So the "all clear whistle" has been blown. What will be your behavior in regards to masks?

I’m inclined to still wear one inside in public places and crowds too and agree with your reasoning about why this was done now.

This tweetstorm pretty much sums up my feelings on the matter
https://twitter.com/jennyrae/status/1392908005700771847?s=20

I agree with you. And until we get tattoos, I dont know who’s been vaccinated.

I just commented elsewhere that while this is a step toward normal life again, I’m not packing away my masks just yet. The rate of positive tests in my area is still too high for comfort, at least mine, and I plan to be wary for awhile longer.

The biggest difference for me will be dialing down on my filter game. I’ll still be mostly unmasked for outdoor stuff, with distancing, and pretty much masked at all indoor stuff. I’m not really visiting anybody inside yet, just running errands and stuff.

I agree with what @janbb said.

I look forward to the day when I can be, once again, seen as an eccentric hermitty person, and not just as a freaked out fraidy cat.
The former has more dignity.

Are vaccinated people required to show proof? Otherwise, where is the common sense? Obviously, anti-maskers overlap with anti-vaxxers.

Ultimately, those unable to get the vaccine are being put at risk.

@longgone No proof required.

I will only wear a mask where required. Same as it has been these many months. I’m just hoping it’s not required in as many places. I don’t care if you’ve been vaccinated because I have so I’m protected. I’m done with all this maski8ng crap. I want to be able to tell who I’m talking to.

In enclosed spaces like in trains and buses I would still wear a mask.

I will burn them.
Except for one. I figure there will always be some crazy place that holds out and says you need a mask. If I can possibly avoid that I will to the best of my ability.
If I can’t I’ll have one just in case.
Not sure why I bothered to get a brand new vaccine with a quick clinical trial if there is no payoff.

I will wear one at least until the signs come down

Oh, I ain’t throwing away any masks yet. If I am inside, in a public place….yeh, I will have one on.

@TJFKAJ The “payoff” is not getting sick, possibly dangerously so!

I’m not taking any risks (or masks off) since my mother’s life as well as my MIL and FIL’s are on the line due to health issues.
As @canidmajor said, I’ll continue my normal hermit ways. The people around here already think I’m a nut for getting the vaccine or wearing a mask.

The only people I will be around without a mask, is my immediate family, a few friends who I know for sure have been fully vaccinated. I only ever go out to Target, and I will be fully masked up when I am around anyone other than the few people I mentioned.

Ooooh, @kneesox, I’ve been looking for another tattoo design! :-). I’m overdue for new ink.

I find it terrible that the CDC is trying to circumvent HIPAA laws. They want to say only vaccinated people can have the no-mask benefit. How do you know if they are vaccinated? You make their medical issues public in some way. That is illegal. And they are doing this for political reasons. They are deteriorating personal rights by waving a carrot of no mask.

I won’t be wearing a mask outside unless it’s in a crowded area. I also won’t wear a mask indoors with family or friends who have been vaccinated. I will be masking up indoors in public places.

The CDC announcement changes nothing for me. I have been using the science already out there and watching the stats in my immediate area for cases to make my decisions.

Once I got my second shot on April 11, the following Sunday I started back to doing Zumba indoors (which was the biggest thing I had given up during covid) and I’m fine being in outdoor crowds without a mask, my husband still wears one. I felt ok to eat at restaurants again, but my husband is hesitant, so I am waiting until he feels ok about it. I’m fine with that, everyone has their own way of easing back into normal life.

I still don’t want to hug or shake hands with anyone, but before covid I felt that way anyway, unless it was someone very important to me who I had not seen in months and especially emotional to see them. I still prefer to be at least 6 feet apart from people if I do not know if they are vaccinated, and actually, at least 4 feet even if they are. I like not getting colds or flu, but that is not new for me.

I will still happily wear a mask in stores, I hope if mask wearing gets very lax that the CDC and our political leaders put out reminders to wear masks and wash our hands during flu season to protect others and ourselves.

As a side note, now DeSantis can say AGAIN that the media attacked him when the science was showing that he was right that mask orders outside is unwarranted, and when he recently enacted an executive order not allowing mayors to have outdoor mask orders that he was not being insane. Ugh. The left has got to stop helping him. It makes me crazy. Their unwarranted hysteria just backfires. He does so many things to truly dislike him for, picking on him when it makes no sense is not productive.

I will be curious to see what Disney and Universal do.

@seawulf575 It’s called the honor code. People who aren’t vaccinated are supposed to still wear a mask. Lots of people who are vaccinated will still wear a mask. It has nothing to do with HIPAA or personal rights. Give me a break. No one is carding anyone. All we flipping need is a cultural shift to care about spreading infectious disease, all infectious disease, like East Asia, and then it will have nothing to do with covid or vaccinations.

I’m sticking with mask for the foreseeable future. There are too many dangerous doubters out there.
As I side benefit, I wore a mask while mowing my lawn the other day and felt a whole lot better.

I will be cautious and careful.
Since my wife and I are vaccinated, it doesn’t really matter whether people around us are unvaccinated, but I have appreciated not getting the flu during the past year.

@LuckyGuy The mask is especially marvelous when wielding the weed-wacker, my sinuses have been so grateful!

@LuckyGuy Your post made me chuckle as somewhere along the line in the dead of winter here in Alaska, I tired of having the snow from my snow blower blow back in my face and coat my glasses. I had the brainstorm to get some of the face shields being advertised as an extra boost against the virus. Got some and tho’ I think the ideal solution would have (wind)shield wipers, they worked. Not perfect but enough so that I’m keeping them near the snow blower to experiment with further next winter.

I don’t care much for what the CDC says, I barely wear a mask anymore and it’s only if I remember. I won’t be vaccinated for quite some time and I don’t care much for the masks so this won’t change my behavior much. Cool they are finally lifting the restrictions a bit.

So @SergeantQueen you’re going to get COVID-19 and give it to someone ?

If they are vaccinated it shouldn’t matter.

If not, whoops. I’ll live. Their fault for not getting the vaccine

“If not, whoops. I’ll live. ”

You bet your life on that ! If you’re wrong . . . .

If I’m wrong I won’t be alive to regret it or care. Either way, I don’t care

Sorry for your point of view and poor attitude !

I don’t think of it as an All Clear by the way. Is that what it’s being called out in the real world?

There will still be COVID at least for the next several months. It would be amazing if we actually accomplish getting rid of it altogether. I assume it will surge on and immediately following Memorial Day and July 4th.

I predict there will still be thousands of deaths in the US through 2021 (my guess is 50,000–75,000 more mid May through December) but hospitals will be able to handle the cases and very few children get severely ill or die, and the number will be low enough that the CDC will find it “acceptable.”

And @SergeantQueen just showed why I’m still going to wear a masks.

@JLeslie It was a figure of speech.

@Caravanfan That’s what I assumed initially when I gave my first answer, although I think a large part of the population will perceive it as an actual all clear and believe all danger is gone.

@seawulf575: If someone asks you for medical documentation, for example your employer, that’s not a HIPAA violation. HIPAA is between the medical provider and the patient. What the patient does with their medical information is up to them.

@seawulf575 You don’t have a good understanding of HIPAA laws. Schools can require vaccination of students. That doesn’t mean that violates HIPAA. That’s different.

I’ll still be wearing my mask inside, in public. I’ll walk around outside without it, but keep one in my pocket in case people approach.

I don’t like it, but I’m not yet going back to hugging and I may never shake another hand ever.

It’s laughable that the CDC thinks the honor system, as to who’s been vaccinated, will work.

Governor Ige of Hawaii has announced he will keep our mask mandate in place. I will still be wearing one out in public as a result. Our busses require a mask as well. I notice I’m less reluctant to take them off inside where distancing is achieved.

I don’t know. They keep talking about the strains from England and other places here so I have to wonder if the vaccines have shown to work against them. I got my vaccine for Covid 19 but until I know if it will work against those other strains I’m still wearing my masks in indoor public places.

I think I finally understand. What’s the point to a mask if you’ve nothing to live for? As far as that goes, why then bother with a vaccine? It’s my business, the rest of you are irrelevant.

I’m a conservative, a Christian and (gasp!) I wear masks! Who knew?

Since the virus is constantly mutating, it seems appropriate to continue wearing a mask in large groups of people, and it seems appropriate to continue to do so whether we are all vaccinated or not, because there’s no guarantee the vaccine is going to always be 100% effective.

Am I afraid? No. It just seems to me to be a wise thing to do, so I’ll do it.

I think it’s fucking crazy. We’re about the same levels we were in September. The mutated strains have significantly higher R values. I’m not taking off my mask in public until we hit herd immunity. I don’t want to take the risk (however small) of hurting someone else. It’s really not that big of a fucking deal to wear a mask. Not wearing a mask is like walking around with a loaded gun and the safety off—sure the chances of it going off are low, but fuck, it’s a simple thing to put the safety on and not risk killing someone else.

Truthfully, I believe as I said before, the attitudes expressed here may well be sufficient in numbers to FORCE most of us to wear masks well into the foreseeable future, with annual shots against mutations the norm. It turns out that the internet is the greatest ally the world has seen for the unification and dispersal of ignorance and misinformation.

There’s still a mask mandate in NY and CT, so the stores and public places still has mask rules, and at work you have to have the mask on. Not sure when that will change, but for the time being, I’ll still wear my mask.

Recently, I’ve noticed a few people being less diligent with masks, at work and in other places, which feels weird but I guess it will be an adjustment, getting used to seeing people’s faces again.

I have a lot of masks, both disposable and fabric, and I won’t be discarding them. In case there’s another virus in the future, I want to have a supply, unlike spring of 2020 when it was very difficult to find masks in stores.

The problem right now is communication with the public is never easy. The CDC does not directly change policies in businesses and government buildings. Public transportation still requires everyone be masked. Hopefully, doctor’s offices will keep mask rules in place, ESPECIALLY internists and GPs, pediatricians, and any other type of primary care. Supermarkets, we’ll see what they decide to do in the coming weeks. CDC recommendations does not equate to policy and rules, but it will influence the rules.

I know a bunch of people will throw off their masks even in stores that still have masking rules. That’s not really what this announcement was about, even though I feel fairly sure supermarkets will begin to get rid of mask requirements with the CDC announcement, we’ll see.

I’m thinking of the videos we’ve all seen of people screaming at store employees when asked to wear a mask – people screaming and going off about how they have medical conditions, their rights are being violated, etc., and how, now with the new CDC guidelines, we’re going to probably see more of that, where people will be quoting the guidelines, despite the state mandates or the store’s rules, or the fact that on private property, the store or restaurant has the right to mandate whatever they want.

@jca2 We didn’t really have much of that here. The maskless were always allowed to walk into supermarkets even though the store policy was to wear a mask. People like me just distanced from them. Luckily, the majority of people wore masks.

I agree with you though, there will be people being defiant and saying, “the CDC said I don’t have to wear a mask…”

My prediction is most supermarkets where I live will stop the mask policy within the next few weeks. The supermarkets have been vaccinating their staff since the time they started giving vaccinations. Most of our supermarkets have pharmacies. Even before their age group supermarket staff got vaccinated, because they received the prevent vaccine waste doses. So, most staff is fully vaccinated unless they are refusing to get vaccinated.

I heard Disney stopped doing temperature checks recently. I’m not sure if that is accurate. I was there 6 weeks ago and I still had to go through a temperature check, but it wouldn’t surprise me if they have eliminated that step. Maybe as masks comes off temperature checks are a good idea. A friend of mine was in Dubai a few months ago and she said there were temperature checks everywhere. She made it sound like you just walk through an area and it’s checking your temperature.

Our governor in Massachusetts (a Republican even) stated yesterday he’s keeping our mask mandate in place.

I never saw a maskless person in a store around here either but I’m thinking that now I will. Frankly, I’m concerned.

Interesting to note the people who say that they don’t wear masks seem to find it necessary to say that they don’t care if others get sick. Yup, say it out loud, that’s important.

I’ll clean it and keep it handy for the next pandemic.

I’m fully vaccinated but I’ll continue to mask up for other people’s comfort.

I haven’t gotten a cold or the flu in years. Since the 90s. With the exception of some weird illness both Rick and I got in Feb of 2020, which was more than likely Covid.

I feel bad for retail and food service workers whose employers decide to keep the mask mandate and then gotta deal with the yahoos insisting (loudly) they no longer have to wear one.

@cookieman They should get their vaccination. Between being vaccinated and wearing a mask they should have very little risk, but I do feel badly for everyone who has worked in any service business this past year and now.

I’m seeing now in FB groups, people arguing about stores ending their mask mandates, and it’s the same old, same old, some saying don’t shop there if you don’t like it, others saying it’s terrible, and the rehashed arguments about whether or not Covid is real.

A friend of mine said to me “a month ago they told us to wear two masks, and now they’re saying you don’t need a mask at all.” I had to admit he made a good point.

Trader Joe’s announced they are lifting the mask mandate.

Some guy was arguing yesterday because some on a Trader Joe’s FB group were saying that Trader Joe’s is not requiring masks, and I pointed out that the state law overrides TJ’s. The guy (who apparently works at TJ’s) got mad on the FB thread, when I pointed it out.

@jca2 A few months ago it was winter travel and Spring Break and still a lot of people weren’t vaccinated. Now, a lot of people are vaccinated. The recommendations change according to the situation. I stopped masking a month ago when I was double vaccinated except in stores, and other indoor places full of strangers.

Although, I must admit I never double masked and I did feel like finally people who hated masks were wearing them to be compliant in stores and then we added another mask to separate people again? Now, the MSNBC watchers wore double mask and the Fox News watchers were single mask? It really is the Sneetches in real life.

I’ll only wear a mask to go along to get alone (I’m fully vaccinated). I don’t think wearing and mask is all that effective from looking at how most folks wear them (with huge gaps, under the nose, etc). Also wearing a bandana as a mask is a joke (like trying to stop mosquitoes with a chain link fence).

@jca2….a month ago almost no one was vaccinated. They’re dropping the mask mandate only for vaccinated people.

@Dutchess_III I’m betting a lot of unvaccinated people will stop wearing a mask. A friend of mine who lives near Memphis just posted on Facebook she was so happy to go to the store today without a mask. I just asked her if the whole store was full of maskless people. My guess is at best her area is 50% vaccinated. I’ll let you know what she says.

Oh you just know most people are gonna go maskless, vaccinated or not. No one will be checking for vaccine validation at the door.

I went to Lowe’s yesterday and probably 80% of the shoppers didn’t have a mask on. I still wear mine even though I’ve been fully vaccinated.

Great minds think alike @chyna.

I went to Trader Joe’s this morning and they aren’t requiring masks. I saw two people without masks. Everyone else was wearing a one. I’m in California.

If I’m not required to wear one anymore, I won’t be wearing one. I think it will be a slow “phasing out” where I live, though. This is an area where mask-wearing was not fought and protested and enforcement was fairly easy.

“Walmart, Costco, Publix and Starbucks are among the retail giants effectively moving to an honor system.”

“New York Times”:https://www.nytimes.com/live/2021/05/15/world/covid-vaccine-coronavirus-cases

I’m waiting in the long line here at the post office. Everyone is masked without exception as are all of the clerks and one mail handler on the back platform.

It seems early to me, and seems like a bigger jump than I would have expected.

Vaccinations only just became available for teens, and are clearly imminent for children. I don’t see why there was a need to shift the status quo now. Without higher vaccination rates among adults, it seems like this shift in policy will allow covid to spread to youth before they have access to the vaccine. That bothers me.

I haven’t kept up well on vaccine distribution across the nation. I know in many places the demand has dropped—is that fairly universal, or are there still places where people who want the vaccine haven’t had access to it? I’ve been assuming there were still those places, and so that also bothers me, but as I’m typing this I realize I’m not sure about this part of the situation.

Last I heard, there were a lot of people who were covid vaccine hesitant but not “anti-vax,” per se. I would have thought the CDC would do more towards campaigning for the vaccine, and letting people have time to come around to it. For most people, it’s only been available for about a month. That isn’t that long, really.

I’m also not sure why there isn’t a more sustained push for herd immunity, since we know that some vulnerable people cannot get the vaccine for themself.

I don’t like that it feels like a division between “the haves” and “the have not yets,” especially when a more solid end is in sight, and all we have to do is hang on a bit longer. I am personally so weary of masks and distance, but I will happily continue them until children have access to the vaccine, because my convenience is in no way more important than others’ lives.

I guess this pandemic has shown me my nation is not one of solidarity. Certainly there are very many citizens who show solidarity anyway, but it doesn’t seem to be a strong part of the national culture or narrative, and that is disappointing.

Now, I know 5 people with colds, various states, and I am pretty sure the girl at the Chinese take-out who handed me my food was sick. She sneezed twice while I was waiting, she looked sick, I almost walked out. Before covid I would have felt exactly the same as I did today regarding wondering if I should just walk out. Possibly, it was allergies, but I have my doubts, we are moving out of the worst allergy time. She was masked, no one else in the kitchen was. You can see into the kitchen easily. They used to have heavy plastic as a divider at the counter to protect the employees from the customers. Too bad they took that down.

I hope the government tells people with colds to wear a mask if they must go out. Now, we have a trained population, this is our chance! People living with sick people can wear a mask for 72 hours and protect others. If you don’t get symptoms in 72 hours you likely won’t get sick. I guess we have to wait to get past the messaging regarding covid, because the American people seem unable to handle too much at once according to the people on TV. I don’t really think that is true, but that is what they are saying.

^Maybe they have allergies. Pollen is bad now.

I just sneezed five times while reading this.

Not allergies. 5 people I know had week long colds, well one is in the middle of it. The one in the middle started going to parties and meeting up with friends a month ago after being extremely careful regarding covid. She overworked herself, meeting up with people, tired, got sick. Typical scenario.

The girl at the Chinese place maybe has allergies. I don’t know her.

Of course there have been colds all along, that’s how there is a 5% positivity rate. Part of the 95% is people with no symptoms getting covid tested, and part of it is sick people getting tested and not having covid. Just been fewer colds and flu than most years.

People seem to be conveniently leaving out the ”fully vaccinated people” can mingle maskless. Of course, that assumes that people are mature enough to figure out what that means. Americans don’t qualify as mature.
If people are getting colds that’s not a bad thing. It’s life. And the good news is they are then immune to that specific cold virus. The bad news is there are about 200 cold viruses, but only about 30 are really common.
This is why little kids are always sporting a runny nose and elderly people rarely get colds any more.

@Dutchess_III You do realize that Covid-19 is a coronavirus, just like every other common cold?

No one is masking here now, which concerns me greatly. My husband was also harassed over the weekend for wearing one to a store.
A group of maskless guys said ‘hey, you don’t have to wear those anymore, didn’t you hear?’
My husband says something smart, like ‘how many people are you killing by not wearing one today?’

Such a shame people don’t seem to understand what ‘fully vaccinated’ means in regards to masks. No wonder there are global spikes again.

I still have to wear a mask at work until my company gives an “all clear”. some of our accounts still want people to mask up, so we just say “wear them” until it really is “all clear”.

The common cold is an infection of the upper respiratory tract which can be caused by many different viruses. The most commonly implicated is a rhinovirus (30–80%), a type of picornavirus with 99 known serotypes.[30] Other commonly implicated viruses include human coronaviruses (≈ 15%),[31][32] influenza viruses (10–15%),[33][34][35] adenoviruses (5%),[33] human respiratory syncytial virus (orthopneumovirus), enteroviruses other than rhinoviruses, human parainfluenza viruses, and human metapneumovirus.[36] Frequently more than one virus is present.[37] In total, more than 200 viral types are associated with colds.[4]

Copypasta from wikipedia

And it is untrue that COVID-19 is just like the common cold.

@Caravanfan Can a “common cold” be caused by a coronavirus? Say yes since you just cited wikipedia (not sure why you wouldn’t use a medical citation, but whatever). So, how does that differ from Covid-19? Yeah, the symptoms are more severe, but doesn’t it hit the same spots in the body? Doesn’t it interact much the same? So what is the difference between this coronavirus and other coronaviruses?

@seawulf575 I used wikipedia because it’s easy. The difference is that a common cold is a runny nose, cough and maybe a sore throat and only affects the upper respiratory system. COVID-19 causes multiorgan system failure.

@seawulf575
https://www.cell.com/cell/fulltext/S0092-8674(21)00160-4

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/05/17/nyregion/vaccinated-masks-cdc.html?action=click&module=Top%20Stories&pgtype=Homepage

Over half a million deaths in a year and comparing that to the common cold? What? The common cold rarely kills someone.

What’s this “just a virus” bullshit QAnon and anti-vaxxers have put out there. Just a virus. Ok, sure, Ebola is just a virus, polio, HIV, we could go on. It doesn’t matter if it is a virus, bacteria, or micoplasma, what matters is it has been deadly, especially in the elderly. The deaths would have been much higher if we had not taken precautions. I think if everyone had been going about life normally my community probably would have had thousands of deaths.

@Caravanfan isn’t it true that cytokine storm is a big contributor to why people’s organs are affected by Covid-19? And that we really don’t have a good understanding of why or how a cytokine storm happens? Isn’t it true that Covid-19 is only a trigger and it is this cytokine storm that causes people’s immune systems to kick into super overdrive causing the inflammation and damage to organs?

And my point to @Dutchess_III was that a “common cold” isn’t common at all. It isn’t one virus. It can be a variety of them. And some of them are coronaviruses. So to say “getting is cold is no big deal, it is actually a good thing” is a bit misleading. And people DO die from colds.

@seawulf575 Sort of. First, on the second point—people rarely die of colds. I’ve been an ICU physician for 30 years and I’ve never seen a serious case of the common cold.

For your first point. It is true that COVID triggers a massive cytokine response. It is untrue that we don’t know a lot about it—we know a ton. And it’s also true that the immune response is responsible for a lot of damage, but that’s how most viruses work.

@Caravanfan Dispelling misinformation one fact at a time!

Funny, I’m reading @seawulf575 last post in Perry Mason’s voice.

Interestingly, I went into Home Depot today which is one of the national companies who has declared people can go maskless. Everyone in there was wearing a mask. Same at the grocery store.

@Caravanfan We know a ton about cytokine storm? All the research I could find said they recognize what it is, they know what cytokines are, but they don’t know what causes the storm. At all. Having the immune system suddenly going crazy like that is the part they don’t understand. Am I wrong? Is all the research I have seen wrong?

@seawulf575 Oh, you did some internet research? I must be completely wrong then. My mistake.

Okay @seawulf575 “Face it, there is a TON of information out there.”

Show me and the good doctor with twenty years of school and 4 or more years in training after
. . . your FACTS . . . are where ?

Please show me !

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7194613/

@Tropical_Willie Here’s a dandy that has this paragraph in it:
“No single definition of cytokine storm or the cytokine release syndrome is widely accepted, and there is disagreement about how these disorders differ from an appropriate inflammatory response. The National Cancer Institute’s definition, based on the Common Terminology Criteria for Adverse Events (CTCAE), is too broad, since the criteria for an inflammatory syndrome can also apply to other physiological states, and the definition of the American Society for Transplantation and Cellular Therapy is based on criteria that focus too specifically on iatrogenic causes of cytokine storm alone.7 Although cytokine storm is easy to identify in disorders with elevated cytokine levels in the absence of pathogens, the line between a normal and a dysregulated response to a severe infection is blurry, especially considering that certain cytokines may be both helpful in controlling an infection and harmful to the host. The interdependence of these inflammatory mediators further complicates the distinction between a normal and a dysregulated response.”

Huh. Doesn’t seem we know all that much, does it? Oh yeah, we know it when it’s happening, we just don’t know why it happens. And the “experts” can’t agree even on a definition that fits it. But hey, it’s only the New England Journal of Medicine. What could they possibly know that a good doctor with twenty year of school and 4 or more years in training doesn’t know? Oh yeah….they don’t know anything about what causes the Cytokine storm. Thanks for helping me clear that up.

The article isn’t saying they don’t know what causes a cytokine storm. They are disagreeing on how to define a cytokine storm (a dysregulated response) from a healthy regulated immune response.

@raum It actually says a great many things. They do understand how to identify it when it is happening. They have an idea of how to deal with it. What they don’t fully understand is why it starts. All the different groups have their own viewpoints and many dispute each other or don’t cover all the cases that are seen. It seems that when there is no pathogen present, it is easy to spot because you get all sort of cytokine activity without a particular reason. But when you have a pathogen present, it muddies the waters. So if they can’t agree on a definition, how can you say they know what causes it?
Meanwhile, our good doctor with a twenty year of school and 4 or more years in training couldn’t even address that much.

^Perhaps he’s busy saving lives.

For the first time in better than a year, I spent nearly the entire day running errands on the road. On the way home, I ordered a burger for pickup from my favorite East bay burger shop on the way. I was wearing a Baylor hoodie when I hopped from the car and this kid of a girl with enormous blue blue eyes barked from behind the counter almost the moment I hit the door: “WHERE’s YOUR MASK, MR. BAYLOR?” Embarrassed the shit out of me as I returned to the car to fetch the thing.

^^ Was that Barney’s?

No. But I love Barney’s. Did you know that all the Burgermeister’s have gone out of business?

No. I suspect there will be a lot of changes when I’m in Cal next.

@seawulf575 I don’t understand your point. You say “Not a lot is known” I say “A lot if known” It’s a pointless argument. Do we understand everything about everything? Of course not. What does this have to do with anything except being a straw man and completely irrelevant to the question I asked? You already answered the question: You’re not getting a vaccine and you’ll continue to wear a mask at work as long as you are required to. Move on to the next question. DBAD.

@stanleybmanly
310?
Scolari’s?
Clove and Hoof?

Now I’m curious. :P
And now also craving a burger!

Gosh, I never thought I’d see a dead bovine link between @raumzilla and Patty_Melt! ;-0

I’m jonesin’ for a burger!
But not Jonesn4burgers. :D

“But not Jonesn4burgers. :D”

To paraphrase Nancy Wilson… for that difference. :D

Ha! Great voice.
Now listening to this.

She was indeed hot. I used to drool over her in that yellow dress on that Cannonball Adderly album. That dress with the matching shoes!!

Wow. This got off topic, but it’s sure entertaining.

@raum Thanks for the concert! I momentarily thought you were going to zing me with the backup singer and rhythm guitarist for Heart. ;)

@Caravanfan Returning to the topic: is it a good idea to remove one’s mask before drooling over Nancy?

LOL

My husband went to a job fair today and he said he saw a lot of people shaking hands. Luckily, no one extended their hand to him. A lot of people think since covid doesn’t transmit easily on surfaces that now they don’t have to worry about touching.

@raum according to google both 310 in Albany and Scolaris in Alameda are still in business, though Scolari’s won’t open until Friday afternoon. Clove & hoof is still the Mecca for burgers in Oakland

@stanleybmanly And Clove and Hoof in Oakland are still in business too! Really glad they’ve all made it through this pandemic. Have had some great local businesses shutter. :/

The only place I still really eat burgers is Shake Shack though. They’ve got a pretty good GF bun. A lettuce-wrapped burger just isn’t the same.

Kind of vicariously living through your comment about hitting up your favorite East Bay burger joint. Made me think of all the great burger places I used to go to. (I’m sure there’s more. Those were just the ones that popped into my head first.)

Wait, how many of you are here in the East Bay?

I have a room in a house in the East Bay that I stay in from time to time. I see @raum sometimes when I“m out.

Next visit: BURGERS!

I am pleased to report that the majority of people at Walmart? Dollar Gen and Goodwill were using masks

@seawulf575—I’m pretty sure the article you cited reads differently to someone with medical expertise than it does the layman, because that is often the case with highly technical texts. People with expert knowledge in a subject understand the context and significance of what is being discussed, and that makes a difference in true comprehension. It’s not just about following the thread of the article, or parsing the diction, etc.; it’s about knowing how the article fits into the larger body of knowledge of the discipline—in other words, it’s not about “smarts,” it’s about study and experience and expertise in a specific field.

When an article is written by doctors for other doctors, of course it’s going to be talking about something that the authors think they can answer better or more fully than has been answered before—else, why write to your expert peers at all? And of course they’re not going to spend precious time repeating all the things that their audience, they’re assuming, already understands—they’re going to zoom in on the one aspect they’re discussing and emphasize its significance.

So when you find an article you think says one thing, and ask an expert in the subject, and they say differently… well, that’s a clue.

And it’s nothing more than that.

An expert answering a question differently than you’d expected is not a reflection on your intelligence. After all, you asked the question for an answer, not a pat on the head.