Sledgstone

i see ads like ear wax removal, dental works, and some random anime characters. but you are right, i dont see ads when im logged in

I haven't seen ads here while logged in. I thought it was an AC Elite thing. Only thing I know about ads being harmful is they're from Google.
Would find it funny though if one of those ads were for Corona Beer.

it was great though. i felt like a little kid again looking at a new super nintendo console on display at toys r us for the first time or something.
yeah i should know better and not to fall for rumors like that..but with news headlines like "US surgeon general warns of pearl harbor moments" and "trump says national lockdown is we talk about" i had to take it with a grain of salt just like houston mayor assured us that there will be no lockdown, boom..the next day he shuts the city down lmao 😂 
before i thought grocery online delivery was working fine in other countries so 2 weeks closing of all stores including essential businesses would be no problem. but after witnessing panic buying fiasco in early march and overwhelmed online deliveries, these would never work in the US. i would hope though if US is as serious as what its saying about upcoming death tolls 
due to corona then it should. or at least implement heavy curfew nation wide because ppl arent exactly following any guidelines to stay away from each other nor care. i had seen a customer armed to the teeth one day with a face mask, a trash bag, gloves and even goggles on, but a next day its a usual tank top and short jeans saying its too much work 
i thought AC disabled sigs long time ago lol!! i forgot what mine was anyway. its either ryoko or relena 😛 im gonna check it out with ipad later. i see AC has some ads here and there so i dont wanna use my pc just incase its harmful

Drive-Thru banking has existed since at least the early 80s. I remember my mom would always deposit checks like this and I'd always hope the bank teller would see little kid me in the car and put a sucker in the capsule for me.
There are so much misinformation going around. Trump nor the federal government as a whole has the power to shut down the country. Thats a state level thing.. one of the few things left that belongs to the individual states at least. There is no precedent for doing this. That being said, he could issue an executive order for a temporary shut down, and then there would be lawsuits. That is government overreach and even though they'd get away with it this time, eventually the Supreme court would rule that it was unconstitutional because of the type of judges he's put in there. And if you haven't been paying attention the 9th circuit has also been flipped while no one was paying attention. There is a reason why they haven't been in the news for months trying to stop Trump. But on the flip side these types don't stand for government overreach, and the 9th would now side with that.
Either way, grocery stores, drive through eateries, and medical facilities will remain open. They can't shut those down ever. Especially with how selfishly Americans live now. I saw a lady bitching on a facebook post about how she needs to go to the grocery store every day to get bread because she can only buy 1 loaf and it won't last a day in a half in her house... Instead of giving up bread or limiting its consumption and eating something else, people think they shouldn't have to go with out so long as they can afford it.  Some people just buy groceries for 1-2 days. Some people would really starve because they can't plan out their groceries for 2 weeks. We finally got hand sanitizer in and I saw a lady pull it out of her grocery bag after she bought it and dump it in her hands in a fit of orgasmic euphoria like shes been cured of all ailments now and forever. 🙄 People are ridiculous... she was probably one of those types that never washes her hands and only uses sanitizer like its a replacement for that.
Edit: Slippers, Even though its been years since you've touched it, it was actually just like 2 weeks ago Photobucket stopped allowing hotlinking images from your personal account unless you pony up $5 a month. So your sig is all kinds of watermarked by them. Sigs can't be seen from the phone in mobile mode, so I didn't notice until I got on my PC.

sledge- definitely downplaying and spreading false info can hurt us at the first few months that were very critical, but after a failure to prevent the virus from entering a country, what we know now can make us careless too. another reason i think for ppl, regardless of their politcal affiliation, for not taking it seriously is bc corona isnt as deadly as it initially thought. when you hear what mortality rate is, it can be scary. but do opposite and say you have 97% to 99% survival rate then its not so scary anymore. it can be "just a flu" depends on who you apply to. sure no one wants this to mutate and become much more aggressive than it already is. but for now, ppl are more worried about losing their homes/businesses than getting sick. so US has to make a decision and stop from further devastation: save the economy or save our vulnerable citizens? i dont think US can do both at this late in stage. we all had already seen what kind of extremely brutal measure china took to stop from further spreading.. or maybe its too late to do anything and just hope and wait till it passes
i dont think we all had it all at once. maybe just some of us did and cycle continued until it caught up on to larger groups with equivalently low health/immune system such as nursing homes. its incubation period is 2 to 4 weeks, even more, theres no way to know virus lives on us hiding as we could be carriers and reactivates multiple times without showing any symptoms. before my brother moved out and got married, he use to go out alot after work and he brought home cold/flu buncha times. for 2weeks of sneezing and coughing and by the time he got better my mom got sick. and when she was getting better i got sick. we were in a same household and it took me almost a month to get sick so its possible for corona to spread weeks or months apart at times, depending on who it infects and where it reaches. im not even saying this theory is true though. it only exists bc chinese govt tried to hide it possibly for weeks or for months until it got out of control. until we know more about this virus, im not counting this theory out yet 😛 

I think people aren't taking it serious yet because of politics. (Beginning rant) Texas has alot of republican people. I mention it because alot of republican people watch Fox News.. and for the first 2-3 months of coronavirus Fox News basically told everyone it was either a hoax, a common cold, nothing to be taken seriously, etc (echoing what Trump's opinion of it at the time except more embellished). Only recently have they actually given a shit and reported the actual news and severity of it (because Trump did as well). And of course people say "the impeachment distracted Trump and the media from emphasizing how severe this is"... ah sure.. Trump was so distracted he still golfed like 20 days and had time to plan a superbowl party. And yes, all the cable news talked about nothing but the impeachment shit, but thats why people have to watch and read actual news. AP, Reuters & NPR and others have been reporting on this since day one. (End rant)
I think the other thing is that theory about "we already had it in January"... I'm really starting to doubt that especially now since there is 300+ local cases and another person in my county died last night bringing it up to 3 and a second Centro bus driver and some farmers the next county over have now been diagnosed with it which means alot of people have already been exposed all over the area.. Thats alot of sick people simultaneously in roughly a 2-3 week span for something we all got back in January. And I've read where people say that face masks wont necessarily help you from catching it.. true.. buts its good at preventing others from catching it from you... well if thats the case, we should all wear face masks because we don't know who is asymptomatic or not. If we all have a mask on then the guy shopping at walmart near me who has it but not showing symptoms won't spread it to me.. or if I get it and don't know, I could help others by having a mask on. *puts on face mask*
Oh, and Lady's dad is getting out of the nursing home this weekend, he had knee surgery and had to be in a nursing home for recovery. Hes a prime target for Covid19. If he gets this, theres a damn strong chance it'll kill him. He gets hospitalized by the flu or phenomena once a year, I don't see how he could survive this.

Rumor
 

^ i thought you guys had 6pm curfew like california did. hm guess not but yeah i see that NY gov guy appear on news almost daily demanding ventilators. cant blame him though. its just gonna get worse if nothings done. face masks are still taboo here lol..but i do see more and more ppl wearing them too. bandana if they dont have one. a guy who works at a walmart as a greeter told me yesterday that he was not allowed to wear one let alone give him one bc it might scare ppl away. still long way to go before ppl take it seriously here
cant imagine how desperate some ppl are going to be getting laid off for this or losing hours bc their business has slowed down. theres a warehouse near my workplace and a worker there had a fight with his supervisor and he shot himself in the head right after locking himself in a bathroom. he probably thought he was singled out and humiliated in front of everyone. this happened 2 or 3 days before shelter in place order took place in houston, and we found out bc there were like 9 cop cars showed up at their warehouse and customers and his coworkers came by to our store and told us what had happened. if he waited just a few more days though, lockdown would have closed down the warehouse anyway. what a waste of life and he thought his life was over for losing his job that day. just a bad timing for that guy. i only saw him couple times so i feel bad for not remembering his face that well
 

Yeah she had some medical issues that definitely did not help her overall health fighting the flu.
No real changes here still an overall lockdown with no end date set. Schools have been closed for weeks now, all non essential businesses are all still closed. Any restaurants still open are all drive through only or curbside pickup, but more restaurants are laying everyone completely off and closing weekly. Theres a local plastic manufacturing plant that has new contracts to mass produce face shields for hospitals so they seem ok, we have great hospitals in this area so there's only been 2 deaths so far here, over 300 cases as of right now in my local county. It sounds like NYC is a night and day difference to the rest of the state, they sound screwed.
Everyone is finally starting to wear face masks and old people seem to finally be staying at home. The restrictions on purchases at the stores does seem to work out. Still limited selections at Walmart and you can only buy 1 package of toilet paper, but it's actually in stock (only 4 packs there earlier today on all those empty shelves but it was there) because they're forcing ppl to not hoard purchase. I think once everyone gets a stimulus check/direct deposit the stores will be a mad house again.
Theres no curfew but it's like everyone is doing it on their own here. I bought fast food tonight for dinner and the parking lot for burger king, arbys, and 15 other stores and restaurants around 6:30pm only had about 15 total cars out of an area that would normally be packed with hundreds. It was a bit unsettling.
All the local schools have been delivering school breakfast and lunches to families with kids so all the bus drivers are still working. They go to all their normal stops but instead of picking up kids, a parent comes out to the bus and takes their food package that's sitting at the door. And it's for all kids not just kids on low income. And all the kids now have chrome books and the teachers are doing lesson plans over the internet. And any kids without internet got discounted and/or temporary free high speed internet until this passes.
For an unexpected epidemic I think this state is handling it pretty well for the most part. And while I haven't/wont always agree with governor Cuomo's ideas and actions (political stuff, nothing at all with what he's doing right now during all this though), he's done a damn good job of keeping everyone in the state well informed.

My Mom had the same thing around that time, and her flu test came back negative. She was diagnosed with Pneumonia and Bronchitis. She was sick for about 2 weeks and then my dad got it before she was fully well. A lady at work took a trip to NC around that time as well and had a 2 week bout of coughing and fever. She was also told she had Bronchitis after her flu test came back negative. I never got it from any of them so either it was nothing, or I was Asymptomatic. I've always had a pretty stout immune system since I'm around nasty ass people 8-10 hours a day. If I ever feel a little off, I just chalk it up to a head cold or some minor virus. 
https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/coronavirus-researchers-identify-strongest-symptom-21790401
Both my parents complained how they couldn't taste anything as well... interesting. They blamed it on the antibiotics.

Sledge- I think it seems that way because ppl are rushing to get tested. results are ppl overwhelming hospitals and exhausting medical supplies, beds, and ventilators just like what happens during panic buying. Other surrounding states i bet have similar number of cases but lacks testing kits, their numbers will rise as soon as they are available. Houston last sunday went from like 23 new cases to 500 new cases in a matter of a day, but still turning ppl away who show no serious symptoms due to test kit shortage. And only a week ago told them test kit was faulty and closed down drive through test area for some time. In some areas ppl are waiting in line for hours to get tested, best way to catch something even when you arent even sick 😷 
Dx- Normally i cant distinguish  smell so hard to say when i was sick in jan but my symtoms were mild, thankfully. One of symtoms that im kinda convinced that i had it was body chills. Last time that happend to me was when i had a stomach flu but that was like more than a decade ago. For three days i was sick, i kept thinking whats going on, somethings not right here. One of regular customers i talk to said when he traveled to france in december, he ended up in hospital because he was so sick but came out negative for flu as well. He also suspects it was corona but he isnt sure either. Strange that it doesnt affect infants and children that much, they have weak immune system most of all

I was prepared 😛 i stockpiled 3 months worthy of supplies back in February. Hurricanes after another, or if anything bad happens, shelves are always empty here. As soon as i heard 1st case of corona virus hit the US, i was like yup..now or never. My aunt in South korea didnt believe me when i told her ppl here were fighting over toilet papers..i couldnt explain any furthur..
Texas is beginning to catch up to california in corona cases it seems. Will have to see in coming weeks but Houston's response has been very slow and not enough testing. One of 4th largest cities in the States and yet we dont even have a curfew yet. Our current weakass lockdown order ends in a couple days, so we are going to hear soon about extention and hopefully a strict curfew.
stay safe guys. As long as you are healthy you have nothing to worry about. Unconfirmed source has it that corona has been spreading since semptember of last year and as early as november here in the States. And like many, showing corona like symptoms, i was sick for 3 days in January, with body chills, chest pains, and some headaches but no fever. and lingering dry cough that lasted for 2 months.. but we'll never know if it was or not and take this seriously as it passes like other respiratory viruses slow down during warm weather. Unless its manmade..cough 😛

I only buy fish sticks when I also buy mozzarella sticks. It just feels balanced when they're together.
 

Hey now, don't go mocking my fish sticks Dip them in a little Mayo and you got yourself a fucking feast (like I said I'm considered the weird on in my family).
So shit seems to be getting real around my area now. The company I work for decided that instead of closing up shop for a few weeks that they'd just go ahead and lay off quite a few people in an effort to "protect as many peoples jobs as possible in these trying times and to try and prevent a company shut down". I survived for now (but my department is hurting badly as we lost 4 people, two of which were rather essential to getting shit done and we're pretty sure they're not getting their jobs back) and they said no more lay offs were being planned (but I and everyone else doubt this hightly). Quite honestly it's fucking retarded considering we're not an essential business (for fucks sake we're a metal fabrication shop), most of our customers are shut down or running at less than half capacity, there's a fear our suppliers might shut down (my supervisor was pretty worried about this yesterday), Bobcat has currently shut their doors to everyone but employees (rumor has it they're considering shutting down), and COVID cases in our county are on a steady rise. Yet for some god damn reason we need to stay open and lay people off so those higher ups can line their fucking pockets cause god forbid we close down to save those people's jobs (we're a multi-million dollar company, we can afford to shut down for awhile). Yea I'm fucking pissed because two of them (the two essential ones I mentioned above) are friends of mine who were already in tough financial spots to begin with.

Pretty much how Trump is now being blamed for the mask shortage that actually happens under Obama during H1N1 and they were never replenished. I also learned the other day, at some point, I dunno under who, we decided it was a bright idea to have all the IV bags come out of Puerto Rico, and then the hurricane hit last year, and everyone is having supply issues. 
https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/news/los-angeles-times-and-bloomberg-news-federal-stockpile-of-n95-masks-was-depleted-under-obama-and-never-restocked
Bush was definitely the end of the Republican's fiscal conservatism as a whole. Big spending government has been gone on for too long and it probably will keep going on. People that like big government that takes care of everything, don't realize that the result is that corporations are going to get bailed out forever... because they fund the campaigns. Not the little people. The government should monitor corperations, let them succeed and let them fail. If something fails, something else will rise up in its place, it always has. With Space X on the rise, and NASA becoming less relevant, its pretty obvious we don't need the government for everything. The government should assist but not take over parts of the private sector.

The dems lost so bad this round. No matter how shitty the package was going to be they joined into it as a bipartisan package over the weekend and then at the last minute yesterday demanded a bunch of unrelated shit like same day voter registration, bailing out the post office, wind power tax breaks, etc. Bad look. There is no way that dumb shit can be defended, especially if the original package was a bipartisan effort. I'm surprised the republicans would even consider passing out checks to everyone since that's kinda against the party philosophy. While intentions are good, man that's ripe for abuse... those tax fruaders were already licking their chops to steal a bunch of those from people that really need it. There is no way the government could implement that this fast without a ton of issues. From what I was understanding pretty much anyone that pays taxes can get it even if they don't need it, while people that do need it could be left out like people that run their own small, and I mean like really small 1-2 person business, out of their home, self employed people etc. They should have came up with a bill that suspended a giant portion of monetary flow. Basically credit card, mortgage, automobile, rent, student loans, personal loans, and basically anything I left out that can ruin you credit or make you homeless or without a vehicle should have been put on hold. If I was Trump I'd just throw down the executive order and dare a judge to block it. My state loosened up all the unemployment requirements so most businesses that are shutting down, have fired all of their employees just so they can get unemployment while they aren't getting a paycheck.
My issue with these testing sites is that if you aren't showing symptoms you shouldn't go. Yeah you could be asymptomatic, but if you're not, you're more likely to get it waiting in line near someone sick with it. I dunno about everywhere, but all I am seeing is some shitty beige tent and a long line. wtf? So much for social distancing when it really matters. Nah fam, I'm good. Not about to get COVID while waiting to see if I have COVID.

I'm glad so many companies are now doing work from home. The company I work for has been doing it for years already. I'm happy with my job, but it'll be nice to see new potential job offerings in the future that actually have telecommuting as an option because it'll open up the workforce across the country instead of only hiring locally. The potential for higher paying jobs will be available to more people in more diverse locations as long as employers keep their work from home options available. Its actually cheaper for the employers too because they don't have to pay for offices, computers, software licenses, power, etc. since all that falls on the home employee. Assuming the workflow stays the same to justify the work from home option. I think that will be the real test for alot of these companies doing this for the first time. Not everyone is suited with the mentality for working from home. It is alot of self isolation and full of potential distractions. I'm a bit anti-social so its never bothered me.  But I know some people that went a bit nuts and craved human interaction so bad they either had to quit or go out to a store or something every single lunch break just to see people and start a random conversation with a stranger. It takes a while, but that going crazy from isolation feeling kicks in for people after about a month.
In other news:
https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/texas-lt-gov-dan-patrick-suggests-he-other-seniors-willing-n1167341
I have a feeling Trump and others will lift the quarantine within 2 weeks instead of a month, because the economy and stocks are more important that old people's lives.
And the coronavirus stimulus package that could send money out to people sounds like a shit show. Republican version wants all citizens taxpayers to get a one time check for roughly $1200 but corporations gets massive bailouts with no real oversight. Meanwhile the democrats must be smoking a shit ton of medicinal marijuana because some are wanting their version of the stimulus to waive up to $30,000 off everyone's student loans. Like that would ever pass. If theres money for getting student loans paid off, why not waive my credit card debt too dems? Or maybe my brother's medical debt? wtf. Or maybe they could make it so all that student loan debt is now zero percent finance and put that bailout money towards medical products or food stamps for the needy that are all freshly unemployed. 
Meanwhile everyone thats losing their jobs from this are losing their health insurance at the same time because they'll always be connected together in this country because its how our health insurance industry is set up. I wonder how long rural hospitals / doctor offices will be able to stay open when a large chunk of people don't have insurance to pay for their visits. Those places will have to take the hit while they send out past due notices to patients that might never pay them. One of my local doctor's offices already closed for the foreseeable future. They have one employee working 4 hours a day over the phone only, basically doing refills and telling anyone with an issue to go to an urgent care facility instead. Apparently it made more sense for them to lay off the entire staff and close up shop and fully re-open in 2-3 months instead of actually helping during this situation. Thankfully this isn't the doctor I go to.
Also, turns out one of my specialist doctor's I've seen in the past is now offering video appointments. I like that some doctor's are actually coping with the situation instead of just denying their services.

Ok wtf? Fish Sticks are an abomination. Sushi is amazing, and there is nothing like some fresh never frozen grilled salmon or fried catfish. I'm not down with Seapak or Captain Gordons.

Yea no. I used to be a hunter and that shit don't even fly with me. Pickled anything is just nasty. Never had liver but looking at it I can pretty much tell I won't like it (I don't consider myself an overly picky eater but there is just some shit I won't do (and I'm considered the weird one in my family because I love sushi yet I hate cooked fish (yea I consider that a little weird myself but meh, catholic upbringing and all that has left a distaste for cooked fish (outside of fish stick, I will totally devour a box of fish sticks any day of the week))).
Sledge you go out and you buy bacon jerky this instant. That shit is fucking amazing and I could eat it all day every day (though Jack Links jerky tends to be rather dry their bacon jerky is killer if you can't find anything else). Granted not as good as freshly fried bacon but damn near. Now I want bacon and I have none in house
See that's the problem with the Walmart here, there's no restrictions on what you can buy. They're just up and letting people buy in mass quantities and it's stupid. Hell the two local grocery stores have a limit of two in place currently for heavily wanted items though in retrospect it's not helping as they're cleaned out of most of the same shit as Walmart. Meh, as my friend pointed out eventually these people are going to run out of storage and stop buying shit (well at least the ones not trying to resell this shit online) which will let stores finally catch up. When that will happen is anyone's guess but it will happen (that or they'll run out of money because they're out of work (which will be the biggest contributor to that in my area as 40-50% of the workforce here is employed by the oil companies and as I pointed out earlier most of those are shut down right now)).
Meh, I shop at Walmart for the ease of it and because it's extremely cheap (my weekly grocery bill would be $40-$80 more if I shopped anywhere but Walmart. That's pretty steep when I usually spend $120-$140 a week). I used to shop at the local grocery store but it just got way to expensive and the other one I refuse to give money to as they're the ones that fired me. Plus since my diet is mostly frozen food it's way cheaper to shop at Walmart as both of the other stores in the area can't match Walmart's prices on frozen goods (a fact I know well having been the managed the frozen department at the one that fired me). Though I'm thinking I might have to bite the bullet and shop at them next Saturday if Walmart is wiped out again.

Wal-Mart is the worst everywhere since its pretty much the average person's first go to. So naturally they get hit the hardest. Personally I never shop there because I hate the general public and like to avoid them at all costs. I mostly do my shopping when I get off work. Yeah things that aren't on sale are hella expensive compared to Wal-Mart but my peace of mind is worth it. My store is one of the lesser busy ones, but our truck sizes are all the size of our biggest truck of the week right now, and thats only because there isn't enough product to come in.. otherwise it would be quadruple the size. Where is everyone putting all this fucking food? We've already put up signs that you can't bring any of the stuff back for refunds. I think everyone is trying to curb the purchasing madness by doing this. I know Costco did this as well. I bet there a bunch of morons, hording with their credit card, and they're gonna be up shit's creek when they can't return any of it and can't pay their credit card. Like I watch people just stroll by with an overflowing shopping cart every day, everyone. I can't even get a damn coffee on a break without having to stand in line behind giant orders. Its completely unnecessary.
Right now its seriously like Jingle All the Way, and all the groceries are Turboman dolls.

Bacon Jerky is heaven, boy do I love me some Bacon Jerky. I'll have to try Wicked Cutz out (was browsing their site last night, might do an order next pay day (if there is one)) because I also hate dry ass jerky. Then again it'll be hard to beat the local meat shops jerky, that shit is awesome (but alas I'm sure they're fresh out with this bull shit).
You can keep your pickled anything. The though of eating anything pickled, especially eggs, makes me want to throw up (don't ruin perfectly good eggs by pickling them, that's an offense to nature).
So I went up to Walmart this morning and it was quite a bit better then last week except for the sheer amount of people (fucking christ it was like shopping on the day before Thanksgiving). Banana's were full in stock (good thing to as I eat those for breakfast), bread was mostly in stock (a few things here and there were missing), toilet paper of course was out (as it is everywhere in town), almost the entirity of the cold/allergy medicine area was gone (which sucks for me because I need sinus medication due to my shit sinuses as of late), but boy was frozen completely wiped out (thin pickings which sucks for me since my diet is pretty much entirely frozen foods (you think your diet is bad)). Was talking to one of my friends that works their (he was getting off when I went in) and he said it's been bad all week (he was even telling me that people were lining up 4 hours before they opened just to get in to get shit (our Walmart closes down at 8:30 pm and opens at 6 am right now). Fucking bonkers). He was also saying they're throwing 10-12 pallets of frozen freight (as I said earlier you wouldn't be able to tell by how wiped out it was) and 10 pallets of paper products a night. God damn people be crazy. Going to be really interesting next weekend.