Down to Zero
Jun. 5th, 2020 08:50 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
cjlasky7An important milestone for me:
My branch is re-opening on Monday.
It's been approximately three months since the Borough Park branch closed, but corporate finally decided it's safe enough to take in regular customers again.
(I'm not quite so sure about that, but we're diving in anyway.)
I spent part of today helping to rearrange the layout of the branch. We're herding the customers to the last window. Transactions and/or paperwork will be passed down to the tellers or customer service reps. (Teller windows have been blocked off.) Nobody will be allowed in without a mask. (Let's see if we can make that work in Borough Park....)
I'm both excited and a little nervous.
Sign of the times: police removed all the garbage cans from street corners in my neighborhood, presumably as a looting prevention measure.
But let's try to keep things positive:
For the first time since early March, there were zero deaths from Coronavirus in New York City.
Governor Cuomo released his plan for police reform in New York State. On a related note, there is an excellent article on the website for The Atlantic ("How to Actually Fix America's Police") on measures that can be taken on federal, state and local levels to make police more accountable. I'm not sure all the proposals are politically workable, but the authors (Seth Stoughton, Jeffrey Noble, and Geoffrey Alpert) make a good case for modifying or eliminating qualified immunity. I suck at links, but find it and give it a read. If you wonder if anything can change in this country, it's good to know there are people out there with actual plans.
The other encouraging news I've heard is the discovery that Covid-19 attacks endothelial cells in blood vessels.
("Wait--thats GOOD news?!")
Well, no. But if true, it would tie together many of the seemingly unrelated illnesses that have cropped up around Covid, including the inflammatory disease putting children in the hospital. A fuller understanding of how Covid attacks the body can help in developing a vaccine (or, short of that, an effective treatment).
Hope everybody is okay.
I'll report from work on Monday.
My branch is re-opening on Monday.
It's been approximately three months since the Borough Park branch closed, but corporate finally decided it's safe enough to take in regular customers again.
(I'm not quite so sure about that, but we're diving in anyway.)
I spent part of today helping to rearrange the layout of the branch. We're herding the customers to the last window. Transactions and/or paperwork will be passed down to the tellers or customer service reps. (Teller windows have been blocked off.) Nobody will be allowed in without a mask. (Let's see if we can make that work in Borough Park....)
I'm both excited and a little nervous.
Sign of the times: police removed all the garbage cans from street corners in my neighborhood, presumably as a looting prevention measure.
But let's try to keep things positive:
For the first time since early March, there were zero deaths from Coronavirus in New York City.
Governor Cuomo released his plan for police reform in New York State. On a related note, there is an excellent article on the website for The Atlantic ("How to Actually Fix America's Police") on measures that can be taken on federal, state and local levels to make police more accountable. I'm not sure all the proposals are politically workable, but the authors (Seth Stoughton, Jeffrey Noble, and Geoffrey Alpert) make a good case for modifying or eliminating qualified immunity. I suck at links, but find it and give it a read. If you wonder if anything can change in this country, it's good to know there are people out there with actual plans.
The other encouraging news I've heard is the discovery that Covid-19 attacks endothelial cells in blood vessels.
("Wait--thats GOOD news?!")
Well, no. But if true, it would tie together many of the seemingly unrelated illnesses that have cropped up around Covid, including the inflammatory disease putting children in the hospital. A fuller understanding of how Covid attacks the body can help in developing a vaccine (or, short of that, an effective treatment).
Hope everybody is okay.
I'll report from work on Monday.
