ADs and their pampered poodles

[BogRollBOGOF]

Here we are again, gaining sequels even more rapidly than the Fast and the Furious...

[NastyBlouse]

@justasking111 and @Iheartmysmart

I got one of those eye-bag things (squidgy mask thing, filled with linseeds I think) and some bottle of something called blephagel (might have spelled that incorrectly) for dry eyes.

You put the eye-bag in the microwave for a short time and then lay it over your eyes, it loosens all of the for want of a better word gunk in the tony littleducts that lubricate the eye every time you blink. Then the blepha-stuff is used on a cotton pad to wipe it all away.

[NastyBlouse]

*tiny little ducts

I don't know who Tony Littleducts is, he sounds like a gangster from 1930s Chicago.

[Iheartmysmart]

Thanks @NastyBlouse. I shall have a look for those. I quite like the sound of Tony Littleducts...

[TheOrchidKiller]

Don't get me started on use of the word "resilience". I have long thought it gets misused by organisations to mean, "it's tough shit so pull yourself together." It puts all the onus on dealing with a stressful time on the person feeling stressed, & whilst there's something to be said for looking after one's own mental well-being, there are times when we all need some help with that. "Learning resilience" or "being more resilient" seems to involve being bunged a link to a well-being website so that HR can tick a box. It doesn't seem to involve looking at why people feel so stressed & considering if anything else can be done by anyone else to support them.

My opinion is affected by a Resilience Worksheet emailed round at work last week. It said that resilient people are positive thinkers who simply imagine what themselves achieving a goal, & lo! It happens!

So I simply imagined myself achieving the goal of finishing work on time for once. And lo! It didn't happen, for reasons that were not my fault. Strangely enough, my thinking wasn't very positive either.

[ElizabethG81]

The phrase I want to ban is "we're in the middle of a pandemic". How the fuck do they know it's "the middle"?

[ElizabethG81]

I also hate "resilient", especially when used in relation to children. The user of the word usually means "buck up and stop bothering me with your problems".

[TheOrchidKiller]

I'd also like to add that I can't stand the phrase, "help us stop the spread" that they make in their safety announcements in Sainsburys.
Makes me imagine low-fat spread seeping out of the chilled dairy products section onto the floor. Or Paddington Bear wandering round the store, leaving a trail of sticky marmalade behind him. I want to shout out, "fetch a mop & bucket!"

[DWPmisery1972]

YES YES YES you people have got it spot on... all of those things. It makes my palms itchy and my eyes twitch in absolute rage.

I like that ‘in the middle of a pandemic’ thing- you’re right, how do me know we’re in the middle! It’s not like we can pause it on Netflix and check how far along we are

[DWPmisery1972]

I can’t get the feeling that the people who spout about a ‘new normal’, ‘I’ll never go out without a mask again’, ‘we won’t see any kind of normality until 2050’ are actually enjoying it.

[TheOrchidKiller]

I think I saw Tony Littleducts performing some terrible stand-up at the end of the pier in Southend in about 1980.

@ElizabethG81
"I also hate "resilient", especially when used in relation to children. The user of the word usually means "buck up and stop bothering me with your problems"."
Yes, it's incredibly dismissive & minimises the problem. In my opinion /experience, people who are dealing with stressful situations (including children) are actually having to deal with a huge amount because they have no choice but to get on with it.Telling them to be resilient just says, "you're not good enough, try harder."
Quite often the advice for being resilient involves going outside for a walk, & "connecting" with people via zoom. Good advice, except we've been doing that for some time now, with the absence of anything else to do. The solution is part of the problem.

[TooManyPlatesInMotion]

Can anyone with more expertise than me help? I don't understand why the gov cares so much (and will use as one of the benchmarks for deciding to lift/not to lift lockdown) about the extent to which the vaccines reduce transmission.

If the vaccines stop people getting seriously ill and so help prevent hospital admissions, and the gov is vaccinating the most vulnerable first, why do we care about transmission further down the line? Surely it doesn't matter if it circulates freely but few people become critically ill?

I get why it is an issue now, as the gov is reasonably early on in the vaccination programme so those who have received a jab could still potentially transmit the virus to someone relatively vulnerable who could become very ill, but as we vaccinate down the age groups/other priority groups why should we care about transmission? Surely we should care about hospitalisations and deaths?

The gov is waiting for a report from PHE on the extent to which vaccines reduce transmission. It won't be available until mid Feb, and will play apart in deciding when lockdown is eased. I don't get it!

[flower11]

I saw one of those posters this morning it was on a bus stop, I was on the bus going to work. The poster was look me in the eyes and say you can't work from home.
Well no I can't my clients would be pretty fucked without the support they get. Lots of people can't work from home.
So now they are guilting people for working!

[2020BogOff]

Can anyone with more expertise than me help? I don't understand why the gov cares so much (and will use as one of the benchmarks for deciding to lift/not to lift lockdown) about the extent to which the vaccines reduce transmission.

I think this is a delaying tactic. They don't want a two tier society where those that have the vaccine can mix freely and those that haven't have to stick to the rules. This iffy stand about whether it reduces transmission or not I think is a stick to beat those with that have the vaccine so they don't all run out and hug people which will then cause the rest of us to throw in the towel.

[BogRollBOGOF]

"Resilience" became trendy in my last year or two of teaching. It was aimed more at the kind of pupil who makes a spelling mistake or other kind of error, and then crumples, not getting pupils with known difficulties to buck-up which is how it is being used at presence.

DS1 uses a huge amount of reslience to walk into school some days. I struggle with him at home because being his safe space and safe person, I don't get the masking (unfortunate double meaning at present), just the constant expression of low level frustration. You can see in his expression when he's steeling himself up to do something he doesn't want to do.

I felt resilient yesterday just going to the supermarket. CBA to leave the house at present, and when I last went two weeks ago, my breath in my visor and general stress level just reached the point that I scratched my face raw to bleeding by the end of the second shop. I decided to fuck it and go with a bare face, and it was the best one on my blood pressure that I'd done in a while. I need a few calmer weeks to break that stress association. I had a lovely silent sit in the car park after as the shop shut for the night. I think the supermarket thing is a mix of mask/ visor issues, and just the fact that other than the DCs swimming, the only indoor public space I go to, and possibly some kind of emotional release about not being at home (or out for a run)

I'm really struggling with motivation to leave the house at present. The only other time that's happened to me before involved the 2 months following DS2's birth owing to a nasty tear, laxitives, continuing SPD and a very stroppy toddler. I don't like this general state of being numb.

[TooManyPlatesInMotion]

Yes @2020BogOff it definitely could be that. But once they have jabbed, say, the over 50s then really who cares? As long as the vaccines prevent people becoming seriously ill it just doesn't matter any longer because everyone actually at risk of becoming very ill has been jabbed so it can transmit away...

[Victoriacres]

@TooManyPlatesInMotion not all who become critically ill or requiring hospitalisation are clearly vulnerable. Hence the anecdotal reports of seemingly healthy people, fit and well, being floored by the virus, not necessarily dying, but off work for weeks if not months. ICU/hospital admissions this wave include many 40-60 year olds with mild or no underlying conditions, people who would not be first in the queue for vaccination but are 'economically productive'. This could amount to 1000s of individuals. Agree that most people have the illness mildly but a large minority take longer than the much vaunted 14 days to recover.

[TooManyPlatesInMotion]

Thanks @Victoriacres. That must be why they are hanging on for data on transmission post-vaccination.

[justasking111]

@TooManyPlatesInMotion

Thanks *@Victoriacres*. That must be why they are hanging on for data on transmission post-vaccination.

I think you're right about that. We're in uncharted territory with the vaccine

[justasking111]

Just reading March school, April shops, may hospitality that's pretty tough

[TooManyPlatesInMotion]

@justasking111

Just reading March school, April shops, may hospitality that's pretty tough

It is tough. I wonder where just sitting in someone's house having a glass of wine and a takeaway with a mate fits into it all. Or... whispers it... A party!!

[TabbyStar]

I also hate "resilient", especially when used in relation to children. The user of the word usually means "buck up and stop bothering me with your problems".

I took DD out of school for a couple of years, but apparently what would have made her more resilient would have been to leave her there being picked on and crying everyday and constantly in trouble because she was too anxious to do anything (although my XP was more worried about lack of access to chemistry lessons).

[Taswama]

There's an interesting (and as far as I saw civil) thread over there on the link between obesity and severe covid and that the 'fit and healthy ' 40 somethings in ICU are obese but its not mentioned. Are obese younger people getting the vaccine early than people of a healthy weight?

Also, any link to data on age of deaths / severe illness due to covid much appreciated.

[smallandimperfectlyformed]

Speaking of resilience, my 5 year old doesn't show very much at the moment. She is very bright but hates being told if she has made a mistake- today she wrote the letter a with the tail the wrong way around and I gently corrected her. This led to her scribbling over her work, crumpling it up into a ball and telling me 'mummy I am just going to do the wrong thing'. Eventually she did rewrite her work but tasks that are supposed to be quite quick take forever because of this. I uploaded her work to the class website and explained the behaviour- her teacher has said she is surprised and asked if a phone call will help. She is very shy and wouldn't say boo to a goose so I do understand that I am her safe space but I am concerned by a lot of things about her- so were her nursery last year too (she was assessed as being behind in communication and motor skills - communication mainly because of shyness but she had even been put in a social group). Sorry, not even sure why I am saying this because I don't know what anyone can do but she is struggling and so, therefore, am I.

[110APiccadilly]

@Taswama

There's an interesting (and as far as I saw civil) thread over there on the link between obesity and severe covid and that the 'fit and healthy ' 40 somethings in ICU are obese but its not mentioned. Are obese younger people getting the vaccine early than people of a healthy weight?

Also, any link to data on age of deaths / severe illness due to covid much appreciated.

I think being morbidly obese puts you into the clinically vulnerable (but not extremely vulnerable) group and so does move you a bit up the vaccine queue. I'm not quite sure how this is behind managed though - pre-pregnancy, I don't think anyone medical had weighed me since I was about 12 - that can't be that unusual? So if I had been morbidly obese, they wouldn't have known.

[110APiccadilly]

@Taswama I believe this ONS release breaks deaths down by cause and age, so should have the deaths data you're looking for: www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/birthsdeathsandmarriages/deaths/datasets/weeklyprovisionalfiguresondeathsregisteredinenglandandwales