Ah, that sucks. Yea.. Shiny and I avoid any kind of gathering of people. We're possibly a little overly-paranoid, but so far it's kept us safe. Who knows... it could also be this special anti-covid rock I was given by an alien visitation.

By the way, for anyone interested, I'm selling anti-covid rocks. Only $500 (or 1000 euros) per rock. Guaranteed 100% effective so long as you abide by the terms and conditions.

*No talking, eating, sleeping, walking, running, standing, or kneeling for 2 years. No getting within 500 feet of another human being for the rest of your life. Also no meet, dairy, cheese, or vegetables. Also no fast food, slow food., or any other speed food.

You almost had me convinced until you listed dairy and cheese separately. I'm not falling for your tricks!

Great news! At least it's going the right direction then. Must be a (small) relief. It's weird looking at the Belgium hospitalization statistics every day and realizing your father in law is one of the people included in there. It's also even suckier to hear that they got it from trying to be nice and helpful - that's how this virus will get you, sadly. My mom would similarly be 'pressured into' helping someone out and risk getting sick, she's too nice to say no. Bleh.

I'm going to Belgium this weekend to embed myself into my parents' household for most of December. Reason I'm leaving so early is to a) avoid the bum rush and b) allow a long quarantine period in a room over there, so I don't infect the old folks. Chances are so ridiculously slim though...virus numbers have been steadily going down here and there and I haven't left this apartment since Monday. But no need to take risks when I don't have to. I'll likely get tested once I get there too (if the government allows me to get tested).

Gonna be weird-ish since I won't be able to spend time with my brothers or friends and can't really go anywhere, but I can always go for walks and bike rides. Bringing my desktop too in all likelihood. Or maybe I should just buy one of Satis' magical rocks instead.

Pev, apparently the UK is going to start vaccination this month in an attempt to one-up the EU as a sign of Brexit power? Hope you can secure a shot soon!

If it's non-dairy, it's not cheese. They can say it is all they like but they can fuck off They're apparently thinking of passing some labelling law on non-meat/vegetarian products. Non-meat sausages will have to be called tubes and non-meat burgers will be called discs! Saves people "accidentally" eating meat and let's them sound like the pillocks they are when rabbiting on about their fakon sandwich. (On a serious note all power to those who can go vegan/vegetarian but I don't need to hear about it from you constantly or stop enjoying my animal products.)

Saw some prick from Wolverhampton just now on the news, they're setting up some mass testing centres around the country for anyone to just walk in, get tested and have a result in the hour. This knobhead's response? "I won't do one, I'm not risking having to self isolate." Selfish wankbucket.

Yep, we are indeed starting vaccinations. The hospital I'm under for my Cushing's is starting next week with them. I'm way down the list though. First group is hospital/care workers etc. Then there are 4 more groups of different ages and risks. Then there's group 6, the "under whatever age and with underlying risks" so I'm in that one. Curse not being a pensioner! Although personally I'm fine with that, not that it'll exactly give time for long term effects to show up but we'll know by then that you're generally safe for a few months at least! The Brexit thing is hilarious, I sometimes read comments on the BBC news site just for the comedy purpose. Everything gets brought back to Brexit and when they announced we'd bought this Pfizer vaccine and are the first to do it there were comments of:
- Hah! We're first! Thanks to Brexit and not following shitty EU laws!
- Crap, we're all gonna die coz it's made and tested by foreigners!
- Europe are dying in their thousands and now we'll get the vaccine, yay we're not part of that!
- I will wait for the Oxford vaccine coz British pride!
- I'm having no vaccine. Remember thalidomide!

That sounds about right yes! Everything is simultaneously amazing and terrible at different points, without any shades of grey. Well, regardless of whether it's the British vaccine and/or if it's thanks to Brexit or not, I hope they hurry up with vaccinating. Good news about being in group 6 is that any serious side effects might have become clear by the time they get to you. It's not that the vaccines using the new mRNA method are entirely without risk of course, but it's very rare for vaccines to cause any sort of side effects beyond the first month or two. So if that happens we'll know it quickly enough.

Jeez @ at that guy refusing to test himself in case he might have to self isolate. Talk about not getting it. It's not about you bro.

Oh god, that's got to be the most British term I've heard in a really long time. You had me literally LOLing just now. Ah, thank you so much.

Anyway, good luck to you all through the holidays. I plan to be working this entire time, since I'm new to my company and really need to be learning a ridiculous amount of shit post-haste. Shiny is also working extra-hard due to her taking over some extra shit and basically doubling her work-loud due to someone quitting. So... yea. Good times? At least I'm back to working from home 100% of the time, which is awesome. And as soon as I can get my hands on the vaccine, I'm all in. Most likely many tens of thousands will have it ahead of me, so in case it turns people into zombies I should be able to avoid it.

Pleased I could help Satis! I talk all sorts of bollocks making up my own swearwords these days. Gotta do something to pass the time.

Vaccines:
Was speaking to my parents on the weekend. Dad is over 75 so he's in group 2 in France but they're not starting vaccinations yet, so he'll probably get one around March. Mum will be in group 3 as she's under 75.

We've started vaccinating here now. I think it was yesterday they started them and televised the very first one. The second one went to William Shakespeare! First group is, like most countries I think (and particularly coz this is the one that needs storing at -70 degrees) mainly hospital workers, care workers and the vulnerable who are in hospital. Two NHS workers so far have had allergic reactions to it though apparently they both are aware they have allergic reactions to this sort of thing, so much so that they carry epipens so it's not really a big surprise. Obviously that's set the anti-vaxxers off with how it's "highly dangerous". I'm just kind of glad I'm lower down the list; it means shorter term effects can come to light before I get it and won't get me excited for no reason. After all even those who've had the vaccine this week (and the second dose in 28 days) won't suddenly be allowed full freedom. Until a certain percentage of the population have had it we'll still be in partial lockdown.

How is your first week going Satis? Other than learning stupid amounts (and you're a smart guy so I'm sure you're coping with that just fine). Sounds like Shiny might be getting a bit run down though, hope you're making sure she is looked after in the evenings since you're at home!

That's awesome that people are already getting vaccinated in the UK.. and yea, not surprising that some people have reactions. It's totally expected. Anti-vaxxers can go to hell. Can we send them to some uninhabited island somewhere to go die where we don't have to endure their stupidity? That'd be awesome.

Regarding my job... funny, I just posted about that elsewhere, but it's going great. I'm overwhelmed, out of my depth... and loving every moment of it. I don't give up and I pick things up fast, so I have very high expectations that I'll be doing amazing soon enough. My coworkers have been amazing so far... very supportive and quick to help and answer questions. I'm so much happier here than where I was.

Having said that... every job is a job... I will almost assuredly become disillusioned eventually, but for now, I'm very happy. As for Shiny, I'm doing my best to support her. Her job is definitely sucking right now. But since my new job doesn't require 10-12 hours of work a day, I can actually do stuff like cook and clean again, so that's something!

Yeah basically this is my position:

- Do I trust the new vaccine methods to be 100% safe? No, but I trust them enough.
- If you are old or especially vulnerable to covid any potential dangers of the vaccine are heavily outweighed by the proven immediate risk of covid
- On the off chance that there is something wrong with the vaccine we will likely know about it by the time I can get vaccinated anyway. And by that point there may also be other vaccines out that use more tried and true methods.

TL;DR : if you are a potential high risk patient for covid you should always take your chances with the vaccine. If you're not, you will likely know if there's anything wrong with by the time you will realistically be able to get it. So no one should be worried about anything.



Love to hear this! It sounds like you were long overdue a new challenge. And more appreciation in terms of your paycheck, position and work conditions. Working from home is awesome! Hope you can keep doing it (partially) even after the pandemic is over.

@ Pev, do you have any idea what the rough timeline is for you to get the vaccine? You'll surely be the first of us here to get it. /jelly

Looks like Pence got the vaccine yesterday and Europe will start vaccinating late December as well. Bring it on! Once the healthcare workers and the elderly in homes have been vaccinated we should already see a serious reduction in spread and deaths I think. Healthcare workers are obviously super likely to catch it at one point and then bring it home to their families, so that's already one potential vector path closed off. And the elderly in homes are sitting ducks for the virus and form a large percentage of the deaths in every country.

No clue on timelines. I know my health trust has some so it's close by, there's probably some within less than a mile of me! But as I'm 6th on the list I can't imagine I'm in this first wave. We had what, about 100,000 doses I think? So that's only actually 50,000 people they can vaccinate as it's a 2 dose deal. My dad thinks he'll get it around March as he's second on the list in France but they haven't officially bought any doses yet. I'll certainly let you all know when I have it if I get any side effects or whatever.

That's all sounding great Satis, I really hope it stays that good for you Jealous of my friend Cat, she has just been told she has a job she applied for so she's handing her notice in soon. Very jealous that she's escaped the clutches of our company.

Think you got to Belgium just in time Ox. Do any of the other countries here have the new strain? Not sure how much you've all been following but London and the South East have got some new strain that they say is no worse and should still respond to the vaccine but is about 70% more transmissible. As such Belgium and a couple of other countries have banned anyone travelling from the UK and looks like France and Germany will in the next few days too. Those areas with it now have a new, special, even more restricted Tier 4 ruleset.

I see the US has started vaccinating now and a bunch of EU states have signed up for some too. Good times. Now we just need to get rid of our "UK only plague" and be accepted back into the world

Vaccines are rolling out... I imagine we'll know in 2-6 weeks if they're effective and whether or not they turn people into zombies. My company's committed to working from home full time for the first quarter of 2021, so that's all good. I did hear about the new mutation in England. There was apparently some disagreement on whether or not it was more transmissive, but that also seems to be becoming less of a question (it appears to be). Still, science doesn't always get things right the first try... hopefully it's not so bad. We'll see. If the zombie outbreak starts there, it'll give me more warning to buy a cabin in the woods somewhere. Stay safe.

We've got 2 new strains now but we're blaming one on South Africa. Yay us. Not sure a cabin in the woods would be safer, haven't you seen the film? That's where it all starts!

We're now virtually all in tier 4. Basically back in lockdown but it's not called lockdown. Everything closed, not to go out unless for a good reason, the only difference between this and full lockdown is schools are still set to open.