cookj5

This is an excellent, short video about the purposes of face masks in the coronavirus pandemic. One important point they make is that face masks are much less about protecting you than they are about protecting everyone else from you. Lots of very practical information about different kinds of masks and how to wear and care for them. https://youtu.be/P27HRClMf2U

I am looking for a used, but still relatively new, Apple MacBook Pro laptop, 15" screen but would consider 13". I don't want to buy one new, because it would come with the Catalina operating system which will no longer support my iPhoto program. Anything with a Mojave or earlier OS would be good.

Since testing is so limited, we have no idea how many asymptomatic kids are out there, not getting sick but spreading the disease to people older than themselves. This is not just about protecting the kids from covid-19, but about preventing them from becoming vectors of the spread. That said, all of the downsides you mention are valid. We're in a pickle and will remain there until we have adequate, reliable, and widely accessible testing.

On 5/24/2020 at 2:47 PM, gringohombre said:

Passed along from a friend...saw it on Face Book, Twitter, got an email...Pleeeese, lets get real here!

6 hours ago, Mainecoons said:

I question whether the low price, high volume model the airlines have evolved into will return any time soon.

I also remember when flying cost a heckuva lot more in constant dollars than it does now.  But it wasn't like traveling in a cattle car either.

An airline stock is the last thing I'd buy.  If it isn't one thing it is another torpedoing the business.  Remember the impact of high fuel prices?

 

 

Yes, I remember all the moaning by the airlines about high fuel prices. They shed rivers of tears about how they just HAD to start charging for checked baggage to offset those fuel prices. And when the fuel prices dropped, I remember how they cancelled the checked bag charges. Oh! Right! They still charge us for the bags. Gee, how silly of me to believe them...

10 hours ago, EldonNova said:

You are the second person today on this site that did not proof read their material before posting.  "Monet" - think you meant "Money".

Gee, and I was hoping to make a bid for the Monet. Don't care for his work myself, but my wife is a fan. Oh well, I'll have to settle for the work of R. Crumb.

My watch battery is dead. Ordinarily I would simply go to one of the guys at the tianguis to change it. Obviously that is not an option at this point. Does anyone know of anyplace to get a watch battery replaced?

"whether or not I can manage construction remotely."

I would definitely not advise doing this. You will have your hands full just dealing with issues that come up on a face to face basis with contractors, workers, government officials, etc. I can't imagine how you would accomplish this from out of the country. Do you speak Spanish? Fluently? Making sure your instructions are understood and carried out as you intended with be tricky if you are not. I have lived down here for 13 years and known plenty of folks who have built homes or had them significantly refurbished. They always report lots of problems, delays, unexpected hassles, etc. I don't want to rain on your parade, just to be sure you know what you are getting into.

Phone scammers are calling up the patients of Dr. Gerardo Leon and pretending to me him. This happened to me yesterday and when I contacted Dr. Leon to verify the call, he told me that several of his patients had been hit. He didn't say so, but I suspect his office computer has been hacked and the patient list with phone numbers stolen. He was very apologetic, but of course it was not his fault.

The scammer doesn't identify himself at first, but then claims he is Dr. Leon. He says he is in the neighborhood checking on his patients and asks to stop by for a visit. I thought he didn't quite sound like Dr. Leon, but said he could stop by. A short time later, the scammer called again and said he had gotten in an accident on the way and a little girl had been hurt. He needed me to go to Oxxo right away and send him $5000 pesos which, of course, he would pay back.

I had been hit with this scam once before, so my BS alarm went off. When I declined to send the money, he asked if I could manage $500 pesos. At that point I hung up and called Dr. Leon directly, who told me that some of his patients had fallen for it and sent money. He was trying to get the word out to warn the rest and was delighted when I said I'd post an alert on Chapala.com.

These scammers speak excellent English and are very persuasive, so be on the alert. If anyone calls you and says  they know you and then lays out a sob story ending with a plea for money, DON'T DO IT! Immediately contact the one they are impersonating and verify the call. This time the scammer said he was Dr. Leon, but the last time he said he was my "favorite nephew", in town unexpectedly and had just got in an accident. The story may differ, but the scam is the same. WATCH OUT!

58 minutes ago, geeser said:

Check out this graphic on pandemics

https://www.visualcapitalist.com/history-of-pandemics-deadliest/

Interesting article geeser. I have one quibble, based on my knowledge of the early epidemics that killed almost 90% of Native Americans. The article says the die-off was due to smallpox. While smallpox was certainly deadly, so were influenza, measles, and a whole host of other diseases imported by the European invaders. It was all of these together that resulted in the 90% figure, not just smallpox.

10 hours ago, ea93105 said:

Am I the only one worried SS will be paying out in three years when I'm eligible ? The music may stop  with no chairs left....

People have been saying that since all the way back in the '80s. The fact is that seniors--those eligible for Social Security or soon to be-- vote at a much higher rate than any other age group. That is why, ever since the Reagan Administration first tried it in 1985, politicians have viewed cuts to Social Security or Medicare as the "third rail" of US politics. Touch them and your career dies. The history of  the last few decades is littered with the dead careers politicians who tried to make even modest cuts. I wouldn't get my knickers in a twist over it.

1 hour ago, Mainecoons said:

Bunch of people went to the beach this weekend in CA.  It will be interesting to see if a noticeable uptick in cases follows within the next two weeks.

https://www.the-sun.com/news/735979/coronavirus-california-heatwave-ignore-social-distancing-stay-home/

The video was produced by a local TV station, Rick.  It wasn't an advertisement.

I saw no disrespect in it, I did see blunt disagreement.  They are not the only ones suggesting the young and healthy have little to fear from this virus.  It is no accident that so much of the death toll has occurred in countries with big elderly populations, like Italy and Spain, and in nursing homes.  If I recall correctly something like half the deaths of CV have occurred in nursing or "care" homes.  Yes, if you google that you will see multiple stories confirming that.

 

 

It is a myth that young and healthy people have little to fear from covid-19. The numbers are that 55% of those hospitalized for it are under 64 and 40% are under 55. Further, a full 29% are between 20 and 44. That's almost one out of three. It is true that nursing home patients are sitting ducks and those that are older have a greater chance of dying. However, you can still get very, very sick and require hospitalization if you are young. 

https://contemporaryclinic.pharmacytimes.com/news-views/cdc-55-of-covid-19-hospitalized-patients-are-64-years-old-or-younger

5 hours ago, Ferret said:

Is that what you call hitting the bottom of the barrel?

Nope, oil is now -$37.00/barrel. That means a seller of a barrel will have to pay a buyer $37.00/barrel for the buyer to take it off the seller's hands. Brave New World!

We have used Handy Mail for more than 10 years and all of our financial institutions have their Laredo address. Instead of Box # ... I put Apt. # ...  No problems after more than a decade.

https://handymailtomx.com/

13 hours ago, gringal said:

Good plea, but we expats and Mexicans do have the choice of going to the tiangus.....or not. This is true of all the venues in lakeside.

It is a good thing, IMO, that Superlake finally closed since our last visit  showed a mob scene with little personal protection or distancing, but all those customers (including us) made a free choice in going there.  It is up to us to use good sense in looking after ourselves.

With respect, Gringal, it is not just a matter of "free choice in going there". If the choices you or I make affected only us as individuals, I would agree. People who go into "mob scenes" in the current environment risk not only their own health but that of everyone they may come in contact with subsequently and everyone those people interact with, and so on. Your choice becomes my risk.

24 minutes ago, mudgirl said:

Did you expect people to read your mind as to what you consider to be a hobby? If you had asked if anyone else made handicrafts, there would have been nothing to misunderstand.

 

Merriam-Webster Dictionary :

 

Definition of hobby

: a pursuit outside one's regular occupation engaged in especially for relaxation

 

 

Ease off on the snark Mudgirl. Have you never been misunderstood because you said something that was not as clear as you intended? Happyjillan was just trying to get a conversation going that would NOT be about all things covid-19. We should thank her for that.

For some years, I have hiked from my home up to the chapel above Ajijic every morning before breakfast. No change in this because of coronavirus. If I meet someone on the trail we keep our distance but always say hi (or buenas dias). Also, I have a vast amount of photos I've taken around Mexico that have needed sorting and organizing for some years now. I'm hard at it. 

While we understand the limitations of masks to protect from coronavirus, my wife and I would like to line up a source. She purchased a couple from the farmacía across from Hotel Mis Amores and the masks were pitiful. Anything better available out there?. We would like to put aside a small stash, just in case. 

17 hours ago, cedros said:

I wonder how Covid19 will affect house prices. Especially in places like the Raquet Club where the second well collapsed.

Well, think of it this way. People come down here planning to buy a house with the money they intend to get from selling their house up north. Or, if they intend to keep it, they plan to use a home equity loan or money from their investments. If house prices plummet up north, along with the stock market, etc., what exactly are they going to use to buy their Mexican dream home? I think buyers will be soon be disappearing like spit on a hot griddle, if it hasn't happened already. People who really want to sell their houses here will drop their prices. Those that don't better pack a lunch. They're in for a long wait. This is exactly the scenario that occurred down here back in 2008-2009.

7 hours ago, Mainecoons said:

Great description of the past RE market and the true nature of all RE markets Jim Cook.  This one has been on a tear and is due for a correction, just like the stock market.  Defer your construction projects until next year, you'll find it will be a lot easier to get the quality contractors and workers.  Construction has been in a bubble too.

We bought and sold into the 2007 bubble and don't expect to get what we paid for this place.  OTOH we've enjoyed living in a really beautiful and well located home for 12 years and expect to live here for at least five more.  I've known too many people who rent who have had to move twice or more times because the houses were sold out from under them.  The three worst traumas in life, it is said, are death, divorce and moving.

We've successfully avoided the last two for a long time and have no illusions about ducking the first forever.  We'll roll on until we can't.

BTW for the newbies here, Jim Cook is a truly talented Mexico travel blogger and photographer.  His blog, "Jim and Carole's Mexico Adventure" is a great read and we keep it handy for reference before we travel.  Highly recommended.

https://cookjmex.blogspot.com/

===================================================================

Thanks for the kind words, Mainecoons. We don't always agree on stuff, but I always find your comments thought-provoking. Re: my blog. For years now I have run a backlog of photos from our travels around Mexico and Central America. I figure I'm about 2 years behind now. A small hidden benefit of our current shut-down is that I finally have time to do some catch up work. I'm just finishing the last part of a series on our visit to the ancient Maya city of Edzná, in Campeche.

9 hours ago, lakeside7 said:

Interesting...so who does he think will come back into the market to buy, . 1. Mexicans with de valued Pesos now on the side lines. 2. North American's 401's decimated. 3. NOB home prices halted and or falling

its a no brainier to realize that there will be plenty of sellers..Maybe you should change your agent???...Sadly I see the Lakeside market go into free fall as people hunker down until this disaster pass's

My wife and I moved down here in the summer of 2007, just as the Great Recession was starting to get under way up north. The buying fever was still strong here, much as it has been recently (at least until the beginning months of 2020). Then the bottom dropped out.

People who had bought here on the upswing, often with money they took from their home equity loan on their US/Canadian home, were suddenly stuck with two homes they couldn't sell. They still had to carry the mortgage on the "back-home" house and they had sunk a big chunk of their net worth into their new Mexican dream home.

A lot of those homes at Lakeside sat on the market for years. People refused to drop their prices because they wouldn't believe that their house was not now worth the inflated price they paid for it. Often they also sank tens of thousands into remodeling. The reality was, and always is, your house is worth exactly what someone else will pay for it, and not a dime more.

The upside of all this was that for five or six years the rental market here was great. People who wouldn't drop their sales price had to rent the house out in order to produce some income. And, they could only charge what people were willing to pay in a rental market glutted with houses whose owners were desperate for tenants.

So, we rented for 7 years before even considering purchasing our present home. Worked great for us and we were really glad we didn't get caught up in the buying frenzy that was happening in 2007 -- the sort of frenzy we have watched with bemusement recently.  The bubble always pops. Always.

Quote in todays Washington Post:

Mainecoons, with all due respect to your thoughts that we are not likely to experience what is going on in Italy:

“When you look at the projections, there’s every chance that we could be Italy,” the U.S. surgeon general warned Monday. Widespread social distancing could help change that trajectory, he said."

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2020/03/16/coronavirus-latest-news/

Good for them! Definitely the most responsible step to take. I am scheduled to go up north to see my 104 year old mom in May for Mothers Day week. If things keep getting worse--and there seems little reason to believe they won't--I will need to cancel the trip, because of the danger of picking up the virus while traveling on two flights and passing through three airports to get there. I'm not as much worried about getting sick myself as passing it on to her and her fellow residents in the facility where she lives. I talked to her about it yesterday and she understands, although she is disappointed she will not see me as planned. Hopefully, the pandemic will be over by mid-summer and I can go then, but I'm taking no chances.

In the past couple of weeks a number of folks on this forum have pooh-poohed the pandemic and said it is "overblown" and not as bad as people described as "alarmists" have said. Here is a story that ran today in the Huffington Post. Doctors in Italy, the country with the second worst outbreak in the world, are sending a warning to the rest of the world. Their country is shut down and they just had the highest single day of deaths in the crisis, higher than China at its peak. Their message is that it is only a matter of time before other countries get hit like Italy unless they take drastic steps now. They estimate that the US is probably 13-16 days behind Italy. Mexico is probably a bit further out than that, but we really don't know because the testing here has been pitifully small in numbers and little action has been taken to restrict large events and encourage social distancing.The Italian doctors' description of what is happening there is chilling. 

Italy Has Been Trying To Send Us A Warning. Will We Listen?

The country with the world's second-worst COVID-19 outbreak is imploring the United States and the rest of the world not to make the same mistakes. Here is the story.