Go outdoors, outdoor is the way to go, outdoors, outdoors

I'm retracting in spirit all the posts that implied folks should avoid going out and having fun. It appears that the quickest way for the disease to spread is to be in close proximity with other folks, who are unprotected, and somehow have unhindered access of air from their nasal passage to yours. When you're outside, not breathing too heavily and have your mouths covered, and so do they, and you guys maintain a healthy distance between yourselves, physical distancing I mean don't need to remind you about emotional distancing sigh but lets no go there it hurts, it's going to be fine and you'll quite likely not give them your air-cooties.

Folks are using all sorts of protective measures. I saw a couple of people use transparent umbrellas that come all the way down to the neck -- they save you from the sneezes and the coughs, remind people to not get too close to you, and also protect you from rain and sun. Win win win. People had solid hand-woven masks on their faces, and layered masks -- a regular mask with a surgical mask inserted within the layers as extra protection.

It's getting weirder. They're saying as long as everyone's washing their hands regularly and wearing masks, public transport can be safe too which is mindblowing to be because I figured that was the easiest way to infect yourself. It's not clear the douchebags who're like panting shirtless and like throwing their aircooties all over as they run are superspreaders or not but it'd be surprising if they were not right?

Here's the thing: we do have limited knowledge, but the framework seems pretty solid and the transmission medium seems to be pretty reasonably understood. Despite that, Americans don't seem to get it. Like at all. There was talk of restaurants somewhere that had been forced by law to reduce their maximum capacity to a third, and now were keeping all their customers in the same goddamn third of their restaurant space, defeating the entire effing purpose. Americans. Don't. Seem. to get it.

One must wonder if it's genuine ignorance, overconfidence, confusion, stupidity, lack of humility, something different entirely or some combination of all of these. Because I'd like to know the ratios. It's confusing. A large percentage of people are careful with masks and distancing and general care, while a significant minority acts like nothing's up it's all cool why are people going so crazy no one's dead yet this is all a big fat misunderstanding that'll get cleared up in a couple of months. It's not even the republican conspiracy theories in Philadelphia, they're rich white people (mostly but not exclusively so) living in center Philly, it's something else, can't quite figure out what's up.

In conclusion, people are generally fine, it's the idiots that we have to fear. Really hope things start improving and people don't take it too easy for the next six months or we'll get the second, third, fourth fifth waves for the next two years. The north-eastern states have got it under control, the hope is that the rest of America wakes up and does the same. A little humility goes a long way, it's been a long way since Americans had to encounter that facet of human interaction. Perhaps they'll learn now that they are not in fact invulnerable, that in fact they are pretty human and susceptible to stupidity disease and death and throwing money at all your problems isn't always a good solution. We can hope.