. He said that you were coming down, and I go into the Preston to see your father, etc. And I should see if this is a cold or COVID-19. It feels like a cold, I can still smell and taste things, and the cold medication is working. (The pattern with COVID is nothing works - but special COVID meds and well the vaccine. That's why Pfizer and Moderna are creating COVID pills for it. No other meds work.)
Apparently my niece takes this one each day for school. To go to London, she has to get the PCR test. So did my co-worker who was going to the Dominican Republic.
We had a stressful fifteen minutes until she could check it and discover that it was indeed, negative. After I got off the phone with her, I did the same thing, which involved opening the little packet. Taking out the little cardboard sleeve, opening it, placing six droplets in the hole. Taking out the cotton swab. Swirling about my nostrils five times, each nostril. (It made me sneeze, and I was worried I got a bit of blood in there.) Put the cotton swab all the way through both holes. Remove the seal, seal the test.
Wait 15 minutes, and do not go thirty minutes. Fifteen minutes later, it was negative, and I was relieved. Let Mother know, and she doesn't think I need to do the saliva test or PCR, in conjunction with the antigen.
We were both terrified of testing positive - because then what? Do I cancel my flight? Reschedule? What?
Meanwhile, her physical therapist who is from Peru, is traveling to Paris for Xmas with his four kids, and going to Euro Disney, then later to Vegas with his wife. He's already gone to Peru a couple of times this year. (Neither of us understood how folks did this.)
**
Funny stuff on Twitter.
So there's this site on Reddit, where people post lengthy essays asking if they are assholes. AITA or Am I The Asshole. Then folks on Twitter repost the essay and make fun of it. Because, it's Twitter. I honestly think sometimes that Twitter exists solely to rag on things.
Anyhow, HERE's the whole crazy tale.
The gist? Poster supervises a workplace that has two cats. Pam, a former volunteer turned employee, has taken a special interest in the cats. Jorts is a Orange Tabby or Ginger Cat, and Jean is a Tortoishell Cat. Jorts isn't that bright. He keeps getting trapped in closets. Their food is in the closet. Jean can open the doors by pulling down the lever or handle, Jorts pushes it up and gets trapped, so Jean has to get him out. Also Jorts apparently isn't that great at grooming himself. And likes to sleep on an old boot pan in the superviser's office. Pam has taken it upon herself to train Jorts, even though Jean does help him and helps groom him. She also has placed magarine on Jorts coat so he will figure out how to groom himself. (Yes, she buttered the cat.)
Her supervisor began to point out that this was not necessary, kind of made fun of what she was doing, and stated, look orange cats are just dumb by nature. Pam felt this was racial stereotyping and fled the office in tears. She sent an email to HR complaining about racial stereotyping of orange cats and refused to come back until it was resolved. HR told her that no, this wasn't racial stereotyping, and she was being insensitive to the actual issue, and she may want to scale back on her oversight of the cats.
It goes on.
I explained this to mother.
Mother: She buttered the cat? Eww.
Me (laughing): yup.
Meanwhile on my wacky soap - they have a scene in a sauna, with a hot guy in a towel and a woman in a blazer, shirt and skirt. And I'm distracted throughout by the fact that the woman will not take off her blazer. I mean come on, who can wear a blazer in a sauna? And who marches into one with a coat and blazer on?
Soap Twitter has forever dubbed the woman character - Blazer Lynn. The guy, though, has a remarkably attractive chest. You can sort of tell who this show is directed towards, heterosexual women and gay men.
Twitter is also upset that Time chose Elon Musk as Person of the Year, so have been supplanting it with cat pictures, specifically Jorts the Cat as Cat of the Year.
Twitter: Elon Musk as Time Person of the Year? Really? This is Unconscionable.
ME: I'm guessing someone at Time desperately wants to go to Mars?
***
Followup on Kindle. Freezing the Kindle did not work. (I'm not surprised, I didn't really expect it to.) I'm guessing I will have to buy a new one. Damn. Mother thinks we may be able to find one at Staples or order it down there. I don't feel like doing it right now. Although I might and just send it to myself down there. Of course, if I don't make it down there, she'll have to send it back, so it may make more sense to wait?
***
It's late, I need to go to bed. No photos tonight. Sorry.
no subject
Date: 2021-12-17 09:49 am (UTC)Not my electronic specialty, but--- bad battery? While I'm guessing the device gives out "low battery" warnings to alert for the need to recharge, all rechargeable batteries eventually get to a point where they won't recharge properly, no matter how long the charger is applied.
So, the voltage to the device slowly drops (and won't go back up) until the device being powered gets flaky or stops working entirely.
Also the only technically reasonable thing I can think of to explain why the freezing would work, but if it did, it would only be temporary.
Dunno, but... worth checking for?
no subject
Date: 2021-12-17 01:10 pm (UTC)