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Splurge Monday’s Workwear Report: Pleated Jacquard-Knit Midi Dress

I know that there are a lot of ’90s looks making a comeback these days, but I’m always more excited to see items that have more of a ’70s feel. (I wore the ’90s trends the first time around; I don’t need to do it again!)

This geometric-patterned knit midi dress is a dream come true for me. I would wear it with boots and some chunky gold jewelry to lean into the retro look. The price is eye-popping, but Oscar de la Renta doesn’t come cheap!

The dress is $2,890 and comes in sizes XS–XL. Pleated Jacquard-Knit Midi Dress

A few more affordable options with geometric prints are from Autograph ($105), Chinti and Parker ($433 on sale), and Stine Goya ($234 on sale). 

Sales of note for 12.5

Sales of note for 12.5

And some of our latest threadjacks here at Corporette (reader questions and commentary) — see more here!

Some of our latest threadjacks include:

458 Comments

  1. Who on Earth is paying nearly $3k for viscose and poly?! That’s outrageous.

    1. IDK but it is beautiful. ODLR is my magical unicorn wardrobe (and Boss, so much Boss; alas, am too short to really carry off Boss).

      If cotton, it would fuzz.
      If wool, it would be scratchy (maybe not in some magical St. John wool/nylon fabric).
      If silk, like DVF, maybe it would work.
      If nylon, same complaint as the original (and might show every lump and bump).

      1. Agree that it is beautiful but for that price point I’d like to see a wool-viscose or wool-nylon blend.

      2. I agree. Wool would be itchy and probably too heavy; cashmere would be $$$ and not durable enough; cotton too heavy, and silk too clingy. I love viscose knits – especially when they’re doing a jacquard like here, it really is the best material to keep the joins where the color changes from being too bulky, and the nylon adds durability.

        1. I have a number of 100% wool knit dresses (Ibex before they went out of business and came back w/ a much narrower product offering) and they are not itchy in the least! This much length might be too heavy, but a similar cut, but that hits just above the knee drapes perfectly. I wear the hell out of them and they were around $200 new (I bought 2nd-hand)

          1. That might be the true for you, but some of us have sensitivities that make wool uncomfortable. I cannot wear any wool next to my skin without a base layer (a full one; a cami does not cut it) unless I want to be itchy all day. My sister does not have the same problem and has inherited all fo the wool clothing I have been gifted over the years.

    2. I love this. I love the styling with those boots. My chicest aunt would wear this in late fall, maybe for thanksgiving dinner.

      1. I’m not saying it’s not beautiful, I’m saying it’s made of awful cheap fabric for that price point

        1. I mean, I hate to say it but is any garment worth 3k? I could see your point for a three hundred dollar dress that I might buy and intend to wear a lot for few years. Chic aunt isn’t thinking about value or costs per wear she’s thinking: I’m rich as all get out, I’ll look fabulous in this, I’ll wear for a season and offer it to Lilau (for whom it’ll be too small because I’m 65 and a size two) and then donate it.

    3. Also, I like this, but I’m pretty sure I’ve seen dupes at JCP and Macy’s, so if the fabric isn’t special… why not spend $60 instead?

        1. No it won’t (I’m a very experienced sewer), even the ‘nicest’ nylon poly blend will ultimately just drape like plastic.

          1. I disagree. If you buy designer quality fabric at a place like Britex, it is very different than what you can find at Joann’s fabrics.

          2. I disagree – poly fabrics from cheaper stores often look and feel truly terrible to me. If you walk through a Target the fabrics for most items are atrocious.

          3. wow, atrocious is a pretty strong word here. A lot of people feel good about being able to afford stuff from Target.

          4. I mean target is atrocious. They make environmentally damaging, poor quality goods using slave labour. They’re all around a bad company.

          5. Maybe atrocious is too strong of a word but the fabrics aren’t great and in my opinion are not in the same ballpark as more spendy items.

          2. Yes, because finding the needle in a haystack non-fast fashion dress at the local Goodwill is SO likely.

            Thrifting for clothing that meets the requirements of the upper class takes time that many people do not have- even women on this board. It also requires living in an area where that sort of item is available, or the ability to spend time online trying to find clothing at Poshmark or eBay (which are often just as unaffordable- a dress that meets all your various perfect person requirements is still likely to be too expensive on those sites for most people.) Good try, though.

          3. Anon I get it you just dont want to put in the effort to do the right thing, most people don’t. But making up excuses is tiring, just admit you don’t care about doing the right thing.

          4. Cute. No, I want you to recognize that you are clearly a privileged woman who has no understanding of the challenges others face.

  2. We see a lot of news in the U.K. about how Covid is being handled elsewhere & I’m interested to know, how is the U.K. perceived/reported on in other countries?

    2. Philly area – pretty “matter of fact” for the most part (like, “new strain that is more transmissible, back into lockdown, early indication is that the new strain is still within the vaccine capabilities”). But honestly, the US can’t really be in a position to judge, so…

      I actually see way more strident commentary on blogs that cover royal fashion (not limited to C-vid, like criticizing people for not wearing masks in certain situations… the same types also rant about the Cambridges’ car seat usage – so irresponsible to have little George in the front seat omg!! – despite the different laws in the UK than the US).

    3. Oh my goodness, this latest news has broken me. We didn’t have Christmas plans, but the Scottish lockdown, including nursery closures, is just so, so devastating. Likely necessary but devastating. What I find funny is how the UK reporting is very “This is so hard for BoJo, it’s an impossible situation” but other countries seem to be managing a somewhat competent response.

        1. I feel like Sturgeon got a bit hamstrung by the four-nations response, when her inclination might have been to be more cautious. That five day free for all was never realistic and she should have said no. Think Welsh Gov would have backed her.

          1. I totally agree. I think she’d have been much more conservative up front if she could.

    4. Perception from my friend group is very much like, ‘Well, at least they get some clear guidance even if it’s rough. Hey, at least they got a summer!’

      1. This is my perception as well. Like at least you have the various phases that seem to be based on some kind of facts, as opposed to what we’re doing here, which feels like a free for all for people who don’t care and phase 4 all of the time for the rest of us.

        1. There are many many many people who are in between “see no one be totally locked down” and “free for all.” I think that’s where most of us are. On the one hand, I am attending a gathering of 3 households for Christmas. On the other hand, that’s a total of 4 people and we see each other regularly anyway.

    5. For today, it looks like the UK has been hit with an ultra-transmissable strain, so it is very much lock borders, suspend trade, stop flights. I think it has made people wary but not at you, just b/c it is localized to there. That said, city folks fleeing to the countryside (where they will likely spread it further) is not a good lock. Just hunker down and stay put!

    6. Idk what’s even happening there but are people not expecting to just ignore the latest rules? Are y’all that law abiding?

      1. They are where they are because adherence has not been good. No one wanted to accept that another lockdown was needed. As Jacinda Ahern said – go hard, go early. You need to lockdown before it is blatantly necessary, not a slow piecemeal approach that drags it out and makes people tired of restrictions and then less compliant. UK should have done this a month ago.

        1. OMG, yes. This piecemeal approach is what got many other European countries in trouble.

          My home country Germany is on a second lockdown over Christmas – but many people simply just cannot sit on their butts for a couple weeks or come up with creative and safe(r) solutions to see grandma. It’s all “BUT IT’S CHRISTMAS” whining and indoor dining.

    7. If I had to summarize the reporting in Canada about the UK it would be ‘less of a hot mess than the US, more of a mess than Australia’.

      Hang in there, population density alone puts the UK in a tough spot. Hopefully the lockdown will work and with the uptick in vaccination, you’ll turn a corner in January.

    8. Looks like a mess. The photographs of everyone jamming on the trains to get out of London was shocking. One would think that by now governments would have learned that issuing these orders sends people into motion, and they should have had a plan. There is also a lot of skepticism that there really is a strain of the virus that is so much more transmissible, and that this actually hasn’t been tested or or proven. So, overall, a reactive mess.

      2. I agree. The top guy, Boris Johnsen, looks like what Trump probably looked like when he needed a haircut. I don’t go for guys that are sloppy like that, tho I understand he has a girfreind that got pregnent having s-x with him, and by now popped out the kid. I wonder if the kid looks like Boris? Anyone have a picutre?

    10. It’s reported very matter-of-factly, but my perception is your PM got it, got very sick, was pretty upfront after the fact about how sick he was, and seems to take it a bit more seriously since that happened. Vs. our President who got it and didn’t get very sick thanks to experimental treatments and thinks it’s no big deal for people because it wasn’t for him. I find that difference very interesting considering they are similar in many other ways.

      1. I was going to type out my perspective but you nailed it. Basically, “Johnson bad, not as bad as Trump” is my perspective.

    11. I follow UK news a little more closely than most Americans, I think, and I still couldn’t say what the perception is of covid response in general. I still see the trend where young people feel invincible and break the rules, but it’s things like a weekend with one friend at their house, not big parties.

      And the roll out of the vaccine will be so much faster and more organized because of the national health system. God I’m jealous of that.

    12. I feel like the US news is very US-centric, per usual. I feel like there is a general assumption that the UK is handling things so much better than the US, but the UK actually has more deaths per capita, although I think the US will catch up soon.

    13. From Norway:

      Obviously not as bad as
      the US. Here the reporting has been «Christmas lockdown, Boris under pressure, Sainsbury afraid of food shortage (broccoli, as far as I could tell…) and of course the massive clusterf@&k that is Brexit negotiations during Covid Christmas.»
      So far the reporting has been more worried for you than anything, as well as demands to «stop planes from the UK», since spreading in Norway is still largely «imported» (work travellers). The reporting on Sweden is worse.

    14. Out here in Southern California, barely anyone is paying attention. We can’t even get people who can to stay home to stop the spread of the normal strain. I’m a ball of stress.

    15. Not as bad as USA but in line as if Trump, Bolsonaro and Boris were in the same team. Lack of consistency in the message: fist go out, then no go, now lockdown. My friends in London are telling me that people dont follow the rules (no mask in the tube although is compulsory) as the police only give warnings but no fines.
      Glad that borders are closed for Uk tourists, if the message in the rest of Europe was stay at home at Xmas they should have done the same.

  3. On Friday, I found out a former colleague passed away, and an hour later, received a phone call to tell me I didn’t get the tenure-track post I was shortlisted for. On Saturday, we found out that we’d be in lockdown from the 26th to the 18th, which means, once again, trying to do 2 jobs with no childcare (our child finally returned fulltime at the beginning of December). My birthday is tomorrow, and you guys, I’m just so exhausted. I was going to take a bit of time off between Christmas and New Year to rest, but now, we’ll be juggling kiddo. My contract doesn’t end until Jan 2022, but after that, who knows? Academia is a dumptster fire. Solidarity? Promises that 2021 will be better than 2020?

    1. Tonight is the Winter Solstice. I’m taking comfort in the fact that it is literally the darkest it will be today, before things start to turn around. I hope it is true metaphorically for you, and all of us.

      2. I’m late to the party and just catching up so you may not see this but-
        As a frontline health provider I received the vaccine yesterday.
        I know it takes weeks for it to work, I know this doesn’t mean it is all over- but it felt like a beacon of hope and light. After the year we have been through, I almost broke down and cried in the chair. I needed that hope so badly. We have been saying “we can endure for so many months”- now it finally feels like there is light on the horizon!

    2. Oh Cb, I am so sorry! If you still have childcare for the next couple of days, can you reshuffle your time off to take one day to yourself this week?

      1. Yes, going to work today and Wednesday but I’ll have tomorrow morning solo, and then an afternoon with my husband.

    3. January 2022 is a LONG way away. Just think how different things were in January 2020!

      Give yourself today to be miserable and wallow a bit and then turn a new leaf with your birthday tomorrow. Didn’t you just by a house? That’s a bright spot. And if you’re going to be stuck at home for a month, Christmas holidays are actually a relatively good time for that – fewer working days that usual and most people taking a slower pace. Take the time off to rest – your health is important too.

      1. Yes, we did. And I’m feeling very grateful now, stuck in a flat in a Scottish winter would be miserable. I have an office rather than a repurposed table in the corner of our open plan sitting room. Going to try and figure out how to split the time into full days, the half days were just too exhausting, particularly for me, with the PM shift.

        1. An actual office is night and day in terms of ability to concentrate. Whoever had morning shift also used to take kids out of the house for an hour or two in the morning, so the other person got a totally silent house to hammer out some work. We ended up on a 7:30am-3:30pm and 2:00pm – 10pm schedule. Nap time was 2-3:30pm. We usually did 3 day of early shift, then 3 days of late shift or vice versa. Ate lunch together as our main family meal instead of supper.

        2. I’ve been getting through this miserable month by making a list of tiny house projects (like, no more than 10-20 minute jobs) that have been on my list but ignored since we bought our house two years ago. Fixing loose handles, changing out an ugly towel bar, touching up paint… it’s nice to do discrete jobs that are quick and give a sense of satisfaction and make our home nicer to live in as a sort of distraction.

          1. Yes! I call these permanent upgrades, because once are done, you don’t have to think about them again. They are very satisfying during the pandemic.

        3. Really agree on thinking of days in chunks. Not sure of your kids ages but what we try to do when we have a few weeks without childcare is a routine of breakfast and read some books, big outside activity, lunch and some playing, nap/quiet time, outside again, TV or movie while parent makes dinner and catches up on work, dinner, play, bath/bedtime. Not having to think of a plan every day helped me a lot.

    4. I’ve got nothing to offer except internet hugs and some birthday wishes. Take care of yourself; you can’t pour from an empty cup!

    6. Oh Cb, you have all my sympathy. From one academic to another, yes, higher ed is a sh*tshow right now, but the fact that you were shortlisted for the job is actually a pretty good sign. I ran a search a year ago, and everyone who broke past the paper screen was just really strong. (And I just looked up my favorite shortlisted folks we did not hire–they are all still employed in good academic jobs.) I think you can have hope that you will land someplace. Hang in there, and yes, comfort yourself right now. Job searching is just so hard.

      1. Yes, definitely, the feedback was very positive, and I suspect it came down to an incredibly well-qualified field and politics (it was an internal college wide competition with 10 spots for 11 schools). They are supposed to pair all the unsuccessful candidates with mentors and support, which will be good. But honestly, given my lack of geographical flexibility (toddler, husband a civil servant), I think I probably need to think about a move to government. Elections in May so we’ll see what they bring.

    7. I’m so sorry, that all just sucks! I had a doozy of a week last week and just keep telling myself that next year has to be better. A year from now we’ll marvel at all we’ve been through… and as SA always says, the only way out is through.

    10. I am so sorry, Cb. That is a LOT to deal with. I’m in higher ed, on the staff side, and can agree that it’s a hot mess right now.

    11. Oh, man. I’m so sorry.

      You have the same birthday as my late mother, whose Christmas snowman bedazzled sweatshirt I am wearing today as I make her famous Chex Mix. Maybe I can offer a reminder that kiddo will remember and care about things like Chex Mix and snowman bedazzled sweatshirts more than tenure-track jobs and how frazzled you were?

  4. Anyone have a special breakfast that is gluten free, and contains no berries, almonds, or tree nuts? Bonus if it’s not same-day labor intensive.

    Looking for something for my newly gluten free daughter on Christmas morning. We usually do a strata but there’s a lot of bread holding that bad boy together. So far all I’ve got is a crust less quiche but that seems…less than special. A yogurt bar is hard without berries or most granolas.

    1. I think you could do a crustless quiche that is really nice – maybe with smoked salmon or bacon? And gluten free granola, maybe with baked apples, is pretty easy to come by.

      1. +1 My mom is gluten free and finds these very special. A recipe based on Swiss cheese is very decadent.

    2. I’m Chinese and biased in favor of savory breakfasts, but what about congee (jook)? It is a rice porridge and you can top it with soft boiled eggs, herbs, crispy shallots, etc.? I also like it with little bits of leftover chicken or other proteins. It’s so delicious and versatile.

    3. In passing I saw a tater tot strata, would require investigating the gluten aspect but it sounded like an amazing concept (and I think potatoes are GF, might just need to adapt the brand of tots to a GF version)

      1. I thought I food hoarded yesterday but OMG did not get Tater Tots. I am thinking that TT, ham, and cheese would be a fantastic casserole. I think my goal is to put myself into a starch-induced hibernation where I wake up in March and this whole thing is over.

        1. Right?! I’m not normally drawn to that kind of thing but right now it sounds so incredibly good!

    4. Try this crust less quiche recipe. Plenty of cheese, cream and bacon gives it a special occasion richness.

      1/3 pound bacon, cooked and chopped, (150 g)
      16 ounce bag frozen spinach, thawed and squeezed dry, (453.5 g)
      6 large eggs
      2 ounces onion, thinly sliced or minced, (about 1/4 of a medium onion) (56.5 g)
      3/4 cup heavy cream (177.4 ml)
      8 ounces Swiss or cheddar cheese, grated (226.7 g)
      3/4 teaspoon salt
      1/4 teaspoon pepper
      1 pinch nutmeg
      1 teaspoon lemon zest (optional)

      1. Cook the bacon until crisp and chop. I do a whole pound in the oven and only use 1/3 for the
      recipe.
      2. Grease a pie plate or 8×8 glass dish. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.
      3. Thaw the spinach and squeeze dry. Slice the onion very thinly into half rounds or mince. Grate
      the cheese.
      4. Put all of the ingredients into a large bowl and mix with a hand mixer until totally combined.
      Pour into the prepared pan and spread with a rubber spatula. Place into the middle of the
      oven and cook for 40 minutes.
      5. Serve warm. Refrigerate up to 1 week or freeze up to 3 months.

    5. Açaí bowls or fancy smoothies? Omelettes? Huevos rancheros or breakfast burritos? If you’re baking for a crowd, you can bake eggs on tortillas (make a cheese wall around the outside) and top with like avocados and fresh salsa. Or maybe eggs en cocette. Shakshuka can also be special!

    6. We do a spanish tortilla that is eggs and potatoes and really lovely and special. We also do a lot of fritattas.

      My mother makes a GF quiche by pressing frozen shredded has brown potatoes into the bottom of the pan and using that as the crust. It’s sensational and really easy.

      Fresh fruit and yogurt on the side would round it out nicely. I also think the idea of something with eggs and GF corn tortillas would be really nice.

    7. We like to do either baked oatmeal or an egg casserole for a special breakfast. Both can easily be made the day before.

    8. How does she feel about dairy? Those starbucks egg bites with bacon and gruyere are so so good and I bet there are recipes to copycat them.

    9. Egg Casserole. Crumbled sausage browned then placed in a casserole pan with cut up sundried tomatoes then covered in raw eggs mixed with a big splash of milk or cream and shredded mozzarella cheese. Swap out the veggies, cheese and meat for whatever you’d like. Repeat at every brunch event until forever.

      1. Bake the whole thing in the oven of course. Don’t eat raw eggs. Or eat them if that’s your thing, but that’s not the idea of the recipe :)

    10. I and my daughter both have celiac. Our household has been GF since 2012.

      Not to worry. You can have whatever you would normally have, and it will be delicious. It helps to have a good 1-to-1 flour blend that you can use in your own recipes. For starters, buy any “all-purpose” GF mixed flour that includes either xanthum or guar gum (for stretchiness). Later you might want to mix your own. I use Nearly Normal:

      https://www.glutenfreeandmore.com/recipe/jules-all-purpose-flour-blend/

      This is a very good book for your transition to GF. It includes a whole chapter on holidays: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B06XD127HX/ref=dp-kindle-redirect?_encoding=UTF8&btkr=1

      Check out the GF on a Shoestring books if you like to bake.

      For your strata, buy a good GF bread from the freezer case. Your availability will vary depending on the part of the country you’re in. I try to avoid Udi’s (only okay) and Rudy’s (awful). Several others are good, including Three Bakers and Canyon Bakehouse.

      Use white bread and toast it lightly so that it will hold together. Then make your strata as normal. You’ve got this. Your kiddo will adapt well, and you’ll quickly get over the hump. There will be special breakfasts and cookies and pizza. Life will go on. Godspeed.

    12. Latkes with lox and a bit of sour cream (or side of applesauce) are delicious.
      Could you do chilaquiles with corn tortillas? Or breakfast nachos?

    13. You can do a strata with GF bread, you just have to pick the right one. I don’t like Udi’s bread at all but I love Canyon Bakehouse’s GF white bread, and there’s another brand my local supermarket carries called Essential Baking that is really good. You may have to find a decent grocery store with a few different GF brands to try (remember to look in the freezer section – some places put their GF bread only in the freezer) to find one you like. You could make one strata with regular bread and a separate one for your daughter with the GF bread; otherwise, to feed everyone you might need two loaves of GF bread and then that gets expensive. I have made Christmas morning french-toast casseroles with GF bread and the key was not letting the bread soak too long, as it tends to fall apart. So rather than assembling the night before, I assembled the morning of, and let it soak for about half an hour rather than overnight, and it worked out fine.

      The other thing I personally love for a fancy breakfast is a frittata with smoked salmon and cream cheese but that is grown-up me; kid and teenage me wouldn’t have touched that with a ten-foot pole.

    15. Last Christmas, we made Christmas brunch for a family member who is gluten free. We made a breakfast casserole with polenta, cheese, Italian salami (or other cured meat of your choice), spinach, and egg. It was simple to make and delicious. Here’s the recipe, though it may be behind the NYT paywall. https://cooking.nytimes.com/recipes/1019766-cheesy-breakfast-egg-and-polenta-casserole?action=click&module=Collection%20Page%20Recipe%20Card&region=Christmas%20Breakfast%2C%2058%20Recipes&pgType=collection&rank=1

      I believe we served it with Alice Waters’ grapefruit and avocado salad. Here’s the NYT recipe, but I’m sure it’s available elsewhere on the internet. https://cooking.nytimes.com/recipes/1015033-alice-waterss-grapefruit-and-avocado-salad?action=click&module=Global%20Search%20Recipe%20Card&pgType=search&rank=16

    16. I love sweet potato hash! It’s super versatile and you can really do any combination you dream up. I saute chopped sweet potato, green bell peppers, onions, sausage, black beans in olive oil. I like to add avocado and salsa or barbecue sauce. The sky really is the limit. You can pretty much add any veggies, any sauce, go meatless, whatever. The downside is that sweet potatoes do take awhile to cook, but you can prep everything the night before.

    17. If she likes crab, a crab meat omelet or crab cake eggs benedict (you don’t actually need bread crumbs or you can use GF). Add some avocado and grilled tomatoes or even bacon.

    18. I’m celiac and don’t like to bake. My mom uses GF flour and (after thoroughly scrubbing her mixer, all bowls, utensils, etc.) bakes banana bread or similar muffins for me. They’re a massive treat for me! She usually makes enough to freeze the extra and I enjoy them for many days following.

    19. There’s a recipe on the NYT Christmas section for a polenta breakfast casserole.

    20. Can she have chickpeas? She might like Pancakes made from chickpea flour (also known as gram flour, make sure it’s made in a gluten free factory). Can be savoury.

      Lots of recipes under the French name socca as well.

  5. Thinking ahead long-term, like post-COVID, herd immunity/widespread vaccination, what practices, routines, or habits do you think will stick with you after this pandemic is over?

    Here are a few I was thinking about:

    1. Virtual movie nights. I love them, especially as a way to see a movie with people across distance and time zones! I never felt good about talking during a movie, but typing is another story. Less disruptive but also easier to keep a conversation going with a group. I will still go to movie theaters when it’s safe to do so, but I’ll see that more as a special event and less as the only way to see a new movie.
    2. Daily walks, ideally in the lightest part of the day so even in the depths of winter, I am getting some daylight.
    3. Wearing only comfortable pants. I don’t think I realized just how uncomfortable all the pants I wore were until I was at home and didn’t even want to look at a waistband that wasn’t elastic. Skinny jeans, scratchy, stiff work pants… I don’t think I can ever go back.

    What about you?

    1. My feet are happy in shoes that I can wear with socks. No hotspots. No stinky shoes. Feet are warm in winter. Shoes aren’t filled with sweat in the summer.

      Maybe low-heeled riding boots will make a comeback as a fashion item?

      1. +1 but I’m really not sure how I will wear anything but my Birkenstock slippers again. I’m also with OP on elastic waistbands.

      2. +1. Work shoes are, without a doubt, terrible for me. I always knew it, but this has confirmed it. My feet are so much happier.

        1. Yes! I pulled out some work shoes this fall and wondered if all my pairs were this tight? Yes, yes they are.

          I’m not sure what I’m going to put on my feet after so many months of wearing fashion sneakers into the office.

      3. Comfortable shoes, for sure! I have been going to work this whole time but have pretty much retired my high heels in favor of things like loafers and low-heeled booties and cute sneakers, even with dresses and skirts. I am never going back!

    2. Friday night pizza + movie! Family is DH, 5 year old daughter, and me. We have all come to really appreciate a lazy wind down to the work/school week.

    3. WFH and not eating in restaurants much. Just doesn’t spark joy and haven’t missed it. I prefer takeout, cooking at home, or grabbing fast casual things like tacos from a great local taqueria.

      On a bigger scale, I am not going to travel via plane as much. It’s clear to me that I can make my own happiness at home and that I can’t ignore the negative impact on climate change any longer.

    4. I think days of people being rewarded for coming in sick to the office will hopefully be over. Same with greeting hugs with people you don’t know.

      I’m hoping more remote work options. I actually do really well away from the noise of the office.

      2. I don’t know if the coming in sick thing will be over at places that do combined PTO banks. I just don’t see people stopping coming in sick if it’s going to take away their vacation time.

      3. Yes, I’m hoping we can just say we are working from home when we aren’t 100% when pre covid we would tough it out.

    5. Mask in the winter. I’m immunosuppressed so already took a lot of precautions around the flu, but I did take public transport when needed etc. pre-COVID during flu season and I will probably continue to mask in those situations in the winter or when covid or flu are spiking seasonally, even with the vaccine.

      More outdoor time with the kids

    6. Baking our own bread. We have been making sourdough weekly for most of the pandemic. The one time we bought a ready-made loaf a couple months ago, it was like eating a cellulose sponge. And that was the good stuff we used to buy all the time!

      1. +1 this is a big one for me, especially if I don’t return to my pre-COVID 25-75% travel schedule. I couldn’t have maintained a sourdough starter on that schedule, which is why I never tried it before.

      1. YES! Unfortunately I don’t think they are going to stay gone in my industry but I wish they wouldn’t.

      2. Being allowed to work from home with kids present for random inclement weather days and breaks. Not in anyway ideal, but better than having to cobble together camps + before care+ aftercare for two spring breaks (why two?!).

        1. WFH on inclement weather days would be amazing. I’ve never understood how it’s good for my productivity to endure massive train delays during storms, leaving me a wet and pissed off mess by the time I finally get to the office.

      4. +1. I especially hate having to shake men’s hands because I know they never wash them.

      5. Agreed. They’re over for me, I’ve decided.

        Also holy cow social hugs!! Gone for good, I hope!

    8. I mostly hate wfh and social distancing, but here are the bright spots.

      My kiddo is now picked up at the front door of daycare-this is 100% preferrable to going in there, trying to wrestle him away from his toys and buddies and getting him to put on his coat, ect. Pickup is now a half hour faster.

      Although I initially hated the idea of waiting in line to enter a grocery store, but I actually love it now. It beats crowed shopping and a long wait in the checkout line, it’s less stressful.

      My company’s holiday party went virtual, was cut to 20 minutes. Instead of bingo and an awful buffet with awkward sober mingling, we got a $100 gift card. Supervisors of long term employees celebrating milestone said a few brief words about the person’s contributions thanking them. It was seriously so much better!

      My small town shut down some side streets to vehicle traffic this summer to allow the restaurants to have outdoor dining. The whole thing had a real block-party vibe and I think we should do it every year. I having been saying for years that we need to be more pedestrian-orientated and it was really great to not have crowded sidewalks and aggressive drivers to navigate.

    9. 1. Wearing only comfortable shoes. I’m in a casual industry and really didn’t need the heels, just liked them for certain outfits, but they were not comfortable. I did a purge and got rid of all of them. Next trade show I do (someday when they existing again) cool tennis shoes for the win. I’m feeling very strongly I can rock a professional casual cool girl look now.
      2. Also more takeout vs. eating in restaurants so much. Even from fancier restaurants, it’s really good and at least equally enjoyable.
      3. Peloton app – discovered it when the pandemic started and I’ll keep it for a long time.

      1. +1 to “professional casual cool girl.” that is now my aspiration although who knows if I will be able to achieve it

    10. Only comfortable shoes! After months without heels, I can’t believe I ever wore them.
      Also hoping that we are permitted some WFH long term so that people stop coming in to work when sick.

    11. One of the clubs I’m a member of has decided in the future to sometimes meet in person, sometimes meet via Zoom. It makes it so much easier than having to find a babysitter or drag along a small and try to keep them quiet.

      I hope doctor’s offices keep telehealth visits. Instead of taking half a day off work and driving to the other side of the city, my followup with a specialist was a 15 minute phone call. Perfect.

      I definitely want to keep the option to WFH. Its not for everyone, and that’s fine, but it certainly makes some of life’s logistics a lot easier.

      1. Telehealth is going to depend on payers. Health insurance refused to pay for it pre-pandemic. Providers like it. Unless patients tell their insurance providers that they want to keep it, it will go away. We are already getting noise from some that we should be planning to discontinue the service once we are at ~50% vaccination, which is ridiculous.

    12. Online grocery ordering with delivery or curbside pickup. I still like going to the store, but I suspect I will only go once a month or so and instead order weekly for pickup. It’s so much less of a timesuck.

      Regularly scheduled virtual hangs with friends. I’ve seen more of friends who live across the country than ever before, and it’s so delightful. Even if it dropped in frequency, I hope we can keep some regularity.

      1. I think we will stick with online grocery ordering too. We have access to Good Eggs here and the delivery workers are full employees with health benefits and living wages, which makes me more comfortable with it.

      2. Yes! I’d always assumed that grocery store delivery was for “rich” people, but for me the only added cost is the $5-$10 tip, and I likely save money because my orders are more thoughtfully planned out. Moving forward, I’ll gladly pay $10 to avoid going to the grocery store, even in normal times.

        1. Yep. I finally started doing curbside and delivery and I’m never going back if I can help it. I didn’t realize how much I disliked grocery shopping.

    13. I hope WFH stays, because the flexibility to go for a walk in the middle of the day, and to handle child issues, doctor apoointments etc, is such a big plus.

      I will definitely stock more food on the regular – it just removes so much stress from planning dinners if I have a freezer and pantry full of options.

      Grocery pickup – again, the convenience of it removes so much stress.

      1. Agreed to all of this – maybe I’ll actually want to go in once a week, but right now I’m struggling to imagine wanting to be in more than half a day every two weeks. I’m SO much happier and more productive with my WFH setup, including lots of high-quality work super early in the morning and much better navigated tough meetings.
        Also: comfy clothes & shoes forever, virtual conferences/seminars, virtual health visits and, in general, so much less logistical/transportation hassle in my life.

    14. My work is going to be more flexible about WFH, which is great. I would love it if the local medical centers continued their respiratory clinic so people seeking urgent orthopedic care don’t also get a respiratory infection from sitting in a single holding pen.

    15. It seems completely bizarre to me I previously got dressed and went into an office to do work for 8 hours then came home… schedule is much more all over the place but I get as much done in comfy clothes from home so hopefully will be able to moe to half time or more at home.
      Masks in the winter
      Many meetings virtually/video versus in person
      Reduced kids activities (I’d love to do like 60% of prior commitments – we’ve been 0-30% with most delivered by zoom during the pandemic)
      Having whole family home around dinner time
      Sitter versus group care (for elementary school aged kids), with part-time camps/programs as something the sitter drives them too.
      Daily or nearly daily exercise, mostly virtually (and once weather improves, outdoors)

    16. I am desperately hoping courts continue to do virtual hearings for matters that don’t require live witnesses. I practice in federal court so have cases all over the place and if has made a HUGE improvement in my life to not have to get on a plane and fly for a hearing that lasts less than an hour. Sure you can call in, but if you are a junior woman on the phone and your male colleagues are all there in person, it’s not the same. I hope judges recognize this equity issue and keep encouraging all-virtual.

  6. Guys, for anyone that needs to hear it today, you are doing a good job. This year has been so, so hard. If anyone had told me last January that I’d be managing what I’m currently managing, I would have laughed (unmasked) in their (also I masked) face.

    Face masks on toddlers? Lockdowns? Zoom funerals for relatives? Hybrid elem school? A 4 month stint where nobody left our house? WFH with DH and 3 kids under 6? Job loss? Tops for Zoom? Furloughs? *no housecleaners*??? The list goes on.

    Ladies, I wholly look forward to brighter times when we can debate the office appropriateness of a lipstick shade. I miss everything, but I am so proud of you for hanging in there.

      1. Oh, this is good. I’ve found myself irrationally irritated at my DH right now, and you know what? It is really not his fault. He’s working his tail off, too, it’s just effing hard right now.

  7. I had gotten word that I had been exposed to a person with COVID. Exposed is the wrong word, more like “in the presence of,” but “probably not long enough to count.” [I recall the encounters; I was probably within 2-3 feet of this person several times going over building construction plans over the course of several hours.] I think I’d reserve that for people I pass at the grocery store ( I shop like a NYC commuter late for the train). At any rate, I waited for enough days to pass and took a test and the results were negative. I think that still, even with the negative test, there is a non-zero risk that something will still develop and I ought to avoid any sustained non-household contacts until the full 14 days have passed just in case.

    [And I feel really burned by this, so I think I’m personally going to avoid sustained contact with people until after MLK, so everyone else with holiday exposure can have any illness come to light on its own and away from me.]

    And are people visiting for the holidays? When I took the dog out this morning, I saw 6 new cars parked on the street (where people tend to park in their own driveways and visitors take the street spots) on just my block.

    1. If you want to be a martyr go for it. You’re not getting applause from me for cloistering yourself bitterly for over a month after you were exposed, waited long enough, and got a negative test.

      2. I think that the guidance is unclear. Rapid test work best if you are having symptoms and wait 5-7 days before taking them. The other test works better, but by the time you’d get results, it may have been 14 days since exposure. My guess, as a lay person, is to avoid people for 14 days post-exposure, and then on day 15 if you have had no symptoms and don’t seem ill, to come out of the cocoon. So no reason to wait a month. But even 2 weeks can be a long time to isolate, especially if you have holiday gifts to get and are running low on groceries towards the end.

        Signed,
        Have done this three times already (all negative)

        The testing place I went to most recently is now giving you “$X off your next test” coupons, which does not bode well for the next quarter, which I think will be rough. After my last negative test, I went out and legit hoarded groceries and will likely do so to I read Mormon levels of food and supplies on hand (kids are slated to go back to school after MLK and if they go (big, big if) it’s probably just a matter of time before we go through this again).

        1. Didn’t the CDC reduce the 14 days to 10 days? Anyway, I think OP wants to wait a month to avoid getting exposed to holiday travelers and celebrants. In any event, the test discount doesn’t bother me. Plenty of unexposed, asymptomatic people are required to get tested for multiple reasons that have nothing to do with being sick or exposed.

          1. I think that some areas have more local guidance that can bring it down to 10 days (not where I live though).

            10 days may get you more compliance than 14. From friends I know who have had it, they seem to know when their exposure happened and said that their decline was pretty quick (3-5 days). Some very mild cases and some where it took from Thanksgiving until now to get everyone in a household better.

          3. thanks for the link Aunt Jamesina. The explanation is pretty clear that 14 days would still be preferable from a risk standpoint, but the options for shortened quarantine are provided in the hopes of increasing compliance. It’s a tradeoff, not based on new scientific information.

        2. I am in ATL and here, PCR testing turnaround is currently much faster than you are suggesting. There was a time when there were long lags, and perhaps it is different in other places, but don’t assume that what you heard in June is true today.

    2. Yes, lots of selfish people are visiting for the holidays. The pictures of people jamming London train stations were unbelievable. That’s like US levels of stupidity.

      1. I am very far from London, in the middle of the US, but I think those people had a few hours’ notice to get home, or somewhere, and they were fortunate to have those trains available. Did they need masks? Yes.

        1. They didn’t have a few hours to get home. They were informed that London was about to go into lockdown BECAUSE A MORE INFECTIOUS STRAIN IS SPREADING THERE AND THE GOVERNMENT WANTS TO PREVENT IT FROM REACHING OTHER PARTS OF THE COUNTRY. So instead of abiding by that, they were fleeing the city so that they didn’t have to miss their Christmas plans with relatives out of the city, or so they could be locked down in their country homes, or whatever selfish reason. Don’t cut them slack here.

          1. +1. It was a shocking display in a time when I thought I couldn’t be more disgusted.

          2. Everyone thinks they’re the exception, whether they’re in the US, or the UK, or commenting here.

          3. This is exactly the kind of pattern that spread the plague in 1348. Human behavior really never changes.

          4. I’m not sure it’s fair to chalk everything up to “human behavior” and conclude it never changes. Some countries have had really successful behavioral interventions, and they are humans too!

          5. Why are the lockdowns announced in advance? Shouldn’t the trains be stopped the moment a lockdown is deemed necessary? This isn’t a snarky question, but I’m assuming there must be a reason.

    3. The CDC specifically says quarantine can end at day 7 with no symptoms and a negative test so I don’t know why you’d be waiting 14. Also your exposure was not really an exposure, as I think you know.

      1. I think that people are sloppy enough that just like there isn’t anything magical about 6 feet, there isn’t anything magical about 15 minutes. My lawyer friends track their time in tenths of an hour but IDK how accurate others are. If you are getting officially notified of an exposure and then people hedge on it being only exposure-ish, I think that’s enough to warrant caution.

        [Or I can think of a trading floor, where there are perimeter offices and then a large expanse with high ceilings. It’s the same air, not the same air. If you are a managing director with an office, maybe your exposure is less, but if a sick person is in the expanse, maybe it would add up over a day. IDK. But as places re-open, I bet we run into these situations more and more.]

          1. My rapid test came with a warning that “you have a negative test result based on today’s test, but could have tested in the wrong window, and the tests have error rates,” etc., etc. Basically a good omen, especially if coupled with no symptoms, but not conclusive.

            [Assuming that this is a rapid test; I think that the non-rapid ones are more accurate. Over a broad enough population, error rates will occur.]

          2. A. Negative. Test. Provides. A. Reading. As. Of. That. Day. Only. It does not mean that one can cease quarantine, nor that there a positive might not be true on a retest a few days later. This is particularly true with rapid tests. So take your … and look at the science.

        2. Haven’t been within 6 feet of anyone for 15 minutes in months. Haven’t been within 6 feet of anyone for any amount of time for months. Wore a mask diligently. Still got Covid. There is absolutely nothing magically protective about 6 feet and 15 minutes.

    4. I personally think you are being reasonable and responsible by waiting a full 14 days due to this encounter, and holding off on general people-contact after the holidays due to increased exposure risks. The more people who can remove themselves from the chain of spread, the less worse this will be and the sooner it will be over for everyone.

      What I don’t understand is people who get upset that another person is choosing to be extra cautious like this, and resort to name-calling.

      1. Agree completely except I do understand why – because it’s not what they did in a similar situation and they feel defensive.

      2. I don’t see why anyone needs to brag about taking unnecessary precautions and still being whiny about it. I’m not giving you claps for this. Feel free to not share.

        1. Agreed. Also, people that do absurd things like quarantine for a month after a negative test are those who are bitter about it, and moaning about “seeing” other cars on the street and getting irritated that not every single other person out there isn’t being as absurdly strict as they are. When you do that, and you start to judge other people, and whine about it in your head (or online), you become bitter and unhappy. Whoever you interact with on a daily basis then sees/is impacted by your bitter, judge-y nature, and you spread the bitterness onward. Please stop. You don’t win any Covid awards by restricting yourself this much and there is a negative impact. In fact, you just spread the negativity to all of the readers of this site. Please stop.

      3. Right. What is so hard to understand about the concept that a person can take up to 14 days to become positive/contagious? Testing negative on an earlier day doesn’t mean you won’t test postiive on day 10 or whatever. I’ll give you that it statistically drops off, but that doesn’t change my viewpoint.

      4. Why do they feel the need to brag about it? Just do whatever you want.
        And there’s a difference between a real exposure, a slight exposure, a rapid test (which is complete garbage, y’all understand statistics), and a PCR test

        I enjoy the conversations but the endless anxiety about this is driving me nuts on this site

    5. People are misconstruing the CDC guidance. I just read it because my child was exposed to Covid at school last week. The CDC still very much endorses a 14 day quarantine. They have some options for shortening quarantine with negative tests if you *must* leave to work. I read the guidance to mean that if you truly can’t afford a 14 day quarantine, then it is less risky to go out earlier if you check all these other boxes. The CDC presents these options as a last resort. And they’re only there because the CDC knew that some people weren’t following the 14 day quarantine and wanted to put out a shorter option that they felt more comfortable with.

      2. They’re misconstruing it so they can meet people for the holidays and not feel guilty.

    6. People are visiting for the holidays. My BIL and his family are driving 18 hours to stay with MIL and FIL for a couple of weeks. BIL and his family quarantined and got tested. FIL and MIL also got tested and are extremely conservative, though FIL can’t quarantine because of his job.

      Plus, adult children are home from college, if they weren’t already home after Thanksgiving. And I know a few people who home semi-permanently for some combination of factors–unemployment running out and evictions being reinstated, or just that leases are up and WFH will be in place at least until summer.

      1. I wonder if you meant extremely conservative in the political sense, because your FIL is not extremely cautious by combining a family visit with still going to work.

        1. Some people have to work, you know, or the electricity won’t run / the internet won’t run / the grocery stores will be closed / the hospitals will be closed.

        2. I meant that they get groceries and takeout by contactless delivery, only socialize with others (including us) outdoors and distanced, etc. You’re right that it’s not cautious to combine households when he can’t quarantine.

    7. At least in my area, there are so many cases that you are likely “in the presence of” a COVID positive person anytime you leave your house, so it’s better to behave like you could have it at all times. You just happen to know about this particular exposure.

    8. I’m conservative on this, but your exposure was minimal / on the edge of transmission viability, you waited for enough days to pass and then got a negative test — enough already, you’re fine. (You should be avoiding any sustained non-household contacts *anyway* because that’s just the New Normal, unless you are a healthcare or essential worker and it’s unavoidable.)

      Yes, you’re right the test is only one day and you could have tested positive the next, but you can’t test every single day of the week.

      And yes, of course there are plenty of selfish people still having people over for frivolous reasons, but you also don’t know everyone’s circumstance — you don’t know if those cars are home healthcare workers, or tradesmen making essential repairs using personal vehicles, or aunt Susie who has been part of their bubble — you just don’t know. I agree it’s frustrating but you kind of have to control what you can, since you can’t control others.

  8. Rude dog question:

    I have an adoptee dog who sniffs butts and crotches of people (dogs I get), including me and other household members (does he not know what we smell like?). Noses go up under skirts, robes, coats; it does not matter. No changes in detergent. Male dog (getting fixed this week per adoption agreement). Older puppy (ultimate age is unclear — he seems to be <1 but is a larger mutt, so his nose is already at butt level).

    Any advice how to curb this? I cannot wait to have our first post-pandemic guest decide to never return because our dog is the nose equivalent of handsy. I tell him "No" but what else should I try?

    1. It’s easier to train a dog to do something else in those moments than stop doing something a behavior. I used the “touch” command to train my dog to stop jumping on people – I kept treats on me when walking/people came over. If we encounter a person, I watch to see if she looks like she might jump, and then offer her a touch + treat. She now always looks to me for a touch when she greets people and never jumps.

      1. This is a good strategy. We’ve been teaching our dog to sit instead of jumping on us when she’s greeting us. It works most of the time. Also, she now sits as her default when she’s not sure what she is supposed to be doing.
        Now the next task is to stop her from licking lotion off my legs.

        1. Training the dog to sit before it gets anything—leash on, attention, treats, walking through the front door— has always been the best strategy with my dogs. The current one begs by sitting down and making expectant faces, which is especially adorable because she is huge.

          1. Q from new dog owner — how do you do that? Also, do people have dogs on a leash at mealtimes or in a crate? Ours is becoming a nuisance dog while cooking / eating / cleaning up (trashcan licking / stealing). It wasn’t a big deal, but seems like it is heading in that direction (esp. with Chinese food; never with breakfast; rarely during the day but dinner manners are bad; dog has dog food available at dinner, but just wants YOUR food). I am thinking I don’t want to crate him, but just want him sitting or ignoring.

          2. Anon at 10:48, do you have a separate dining room/kitchen? Our dog is trained that he’s not allowed in those areas, which works pretty well, but is harder if you have an open-plan design with no obvious “food area” transitions.

          3. Every single time they get food, they must sit first. It takes time before it is automatic. Also train them to stay out of the kitchen/dining room when people are cooking or eating. It helps to train them to go to a certain spot. We trained “go to bed.” The trick is that you have to train the dog to do something other than the undesirable behavior so you can give the command and the desired behavior replaces the undesirable behavior. It is not possible to train a dog to stop doing something. Even “leave it” is really just training the dog to do something else instead.

          4. Yes, crate him or tether him during human mealtimes until he is ready to learn to behave properly. You will probably need to train “sit” and other commands before he’s ready to learn not to bother the humans while they are eating. Don’t let him develop bad behaviors—prevent and train.

          5. That was my late dog. Since puppyhood he associated sitting with getting a treat, so he would make a point of sitting very dramatically with a big thump whenever he thought I had something tasty in my hands/on the kitchen counter.

          6. Dog training is about anticipating undesired behavior and giving another behavior to serve in its place. I really don’t understand when I walk into someone’s house and their dog jumps all over me and then the person chastises the dog, tells it to get down, and thinks that they are “training their dog” not to jump. No. It was only common sense that they should have had their dog sitting before they opened the door to a visitor in the first place. Don’t give the dog the opportunity to do the bad behavior in the first place. He’s a dog, of course he’s excited there’s a brand new visitor.

    2. Crate him when visitors are first arriving. Let him out once they have been in the house for a while. Use a treat to get him to sit before he greets the guest. Train him that “off” means to stop touching a person. Train him to “leave it” (stop what he is doing and look at you.”

    3. When people come to your home, before you open the door you tell dog to “sit” or “stay” – he sits, guests come in, he watches you greet them but he is only allowed to visit with guests when you release him accordingly. Jumping or sniffing not allowed and is met with redirection to sit or stay.

      Re meals – before you eat, tell dog “go to your mat” or similar and you have him lie on a dog bed or whatever in a nearby room. He waits there til you are done; you release him and THEN he is fed. He needs to know you are the boss. This solves begging at table. You could use a crate too, we just preferred dog bed for this.

  9. Did anyone watch the second season of Home for Christmas on Netflix over the weekend? I won’t put spoilers in the top post, but it was so good!!

    3. I watched both seasons last week and over the weekend — and now (as an avid knitter) I want to live somewhere with a yarn hut that is within walking distance!

  10. Thanks to a few posters who commented when I asked about adapting to new job after 2 years…when will I adjust? The answer is never…this is not my tribe even though I am appreciated as a high performer and compensation is fine. Your acknowledgment of this situation helped a lot and I am reflecting on the year and figuring out next steps. I especially liked the comment about “working in a medium sized company with medium people”…I work in a very large company with medium people who like to collaborate vs. compete – they’re ok with being part of the herd. Maybe I’ll find a tribe or way to contribute my skills outside of work…maybe I’ll find a new role that I can serve that suits me better….options are endless. Bring on 2021!

    1. I don’t understand when people like cut throat work environments. Good work doesn’t come from constantly scheming and undermining others. Nor does it breed trust and morale. I love my colleagues, I consider them all excellent (though we get about 1k applications for every job so we truly get to pick the best) but I would never want to fight against them, we do our best work together.

      1. I think you can be a really high-performing team where the “competition” isn’t with your co-workers but against whatever outside circumstances make your job necessary (e.g. I work in software, and we are definitely fighting bugs, bad code, and deadlines, plus the external project constraints that need to be accommodated).

        1. ^ My work environment is like this and I like it. Look people are competitive about different things . . . grades, biggest house, PTA meetings, nicest garden – whats wrong with getting that competitiveness out at work, and only at other things (not other people). Can’t be worse than any of the other places people are cutthroat.

          1. OP here…well stated poster and previous poster…love the culture that values the high performing team…not loving the culture that places priority on individuals being comfortable and resists challenging team members to perform better.

        2. I think there’s a difference between competitive and cutthroat. The reality is that all people have limited attention and energy to spend somewhere, and if you’re using it to always fight internal battles, you’re probably not advancing your business interests like you could be.

      2. I worked at one of the most notoriously cutthroat companies in my industry for years. Someone commented that they’d heard my company was “back-stabbing,” and I said “no, it’s actually front-stabbing.”

        I left that company to go to a midsize company where everyone seemed super nice. It was such a cultural change from my old company. But you know what, it actually was back-stabbing. Everyone was super nice to your face but behavior from snarking to complete sabotaging behind your back was completely normal.

        I would take the attack you can see coming any time. I thrived in the front-stabbing environment and wish I hadn’t left.

    3. I think you may like Amazon. I ran the other way because I work at the complete opposite right now. Just the brief interview process with my would-be boss reminded me of why I have such a great thing at work.

      I like competing and winning with barbells, trivia, etc. But I need a collegial environment to thrive at work–go find your tribe at places that love the outlook you’ve posted here!

  11. Can anyone recommend non-wool warm socks? I have a bunch of Smartwool hiking socks that are great for warmth, BUT they seem to irritate my eczema that flares up with the season changes.

    1. My kids have eczema and we do cotton socks in winter. No particular recommendations for adult socks but you can get thicker cotton socks. Add thin wool socks on top if not warm enough. Not great for sweaty activities but usually they don’t get that sweaty.

    3. I like Fox River Outdoor Wick Dry Alturas Ultra-Lightweight Liner Socks as liners for my wool socks when my socks are more irritating or if I know I’ll be really cold that day. They are made of polypropylene which is what the US military uses as their liner socks for winter weather. It is one of the warmest synthetic fibers, and great at wicking.

    4. I just bought four pairs from Kane 11. The socks are sold by foot size, not just S/M and M/L. Having socks that actually fit is great!

    5. I would check out the options at REI. They will definitely have a good selection of non-wool warm socks.

    6. The best warm sock for me are Falke soft wool. They’re cotton on the inside and wool on the outside, fine knit, and come in both crew and knee lengths. Pricey, but totally worth it!

  12. I started long distance dating during Covid. We both feel comfortable flying, both live alone, are both regularly tested for Covid due to our jobs, and it’s been a really nice mental break from work (and forced me to use vacation days, which I usually lose). I am starting to think we aren’t a good fit long term – I want to live with my spouse and I can’t imagine either of us leaving our job, moving states, etc. Is it wrong to stay in this bubble and live in the now vs. break it off and let us both heal/look for a forever human? Do I need to talk to him about this?

    1. Unless you actually know that he is not looking for a long-term relationship and is content to just have fun while it lasts, then yes, you should talk to him. What if the tables were turned?

    2. Live in the now. It’s so hard to know what things will look like in 6 months. And at some point, one of you may decide that it’s worth it to move.

    3. “I can’t imagine either of us leaving our job, moving states, etc.”

      Why? Most people don’t stay at their jobs forever. Plenty of my friends moved states in their 30s (I moved for my husband; grueling, certainly, not impossible). How old are you? Do you both want children? Is that children timetable such that you actually do not have six months to figure out if this is going to work?

      Bluntly, yes, talk about this.

    4. So you are currently traipsing about the country flying in a pandemic just to get laid?

      Are you really sure you needed to share this here?

      2. This is going to be spicy, all the grown ass women on this board will surely handle this in mature, reasonable, non-petty, and scientific manner . . .

          1. Hi, you missed the cue that she was already married, and I do not support traveling during the pandemic to have s-x with someone else. The OP could be bikini ready, and I am sure that the guy who is having s-x with her is happy to do so, but if she is still married, she is probably still having s-x with her spouse, so the last thing she needs is to bring home an STD or COVID to the spouse, assuming of course he is not having s-x with someone else. I am for marrage until divorce and no s-x outside of marrage! PTOOEY!

      3. I was in a long distance relationship last year, that ended for the same reasons that OP mentioned. I was just thinking this morning how glad I am that it ended a few months before the pandemic because not seeing each other since March would have been so hard, and neither of us would have felt comfortable traveling. There were great reasons neither of us could move — one needs to stay put for family caretaking reasons, the other is an academic in a tenure-track job in the humanities, which is basically a unicorn. Not everyone can just pick and move cross country!

        OP — end it now because it’s going nowhere, slowly, and you should not be traveling. Take the rest of the pandemic to heal and you should be ready to start looking for your forever human once most people are vaccinated and it’s safer to venture out. I totally get how much it sucks, but it’s the right thing to do.

      4. I know why you’re salty about this comment and I don’t even need three guesses. And it doesn’t have anything to do with the pandemic. Stay pressed

          1. Is the “I recognize your syntax” thing supposed to be some kind of threat? If you’ve got something to say to someone, just say it.

      5. Why did you feel the need to reduce her relationship with her significant other to “just get[ing] laid”?

    5. You’re in a long distance relationship and you haven’t talked about if and how the long distance part will ever end? Yeah, you need to have that conversation.

  13. Anyone have Athleta Made to Move masks they don’t want? Those are my favorite and it looks like I now need to return to classroom teaching, so I will be wearing a mask all day, but they’re not on the website.

    I will happily pay you for them. Post a burner email and we can coordinate!

    Thanks.

    1. My store recently had tons in stock — if there’s one near you, I would call and see if you can do curbside pick up.

  14. When did you decide to leave your marriage?

    I do love my husband but the last few years have been very hard between us. He’s very demanding and controlling and it has gotten to the point were I no longer feel attracted to him. I’m to the point now where I almost every day I wake up with a sense of heaviness and sadness. I feel lonely going to bed at night. The issues were definitely there years before COVID but being in lockdown has really exacerbated the situation. We’re in couples therapy and I’ve gone to individual therapy (stopped because of COVID) but nothing has really changed. We aren’t even intimate any more and I have pretty much lost all desire to be with him. We’ve been together 12 years, married 10, maybe this is just what a long term marriage feels like? I don’t want to make a rash decision and throw away something I’ve invested years into but I miss feeling connected to someone. And I don’t know how much of what I feel is attributed to an issue with our marriage or any number of the crazy things going on in the world today.

    Anything you can share would be helpful.

      1. +1 one could maybe debate over how much intimacy etc should exist after a long term marriage, but the demanding and controlling part is what crosses the line for me in what you wrote – especially if therapy is not helping. I take it you don’t have kids? Which helps.

    2. I agree, leave. You haven’t invest 10 years, you have endured 10 years of abuse from a controlling partner.

    3. I’m in a similar situation as you: only you know the answer to this. Gently, this is something to discuss with your spouse and therapist, not internet strangers.

      1. Any tips for her to think this through or broach this with them? Or anything that’s helping you? Journaling helps me with other problems.

        1. Things that have helped us are Zoom therapy (both individual and couples’, if you can swing it) and gardening more often. I don’t think you should force yourself to garden with someone you don’t get along with, but DH and I are still friends, just having a hard time right now…not like everyone else in the world, right? I only said similar situation because DH has controlling TENDENCIES; he is not outright controlling. And after our therapist addressed it he is actively working to change, which I think was the kicker for me. I think that’s a big difference that wasn’t exactly clear from her post. I definitely don’t think you should stay in a controlling marriage – I just wanted to offer a different perspective than “immediately DTMFA.”

      2. Gently, you don’t discuss with your controlling spouse whether it is time to leave them.

        2. Seconded. I left my abusive/controlling ex after 6 years of marriage. It was terrifying to get divorced, but I am so much happier. I had a plan and didn’t bring it up with him until I was packed and had moved out the important things.

    4. I’m sorry you’re going through this. I’ve been married 26 years, and with my husband for 31 years, and I don’t think the feelings you describe are “just what a long term marriage feels like,” though a long-term relationship does go through ups and downs. If you’re feeling like divorce might be a “rash” decision, I’d give counseling some more time, and maybe not make this decision at such a stressful time (i.e. during COVID lockdown). My husband and I hit a low point a few years ago. We’d both been busy with career, and made the mistake for years of making our kids the focus of our relationship, while severely neglecting our bond as a couple. I was feeling a lot of resentment and loneliness, and I did consider divorce. We did some marriage counseling and decided to stay together because we were able to rediscover our friendship and enjoyment of one another through airing some issues, and mainly just taking the time to make our relationship a higher priority in our lives.

    5. I’ve been married for just a bit longer than you, and I can tell you that what you’re feeling is not how a healthy marriage feels. It’s not just what it feels like to be married for a long time. Lack of connection, feeling lonely when you are sleeping next to your spouse, and no attraction is not healthy. The bigger issue to me is that you say he’s become controlling. I think you could potentially re-kindle attraction or connection, but lack of trust or controlling behavior are red flags. The other question is whether he’s actually doing the work to improve, or he’s just checking the therapy box. When my husband and I have gone through rough patches, we’ve both put in the work. We both make changes, we both voice our frustrations, and we both commit to getting back to a good place. It doesn’t sound like you are in a situation where he is also willing to make the necessary changes to improve. Don’t get stuck in the sunk cost fallacy. Just because you’ve already invested time in this relationship doesn’t mean you should keep chasing it if it’s clear things won’t improve.

    6. I was you but I realized that I not only did not love my husband, but actually disliked him. We have a child so I did care about him in a “my child’s other parent” way, but it wasn’t love and it wasn’t a relationship. I left and I’ve been soooooooooo much happier since, even though being a single parent and single after 15 years sucked in many ways. Only you can decide what’s right for you, but this was the best move for me.

    7. Married 21 years. No, this is not what long-term marriage is like. I am still in love with my husband. I am still attracted to him. We are still intimate on a regular basis. I am happy to see him when I get up in the morning or when he comes home after being gone and he seems to feel the same about me. We like to do things together but also don’t resent when one person wants to do something on their own. We make each other laugh, every day. While WFH together has been an adjustment, we adjusted and negotiated boundaries and ground rules to make things work.

      Marriage is not always rainbows and unicorns but it should not leave you feeling “heavy and sad” on a regular basis. My husband and I have disagreements, but they are short-lived and we work through them and things go back to normal, meaning we are both happy and have fun and can solve problems cooperatively. Things are crazy in the world right now but my husband and I have been able to lean on each other in our moments of doubt, or despair, or stress, and help each other through it. If you have a partner who you cannot rely on to help you when you are down, and who makes you feel worse about yourself and your life, that is not okay. I would resume individual counseling over the phone/video call, and I also recommend reading the book “Too good to leave, too bad to stay” which helped several of my friends decide to leave relationships that weren’t working. You deserve better than feeling like you’re feeling, and if this has been going on for years – it is probably time to make a move of some kind. Good luck.

    8. Are you me? I was married for about the same amount of time.

      My husband checked out years ago, and we led really separate lives. Separate bedrooms. It was really sad, and I was drowning. I felt alone even when he was around, because he wasn’t my person anymore, for various and sundry reasons (many his fault, many not).

      I asked for a divorce in early June of 2019. We, at his request, tried therapy (after years of him ignoring me asking to go). It was too late – nothing really changed. I could not make myself forget the years of betrayal and loneliness because he seemed to now recognize, when I was done and ready to leave, that it was a problem. We stopped therapy in November. I moved out in January of 2020 (thank GOD). My divorce will be final in February.

      I don’t think that feeling of dread and loneliness and longing is part of a healthy long term marriage. It think people fall into that, but it’s impossible to correct if your husband is controlling (which is the red flag to me. Get out. Get out. Get out). For me – life was too short to be miserable at 35. So now I’m not. I’ve spent a lot of time alone this year, and it’s still preferable to being alone in a house with someone who wasn’t kind or good for me.

      I also fell into the trap, early on, of telling people that there was no villain and that my ex was a good person who wasn’t right for me. And now? I’m less generous, because he wasn’t always a good person, and he certainly wasn’t good to me. I’m not out on a spear campaign, and I don’t wish him harm or ill, but with some distance, I’m able to see how bad a husband he was, and don’t feel as if I owe him public praise in the process of undoing our marriage.

    9. I decided to leave my marriage when I discovered that my husband had been repeatedly lying to me and taking our money and using it for a purpose I very explicitly disapproved of. But before that, I could have written this message. In a way, I’m glad we came to this breaking point that filled me with enough rage that I packed my stuff and walked out the door. We hadn’t been happy for a while and although I was convinced I would never make it on my own, in the end I am a thousand times better off. I’m with someone else now, but I was happier being single too.

    10. Get out. You have one life to live. Don’t waste years of it being unhappy. This is a solveable problem.

    11. One of my good friends left their partner (Sam sex couple) 5+ years ago because partner had become controlling. They have kids so they still spend a lot of time in each other’s company. Partner did not become less controlling post-breakup, but more, which causes all kinds of issues with shared parenting. And parenting in general for that matter.

      This is despite lots of couples therapy pre-breakup, where partner acknowledged the issue, owned up to the behavior, and promises to change. But obviously none of those changes lasted.

      At the end of the day, controlling people know they’re being controlling. They’re the kind of people who at a fundamental level think they’re right about everything and are not open to thinking about things any other way.

      Your husband is not going to change, OP.

    12. Being demanding and controlling are not attractive traits, so I’m not surprised you don’t feel attracted to him. You don’t describe anything positive or pleasant about your current circumstance. This is not what long term marriage has to feel like, but it is what long term marriage to an unpleasant, incompatible person might feel like.

      Don’t get distracted by a Sunk Cost fallacy. Evaluate the situation on it’s own merits. Do you want this? If no, is there a way to get what you want within the relationship that you haven’t already tried? No shame if the answer to that is no, or if you’re too tired to try or care.

    13. It’s time. Consult with an attorney and start planning your exit. Hugs from an internet stranger.

    14. My in-laws, who have been married over 40 years, still flirt when they think we can’t hear them. You deserve better. And “better” can mean “by yourself.”

    15. No, this isn’t what a long-term marriage feels like. This isn’t what a healthy marriage feels like. It’s ok to leave.

    17. When you say “demanding and controlling” I suggest making a list of the exact behaviors your are referring to and when they occurred – just for yourself. Not for us, not for him, not for your therapist. Look at that list and ask yourself, if my best friend/beloved family member had a spouse who did/said these specific things with this frequency, would I tell her to leave? If the answer is yes then treat yourself just as well.

    19. I was married for 15 years to somebody I now realize was a malignant narcissist. He was critical and controlling and gaslighting and I walked on eggshells the whole time and still could never please him. I had been divorced once before and was DETERMINED not to be a “two time loser,” so I tied myself in knots trying to figure out how to be reasonably happy while married to him. That involved trying to be happy in other areas of my life even though my marriage was a wreck. He traveled more than half the time so that helped. Then towards the end he was working more in town and that was harder. I was DETERMINED to muddle through somehow, but what finally pushed me out the door was when it occurred to me that possibly at some point HE might decide to leave ME, and then it wouldn’t be on my terms, and moreover I’d have wasted more and more good years.

      I left when I was 55. I’m now 62 and married to somebody who is so kind and loving and thinks the sun rises and sets on me. I love him more every day and I thank my lucky stars every day that I had the courage to leave Mr. Awful when I did.

      P.S. I was single for a while between marriages and I am her to tell you that being alone was SO MUCH BETTER than being in that bad marriage. The new guy was just a bonus.

      P.P.S. When I was trying to decide whether to leave I brought it to the ladies here, and the internet strangers were very helpful, most notably in helping me see that my situation was neither normal nor acceptable.

      1. Well done, Senior Attorney. It was 15 years for me as well and once I was gone it was so awful contemplating what felt like all that wasted time. I really grieved for those 15 years. I also found someone new who sounds a lot like your fella and now those lost years don’t seem so monumental. But I still wouldn’t wish it on anyone.

        1. Thanks, PNW. Same to you! And yeah, even though I’m stupidly happy now, sometimes I can’t help thinking that the years from 40 to 55 should literally be the best years of one’s life and I wasted them with a psycho.

    20. Hugs! I am with you. It took me a long time to realize what was happening. I’m in biglaw and everybody is unhappy so it was really jarring when I realized it wasn’t my job making me unhappy but my personal relationship (that and biglaw makes it easy to throw yourself into work to avoid going home).

      Last christmas I realized I was done. because of covid, I didn’t make the clean break. This christmas, I think the gift I give myself is moving out. -_- eep.

      On another note, I found reddit subreddit on divorce and deadbedroom helpful (but you do need to filter through).

      I tried the book “too good leave, too bad to stayed” and also found personal therapy with a specialist on relationships SUPER helpful (and a wonderful commenter here recommended my therapist – Marcie Shulman).

      Also surprisingly helpful for me have been instagram accounts about relationships and healing.

    21. My usual advice, consolidated:

      1. Is the other person willing to change? If so, pray/hope for patience and forgiveness and work on the marriage.

      2. Would you rather be single than be married? I think a lot of people leave marriages too soon when they assume that they will be snapped up by some hot, amazing, rich person and go riding off into the sunset. In reality, they find that dating is (shocker) hard and sucky.

      I get flamed for this because people, usually women, erroneously read this as anti-single. It’s not. The proper analysis is not to assume that you’re going to meet someone great; it’s to compare what is certain and known (building your own life as a single person) with what is also known and certain (the marriage as it is now).

      3, or maybe 2a: If you leave, do not date immediately. People who are in dysfunctional relationship patterns have a hard time breaking out of them.

    22. Not sure why my long post was removed, but I left after 15 years and my only regret is that I waited so long.

      1. And there it is. So weird. I guess I had my browser on “collapse.” Sorry.

  15. Anyone else dread long family visits? My in laws were in town this weekend and all we ever do with them is sit around at the house all day visiting. It feels mind numbing to have to sit around for hours on end, especially when they only really want to hear about what my husband has been up to. I thankfully had breaks to watch the kids play outside or pick up food. I don’t even visit with my own family for that long and no one thinks anything if at my parents’ house, I will go into the other room or play on my phone for a bit. It is exhausting to have to visit for such long periods with anyone!

    1. I felt like this every time I visited my ex’s family. It all felt so forced, including the forced family group games like Pictionary and Charades. It was exhausting. It honestly made me love my family more – they are so laid back, my parents will talk to anyone about anything, and the holidays are filled with relaxing, movie watching, and napping, although no one turns a side eye if someone disappears for a little while to do their own thing.

    2. Yes. I often keep myself busy with extra housework to give DH some space to spend one on one with his parents or kids one on one with grandparents. I also try to plan a few activities like – we’re going to make hot chocolate and walk around the neighborhood to look at the lights, do you want to come with us?

    3. I think the biggest thing with long family time is to give yourself the space to not sit around the entire time – I would treat visits with the in-laws the same way you do with your parents, especially if it’s in your own house.

      Activities are key – maybe instead of picking up food, you plan an elaborate dinner that involves you being in the kitchen prepping for a long time. I would much prefer chatting while doing that rather than sitting and visiting.

      Two years ago my in-laws talked us into going on a Christmas family vacation for a week, and in anticipation of this problem and not wanting to have the TV on all week, I brought a 1000 piece puzzle. First time it started to drag a little bit, I popped out the puzzle and started doing it. It became a thing that we all did together for the week.

      That said, we didn’t have any kids around. I now have a 1.5 year old nephew and I would never attempt that right now. Instead now we all just basically play with him and that’s fun.

    4. You could’ve cancelled due to the pandemic. Easiest excuse ever. Why didn’t you if you hate their visits so much?

        1. He can like them over Zoom like so many of us HAVE to do this year. He’s not special.

    5. You need activities. Even my BFF and I can’t sit around for 6 hours and just talk to each other. Cookies. Movies. Games. Something!

    6. Totally. I’ve learned about myself over the years that I can only go about 2 days of being a Good Guest before I need a break. Usually I’ll find a way to exercise alone or take a walk with my husband. I also make a point of not doomscrolling, especially in the evenings. I have to use my wind-down-before-bed time to read or watch an actual show, and that helps too.

    7. It’s hard to do during Covid times but during non Covid times setting up a coffee with an old school friend who is in the area, doing my usual exercise routine either in a local gym or by going for a run, running to a florist to get some flowers, running to a bakery for a fun cake, etc., have all been life savers. Just plan ahead.

    8. Honestly I don’t love it, but I also take the opportunity to take a nap and let them babysit. Like I’ll hang out and chat, but I definitely take hours longs breaks to nap or lay in bed and watch Netflix.

    9. My in-laws also mostly sit and talk to my husband; he would probably stay the same about my family. It was a major epiphany a few years into our relationship when I realized they are also introverts and readers who would truly prefer we all mostly sat in silence instead of making obligatory small-talk. Count me in! I also second the puzzle that someone suggested above; it is one of our traditions too.

      TLDR: if they don’t seem interested in chatting with you, maybe you are off the hook.

    10. I thought it was just me?! Some international
      family will visit for a couple weeks on end and it drives me insane, and I get petty. Little things like them not cleaning up after themselves, as if I’m here to serve them. They’re lovely but as it would be with any long visit, it’s so draining, and I dread it for the next time, and I don’t know how to set boundaries or raise little things (like please don’t eat directly out of the ice cream container, please be careful with X (which will inevitably break). Sorry, I clearly need advice as well!

    11. Knitting is great for being in the same room but having a legitimate reason to not pay attention.

      It’s a lot easier to sit with them if you can do something else in the room.

      1. Ha, I’m rewatching Downton Abbey and this is how those ladies sat through insufferable afternoons in the parlor.

    12. I dread when my 27 yr old daughter comes to visit. I love her but I feel like she judges me and disapproves of my “materialistic” lifestyle. A lot of that has benefited her directly ( paid for her ivy education, funded a trust for her etc…) I’m a SVP of finance at a Fortune 100 company. DH is a CFO. Earned everything we have. I never judge her. It hurts my feelings and Im always relieved whens she leaves.

  16. I have a couple of vintage wool sweaters that I think need a wash – they might be dusty or something since they seem to be irritating my eyes. What’s everyone’s favorite technique for handwashing wool? What kind of soap should I use? The sweaters are from the 1950s and 60s and I definitely don’t want to screw them up.

    1. Dilute some baby shampoo in a sink and let them sit there. Cold water. DO NOT AGITATE
      Rinse thoroughly. DO NOT AGITATE, DO NOT WRING OUT – squeeze between 2 towels if necessary
      Lay flat to dry, reshaping if necessary.

      1. I do this except I use Dawn dish soap. I’m a knitter and wash a lot of wool this way.

        Really do lay flat to dry if you can. A lot of wool will stretch lengthwise, sometimes a lot, if you hang it in any way while it’s wet.

      2. Baby shampoo is easy on the eyes but harsh on wool (it is very drying). I second the dish soap recommendation, or even just regular shampoo, unless you go for a specific wool wash like Eucalan or Soak.

    2. I wash the in the sink – fill up the sink with a very small amount of woollite and water, let them soak, gently swirl, drain and gently squeeze out the water, rinse under the tap, let it soak in clean non-soapy water, gently press, and spin in a salad spinner. Lay flat to dry.

      1. Hm, wouldn’t putting them in a salad spinner count as agitating, which someone advised against above? Thanks all for the responses.

        1. Not really, it’s not moving around in the spinner or rubbing against anything if that makes sense. It stays against the side of the basket in one place and the water goes out. It doesn’t make my sweaters fuzzy.

    3. I like no-rinse detergent for this. I use Soak because it’s lanolin-free. If you are not sensitive to lanolin, then Eucalan would be a good choice for wool sweaters (do not use on synthetics).

      2. I’m the knitter above and I also like Euclan. I wanted to recommend Dawn because it’s more likely someone has this at home. But if you want to save on the rinsing step and don’t mind buying a product, OP, by all means try the euclan.

        I like the lavender version because it apparently repels moths after its washed.

  17. Good news – I managed to book a flu jab for tomorrow! I fall in this weird overlap where my doctor tells me I have to get one but I don’t qualify for the priority lists so I organise it myself. Normally that’s not a problem but obviously supply has been prioritised this year.

    (For the record and given the train station footage from London on Saturday, I want to say that my own journey on Friday was totally safe. The operator I use limits occupancy considerably and there were 4 people in my train carriage for the whole journey, all at least eight feet apart from each other, with enhanced AC and cleaning all the way).

    2. Oh good job! Supply was ridiculous this year, I booked them on the day they were first available and had to go with a weird time and location.

    3. Wow! Everyone brags about the NHS but you haven’t been able to get a flu shot until now? They were readily available to me, no priority list or waiting, from September on.

      1. No, because people who really-really-really need one got priority over people who pay for a private one. Frustrating but fair.

  18. Does anyone have any links to guidance on how to interact with others after vaccination? If my MIL is an essential worker and was vaccinated last week, can she visit us indoors over New Years? Should we still wear masks around her?

    (Spoiler: My DH and I have very different philosophies on this and I can’t find any data to support either of our stances.)

    1. Laurel Bristow (kinggutterbaby) on Instagram has had some good stuff on this – essentially you’re not protected until two weeks after the second dose, so maintain full caution until then, and only after that can you ease off.

    2. Short answer: no, you still need to treat her as someone who is exposed at work, who is a possible vector, and you should only see her masked, outdoors.
      Longer answer:
      1) Incomplete protection: if she was vaccinated last week, on New Years she will only be just eligible/almost eligible for her second dose (21 days). Therefore she will not fully have immunity built up yet. So you cannot depend on the vaccine working yet. She needs to wait till 14 days after second dose (I believe) before she can expect to receive full benefits of vaccination.
      2) Unclear if it prevents asymptomatic infection/transmission: What we know about the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines is that there were ~94% fewer symptomatic COVID cases in the vaccine group vs. the placebo group. The way the studies were designed, there is no data yet available for Pfizer and limited data available on Moderna as to whether the vaccine prevents asymptomatic infection, or simply prevents developing symptomatic prevention. While it may turn out that these vaccines completely stop someone from being infected with COVID-19, we absolutely do not know that at this time. We only know that it stops people from getting sick enough to have symptoms. Therefore, until we know more, anyone who gets a vaccine could still be infected and transmitting COVID and therefore should still wear a mask and social distance from others who have not been vaccinated. (Yes, I know that most people are not likely to follow this guidance, but that doesn’t make it wrong). Hopefully we will get more data as we go along, but *right now we have to assume that vaccinated people can still transmit COVID to others and act accordingly.*

    3. It is unknown whether your MIL can transmit COVID to you even if she doesn’t get sick herself. If she was vaccinated last week, she is not fully protected yet since it’s a two-dose vaccine. Yes, you should wear masks if you must visit.

    4. And since you asked for links to guidance-

      NYTimes rundown of this question: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/12/08/health/covid-vaccine-mask.html

      From Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Resource Center:
      Will we still need to wear masks and practice physical distancing once a vaccine is available?
      We will still need to wear masks and practice physical distancing until a large proportion of the population is vaccinated and we are sure the vaccine provides long-term protection. Initially, we will not have enough vaccine to vaccinate everyone who wants the vaccine and the virus will still be transmitted.

      Although the phase 3 clinical trials are designed to determine whether vaccinated individuals are protected against disease, it will also be important to understand whether vaccinated individuals are less likely to transmit the virus. This is likely but not ensured. If a vaccine not only protects against disease but reduces transmission, and continues to do so for many years, we are likely to reach a state of herd protection when masks and physical distancing will no longer be required. Herd protection is achieved when a sufficient proportion of the population is made non-infectious through vaccination or natural infection so that the likelihood of an infectious individual transmitting to a susceptible individual is very low.

      Link:https://coronavirus.jhu.edu/vaccines/vaccines-faq

    6. My understanding is that the vaccine will prevent her from getting very, very sick, but it’s less clear about whether she will be able to transmit it to others. (Source: Dear Pandemic). Plus, I assume she hasn’t had her second shot yet.

    9. Are you concerned about whether she can still infect you or whether you can still infect her? The answers may differ.

      1. Honestly at this point it’s mostly about her infecting us. She’s an essential worker at a hospital and in her mind, she doesn’t care if we infect her, she just wants to see her grandchildren. The first shot (yes I know there’s two shots) is 50% effective and her argument is that the FDA was only hoping for 50% efficacy in the first place and waiting to get to 95% is just being excessively cautious. My DH is starting to wear down under her constant pressure and is thinking maybe she can visit indoors as long as she wears a mask.

        My thought is that we need to wait until we’re all vaccinated before we would do an indoors unmasked visit, and probably also that long until an indoors masked visit given her higher risks of exposure at any given time. I know how to google – but to me it’s unclear whether a vaccinated person can still transmit the virus so it’s hard to understand what kind of a risk we’re debating. I get that the current CDC guidance says we’ll all need to keep masking and social distancing even if everyone is vaccinated until we reach herd immunity, but if that’s true and we’re years out from hugging grandma in the winter I think our risk calculus becomes a different one.

        1. Did you see my thorough answer to this question above? Or do you just not want to hear an answer if it’s ambiguous? **We literally don’t know yet if a vaccinated person can still transmit.** We will hopefully know sooner than “years” from now, as the clinical trials are still ongoing and researchers also would like to know the answer to this question. For now, we have to assume that she can still spread it to you. I think she could visit you briefly indoors while masked but I would limit the duration, and it would still be better for it to be outdoors if you want to be 100% sure she won’t spread it to you until everyone is vaccinated.

    10. This isn’t a question of “philosophy.” This is a two-dose shot, so why you are considering her protected after only her first dose doesn’t make any sense. Moreover, of course you would still wear masks around her and stay socially distant and avoid extended indoor gatherings. The vaccination is not a get out of jail free card.

    11. Spouse is a healthcare worker who has gotten the first dose. You know what’s going to change about how he interacts with people once he gets the second dose? Not a darn thing. Still 100% masked and socially distant (except in the context of necessary patient examinations / care, of course), no socializing outside of our immediate household, nothing other than work, groceries, and home. I am surprised anyone would think otherwise.

    12. What is the downside of wearing masks around her? Why wouldn’t you? Don’t tell me, let me guess, does husband have the “philosophy” that wearing a mask is a big imposition?

  19. Maybe an odd questions but does anyone know where I can get a gel or comfort mat that is not super thick? Gelpro and similar ones are 3/4″ but I’m looking for something a little slimmer, maybe 1/2″ tops. I know it won’t be as cushy but that’s ok.

    1. Do you mean something like a yoga mat? Or those foam puzzle squares for kids? Or a more robust version like for a workshop?

  20. A query for cat owners: My indoor cat has suddenly started shedding a lot more than usual. I’m finding these tufts of fur everywhere. It’s not really shedding season, so what could be going on? Kitty is eating and drinking fine, and his behavior seems normal. Could it be stress from having his humans around all the time? He is an elderly kitty, if that makes a difference. (17!)

    1. Do you notice him scratching or grooming more than usual? Any changes in the environment – like food or possibly new detergent or something that could be causing an allergic reaction?

      I would keep an eye on him to see if he is getting any bald or bare spots. I have one kitty who was diagnosed with allergies and he had bald spots where he would groom and chew too much.

    2. This was the first sign of intestinal cancer for my last cat. I would take your cat to the vet immediately

    4. That symptom might be serious, especially in an older cat. Please take the cat to the vet right away.

  21. Does anybody have experience managing migraines that last for days? Looking back I think I’ve always had these headaches, but didn’t realize they were migraines until this year when they got a lot more frequent (I assume due to stress). I have Imitrex and it definitely stops the migraines but I do get side effects and I was told by the pharmacist not to take it too frequently because of the risk of rebound migraines. But, when I do take it I feel better the day I take it but still have headaches for a few days after.

    1. New migraine treatments are always coming out, but different things work for different people. The specialist to see is a headache neurologist (your local research hospital or hospital system is likely to have a neurologist who only sees headache patients and is highly expert compared to a general neurology neurologist or a primary care doctor).

    2. No advice but I am in the same boat! Had a migraine last week, took treximet, another migraine the next and then the next. I was so anxious about whether I would get one four days in a row which has never happened before! I will say that treximet has been very good for me usually. Good luck!

    3. Yes, my migraines last 72 hrs exactly. When I take a triptan on day 1 or 2, there is a high likelihood it comes back the next day in a different location. I’m alerting my PCP on this, but I do have success taking a second triptan dose at that point. Note – I don’t take more in a row than that, and I’m not taking more that 6 per month either.

    4. Talk to your doctor, it means your imitrex isn’t working. There are lots of other acutely meds to try. Your pharmacist is giving you good advice to avoid rebound headaches, such a nasty cycle. You may need to consider preventative meds as well, they can reduce frequency and also intensity. Topamax is usually the go to as far as I know.

    5. Agree that you should talk to your doctor, or even better, a headache specialist if you haven’t seen one already. There are different medications you can try to stop a headache once you get one and they can also talk to you about a daily preventative (won’t be imitrex or anything like it, something safe to take every day).

    6. I started taking Namenda in February and have had only 3-4 migraines since- last summer/fall it was 5-6 a month, sometimes more. Maybe something to ask your doctor about!

      The only migraines I’ve had since starting Namenda was after we upped another med I’m on. Went back down and they stopped again.

  22. I need some suggestions from the group as to how to make an office holiday celebration safer. This is happening, so comments about whether it should be happening are not helpful at all. We are gathering the ~20 people in my office for a holiday lunch this week. The food will be catered in individual boxes, so there is no concern about passing the virus through home prepared foods, buffet service, or common serving implements. We will gather in our conference room, which does not provide for full 6-foot distancing, to eat. It is important to my partners that it not be everyone retreating back to their own offices, just having been given a free meal. And they’ve had some practice group lunches a few times recently in the same space (though I did not attend). We have been open for the duration, so most of us are in the same spaces several times a week already, and we’ve not had anyone contract the virus (just one person’s wife but he stayed negative). We mask when not in our individual offices unless eating or drinking (or occasionally when on Zoom in pairs behind closed doors). We will be cleaning down the room before and after the event. But we will obviously need to unmask during the meal. I am thinking of other protocols to put in place. I am thinking of forcing everyone to use hand sanitizer on the way into the conference room just to be sure. Should we be checking temperatures like we do for clients? And everyone will need to toss their own cutlery/box/plate, etc. I have suggested to everyone that family should not drop by as they usually would, but that may be a losing battle for some (though generally people who have made several trips into the office already this month so not really new to the mix). What other steps can I suggest to make this “safer”?

    1. OK, no. Don’t come here again with this “this is happening, so don’t tell me it shouldn’t.” Obviously this is a horrendous idea. There is no way to make it safe or even “safer.” Don’t come here and tr011 when we are entering the darkest days of a dark year.

    2. I shouldn’t take the bait, but if this is a fake post, F off. If this is a real post, also F off.

      2. This. I would be totally boycotting this ridiculous thing and everybody else involved should be, too.

    3. There is no amount of hand sanitizer that will protect you or anyone else from COVID in this situation. JFC.

    4. Oh for sh!t’s sake. This is dumb. You can’t even distance properly, so your office is literally worse than dining out at a restaurant. There is no way to make this “safer,” unless you move the party outdoors, or spread out more (even then, that’s risky).

      Sorry not sorry I didn’t follow your rules about offering constructive feedback, but your office s*cks.

      1. I won’t even stop at “her office sucks.” She sucks for this fake af post. Even if this party is happening, which I doubt, the coming here to post with the oh-so-genuine concerns about making it safer is incredibly transparent.

    6. Here’s what you can suggest: cancel it.

      But since it’s all about you, I doubt that will happen. Hopefully no one ends up dead!

      As I said last week on a similar selfish person doing a stupid thing post, get F-ed.

      1. She just wants attention. If this were actually happening, she could have Googled for “tips on making it safer,” but she thought it would be a nice holiday stress-post for everyone reading here. OP, maybe you should also put this on blast on Facebook and Nextdoor (or let me guess, V Kontakte?) just to scare your elderly family and neighbors too.

    7. I mean it’s mainly spread via air so all the hand sanitizer in the world will not help you and there’s nothing you can do to make this dangerous situation any safer unless you fake sick and call out. It’s also such a weird post to ask this group, fake or not. You cannot possibly still be confused about how Covid works.

      1. If my office pulled this stunt and invited me to said lunch, I would be job searching immediately. If my bosses were insisting that I organize such an event, I would be job searching immediately. Playing fast and loose during a pandemic is not OK. It is not necessary to have a holiday lunch.

        1. My office attempted to schedule a “what to do about the pandemic meeting” with a catered lunch back in March. Enough people said they wouldn’t be attending that it was canceled. At least they had the excuse that the pandemic was a new concept at the time!

    8. You make this safe by lodging a complaint with your local health department and having it shut down.

      2. Yes, I really wish people would start being held PERSONALLY RESPONSIBLE for planning, participating, attending, “requiring” activities like this.

      3. Some people on this list really need to get a handle on the concept that not every jurisdiction is treating this the same. In many, many locations this would not be the tiniest bit unlawful and the local health department would just tell you so.

        I agree that it is stupid but some of us (still) have jobs in places that are not closed down and if we need income and need to work, there is not a whole lot we can do about it. If I quit because I do not think it is safe, I am not eligible for unemployment, lose my health insurance, and cannot pay my mortgage.

        I am an attorney. Our courts are open, we are having trials, and that means court staff has to be there. And our physical location is not set up for distancing.

        1. Yes, this is the case here. My health department would not be interested at all in this information. And no, we are not a comparative hot spot, duly suffering from bad policy, though of course there isn’t really anywhere that the virus is not spreading at an alarming rate.

        2. I mean, having to come in and do your job is super different from squishing 20 people in a room together where they will talk and eat with their masks off? People can come in and wear their masks all day and mostly, if they are lucky, not get covid (especially if they stay distanced at their desks, etc). But having a bunch of people in a small space unmasked for festivities is a pretty much guarantee that if one of the 20 people has COVID some of the others will leave with COVID. Whether or not its illegal isn’t really the question here?

          1. But we already eat together in smaller groups daily? And sit at cubicles? I am not saying it has to be illegal to be problematic? I came here saying it is problematic and asking for advice on possible ways to make it “safe-ish”?
            Maybe I will just set an example and grab my box and go sit in the waiting room where there are a few distanced chairs? I know most people on this board are of a higher character than I am and so they have money to quit their jobs but I will have to save a few months in order to last a few weeks without a job but maybe I can do that to prove a point?

          2. This is like asking how to make s3x without a condom safe enough to lower the risk of transmitting STIs. It can’t be done.

    9. I mean if someone is positive and happens to be contagious it’s going to spread through the air. There’s nothing you can do about that. It’s a very bad look for the partners to be encouraging people to stay in the room just because the employees were given a “free meal”. I don’t feel that my firm providing me a $15 lunch means I should thank them by potentially getting COVID. I’m less risk-averse than the majority of posters here but I think this is crossing a line. I’ll take risks for certain things but hanging out with my co-workers is not one of them. My firm actually still does holiday parties too but they are fully optional and I do not attend. I already had COVID and live alone so I’m not avoiding the office parties for fear of being exposed. I avoid office parties because of the message it sends and I want to perpetuate to the more junior staff and attorneys that its ok for them not to attend as well. I would urge you to consider that.

    10. My suggestion is stay home and say you have a cough and don’t want to risk infecting others.

    11. This is insane. None of your hygiene theater will make this any safer. If anyone has Covid there congrats, you’re a super spreader event. Stop being pig ignorant.

    12. This is not a fake post. This event is happening in my office on Wednesday. I was not consulted and I am not organizing. I am trying to salvage any potential threads of safety I can knowing this is going forward. If I bring suggestions, they will be heard and likely followed. But I am not sure what will help and thought others might have dealt with similar and have creative thoughts on the matter. Also, I am not saying the partners think they should be thanked for a measly free meal. They want this to be meaningful beyond just a free meal. Again, since we’ve all been congregating somewhat throughout, they are aware of but not moved by the fact this is not within recommendations. We are also not deniers. For a lot of reasons, fully shutting down and moving to WFH for everyone was impractical and they want to salvage some morale since we used to be extremely social with each other, not just co-workers.

      1. You make it safer by not having it, not going and letting those around you (and especially those junior to you) know they also can make the decision for themselves not to attend. Full. Effing. Stop.

      3. Nothing will help. The partners have their heads up their a$$es. If morale is bad now, how bad do they think it’ll get once half the office has covid?

      4. Uh, you are obviously deniers if you are having an indoor lunch without adequate distancing.

      5. If it is a seated meal, what about putting a row of seats behind (around) the table, so that maybe some people can spread out? I don’t think it would hurt to encourage use of hand sanitizer and take temps too. Maybe see if you can encourage it to be a shorter event (or for yourself, say that you have a conference call in a half hour and can’t stay long)?

      6. Find a way to ensure appropriate social distancing. Set up multiple conference rooms that are connected by zoom – everyone can see everyone else but fewer people are in each space. Or have lunch in shifts? Move the lunch to somewhere larger, like the reception area or even in the hallways?

      7. Is there is a bigger room that you can have it or even move it outside? If not, if the lobby is bigger, could you all meet there, let the partners make a small speech, and then say everyone is free to eat lunch in the conference room (or not)?

      8. If you have to go thru with it, make everyone take their $15 plate of pasta back to their office, or better yet, “grab ‘n go” leaving the premises immediately after waiving at the manageing partner. We are allowed to eat in our offices, even tho it means the mice will have more places to find food. I suggest you make it mandatory to let people grab their plate of pasta and leave the conference room. PTOOEY!

      9. You make it safer by telling these people who are supposedly receptive to your input that everyone should pick up their free meal and go back to their desks to attend a zoom party where they eat in their own office with the door closed.

      10. Other than not having it, you assign slots for people to take off their masks and eat while everyone else keeps their masks on so maybe not more than 3 people have masks off at a time

      11. I believe you. The last week of November, my office announced that our Christmas party was scheduled for December 6, meaning within a week of everyone returning from various Thanksgiving gatherings. The party was going to be a multi-course seated meal inside a restaurant. I was trying to figure out how to avoid going without sabotaging my career. My boss (a) believes Covid is overblown because he had it and was fine, and (b) strongly believes in the value of Christmas parties.

        Apparently, plenty of people objected to the party, especially because our office had more confirmed Covid cases over Thanksgiving. It was canceled. Most of the money is being saved for a post-vaccination social event. The office did pass out a picnic lunch and let us go home early on the day of the canceled party.

      12. I don’t know what possible morale you will salvage when some of your workers wind up with Covid. This is just grade-A stupid. The fact that you’ve already been congregating together – which may be necessary in the course of doing your job — doesn’t mean “hey, we should add unmasked congregating to the equation.”

    13. This is like saying that you are planning on giving everyone drinks and then have them drive home, but you’ll take steps to keep it safe by checking everyone’s tires to make sure they are at the right pressure. This is a dumb idea right now.

    14. In addition to what everyone else said, the “it is important to my partners that it not be everyone retreating back to their own offices, just having been given a free meal” part is absolutely ridiculous. Do the partners need to see their employees chewing and making yummy noises while eating to feel their gesture is adequately appreciated? I absolutely hate the “we did something nice for you, now appreciate it in the way that I deem acceptable” attitude, especially in the workplace. It would be annoying and ungenerous in normal times and is unsafe now.

      Additionally, the vast majority of the risk doesn’t come from the food and serving utensils, it comes from eating in the shared space! You might as well all eat from a shared trough for all the good that your “precautions” are doing in preventing Covid. If I were your employee, I would either grab my box and go, or just not pick it up at all.

      1. I think I clarified elsewhere, but my phrasing was bad. “Just having been given a free meal” should read “only having been given a free meal.” They don’t want it to be simply an empty and measly gesture. I can absolutely see that attitude in other law firms, but I assure you that is not the case here. It was just poor wording on my part. All of that, of course, does not address the safety issue at all.

        1. I feel like this is a “but this is worse. you do see how this is worse right?” meme.

        2. Wait, so are you saying that eating in a room with others should be considered a benefit in addition to the boxed lunch? It’s not. The gesture will be *more* appreciated, not less if people are allowed to take their meals and leave.

    15. I would make this safer for myself by calling in sick that day. This is a ridiculous activity right now and your bosses are ridiculous for insisting that it happen. Do yourself a favor, and find a new job. Actually – do you work for the Trump administration? Because they’re the only people I know of openly doing stupid stuff like this. In which case, you should be looking for a new job anyway.

  23. My entire province (Ontario, Canada) is anticipated to be going into lockdown as of Dec. 24th. I live in Toronto, where we have been under a lockdown order that was set to expire today, and I was intending on going home to my parents’ place tomorrow (in a non-locked-done zone a short drive from Toronto) and staying for Christmas. When I told my mom the news and explained that it meant that even their region would be locked down (which means no indoor gatherings outside the household) and asked if this means our Christmas is cancelled, she said that “she considers us [meaning her and my dad, myself, my siblings and their significant others] to be a household” and that it would not be cancelled. Obviously, I know that this is not what a “household” actually means legally, and I bristled at my mom’s disregard of the new rules. I’ve already cancelled my NYE party that I was planning on hosting. BUT I’m probably still going to go home so that I don’t have to spend Christmas day alone with my dog, and can see my parents who I haven’t seen for months. I assume my siblings and their significant others will also be joining, which will make it technically 5 households joining, but only one family. I feel very shitty about my decision to still go given the new lockdown order, but not shitty enough to not do it, as I don’t feel I am putting anyone at risk by going home to see my family. I anticipate that this is going to be the response of majority of people. I’m wondering what the government is trying to achieve by having a lockdown order start on Christmas Eve? Also, if anyone can point out some actual harm being done by still going home, I’d love to consider it. Trying to be a good citizen but this is the one day of the year where family time (to me) is paramount.

    1. Do your own research. Even a cursory Google search will show you the “actual harm” you claim to be unable to find. If you want to be a good citizen, stay home. We are ALL going through the same pandemic and you are not special. As for what the government is “trying to achieve,” it’s less loss of life – as you obviously already know.

      1. OP here – I should have worded this more clearly. Obviously “less loss of life” is the goal. What I am getting at is that I think most people are going to disregard the lockdown order on Christmas Day, which the government certainly knows, so I don’t see what starting the lockdown on Dec. 24th is going to achieve, vs. starting it on Dec. 26th. I also don’t see a causal relationship between me and my siblings (each of whom has been tested recently) going home for Christmas and more people dying.

        1. If you’re going to flout the rules, do it without posting here looking for headpats. kthanks

        2. They are desperately hoping that people will obey so that you don’t end up with overflowing ICUs. They realize some people will be dumb as rocks about it (see your family) but if some families have enough sense to realize that compliance with public health directives in a pandemic saves lives, then there will be less spread. They will take any amount they can get at this point.

          Metaphorically, it’s like the final months of a war and instead of staying hunkered down in your trench like the general is yelling at you to do, you have decided that since peace talks are ongoing you can just climb out of your trench and relax in the sun and expect to not get shot. It’s going to be MONTHS before you get vaccinated. Stop creating potential superspreader events.

        3. I’m also in Toronto. Gatherings are also important; all the time, not just now but especially now. We are all abiding by the regulations. Not keen on being the accidental transmitter to anyone.

    2. Five households is still a lot, even though you are family. I’m not going to waste my breath talking you out of this plan because it’s pretty clear that you’re going to do whatever you want to do.

      1. +1 people could die. Signed a very irritated Ontario resident who is tired of Toronto people coming to my city to skirt the regulations. Just follow the GD law!

        1. Right? SO MUCH more dangerous outside of the bigger cities. At least in the bigger cities then can move patients between hospitals and have good ICU capacity. Many rural hospitals have minimal ICU capacity to begin with.

    4. You sound like a smart person who must be capable of understanding “contagion” as a concept. I understand you feel nostalgic about a “day of the year,” but try to think this through after setting emotion aside.

    5. I am confused how it matters that you are all the same family. You can all give the virus to each other. If anything, the probability is higher with family, because it’s extremely unlikely that you will wear masks in your family home, or sit far apart with the windows open, or refrain from hugs.

      1. DH’s extended family gathered for Thanksgiving. Several households, of course, because faaaaamily is paramount at the holidays. Nobody was sick (i.e., thought they were sick), but surprise, surprise, two people tested positive the week after that stupid gathering. So glad that we didn’t go, not that we ever entertained the idea.

        There. Anecdata for “actual harm.”

    6. Can people just stop asking for the hives blessing to do things that are a) dangerous or b) violate the rules? Just don’t what you’re going to do.

      1. +1. JFC, don’t do these things and if you must, don’t advertise it or look for reassurance that it’s okay. It’s not okay and if anyone is “killing Grandma,” you are.

    7. “I’m wondering what the government is trying to achieve by having a lockdown order start on Christmas Eve?” — They are trying to stop people from doing the exact thing that you are going to do.

      “Also, if anyone can point out some actual harm being done by still going home, I’d love to consider it.” — If you can’t see the difference between the situations in Alberta/Ontario vs. Atlantic Canada The actual harm is the spreading around of covid. Unless everyone in your group (all 5 families) have not left their houses for the last two weeks – someone likely has covid or has been exposed to someone with covid.

      If you’re wondering why Atlantic Canada is miles ahead of the rest of the country and has no community spread, it’s because we don’t do dumb shit like this. This is dumb as rocks.

    8. “I’m wondering what the government is trying to achieve by having a lockdown order start on Christmas Eve?” I speculate about the justification of many laws. That doesn’t mean I feel free to disregard those I disagree with. You’ve acknowledged that your mom’s interpretation is not what it “actually means legally” so you’re announcing that you’re going to break the law and you want us to tell you that’s compatible with being “a good citizen”? “if anyone can point out some actual harm being done by still going home, I’d love to consider it.” Are you asking us to explain how asymptomatic contagion spreads and/or what covid tests can and can’t tell you? If yes, I can find you some helpful links.

      1. Is this a real question? They are trying to stop the EXACT THING YOU ARE PLANNING TO DO.

        Here is So Cal people disregarded the order not to travel/gather on Thanksgiving, and guess what? We are out of ER beds, we are at something like 150 cases per 100,000 people (national average is like 64), and things are just wildly out of control and looking to get worse because of Christmas. We had been managing okay up until Thanksgiving but the family gatherings just made everything explode.

        For Pete’s sake. Just don’t.

    9. Yes, we get it, you and you alone are the one exception to the rule. You can see your parents on Zoom like everyone else this year. And you were seriously planning to host a NYE party??

    10. Oh look, your little super spreader event won’t be techincally legal because the lockdown doesn’t start until the 26th – https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/covid-19-ontario-december-21-lockdown-orders-1.5849760

      ” ‘If we fail to take actions now, the consequences will be catastrophic,’ Ford said. ‘We need to do everything in our power to protect our hospitals and our most vulnerable.’ […] Over the past four weeks, officials said, there have been a 69.3 per cent increase in overall hospitalizations of patients with COVID-19 and an 83.1 per cent jump in the number of patients requiring intensive care.”

      For non-Canadians, Ford is basically the Boris Johnson of Canada. Conservative and anti-govt intervention. Which means the public health recommendations were likely stronger than what he actually agreed to put in place, hence the start on Dec 26 instead of Dec 24.

    11. OH MY GOD. Doctors and nurses on Canadian Covid units in tears BEGGING you to do the right thing isn’t enough? Moving children from pediatric ICUs to double-bunk them elsewhere so adults can move into their ICU’s isn’t enough? Cancelling surgeries isn’t enough? What the hell?

      Are you even Canadian? (JK, there are lots of Canadians as selfish as you are being).

      Get a grip. Stay home with your dog and zoom your parents. Otherwise you are not even TRYING to “be a good citizen.”

    1. I haven’t tried it but I’ve been taking zoom classes at a local yoga studio and I really like having live classes vs doing a recording. I hope they keep doing them after things go back to normal.

    2. I’ve been doing it since March and like it a lot. I love the variety of classes and fun instructors. Highly recommend. There are usually some promo codes out there for a free week or month so look around before you sign up.

  25. Based on the posts on a board full of supposedly smart women, JFC, no wonder the pandemic is out of control. Everyone thinks they’re an exception to the rule and that they’ve outsmarted the safety recommendations. It is so disappointing.

    1. I know. It’s a real slap in the face to the posters who have lost immediate family in recent weeks in particular.

    2. I don’t think anyone thinks they’re the exception or that they have “outsmarted” anything. People are just looking to discuss their individual situations with other smart women. You can be smart and understand the situation but still struggle emotionally with the reality of applying it to your individual life. I don’t see anything wrong with mulling over ideas and issues at the tail end of a very difficult year. I personally have had my mind changed a few times by thoughtful responses from others here. It’s the people who respond with sarcasm and needless jabs without actual helpful information that are the problem IMO.

      1. FWIW, when I see these questions come up and people immediately responding with insults and accusations, all I think is that the ones with those responses are individuals who have nothing even approaching an informed, rational opinion on any of this, and should be immediately disregarded. You hurt your own cause.

        1. This. Have they ever understood the concept of nuance? It’s incredibly difficult to make some of these risk calculations and moreso when you’ve lost a family member. When your mother has lost a sibling to Covid and wants to seek comfort by gathering her kids and their families for the first holiday without said sibling, it is HARD to say no and even harder to be the only kid pushing back.

          It feels like some of these people not only never drive above the speed limit, but somehow also avoid all roads where someone else might drive above the speed limit. Yes we know there are rules and there are consequences to a wider group of people, but there are also nuances to applying those rules and we take calculated risks every day. This isn’t a new concept and it’s not unique to our current worldview.

          1. One would think if one has lost a sibling to Covid, one would care even more passionately / be even more insistent about celebrating the upcoming holidays via Zoom and keeping the rest of the family safe.

          2. Welcome to adulting, it’s hard AF sometimes. And maybe what you say to your mom is ‘we are not coming because we don’t want to risk losing you like we lost aunt susie’.

          3. What I see is people thinking in terms of “rules” and “being good” and “being reasonable” when the virus isn’t going to reward anyone for being good or having really good reasons for breaking the rules. It’s not a hypothetical that people’s poor choices are driving spread right now, but people want to take on unnecessary risks without feeling guilty and they want to be told what they’re doing is okay.

            Imagine if someone came on here and explained that the food they prepared for a family gathering was recalled, and in fact it did seem off, but the holiday just is not the same without this traditional dish, and of course we all take calculated risks every day. So they should serve it, right?

          4. I have lost a family member, and thus, no — I don’t see nuance in this situation.

          5. The decision not to attend or host an indoor lunch with coworkers right now should be the easiest decision you make in your entire life.

        2. You are deluded if you “immediately disregard” people telling you your special plan for the holidays is unsafe.

          1. No one’s said anything to me personally, but you’re deluded if you think telling people who are experiencing human issues to get bent is going to convince anyone that you know or understand anything.

          2. Pretty sure people who are miserable AND STILL DOING THE RIGHT THING understand what’s going on better than people who are pretty sure they’re totally special/exempt/thinking “I’ve been really good for months let me have my one special day!”

            The messaging has been clear for months. Public health officials have been pleading with people to do the right thing since March. Clearly, that hasn’t been effective for many people including the women on this board who just have to have their special trip/lunch/holiday gathering/party.

            This sucks for everyone. But the only way we are going to not have this drag on is if people don’t see themselves as exempt from staying home, wearing a mask when out, limiting unnecessary outings, and doing the right thing. And that’s going to mean missing things that we would all love to do. If people can’t do that, if they can’t take a step back and realize that EVERYONE is suffering, then yeah, get bent.

        3. Yeah, our grace and patience are GONE after nine months of this ish. It is a pandemic; nuance is not really a thing under these circumstances.

      2. Some call for thoughtful responses but not all. I think fatigue is getting to us all in different ways. I lost a family member to COVID so I probably should just start scrolling fast over some of the posts.

    3. Be careful, lest you suffer vertigo from the dizzying heights of your moral ground!

      1. Moira would be the first to follow the rules lest she be infected by the masses.

    4. I posted above but I am going to say it again:

      I am getting really, really tired of the assumption on this list from people in places with real shut-down orders and/or from people who can work from home that everyone lives in those places. Heck – I live in a place that purportedly HAS such an order but the list of “essential” functions is so long that it is essentially meaningless. The courts are “essential” – and that includes not only criminal and DV cases but traffic court, personal injury trials, etc. So we are working and not from home. That means that a lot of us are crammed into a small space with no realistic option to distance (try having a confidential conversation with a client while staying 6 feet away in a public space).

      So I work all day in a small, unventilated space with multiple other people. Then I pick my kid up from school where she has spent the day with multiple other people. Then I go home to my spouse who also has an “essential job.” And while I would love those things not to be true, they all are. And that leaves me disinclined to spend my weekends at home rather than getting together with a friend’s household who are in the same position (although I am staying way away from my parents since they are retired.) Yes – I am seeing 4 people outside my household for social reasons but since my collective household was probably exposed to 100 people over the course of the school/work week, that is a risk I am willing to take.

      I am not traveling outside my city or seeing people who can stay at home but that is as far as I am willing to go. When the presiding judge gets his head out of his a** and closes the courts except for restraining orders and truly critical criminal matters so that I can stay home I will revisit it. And I am inclined to cut other people who are trying to live their lives in an imperfect world some slack.

      1. I don’t get the concept of “because I”m already exposed to X people outside my household because of unavoidable / essential work, that it’s ok to keep exposing myself to more,” as if it doesn’t make a difference. Every exposure adds up.

        2. More accurate is “I’m already exposed to X number of people outside my household because of unvoidable/essential work, so it’s okay for me to expose a couple more people and put them at risk”

      2. I find it so strange when people are forced into higher risk situations at work and then choose higher risk situations in their personal life by not staying home. Is it that hard to spend time at home with your spouse and kids? This is going to be mostly over in a few months. It’s not forever.

        signed, lawyer whose practice has been deemed ‘essential’ and working in office non-stop since July but who has enough sense to not socialize extra on the weekends and expose my family to more risk.

        1. Because having been exposed (directly at work or through spouse/kid) to 100+ new people a week it feels like having dinner with my similarly-situated friends is an such a small increase in my risk that it is not worth giving it up, particularly as my risk circle overlaps substantially with theirs.

          And yes – staying home for months on end (and let us be honest, this is not going to be over in “a few months” – we are looking at summer at the earliest) with my wonderful husband and our wonderful but super active kid is really, really hard.

          The calculus might be different if I was only exposed to people in my office. But I am interacting daily with people in the most ridiculous excuses for masks in close quarters. And don’t even get me started on the level of Covid exposure in the prison system and therefore everyone they come into contact with. And not coming to work is not an option and there is nothing I can do to change it.

          I am not asking anyone to agree with me. Honestly I am past caring. I am encouraging everyone to be just a tiny bit kinder to their fellow posters and not immediately jump to the conclusion anyone doing things differently than you is stupid/selfish or a troll.

          1. Small increase in YOUR risk – but what about their risk? They don’t share your office space or go into the prison system with you. Serious question, do you feel okay with boosting others’ risk to that level just because they’ve said they’re okay with it? What about the people who aren’t okay with it, but who don’t have a chance to avoid you (grocery store clerks, receptionists?)

          2. Not the Anon at 3:50 pm; however, I am an extremely low-risk person who, every other month or thereabouts, gets dinner with an essential worker (ER nurse and her husband).

            I can assure you that I am a grown-a$$ woman who knows the risk she is taking and is okay with it. Further, I am full-time WFH, live in a small city (i.e. our grocery stores are seldom even at the half capacity limits established by the state) with mask mandates, and am therefore very, very unlikely to spread the virus to anyone else if I got it.

            We ask a tremendous amount of our essential workers. I resent the idea that we try to tell them with a straight face that the first 200 people they see in a month is NBD, but the full-time WFH couple they have over for dinner is the feather that breaks the camel’s back.

          3. But in a workplace it’s far easier (physically and mentally) to maintain distance, continuously wear a mask, and avoid eating in a shared space than it is with family and friends. Our guard is naturally down around people we’re close to because our lizard brains tell us we’re safe. But it’s not safe, and YES, seeing more people makes it worse.

            Avoid unnecessary contact. And wanting to see people really badly doesn’t make it necessary. We’re all in that boat.

          4. Is this an indoor, unmasked dinner? Because if so, that means you are spending multiple hours sharing air and exhaling droplets less than 6 feet from each other. And if so, that means that if one of the 8 of you has COVID, it is highly likely that one or more of the other 7 people gets it. Basically guaranteed to catch it from a positive person at dinner. Whereas in your daily life at work, you are presumably social distancing and masking the best as you are able, wearing a mask, and trying to avoid other people who are wearing masks. So if someone in your workplace/courtroom is covid positive, it is an exposure risk to you but not at all a guarantee that they will infect you. The risk of any activity is a combination of a) the likelihood that one of the participants has covid (so a combination of incidence in the community, as well as the level of exposure of the particular individuals involved) and 2) the likelihood of spreading it in the particular circumstances of the activity. At your workplace, 1 is higher, but 2 is much lower. In a dinner party 1 is somewhat lower, but 2 is so high it is basically guaranteed.

          5. Ok one more time from frustrated Anon: I am having dinner or meeting up with friends who work with me and have kids in my kid’s school. In other words, they are pretty much already exposed to the same risk that I am exposed to. (And I am laughing over the idea that we are better able to avoid risk at work given that half the people I interact with are either wearing loose bandanas over their faces or masks with valves or masks under their noses).

            And again – I know my situation and you do not. My point is that rather than jumping all over someone whose question is “how do I make this safer” and just saying “Sorry that s*cks but I do not think it can be made safe, but good for you for trying” or offering reasonable suggestions , you jump all over someone who did not plan the event, cannot control whether it happens, and presumably has limited time off to suddenly mysteriously get sick for one day. Or someone who has tried to balance a lot of competing priorities and has come to a different conclusion that you might have if placed in that situation (which you do not actually know since you are probably not in that situation).

            My grandmother had a milestone birthday this year and really wanted to see people. I did not go because I live in a hotspot and would have needed to fly. Other family members did go on the theory that she is very old and in terrible health and may not live to next summer and she (and they) were willing to take the risk. I am not judging them because I understand that it was not black and white. I am just suggesting that after 9 months of this we are all on edge and frustrated but just maybe a tiny bit of kindness and understanding is called for and we need to stop jumping all over people.

          6. I still can’t get over the idea of a workplace pandemic exposure luncheon all for the sake of “morale.” This is really good for morale? Not just a “would you die for us” loyalty test?

      3. Why doesn’t your greater exposure make you want even more to stay at home to protect others from potential exposure?

      4. Yeah, this is just a totally non-justifiable justification. Of course it sucks that your family is forced to take on a lot of exposure risk, and it would be nice if you were able to isolate more and work from home more. However, the fact that your family has 100 exposures all week is all the more reason that you need to act at all times as if you have been exposed to COVID and may be infectious to others. So sure, go see another family outdoors in a park with masks, but if you are going to see them inside unmasked than you are just making sure that each of your families have ~200 exposures per week rather than 100.

    6. Funny, I have a similar thought every time I hear the pile on of voices tell people to never leave the house or see their family members. Where did all the s art, high achievers go? No one is thinking g in degrees or about risk assessment, or balance.

      1. It’s not an acceptable level of risk to any thinking person to mix households right now. This is why we have a complete disaster in the U.S. and so many other countries. If you don’t get this by this point, though, this many months into the pandemic, I don’t know what we can do for you.

        1. I am not looking for you to do anything for me, except stop telling me what to do. I hear you that you think it is not an acceptable level of risk, but I believe that it is. The reason that many countries are in a bad place right now is because testing and results and contact tracing have been spotty at best. The tests are unreliable, they aren’t easily available, and results take too long to come back. Contact tracing isn’t happening except in school related cases in my county. I know this is hard for you to hear, but your opinion isn’t the only one that matters right now.

          1. We are in a horrendous place in the US and especially so in areas where their moron governors have not instituted mask mandates and people don’t take it seriously. The medical community is PLEADING with everyone to please stay home unless you are an essential worker, and please please please mask and social distance. But everyone wants to be an exception. I want to go see aunt Susie, I want to socialize with my neighbors, I want, I want, I want. Well, I’d like a pony and a million dollars and Cindy Crawford’s body, but that ain’t happening right now. Frankly I think socializing with friends in any context other than outside, masked, socially distant, **and infrequent** is just selfish and self-centered.

      2. Where is the “balance” when hospitals are calling in the national guard and building tents for overflow patients? “High achieving” right now means being part of the solution, not contributing to the problem “within one’s own risk tolerance.”

        1. We’ve got refrigerated morgue trucks at our local hospital, but sure, let’s go have indoors office lunch for 20 people.

  28. How do I prevent this one superior from layering me?
    There is one partner (let’s call him Partner A) I work with at my job, he is the nicest guy, but he is not politically savvy at all. Among the partners, he is constantly being bullied and seems like some of the other partners do not respect him as much unfortunately.
    I have a good working relationship with him, and go out of my way to really deliver for him. I’ve been doing what I’m doing for 5+ years, and I know for a fact I’m really good at my job. When I work on deals with Partner A, however, recently he is layering me (and layering other people at my level too). It is not only extremely annoying, but also inefficient (he’s adding people where they are not needed), and detrimental to my growth and learning. I noticed he is doing this to others, and others are also pushing back. Sometimes even the people being layered over me are confused as to what exactly they are supposed to be doing in a situation where they are not needed.
    It’s tough because he is such a nice guy, but I’ve come to the realization that however nice he is, he is not looking out for me or giving me the right opportunities to grow and learn. Unfortunately I think my only solution may be to try to avoid working with me.
    Has anyone else experienced this?

  29. My peloton arrived today! Took the first class in the basic cycling class with Alex T. Other than that I am already sore, loved it.

    The delivery was super smooth and COVID safe- both delivery guys were in KN95 masks and wore gloves they put on just before entering. And it arrived within 3 weeks of ordering on the scheduled day!

    What’s your favorite type of class? Teacher? Recommend me all the things, please!

    1. The new Pilates classes are good! For bike instructors, my favorites are Hannah F., Cody, and Ally. Enjoy!

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