Coronavirus Lockdown Journal Day 78: how do we thrive from here?

Is nothing is as it appears? You know that house down the street with the Covid-19 quarantine notice on it? We're pretty sure it's empty. It's tied up in some sort of foreclosure fight, and the lawyer put that up to scare people away.

And then there's all this crap:

Or this:

She posed for Instagram, then got into her Mercedes.

Or this:

Or this:

"Insane despot." "You thought he would turn us into a third world country, well here we are."

https://www.facebook.com/210277954204/posts/10157606114519205/

"A literal fascist takeover." That's maybe the scariest thing I've heard yet. 

"If they just read Ready Player One," I said to my brother on the phone, "They would know what to do." We were talking about the youth unemployment situation. I was selling the idea of a virtual jobs program, something to give the kids something to do besides break windows and steal.

What could kids do online? Well, make more online. Learn skills. Document stuff. Add data. Play tournaments. Compete in all kinds of -athons. Hackathons. Gameathons. Buildathons. Chatathons.

I don't know, the point is, let's get creative about stuff to do, and then pay young people (all unemployed people, really) to do it. 

Or, we can sit back and watch them throw bricks.

Notes on our kleptocracy, and the illusion of democracy, and why so many of us want to believe in this whole left vs right argument, even though it just keeps making the rich richer and everyone else poorer.

Here, ultimately, is my simplest and best take on humanity's position in the 21st century:

The sooner we adapt to use more internet and less fossil fuels, and less "stuff" in general, the better off we will be.

Conversely, the longer we cling to our old super-polluter, disposable consumer ways, the worse we can expect things to get.

The infrastructure of flourishing versus languishing is very fucking clear at this point. 

File under: good news, maybe. Seasonal, maybe. Herd immunity, maybe (in Italy).

Virus losing potency? 

File under: we're learning

That guy was walking home from work at a hospital and saw cops chasing down a guy, so he started filming on his phone. Next thing you know, he was back at work. (As a patient.)

This guy was acting as a medic at a peaceful march, in daylight:

But, again, not every cop thinks bashing heads is the best approach here:

How bad is it? How about "I don't want to talk about it" bad?

The CBO report was requested by? Vermont Senator Bernard Sanders, someone the entire political class likes to point at as "non-realistic."

And everything is local. Here's a notice posted by my friend Matt, who up until recently was running a successful boutique gym:

Let's play a round of "what was he really thinking."

Oh shoot, I forgot my face mask.

DC had lots of problems last night. Many people were unhappy. Awful stuff, really. Our forces are overwhelmed. We're being dominated by kids. Have I been to Minneapolis? Is that where the cheese is from? Can't believe I'm still president. That's me, right?

I don't give a crap about you. I cannot allow the righteous cries of angry protestors to drown me out. So I will use the military to make violence.

Just some bois hanging out on Market Street. Yeah, my guess is these "very good people" are not from the city.

In the picture at top, because as far as I can tell we're basically in this situation because we refused to start wearing masks back in February (or March, or April, or May, or June) we got our first bespoke masks, from friend the Photobomber. They're quite comfortable, although the look has definitely given me another reason to shave the winter beard.

And finally, looking forward to hopefully following this guy next week: