The Coronavirus-and Pip (the bird)

Yeah we had a few people over Friday and one of them is positive today, apparently.

Yeah, basically how I feel about it. Gonna be somewhat careful for a couple days then test.

Went to a family function saturday, & towards the end of the night, I asked my aunt where a friend of the family was told he had covid. I asked: "and when was the last time he came over to the house??" her response: "Tuesday, but I tested Thursday, and it was negative".

I have an home test kit, but it's pretty old and was exposed to the elements the entire weekend of Coachella so I think it's a sign to reup on the test and prepare. It was weird cause when I was at the party and the house was full of like 20 people I was thinking: "SUPER SPEADER!!!" I hope to god I'm wrong....

Tested on Tuesday and was negative! Haven't experienced any symptoms.

yeah it feels impossible to tell what is and isn’t Covid anymore. I’ve been gravitating back to the old “if you have a fever, or some combination of symptoms, stay home”, standardbecause it doesn’t feel practical to test a bunch when insurance isn’t covering it anymore and the tests are getting less and less accurate. I think if I had kept up isolating every time I had one little symptom that vaguely might be Covid, I’d have driven myself insane.

Well, we're both sick. My wife's sore throat has come back, and I now have post-nasal drip and some congestion going on.

BUT. We don't know if it's COVID. We've tested daily the last 3 days, and have both been negative (today is day 6 past exposure). Plus, our daughter has had what we think is a cold for the past 4 days or so - fever for a day and a half, followed by a stuffy nose. We're pretty sure she didn't get our friend's COVID, because she was asleep in her room before he even got there, he never went close to her room, and she didn't come out until hours later, the following morning. Of course, it's possible she caught COVID somewhere else - we have been taking her to the occasional group play session, and to swimming lessons weekly. But it's also possible she just has a cold, and with the incubation period of the common cold only 1-3 days, we'd be right in that window...and, of course, she's been snotting and sneezing all over us.

Anyway. This is both good (ooh, it might just be a cold!) and bad (since we don't know if we have what she has, we're having to mask in the house because we're worried about giving her COVID if we have it and she doesn't). I'm basically going to keep testing every other day until 10 days from exposure - if it's *still* negative at that point, I don't even know what.

It's going to suck on multiple levels if this is COVID round 3 for me, though. Damnit.

Have the COVID tests ever been updated to detect the more recent strains better? Or are they still based on the alpha one? I've already gotten sick twice this year, and tested negative both times, but I do wonder...

I hope it's just colds and you all feel better soon.

And if it is covid, at least it seems like a mild case and hopefully you recover quickly and then have a few months of not worrying about catching it.

Seen a few stories about covid being on the rise again, but still much lower than the last couple summers.

www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2023/07/28/1190443473/the-cdc-sees-signs-of-a-late-summer-covid-wave

I would mask up, at those indoor "must see" shows. Fuck everyone else. We have a handful of people that mask at shows. There's actually been an uptick. Just make sure you are diligent. Don't take the mask off inside.

Yep, those discounted prices are still valid through August. I guess that as fewer people are masking, they're having to extend the discounts.

I use the Harley-brand N95 masks with the full head straps they sell (my ubiquitous ball cap hides the strap over the top of my head). I might give the other kind with behind-the-ear straps a try and see if they're comfortable enough to wear with glasses.

To conclude my saga: I did not catch COVID from the friend who was at my party. I tested negative on another at-home test on Sunday, but volunteered to go get a PCR since I'm supposed to take my nieces to see Fall Out Boy on Saturday. Took the test on Monday, results came back negative today.

I'm genuinely surprised by the whole thing. Everything I've read says you're most contagious just before symptoms onset, which is when my friend was at our house. Our apartment isn't big and the windows weren't open. We did have a HEPA filter running the whole time, so there's that. Otherwise, just dumb luck, I guess, and whatever I have/had is the head cold from my daughter.

So sorry to hear you got nailed, abrakapokus . Hang in there.

Although the word is going to be edited by Inforoo, all I can say is...shit.

I went to a free outdoor show last night and when I got home, I felt more tired than I should have felt, given the hour and the amount of sleep I got the previous night.

All day long today, my sinuses were bothering me, as if I had a little cold. This happens to me often, since I tend to detox everything from artificial food coloring to cannabis through my sinuses.

Usually, though, that passes in a few hours, and it didn't pass today. I took a test within the last hour, and tested positive.

I'm trying to look at the bright side. If I had to get COVID, this was the best time to catch it for a while. I decided to skip The Mountain Goats show on Saturday night, and I opted to see a small outdoor show with a local funk band last night instead of seeing Fall Out Boy. (I love a fair number of their songs, but when I saw them in 2018, I was absolutely certain that a lot of what they were playing was prerecorded.)

Also, I just got up to Trader Joe's today and have around two weeks' worth of food, and received a couple of Amazon shipments with enough bottled spring water to last me a month, so the only things I'm worried about running out of are toilet paper and Kombucha. I'm sure that I can order the first on Amazon and a building neighbor can likely pick up a few bottles for me.

Hopefully, I'll be fully better and testing negative in 15 days for the In Between Days festival in town here (The Beths, Trampled By Turtles, and more), my body filled with antibodies swimming around and T and B cells which have seen the XBB variant, just in time for that fest, outdoor venue shows with Hozier and Goose this fall, as well as indoor shows with Peter Gabriel, Nick Cave, Ted Leo, and My Morning Jacket (and a handful of other outdoor and indoor shows).

I just can't help but wonder how I got it. I'm always masked with an N95 in indoor public spaces and on public transportation, except for the literal 10 second walk from my apartment door to the building's exterior door. I went to a free outdoor show last Sunday and one of my building neighbors (a different neighbor than the one mentioned above) was sitting in with his old band there, and at one point, with my mask down, he leaned in, talking to me right in my face for a couple of minutes. My first thought was, don't be paranoid, you're not going to catch COVID.

I'm not sure how someone as diligent about masking with an N95 as I am caught it.