Six weeks

I started writing these posts to keep track of what I saw coming and what about this whole experience with COVID -19 came as a surprise. All too much of what has happened has been easy to see coming. I'm slightly pleased with my expectations of technical things.

I told a couple of neighbors soon after this things started that the virus has been here mush longer than what was being reported. Recent reports have indicate that this is indeed the case. It's not like this was some deep insight. You don't go from finding the first case and a few days later have positive results all of the country.

I was doing pull-ups using some bars on the playground at the neighborhood elementary school. My wife was teasing me about touching the bar. I responded by telling her that there was no way that little bundle of genetic material could survive being out in the sun. If we need to wear sunscreen to protect our skin, a virus will not hold up well to exposure to UV light. That looks like that is the case (although that insight is being buried under Trump's reaction to the news).

I think I already mentioned the air pollution link. I've been reminding the wife about the risk that obesity brings, but I can't claim that idea came to me from thinking about what's out in the media. I heard that obesity was a risk on an interview on the Joe Rogan podcast. It made sense and was a consistent feature in pictures of people who have died from the virus. The deaths are sad and unfortunate, but it's frustrating that there is still very little commentary on the risks that obesity brings to people infected by the virus. It's a bigger factor than everything but age.

My drive to emerge stronger from this crazy time has only been reinforced by the link between poor outcomes and obesity. Everything is better when you are at a healthy weight. This is particularly relevant as I get older. I'm looking at 44 in less than 2 weeks. (My birthday will be cancelled by this damn virus.) I have continued to loss weight after the pact with my wife ended. I'm working out everyday, going for long walks, and trying to avoid eating too excessively. I'll stick with it for as long as I can.

I'm not sure what will come next with this saga. We're shifting from the solid facts about the virus and how it effects people into human judgement and decisions. That's so wrapped up in irrational motivations that it's not easy to say how we get back into a semblance of pre-virus life. It's not going to be smooth. I'm not going to wear a mask (they aren't effective, particularly when they aren't worn properly).

Time will tell...

5 Weeks

I started a note on my phone keeping track of different things I've done while the world freaks out about prediction models built with poor and incomplete data. It's a work in progress. It's something to mark progress, keep me focused on something positive rather than succumbing to the pull of absurdity that will define this collective inflection point. I've finally come to peace that logic and reason stand no chance against fear and irrationality feed by misinformation.

My earliest reaction to the closing and cancelling of modern life was that big decisions were being made with very poor data. How do we know that this will be as bad as they say? We were trading a health problem for an economic problem. Were we making a good trade? The last five weeks have me convinced that we are going to regret some choices. Actions were motivated by models predicting millions of people dying. Models are sophisticated ways to guess what's going to happen under a certain set of assumptions. You can't get a good model without good data. COVID 19 is a wonderful illustration of garbage in / garbage out. Decades from now lectures about modelling will caution future modelers with tales of how a sophisticated model informed by garbage data crushed the global economy.

There are no controls in this global experiment. They tell us that all this social distancing is working, pointing to all the deaths that those early models predicted have been averted by locking ourselves away. That's just a story we're being told to keep us compliant. We have no way to know if those early predictions were anywhere close to what would have happened if the virus was allowed to do its thing unopposed. You don't control a virus. You control people to thwart the viruses molecular machinery from making more viruses. Telling people that the initial models were total garbage isn't effective in getting them to stay home.

We've sacrificed more than we realize to avoid a situation that was likely to never become reality. The first few days of this scare felt like a blizzard predicted to drop 2 feet of snow was heading our way but we would end up getting a dusting of snow. There is an argument that it's better to prepare for the worst and hope for the best, but should we create a bigger problem in preparing for the worst? Yes, people have died. Those deaths are tragic, but virus kill people everyday. More deaths will be called by the problems created by shutting down the economy. Will those victims be part of the final tally?

Three Weeks Deep

The wife and I had a pact to lose weight together. We would hold each other accountable and make good choices together. I aimed for 7 pounds of weight loss in a month. My weight has oscillated around 222 for years. I've been below and above, but I seem to settle right around 222 when I'm not sticking with a reasonably healthy diet and working out regularly. I figured my body would be willing to settle into that familiar weight if I cut the desserts, upped my running mileage, and replaced salty snacks with vegetables. Then this damn virus showed up. 

I was 229.3 when I started the pact. I was 220 when I weighed myself this morning. Lots of walks, consistently running 15+ miles a week, and snacking on fruit and vegetables rather than a handful of chips or crackers (most of the time anyway). The process was easy the first few weeks, but it's getting harder to stick with the plan as I spend more time working from home. The distortion that we've all been feeling is making life feel flat and stale. I'm getting sick of my house. I hate the furniture that we've had for way too long. We need to replace the siding our of house soon. At least the weather is getting warmer. 

We're going to look back on these few months (or however long this twist persists) and question why we shut things down. We're being asked to make profound personal sacrifices with no real indication that they are making a difference. I'm lucky that I can work on emerging from the stasis improved. The gym is closed, but I have a treadmill, a rowing machine, and a bench and dumbbells waiting for me in the garage (I've used them all this week). I have money in the bank. I'm inconvenienced. Too many people are losing everything. We may be saving lives (maybe, this is all really just a theory), but lives are being destroyed at an industrial scale. The wreckage from our response to this virus will haunt us forever.

There is all kinds of talk about controlling the virus. Controlling the virus is an illusion. We are the ones being controlled. Stick us in our houses, take away the most popular diversions and pleasures in life (those things that attract the most people must be the best after all), and cheat a hollow sphere of lipids decorated with proteins a place to release its bundle of genetic material. We take the leaders at their word. The stories of doctors and nurses tending to the worst of the worst cases magnify and amplify the worst that this virus has to offer while its failures feel ill for a day or two and go about their now heavily restricted life. 

It could be worse, it can always be worse. This could be China. The government could put everybody under house arrest and mislead the rest of the world about how effective the virus was in evading their plans to foil its life's work. I could be compelled to wear a mask, which would require shaving my beard, and carry a letter allow me to get groceries or head to work. That would be worse. The chaffing of being stuck in a three mile ring grows everyday, but at least I was free to get Taco Bell for lunch today.