Red Mosquito

McParadigm wrote:

doug rr wrote:

verb_to_trust wrote:

Strat wrote:Chuck grassley being treated for it.

That fossil is 87. Wouldn't surprise me if he dies. Fun fact: he knows where every Dairy Queen is in Iowa.

the one in council bluffs on 32nd has the best soft serve

Eating at Dairy Queen when you’re that close to JC’s Dairy Den is a rookie mistake.

time for a road trip..

Yessir.

simple schoolboy wrote:

Bi_3 wrote:https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/global-opinions/the-coronaviruss-origins-are-still-a-mystery-we-need-a-full-investigation/2020/11/13/cbf4390e-2450-11eb-8672-c281c7a2c96e_story.html

“ Hopefully, too, the international scientists who are taking part will push hard for a rigorous and penetrating investigation, including the possibility of a laboratory accident.”


I have been told that is completely impossible by top men on this forum. Top men!

Did anyone ever establish whether the US contract for coronavirus research at that lab included gain of function work? It would be kind of hilarious if this happened because of something we paid for, but China was too worried about saving face to point the finger back at us.

Beyond the blame game, there are troubling questions in China that must be examined, including whether the coronavirus was inadvertently spread in an accident or spill from the Wuhan Institute of Virology, which had previously carried out research on bat coronaviruses. The institute collected samples from the Mojiang mine in Yunnan province in China in 2012 and 2013. Earlier in 2012, six miners at Mojiang exposed to bats and bat feces were hospitalized suffering from an illness similar to severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS), and three died. The disease was similar if not identical to covid-19 and may have been a previously unrecognized parent virus. Conspiracy theorists have proposed more outlandish scenarios of a deliberately created pathogen, but they do not hold much water.

The Lancet Commission, formed by the British medical journal in July, has made a primary goal identifying the origins of covid-19 and averting future zoonotic pandemics. The journal declared “the evidence to date supports the view” that covid-19 “is a naturally occurring virus rather than the result of laboratory creation and release.” But the commission says, “The possibility of laboratory involvement in the origins of the pandemic should be examined with scientific rigor and thoroughness, and with open scientific collaboration.”

I look forward to when the Coronavirus movie eventually gets made. The vignette early in the film, miners deep in the Chinese jungle, exposed to a mysterious SARS. Like the scene in Jurassic Park where they find the mosquito trapped in amber. The chatter amongst the locals. The mysterious coughing. The sadness of the families waiting outside their modest huts as the men pass. The unceremonial burial.

6 years later

Camera follows mild-mannered chinese scientist (played by Tom Cruise in culturally tasteful yellow-face) on morning commute to Wuhan lab. Scientists starts doing science. Accidentally gets pooped on by Covid-ridden bat. Accidentally wipes poop in eye/nose/mouth/wound. Follows standard washing precautions but thinks nothing of it. Cleans up and heads to the nearby open air market with trusted scientist friend to pick up a lunch of wild pangolin. Next day trusted friend comes down with terrible headache. Pangolin dealer at market comes down with terrible dry cough. Two weeks later other customers are dry coughing as it spreads like wildfire.

3 months later - cut to idyllic Austrian Ibiza Ski Town

Young hotties party unaware of the viral load passing between them with each increasing load. Not only herpes, nor it's friend chlamydia, but the SARS Coronavirus #19.

Cut to Uter, about to douse his buddies in a boot of Heineken.

'I laav zisss plaace! Nassssing' could possibl-y go ronngg!'

and the rest of the story writes itself

Trump will be played by the actor who played Biff in Back to the Future (as 'Biff')
Fauci will be played by Richard Dreyfuss

Trump’s fault.

They just need to lockdown harder

We’re in lockdown from midnight tonight.

Enjoy the quiet time Spenno.

Do you guys get helicopter money when you go into lockdown?

verb_to_trust wrote:Do you guys get helicopter money when you go into lockdown?

Back in March when this all started our Government bought in the JobKeeper payment, which is a $1,500/ftnt payment to employers for each employee they have (so long as the employer could show a 30% downturn in turnover from the same period last year). The $1,500 had to be actually onpaid to the individual employee.

This allowed employers to carry on at a basic level and, at worst, every permanent or long term (1 year) casual employee was guaranteed the $1,500/ftnt payment to get through.

As of 1/10/20 this payment has been reduced to $1,200/ftnt, but it continues on, again so long as the employer can show a 30% reduction in turnover from the same time last year.

This was not perfect policy and was certainly policy on the fly, but it absolutely allowed a huge number of employers to carry on in times of uncertainty and guaranteed a huge number of employees didn't have to worry about paying their rent or putting food on the table.

The scheme is continuing until the end of March 2021 at this stage.

I've said it all along - first off you must financially support your citizens in a meaningful way. Once you do that you can look at requiring actual lock-downs or whatever other measures are required because you've taken care of the most important aspect and fear for all of us - financial security.

People make fun of Americans for Imperial units and y'all use fortnight as something with a commonly used abbreviation? Biweekly bruh.

Yeah we haven't done any of that here. Unless you count the $1200 people got months ago.

simple schoolboy wrote:People make fun of Americans for Imperial units and y'all use fortnight as something with a commonly used abbreviation? Biweekly bruh.

I'm 6 foot 4 and I weigh 90 kilograms. 2 weeks is a fortnight. I live 5 kilometres from where I work and sit 1 metre away from my monitor. My car uses diesel and my tank is 50 litres.

Imperial or metric depends on what you are measuring. We aren't animals here, ffs.

(And bi-weekly sounds like your regular trip to your male fwb, just saying).

verb_to_trust wrote:Yeah we haven't done any of that here. Unless you count the $1200 people got months ago.

Its the biggest travesty of the entire US covid "response". How can you expect people to stay home and social distance when they simply can't do it - people need money and security - they have to work.

I got shit on here ages ago when I was bagging the US being unable to get stimulus sorted (hi numbers!) but I was (and still am) astounded that your government hasn't supported you through this. And you still haven't got any payments and now its all but fucking over in the US.

I'm sorry bud.

Its truly pathetic how partisan gridlock has taken priority over people slipping into poverty by I'm sure the millions at this point.

Higgs wrote:

verb_to_trust wrote:Yeah we haven't done any of that here. Unless you count the $1200 people got months ago.

Its the biggest travesty of the entire US covid "response". How can you expect people to stay home and social distance when they simply can't do it - people need money and security - they have to work.

I got shit on here ages ago when I was bagging the US being unable to get stimulus sorted (hi numbers!) but I was (and still am) astounded that your government hasn't supported you through this. And you still haven't got any payments and now its all but fucking over in the US.

I'm sorry bud.

If fortnight translates well into other languages, than by all means. To me it signifies something from the Seven Years War (French and Indian Wars for us Yanks) related to the duration of a failed campaign to take a Quebec fort.

Also, stone as a unit of weight is great, and should be preferred over kilograms for weighing humans.

I'm down with stone for weight, I just can't remember how it correlates to kilos.

I'm also nearly 50 so my personal imperial/metric mix is kinda weird and has many old hang-ons from back in the day, sonny.

Higgs wrote:I'm down with stone for weight, I just can't remember how it correlates to kilos.

I'm also nearly 50 so my personal imperial/metric mix is kinda weird and has many old hang-ons from back in the day, sonny.

I haven't used stones in years. Growing up it was all I knew

It's always a fortnight. Bi-weekly is just wrong